• A new LGBTQ+ forum is now being trialed and there have been changes made to the Support and Advice forum. To read more about these updates, click here.
  • Hey Trainers! Be sure to check out Corsola Beach, our newest section on the forums, in partnership with our friends at Corsola Cove! At the Beach, you can discuss the competitive side of the games, post your favorite Pokemon memes, and connect with other Pokemon creators!
  • Due to the recent changes with Twitter's API, it is no longer possible for Bulbagarden forum users to login via their Twitter account. If you signed up to Bulbagarden via Twitter and do not have another way to login, please contact us here with your Twitter username so that we can get you sorted.

What are your feelings about Iris?

Exactly.
Good character.
Maybe I prefer previous characters but she still wasn't bad. I used to love her ,,You're such a kid". :D
Such a pity she disappeared after BW...
Just like saw, she had a great talent- as a character and as a trainer

I know she's annoying, but people make it seem as if she hated Ash.
Plus, there's another PokéGirl Who used to tease Ash.
 
For how annoying she was and all the drama she caused, now I realize she is just a very forgettable character. I often forget she was on the show. I guess it's because didn't get any good resolution to her subplots.
True, from what little I watched of BW Iris was the least memorable.
 
I didn't like her. I feel like they tried to hard to give Iris the kind of relationship that Ash had with Misty in the OS, but it failed cause it was too one sided. Iris came off as annoying because of her constant insults with little reaction from Ash, especially with her "You're such a kid!" comment. Plus, Iris didn't really have a great story arc I felt.
 
Iris? You can consider me one of her most passionate… haters.

She was so hypocritical and irritating, who got easily in my nerves every time she teased someone with her catchphrase and who got everything handed on a silver platter. I still can't get over the Junior Cup tournament, where she managed to beat her rival and Dawn with a disobedient Dragonite.

Oh, wait, scratch that. It was Dragonite who won those battles for her, when she didn't even deserve those victories. Heck, even Georgia lampshaded that.

And what about Excadrill and Axew? She needed Cilan to tell her what was wrong with the former and to be used as a practice dummy for the latter, before she even started working on those Pokémon. I find it baffling how little she did to actually try to connect again with Excadrill and how little she worked with Axew, who couldn't even fire a Dragon Rage (and, ironically enough, managed to master it while Iris wasn't around). Oh, and don't get me started with Emolga!

Also, what was with her magical heart-reading powers and ability to calm down dragons like nobody's business? Where do they come from? How did she get those skills? How come she wasn't a Dragon Master already with such special and unique skills?

Maybe she gets more hate than what she deserves, but she surely won't get any praise from me. Her whole character was a mess, her whole backstory and development was an even bigger mess, and I've never been a fan of this kind of character.
 
Wow, I've never expected Iris is so...hated.
I like this kind of character.
I definetely prefer teasing Ash to cheerleading him (like XY or SM girls- of course it's a little thing, SM is much better series than BW).
What is more important, I find a lot of BW and XY characters bland and boring. Iris was always a positive exception for me- but I see I'm her only defender :D
 
Although Iris did more to achieve her goals than Misty while on her journey(which is my only problem with the latter) she was by far the worst pokegirl in the history. I haven't seen a more annoying companion than her. She was the only companion that I didn't care that she left. She is one of the main and many reasons that I didn't like BW.
 
I know she's annoying, but people make it seem as if she hated Ash.
Plus, there's another PokéGirl Who used to tease Ash.

That are some key differences that I don't think people recognize when they make that comparison. Misty used to tease Ash, but that was back when he was a rookie trainer and made a lot more mistakes. Misty calling him out felt a lot more justified compared to Iris getting on his case for acting just a little bit immature. Not to mention that the arguments with Iris were all one sided practically. Ash rarely reacted to Iris's comments, so it felt like a poor attempt at recreating that dynamic instead of actually doing something new and interesting. It also helped that we did see a sense of friendship growing between Ash and Misty, while I don't think we really got that from Ash and Iris. Even the standard Ash arguing with the new female lead episode didn't really do much to help with their friendship.

