Review JN090: Dialga & Palkia! The Space-Time Showdown!!

[L-05308]

I doubt the anime would ever show Ash’s caught Pokémon on his dex the same way they do for Goh as it’s a can of worms - Beedrill, Seaking, Ulta Beasts and now, does it count as him having owned Dratini, Dragonair, Fastly and Haunter.

Regardless, I got a kick out of seeing them in their base forms - Wobufett too!

 

[Singaporean]

What a rushing episode and conclusion of this winter arc. It can be better comparing to the darkest day from Galar. But sadly, truly they run out of idea and finish up as soon as possible. Nonetheless, it still decent.

Overall rating: B-

 

[Sai]

First off, Mirror-TR actually had a good disguise. At least these writers can make some pretty clever jokes.
Secondly, I didn’t watch last week’s episode until this came out, so I could gather thoughts about the arc as a whole. I thought the first episode was the first time, in a long time, the show was actually well-paced, setting up interesting plot-points to sign off with. However, I didn’t want to get my expectations up.
And, I hate to be gloomy about this, but…dammit. This was so underwhelming. Overall it was fine, this series just keeps letting me down, even when I didn’t have any expectations going into this.

Spoiler

I said it’s a good thing (in the preview) Mirror-TR were utilised instead of the Matori Matrix, as they’re stale villains - the TR here were just as plain, with literally no personality at all; Jessie, James and Meowth were all exactly akin to one another. Couldn’t have we had an evil Cynthia? Would have been as flat, but pretty intimidating none-the-less.
Also, nice to see our TR literally contribute nothing again. I thought they at least would have been in the final battle, and perhaps try to use all the Gatcha Pokemon, inadvertently causing them all to in-evolve, cramming the battlefield.
Speaking of being redundant, Dawn? She was fairly useful in the first part, then just stagnates. Throwing in an aspect that her counter-part is the runner up of the Sinnoh League, was as I expected, completely a dud.
And that just reflect a massive aspect of Journeys for me, there’s thoughts of doing something for the sake of doing it, with questioning of why they’re doing it. What was the point in the aforementioned Mirror-Dawn’s achievement? It’s there to entice people to watch. Nothing wrong with that, it’s a show after all, except all it’s doing is leaving a massive whole in the void where these points assist to nil, in turn creating feelings of complete disappoint these don’t expand, like there has been for this episode, ruining the viewings. It’s like showing Ash having Mega-Lucario, yet not establishing a proper arc for its growth and bond with said trainer, compromising all attachment. Or, having a popular starter in Inteleon being in the group, with a story so half-assed its rushed, making it completely butchered. A Gengar with Gigantamax, Grookey, a few characters reappearing without much impact, etc. It’s not bad to have these things, they are just not being utilised properly, and it’s extremely frustrating.

Spoiler

Then, that conclusion was pretty weak. I don’t even know what to say, it’s just not concentrated well and leaves no impact. It makes sense given where they are and all, but it is such a cheap way to resolve things.

They generally brought up those things to show a few differences between the AU counterparts from the normal versions. AU Ash was still kind of a crybaby, AU Dawn is a battler, both AU Go and Koharu were a lot more confident (hard to tell without subs), etc. I don't think anyone expected them to delve into AU Dawn's history of battling in a league, that wasn't relevant to the story. They served as necessary comparisons.

I did think the de-evolving was the funnest part of the episode since it never happened in the anime before. I wish Dawn got a little more focus but that's my only real complaint.

I also don't get the rushed complaints at all, this actually had proper pacing the whole way through. Arceus was also the only believable way to reverse the de-aging of the kids and turn the Pokémon from eggs back to normal, and it fits into Sinnoh lore where Arceus is a God. I ask how people thought they should change the characters back to normal otherwise if Arceus never showed up and any other way would sound a lot less believable and make less sense than this ending.

 

[Reborn Talonflame]

I also don't get the rushed complaints at all, this actually had proper pacing the whole way through. Arceus was also the only believable way to reverse the de-aging of the kids and turn the Pokémon from eggs back to normal, and it fits into Sinnoh lore where Arceus is a God. I ask how people thought they should change the characters back to normal otherwise if Arceus never showed up and any other way would sound a lot less believable and make less sense than this ending.

I get that, and that’s why I even said “it’s makes sense and all”, but it’s the fact there was no build-up in the previous episode about Arceus, aside from seeing it in a textbook. There wasn’t any mystery towards it, or whether Arceus does reside in their plain of existence, then they just pulled it out as a trump card. Sure, Ash and Dawn, would know, but it’s still extremely rushed in the regard it’s mentioned once, and is the ultimate saviour in the end. It makes sense, but doesn’t mean it’s always the best resolve.

 

[Audino1008]

You can't tell me this wasn't Mirror Ash. Maybe they mentioned it, idk, subs aren't out yet.

Pokemon is now VeggieTales.
But in all seriousness, Pokemon is literally the last place I wanted to see Religious Propaganda in. I know they didn't actually do it to spread the word of JeSUS, they just did that because they didn't have enough runtime to make a good resolution, but it doesn't really make it any better. This is the literal definition of Deus Ex Machina.
I mean, prayer? Seriously? Last time we saw Arceus he.... Only appeared for like a second but the time before that he was an Ass with Anger Issues just like God. I mean, I'm sure he would want to help, but there was definitely a better way to execute this.


I pretty much called it. In last week's episode's thread I said something like "Hoping this doesn't end up like the previous Sinnoh two-parter where the first half did a great job of setting up the second half, but the second half didn't deliver".
But this time, the first half of the episode was actually pretty good. It's just the second half that was so rushed because they didn't have time to resolve it.

