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Review JN056: Gampi of The Big Four! The Hall of Chivalry!!

Ash is already more competent and tough than Goh. He traveled the world and experienced.

There is no need to show them. It should have been just Farfetch's war. Goh is not at a level to challenge one of the elite 4.

It is compared to Ash's 1997 version, Goh. But here the problem arises. Goh is far superior to Ash in 1997.

We all know that Ash has always been stronger and a better battler than Ash. You said that Goh "got ahead" of him in this episode, so I was stating how the anime clearly demonstrates that Goh is still behind Ash.

Also saying Goh is further in his dream than Ash in 1997 is false equivalence. The show was very different then and has changed over time.

Dawn, May, Iris, Serena all advanced faster than Ash did in OS over the course of their own series.
 
We all know that Ash has always been stronger and a better battler than Ash. You said that Goh "got ahead" of him in this episode, so I was stating how the anime clearly demonstrates that Goh is still behind Ash.
And the only reason Goh “got ahead of Ash” was because Scyther blocked Escavalier, and had nothing to do with Goh’s battling instincts, it was all thanks to Scyther.
 
Alright, largely similar thoughts with the subbed, good episode for Ash/Farfetch'd (even though some somehow took it as Gou "getting more" despite mostly just being there until the end, and then being able to evolve Scyther, which was fine). In particular, really like that alongside 51, for the most part, Farfetch'd moves ahead of the pack, and Ash mostly doesn't mind, but when he thinks necessary, tries to "reign" Farfetch'd in, but after Farfetch'd saved him after Ash saved the leek, Farfetch'd was following Ash, and in general, how that plays out the rest of the episode. Like last week with Koharu, this could've been more "Ash/Farfetch'd focused" but Gou did end up being very relevant in them overcoming the "course" at the end. And learning that it wasn't a "trade machine" of any sort, but Gou "boxing" Scyther with Metal Coat was weird, but better overall than any sort of "trade" shenaningans.
 
COME ON KAMONEGI KAMONEGI COME ON

I've gotten lazy about doing reviews but I enjoyed this one too much not to.

GOOD:

- Ash and Go fighting with leeks. That was actually a nostalgia rush for me; me and my friend down the street used to fight with sticks all the time when we were kids.

- Callbacks to the previous Galarfetch'd episode, even though they had different writers. Can we have more of this? Journeys' disjointed feel gives me the impression that there's less communication between writers than usual, hopefully this is a step in the right direction.

- I loved Wikstrom's characterization and the expressions Iwane gave him.

- Iwane duck closeups.

- The dungeon crawl segment was fun, especially the pit trap - that was a nice callback to Ash jumping off the tower to save Pikachu at the beginning of XY.

- Humans fighting alongside their Pokemon are you kidding me!? This was so unlike what we usually see, suddenly it's like I was watching Zelda or Dragon Quest instead of Pokemon. Really hope we see something like this again, maybe with a Fighting-type trainer. Another thing I loved about this scene is that it emphasized Ash and Go working together, no "I have no intention of helping Satoshi blah blah blah" BS here. Too often they have them just doing their own things without much cooperation, this is how I'd like to see it done.

- Ash helping Galarfetch'd curb his aggression and hastiness.

- Galarfetch'd has become my favorite Ash mon this gen. That's the second time for a Fighting-type bird; Hawlucha was my favorite in XY. I didn't expect him to overtake Lucario in terms of plot focus, but it looks like that's where we're headed and I welcome it.

NEUTRAL:

- Scyther evolving. It's okay I guess.

BAD:

- The plane landing in Kalos looked cheap, like it wasn't scaling right with the background. On that note I wish it had been a propeller plane like we saw in XY. I'm not a big fan of how they've gotten more "realistic" about the tech levels, it gives less of an "Another Time, Another Place"* vibe that way.
*Streets of Fire reference. A movie that flopped in America but was very influential in Japan, featuring a mashup 1950s/1980s setting. Check it out.

- Running laps around the castle wasn't too exciting.

- Wikstrom being the only human at the castle. Team Rocket LARPing as his assistants or something might have been a fun addition.

- I would have liked some Kalos music.


Overall this is one of my top Journeys episodes, it did a lot of things right that the series often does wrong.

Imagine complaining about Farfetch'd getting development without it being rushed (aka what evolving it rn would have been).

.I have to say I'm not surprised at the reactions, though. It honestly feels that the only way Go wouldn't "steal the spotlight" is if he had disappeared entirely. Even in episodes where he gets such a minor role as this people find what to complain about just because his Scyther evolved in like the last 30 seconds of the episode LMAO.