Anyway, I hated Iris back then and I still do. There aren't a lot of characters from the anime that I do genuinely hate, but Iris wins that prize. I remember thinking she had such potential when BW started because they were laying out all of her flaws clear as day and I liked the idea of her goal to evolve Axew. Axew's growth in strength and evolution could have served to mirror her own growth as a trainer and character. Clearly, that did not happen.

She was so unlikable, annoying and such a hypocrite. She kept getting on Ash's case for acting like a kid, even though she was just as immature, if not more so, than he was most of the time. I don't mind that they dropped the whole Axew evolving aspect of her goal. That was still pretty weak when they just addressed it a couple of times, but they still could have made it work by having Axew slowly gain more strength over the course of the series. Instead, we get moments like it learning Outrage and Giga Impact to give the illusion that it had gotten stronger even though Iris barely did any training with it. Even Axew itself was annoying because they kept going back and forth between making it powerful and a weak baby Pokemon. It was like they wanted it to be Togepi and Piplup at the same time, but that didn't work.

Practically all of Iris's accomplishments were handed to her on a silver plate. She rarely had to do any work herself. Cilan had to point out why Excadrill wasn't listening to her, which really paints a terrible picture of Iris when you consider that this issue must have been going on for at least a couple of years given how young she looked in the flashbacks. She never thought of anything else to do with Excadrill other than calling it out in the hopes that it would listen to her. But one apology was enough to erase years of anger in Excadrill. And because they didn't want to evolve Axew, they just gave her a Dragonite. In retrospect, I don't even understand why they made Dragonite disobedient other than giving her more undeserved victories. She didn't learn anything from that conflict, especially when it was resolved due to Iris protecting Dragonite like when she first met it. It also showed how Iris really wasn't learning anything from her journey. Despite having a similar problem with Excadrill, Iris's main means of attempting to solve the problem was just yelling at Dragonite to listen to her. She didn't really try anything else or consider using another Pokemon for the rest of that tournament so she could work more on Dragonite later. I think that the only accomplishment Iris really earned was getting Axew to master Dragon Rage and even then, her training method was just to keep ordering the attack until it worked. At least when Ash has done that, he actually spends time working on the move during training instead of doing it in the heat of battle.

She was shown to be a flawed character, but they never really addressed those flaws in meaningful ways. The few times it did happen was in passing or for comedy like when Georgia asked why she was using Excadrill instead of Axew. They made it clear that Iris was an extra special trainer and I probably wouldn't have minded that as much if Iris deserved that kind of attention/treatment, but she really didn't. The show tried so hard to make it seem like she had grown or that she was much stronger as a result of her journey, but it felt so forced and hallow. She was easily my biggest problem with BW, or at least tied with Ash's regression of his skills in that area, and she is still my least favorite female lead thus far.
 
That are some key differences that I don't think people recognize when they make that comparison. Misty used to tease Ash, but that was back when he was a rookie trainer and made a lot more mistakes. Misty calling him out felt a lot more justified compared to Iris getting on his case for acting just a little bit immature. Not to mention that the arguments with Iris were all one sided practically. Ash rarely reacted to Iris's comments, so it felt like a poor attempt at recreating that dynamic instead of actually doing something new and interesting. It also helped that we did see a sense of friendship growing between Ash and Misty, while I don't think we really got that from Ash and Iris. Even the standard Ash arguing with the new female lead episode didn't really do much to help with their friendship.

Anyway, I hated Iris back then and I still do. There aren't a lot of characters from the anime that I do genuinely hate, but Iris wins that prize. I remember thinking she had such potential when BW started because they were laying out all of her flaws clear as day and I liked the idea of her goal to evolve Axew. Axew's growth in strength and evolution could have served to mirror her own growth as a trainer and character. Clearly, that did not happen.