Hey, DeviantArt, what do you guys thi- Hey, gimme that! slaps a picture of de-aged Ash and gang and a pencil out of their hands

 

[Sai]

Sinnoh lore generally has humans praying to Arceus and we've seen this in the anime and the movies. The last ep of the Lyra arc in DP shows the entire main cast praying and serving respects to the legends for example from 2009. Arceus is treated like a God and controls Dialga/Palkia and with all hope pretty much lost it generally made a lot of sense to pray to it to reverse the changes.

For the most part if Arceus didn't show up and Dialga/Palkia just magically changed the cast back to normal instead for example, that would have been far more underwhelming. Besides that they actually gave a bit of time to the TR battle and the stuff with Go/Koharu flying on the dragons. I honestly feel as if people lost the meaning of the word "rushed" because I don't see what they would have done otherwise. Probably just more interactions with the AU counterparts I guess.

 

[Soniman]

Like praying to Arceus is literally Sinnoh lore as the God of the region and controls Dialga/Palkia. It was the best way to end the episode with the kids de-aged and pokemon as eggs. What else were they to do? Back in the DP anime and movies they made this all apparent that praying to Arceus was part of Sinnoh culture. In fact it was my favorite part of the episode.

Here's a thought. The characters aren't real and the writers shouldn't have wrote themselves into a corner of they had to resolve it by having the main characters pray to Arceus to fix everything.

Could've had them try and find a way to summon Arceus to fix things instead of just hoping he'd come that way the moment feels more earned

 

[Unireon]

That's the classical definition of a Deus ex Machina, waiting for a deity to come and fix everything.
This is becoming more fanfic-y with each 'Arc'.

If that DeM was due to them running out of time, then why they didn't make a three-parter. It would have avoided the rushing and, if really needed, more time to delve into Arceus' lore and role.

 

[Sai]

Arceus role is connected to Dialga/Palkia, and it's an established part of Sinnoh lore for the humans to pray to him. The visual of it appearing at the end was one of the highlights of the episode. For people who never watched DP I can see for them not understanding why Arceus would appear to help them, but since I know most people here did that shouldn't be an issue.

Would people just rather Dialga/Palkia zap the cast/pokemon and just change them back to normal instead? That would have just been dull. They didn't run out of time, how else would the ep have concluded???

Also forgot they already brought up Arceus in the previous ep when Cynthia showed it in the book to Ash/Koharu.

 

[UxieLover1994]

Rushed arcs and cases of Deus Ex Machina have always been an issue with the anime, and the writers probably don't care because "it's for kids". Remember the Team Magma/Aqua two-parter in AG? Remember what happened at the end of M18, which also had Arceus show up unexpectedly because of an implausible plot hole?

By this logic, why didn't Arceus appear when Cyrus and J captured the Lake trio and forced them to summon Dialga and Palkia back in DP?

 

[Sai]

Lol, I forgot Arceus didn't even appear then. If anything now it makes more sense it came to help out.

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

Lol, I forgot Arceus didn't even appear then. If anything now it makes more sense it came to help out.

At least here, Arceus's name was mentioned both here and in the previous episodes. And the Red Chain was linked to Arceus in that it contained its power, so technically, it didn't come out of "nowhere".

 

[Audino1008]

Can anyone who knows Japanese explain to me what the heck is going on with Mirror Goh and Mirror Chloe? Where did they get those Temporal-Protection-Suit-Thingies? They looked like the same ones Mirror Team Rocket had. Are they like, Team Rocket Moles or something?

 

[Sai]

That's the classical definition of a Deus ex Machina, waiting for a deity to come and fix everything.
This is becoming more fanfic-y with each 'Arc'.

If that DeM was due to them running out of time, then why they didn't make a three-parter. It would have avoided the rushing and, if really needed, more time to delve into Arceus' lore and role.

Making this a 3 parter would not change the ending in any way. They established Arceus in the previous ep and that was also the only believable way to change the cast and pokemon back to normal. I don't understand why you feel they "ran out of time" when literally nothing about the climax would change. The only thing another ep would have done is some padding in the middle probably giving more screentime to AU Go and Koharu but wouldn't change the last episode.

 

[LuxrayOfTheWild]

Yeah, this wasn't that good. The ending felt very rushed, complete with a deus ex machina.

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

I've seen some people on the internet really liking this episode. To each their own.

 

[Kurolegacy]

Here's a thought. The characters aren't real and the writers shouldn't have wrote themselves into a corner of they had to resolve it by having the main characters pray to Arceus to fix everything.

Could've had them try and find a way to summon Arceus to fix things instead of just hoping he'd come that way the moment feels more earned

You know what would’ve been a better solution than prayer to summon Arceus? The Azure Flute. But that would’ve required more effort to introduce than the writers of Journeys are willing to put in.

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

You know what would’ve been a better solution than prayer to summon Arceus? The Azure Flute. But that would’ve required more effort to introduce than the writers of Journeys are willing to put in.

Hey. Arceus still has plenty of time to get focus, thanks to Legends.

 

[Blob]

Infernape again??? Poor Torterra doesn't even get to have a cameo! Not to mention our universe Dawn has pretty much been confirmed to have sold/got rid of her other Pokémon.

Anyone else hate how they retconned the eggs of Pokémon we've already seen the eggs for? I hate the lazy Pokémon Go recolours too.

 

[LuxrayOfTheWild]

Not to mention our universe Dawn has pretty much been confirmed to have sold/got rid of her other Pokémon.

Anyone else hate how they retconned the eggs of Pokémon we've already seen the eggs for? I hate the lazy Pokémon Go recolours too.

She was shown having her other Pokemon last episode though.

I agree though. The retcon of egg patterns to resemble Go's egg style more was pretty bad.