This sums it up. I guess we've reached the point where Go doing anything at all counts as detracting from Ash - apparently Scyther evolving counts as An Event while character development for the duck doesn't, despite the latter having immensely more plot relevance.
 
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The problem is Goh's constant interference.

Instead of watching Farfetch, we also watch Goh's Syhter.

Goh is everything for the anime. His warrior, his tactician, his challenge to E4.

Authors must decide for Goh. Yes, he may want to collect every pokemon. But let Ash be against the E4 member too.

In the battle episodes, they must cut Goh away. The war job must belong to Ash.
 
Regarding the weird "4 moves only" rule and how it applies to the anime, my personal headcanon is that technically all Pokemon always have access to every move they've ever learned. It's just that in official matches there's an unsaid rule that forbids trainers from having their Pokemon using more than four in the same battle, with exceptions only being made if a Pokemon learns a new move mid-match, and even then, that move must "replace" a previous one in the battle proper. So basically, once a trainer has commanded their Pokemon four moves, they have to stick with those for the rest of the battle (this, by the way, might explain what the hell was up with Stephan's Zebstrika having only four Normal-type moves; presumably, Thunderbolt, Double Kick, and Flame Charge were still there. It's just that none of those would have been effective against Palpitoad compared to the Normal-type ones) .This rule was not as enforced back in the older series, though. As for why some trainers never bother using more of their Pokemons' moves in unofficial battles (such as when being targeted by villains), that could be chalked up to the fact that in most cases it simply isn't necessary.
In the Pikachu Valley episode in SM, Rotom told Ash that his Pikachu would need to know Volt Tackle in order to use Catastropika, and Ash was dismayed, heavily indicating his Pikachu doesn't know the move anymore.
It looked like Magnet Pull to me, in which case it'd be an Ability. But I'm not really sure.
I need to watch the subtitled version too, but there's also the possibility that it was the move Gravity.
 
To all those complaining whenever Goh gets a new Pokemon in a mostly Ash-focused ep, you do realize he has no other choice but to, right? Whenever Ash wins a PWC match, he often goes up 10+ places in the rankings. For Goh, with how many Pokemon there are, getting one won't make a dent in his goal, so the constant catches are necessary just to keep up. Despite starting his goal 10 eps before Ash had his first PWC match, Goh is barely in the 10% mark, assuming he reached that point.
 
I hope this will be the last season of Ash. The writers officially waste Ash.
Ash should increasingly get less focus, yes. There is only so much you can do with an experienced trainer. I get that Go's goal isn't for everyone, so maybe next time Ash should actually mentor a battler.

The fact that Wikstrom is going to return in just a month invalidates the "why didn't Ash have a real battle?" complaints. I thought you guys didn't like rushed battles.
 
Ash should increasingly get less focus, yes. There is only so much you can do with an experienced trainer. I get that Go's goal isn't for everyone, so maybe next time Ash should actually mentor a battler.

The fact that Wikstrom is going to return in just a month invalidates the "why didn't Ash have a real battle?" complaints. I thought you guys didn't like rushed battles.
The title of the newly revealed episode was changed. It doesn’t mention the Hall of Chivalry anymore, so Wilkstrom isn’t likely to return.
 
To all those complaining whenever Goh gets a new Pokemon in a mostly Ash-focused ep, you do realize he has no other choice but to, right? Whenever Ash wins a PWC match, he often goes up 10+ places in the rankings. For Goh, with how many Pokemon there are, getting one won't make a dent in his goal, so the constant catches are necessary just to keep up. Despite starting his goal 10 eps before Ash had his first PWC match, Goh is barely in the 10% mark, assuming he reached that point.

Goh getting a Pokemon in a Ash-focused epsiode isn't the problem if all he does is catching a Pokemon (Which takes one minute at best), however, him getting a whole storyline (Korrina episode, Bea 1 episode), thats the problem.
 
To all those complaining whenever Goh gets a new Pokemon in a mostly Ash-focused ep, you do realize he has no other choice but to, right? Whenever Ash wins a PWC match, he often goes up 10+ places in the rankings. For Goh, with how many Pokemon there are, getting one won't make a dent in his goal, so the constant catches are necessary just to keep up. Despite starting his goal 10 eps before Ash had his first PWC match, Goh is barely in the 10% mark, assuming he reached that point.
Within Ash centric episodes, or those of party related episodes, Goh has caught a obtained a total of eleven Pokemon.