She was so unlikable, annoying and such a hypocrite. She kept getting on Ash's case for acting like a kid, even though she was just as immature, if not more so, than he was most of the time. I don't mind that they dropped the whole Axew evolving aspect of her goal. That was still pretty weak when they just addressed it a couple of times, but they still could have made it work by having Axew slowly gain more strength over the course of the series. Instead, we get moments like it learning Outrage and Giga Impact to give the illusion that it had gotten stronger even though Iris barely did any training with it. Even Axew itself was annoying because they kept going back and forth between making it powerful and a weak baby Pokemon. It was like they wanted it to be Togepi and Piplup at the same time, but that didn't work.

Practically all of Iris's accomplishments were handed to her on a silver plate. She rarely had to do any work herself. Cilan had to point out why Excadrill wasn't listening to her, which really paints a terrible picture of Iris when you consider that this issue must have been going on for at least a couple of years given how young she looked in the flashbacks. She never thought of anything else to do with Excadrill other than calling it out in the hopes that it would listen to her. But one apology was enough to erase years of anger in Excadrill. And because they didn't want to evolve Axew, they just gave her a Dragonite. In retrospect, I don't even understand why they made Dragonite disobedient other than giving her more undeserved victories. She didn't learn anything from that conflict, especially when it was resolved due to Iris protecting Dragonite like when she first met it. It also showed how Iris really wasn't learning anything from her journey. Despite having a similar problem with Excadrill, Iris's main means of attempting to solve the problem was just yelling at Dragonite to listen to her. She didn't really try anything else or consider using another Pokemon for the rest of that tournament so she could work more on Dragonite later. I think that the only accomplishment Iris really earned was getting Axew to master Dragon Rage and even then, her training method was just to keep ordering the attack until it worked. At least when Ash has done that, he actually spends time working on the move during training instead of doing it in the heat of battle.

She was shown to be a flawed character, but they never really addressed those flaws in meaningful ways. The few times it did happen was in passing or for comedy like when Georgia asked why she was using Excadrill instead of Axew. They made it clear that Iris was an extra special trainer and I probably wouldn't have minded that as much if Iris deserved that kind of attention/treatment, but she really didn't. The show tried so hard to make it seem like she had grown or that she was much stronger as a result of her journey, but it felt so forced and hallow. She was easily my biggest problem with BW, or at least tied with Ash's regression of his skills in that area, and she is still my least favorite female lead thus far.

I do feel they tried to copy Misty but it got botched. They probably though calling Ash a kid over and over was funny, but it wasn't. But she was a friend of Ash.
And this same series had Trip, which was a lazy rip-off of Paul.

Also, Ash was a noob un BW. It was just that people didn't like it because he was regressed.

I didn't like Cilan much. At first, I though he was a breath of fresh air because Brock falling in love with every girl he meets was annoying, but then, he seemed too perfect.

BW was a series where OLM/TPC felt too complacent after the success that was DP, so decided to act lazy. XY too was lazy, but hey, why put much effort into something that's guaranteed to sell tons of money at the end of the day?
 
I hate her and hope she has fallen off a cliff while searching for Rayquaza.

Damn, that's cold. She wasn't that bad.

It also helped that we did see a sense of friendship growing between Ash and Misty, while I don't think we really got that from Ash and Iris.

True. In Ash's battle with Homika though, I dug how Iris got Dent to cheer him on just like Homika had her support. That was the strongest sign of friendship I saw for Iris towards Ash.

With Dawn as a tough act to follow in terms of development, Irish could have been written a lot better. Overall, I like her though. I like how she was not afraid to battle. If only her battles were better...
 
I do feel they tried to copy Misty but it got botched. They probably though calling Ash a kid over and over was funny, but it wasn't. But she was a friend of Ash.
And this same series had Trip, which was a lazy rip-off of Paul.

I think that they could have done a much better job at conveying friendship between Ash and Iris. It doesn't help that Iris didn't really have much of a reason to travel with Ash to begin with. Trip was definitely a pretty blatant attempt to make another Paul, although I think they realized after awhile that he wasn't going to work out nearly as well as Paul did.

QueenEevee said:
Also, Ash was a noob un BW. It was just that people didn't like it because he was regressed.