Geodude - Farfetch’d v Gurdurr
Chinchou - Ash v Bea Rematch
Pantump, Fletchling, Flabebe, Scatterbug & Biancle - Ash v Korrina
Spearow - Ash v Visquez
Scizor (Evolution) - This Episode
Dewgong - Dragonite Capture
Hitmonchan - Ash v Bea First Match

Eleven Pokemon. Goh roughly has 77 Pokemon all together. Now, your right, and in fact, this validates your point - Goh needs the captures in Ash’s episodes to keep pace.
However, it’s the way it’s handled. For example, that Chinchou capture was a piss-take. It wasted about three minutes of the episode, and considering Riolu v Grapploct was very rushed, or at the least felt very short, it was fairly annoying that it got in the way of the fight. The Scizor evolution doesn’t bother me really, but captures like the ones in the Ash v Korrina match take up the run time, and instead of showing Goh capturing Pokemon for a few minutes, in all honesty, it’s better if they simply did a short cartoonish drawing of the captures Goh did, like the Drowzee in the Suicuine episode. Whilst Ash v Korrina was enjoyable, there were still some aspects that hindered it - 2v2, Gengar was devoid of action, etc. Showing Gengar off a bit more would have helped, and considering Gengar’s lack of involvement generally, Goh’s captures again, could have been handled in a simpler format for the show to run clearly.

Now, as mentioned, you’re not wrong, Goh needs focus as well in these episodes to help, and in fact, the Dewgong capture helped Ash and Goh reach Dragonite. So, the captures can either be implemented in different ways, cause cutting off vital time for Ash’s focus has effected the growth experienced; showing the captures in a cartoonish way, or fitting them in to driving the plot forwards, instead of having Goh wander off, distracting from the plot, which is what the Scizor evolution did well - fit into the plot, and didn’t take too much time away from the growth parts for Ash.
There’s more to say, but hopefully we can see eye-to-eye, and you can share your take.
 
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To all those complaining whenever Goh gets a new Pokemon in a mostly Ash-focused ep, you do realize he has no other choice but to, right? Whenever Ash wins a PWC match, he often goes up 10+ places in the rankings. For Goh, with how many Pokemon there are, getting one won't make a dent in his goal, so the constant catches are necessary just to keep up. Despite starting his goal 10 eps before Ash had his first PWC match, Goh is barely in the 10% mark, assuming he reached that point.
So ash jumps ranks offscreen and he did jump around 900s rank offscreen but has goh has caught more than atleast 10 mon offscreen?
 
Yes, finally a great Pokemon episode again! (Look, how good an episode can be, once that Go isn't in the center of attention!)
I'd even call this a "true" Pokemon episode because it had all the elements like bravery, strength, fighing spirit, and battles that I truly love. These are the episodes that keep you at the edge of your seat and get you all excited. I must admit I'm still a bit psyched.

First, there was that impressive castle and an Elite Four member who. despite his unusual outfit, was pretty cool. Then, we got different tests that our heros had to pass which tested strength, determination and cooperation. And it all culminated in a great showdown against Wikstrom and Aegislash. Also, that chivalry motif was kept from the beginning to the end, making this a very consistent and well-written plot.

There's really nothing negative I could find except that I definitely expected Ash's Farfetch'd to evolve here. But in retrospect, I find it even better it didn't happen, so they can keep up the suspense, plus the storyline will continue to be exciting and more complex.

At the end the narrator said "Ash (and Go) have learned the way of the knight: strong. brave and kind". This single line really meant a lot to me! I'll tell you why:
Maybe you have heard of Sophie Scholl. She was a famous German resistance fighter during the Second World War and killed by the regime as a consequence. There is one line in her diary that has become one of my most favorite and most precious quotes. You can translate it as follows : "You need to have a strong/brave mind and a kind heart". This was exactly the message conveyed in this week's episode and that's why I thoroughly enjoyed it.

To sum it up: We definitely need more episode like this one. And we need more Ash focus again. That will certainly be a recipe for success.
 
An okay episode. The first two trials were classical "Training from hell" sequences with clever twists, but that also were resolved a bit too easy. The "hole" sequence with Ash saving the leek was neat. But the real standout was the final battle, I didn't expect the humans to battle too and it was a really nice addition, it feel intense and rewarding.

I don't have a problem with Goh doing better than Ash in the challenge, however it's true that the opposite should happen more often. I have more of a problem with Scyther not getting an evolution sequence, it feels like a real disservice to both Scyther and trade evolutions of past series.
 
Just wondering: If Farfetch'd hadn't interfered at the very last moment, would Wikstrom really (I mean really) have hit Ash with that sword? Sure, he pointed out it was only a replica of a real sword, but still, that sure would have hurt. It would have been a bit unexpected if he had really hurt Ash.
 
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