I wouldn't say he was a noob since that would imply that he was a rookie trainer again, but he wasn't. He regressed in his overall skills, but his previous adventures still happened. Even with his regressed skills in mind, Iris really didn't have any ground to stand on with calling him a little kid given her own immaturity.

QueenEevee said:
I didn't like Cilan much. At first, I though he was a breath of fresh air because Brock falling in love with every girl he meets was annoying, but then, he seemed too perfect.

I had kind of a similar experience with Cilan. I still like him and he was one of the best aspects of BW for being entertaining, but he was kind of boring. Maybe it was the too perfect vibe you mentioned or that he really didn't go anywhere with his goal, even to the point where his evaluation time was treated as a gag, but he just became much more boring to me as the series progressed.

QueenEevee said:
BW was a series where OLM/TPC felt too complacent after the success that was DP, so decided to act lazy. XY too was lazy, but hey, why put much effort into something that's guaranteed to sell tons of money at the end of the day?

I don't know if we can say that they were too complacent after DP's success or if that was a factor for BW's problems. I have my fair share of problems with XY, but I don't think that lazy fits as a way to describe the whole series.

True. In Ash's battle with Homika though, I dug how Iris got Dent to cheer him on just like Homika had her support. That was the strongest sign of friendship I saw for Iris towards Ash.

I could only think of that montage where Ash and Iris were playing around in a mall, but that was a good example too. That would have been a nicer moment if it felt more natural for Iris to go all out cheering Ash like that.
 
I always disliked how all of Iris's Pokemon just followed her because she was nice to them. Not once she caught a Pokemon because she wanted/liked it. Dawn wanted a Buneary and wanted to use one for contest so she got one, same with May and Beautifly or Serena and Pancham or Eevee. That made them feel like they were taking their goal seriously, with Iris? nope.
 
0a4475e1b9939d2dc43d9d3c5a7e293f2cb6d7dd_hq.jpg
But in all honesty, I didn't like Iris, similar to how I don't like Misty either. I was more lenient on Misty because the OS was actually good, but I hated the BW arc
 
The chemistry Ash had with Misty over Iris is what one of the major differences was. Ash and Misty argued a lot, but still had this bond develop over time. They actually felt like close friends. Iris though would criticize Ash all the time and call him(And everyone else) a kid, though Ash paid little attention to this most of the time.
 
I've seen that image floating around before. It's one of the reasons why I think that people tend to ignore key differences between Misty and Iris when making those comparisons. Misty and Iris have some general surface level similarities and they probably were trying to recreate a similar dynamic between Iris and Ash, but there are a few reasons why Iris isn't as well received among fans beyond the nostalgia factor that Misty has.
 
Ignoring the fact that i was against her getting a psuedo being I don't like her. I go on a 3 minute plus rant on how she caught Dragonite was bullshit.

And I can still rant about how her concern about Trip's Frillish's curse body was bullshit too.

Overall thoughts on her?

REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!
 
I'll just keep this short, simple, and sweet. A lot of other users have already covered most of the ground of why many people can't stand Iris and I see no need to repeat them.

Basically, she was an annoying and immature hypocrite with an incredibly underdeveloped story-line. It seems like they wanted to re-do Misty but take away any of the qualities that made Misty more tolerable. Iris constantly berated other characters for their lack of knowledge on something, yet when the same thing happened to her she responded in annoyance and acted as if she was being attacked for no reason. She acted like she was an expert on everything even though she was just as much of a rookie as anyone else. (I don't count the Drillbur stuff as making her that much more experienced over other characters) And again, she always made fun of people when they made a mistake, 'calling them a little kid', but got mad when they did it to her (acting just like a little kid).

And her Dragon-type master goal went barely anywhere. All she did was get handed powerful moves and Pokemon out of nowhere with barely any effort on her part. In the the entirety of BW, Iris didn't feel like she grew as a character at all, imo.

So yeah, I hate her with a passion. Easily the worst character in the history of the series.
 
Please note: The thread is from 4 years ago.
Please take the age of this thread into consideration in writing your reply. Depending on what exactly you wanted to say, you may want to consider if it would be better to post a new thread instead.
Back
Top Bottom