• 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.

Review XY080: Tairenar and Yancham!! A Captivating Fiery Performance!!

Here is my summary.

The episode starts with Serena and her Pokemon watching the sunrise over Dendemille Town.

She and her Pokemon are excited about their upcoming Pokemon Showcase.

Serena talks on a video screen with her Mum in a Pokemon Center.

She shows Grace the dress she will be wearing during the Pokemon Showcase.

Ash and co. arrive to the front of the stadium that is holding the Showcase.

Miette walks up to Ash and co. with her Pokemon, Slurpuff and a male Meowstic.

Serena blushes when she sees Miette.

Miette tells Serena that she will be entering this Pokemon Showcase, just like Serena is.

They all talk for a bit and then they all enter the stadium.

Ash, Clemont and Bonnie are all seated in the audience, while Serena and Miette are preparing backstage.

Tierno, Shauna, Trevor, Professor Sycamore, Sophie, Cosette and Aria (with her Pokemon) are all watching this Pokemon Showcase.

The three groups are watching on TV screens from various locations.

Miette is up first and she is using her Slurpuff and Meowstic against two other competitors.

One has a Plusle and Minun and one has a Swanna.

The first performance round is a baking competition.

Gena from XY026 as well as a man and another woman are judging the baking competition.

Miette wins against her competitors.

Jessie is up next, and James and Meowth are watching her from the audience.

Jessie is using Meowth and her Wobbuffet against two other competitors.

One competitor is using a Psyduck and the other is using a Sneasle.

Jessie wins against her competitors.

Pokemon Quiz: Braixen.

Serena is up next for her Theme Performance.

She is using her Braixen and Pancham.

One of her competitors is using a Lickitung and one is using a Honedge.

Serena makes it through to the next round.

The Free Performance is up next and Jessie is first.

She uses the same Pokemon in the Free Performance.

Jessie makes Meowth run into Wobbuffet and Wobbuffet continuously bounce Meowth off with Wobbuffet's Counter.

Serena is walking through a hallway backstage and she bumps into Jessie, Meowth and Wobbuffet.

Braixen and Pancham get angry at Jessie, but Serena apologises to Jessie.

Jessie, Meowth and Wobbuffet walk off.

Serena is surprised that they disappeared.

Miette's Free Performances is up next and she uses her Slurpuff and Meowstic.

She uses her Meowstic to fly her Slurpuff through the air.

Serena's Free Performance is now up.

She does her Free Performance with her Braixen and Pancham.

All of the competitors who have made it through so far, including Serena, Miette and Jessie are lining up on the stage.

The winner of the Dendemille Pokemon Showcase is about to be decided.

The audience vote for the winner and Serena doesn't seem to be getting much votes.

She remembers back to some past events, including her Skiddo race with her mum and when she cut her hair.

Serena then gets lots of votes and ends up winning the Dendemille Pokemon Showcase.

Monsieur Pierre gives her a Princess Key and Serena does a victory pose with her Pokemon.

Jessie is sad that she did not win.

As the sun sets, Ash and co. are with Miette and her Pokemon outside.

Serena and Miette shake hands, but Miette also whispers something to Serena with a menacing face.

To be continued.
 
Hitotsuki's debut was completely wasted here... we didn't even see the thing move.

Also, once again, Musashi put on the more interesting and unique performance and yet was screwed over by the audience who seemed to prefer the old 'Combine attacks to make glitter effect' trick.
 
A really good episode, but the results felt a little exaggerated.

Serena's performance was boring until Braixen jumping on Pancham's Stone Edge and using her fire stick, which visually looked amazing.

I'm also glad that the writers didn't ignore Jessie's Sinnoh Contest era but it seems like they will continue screwing her up for the sake of Serena winning. Hopefully, she gets her 3 wins one day.

With all the people watching, writers could've added Yashio, too.
 
LOL at all the shots of everyone watching Serena - no pressure there :-D

Jessie looked great and deserved far more votes that she received (again)
It was good to see new determined Serena not let the damage to her dress discourage her (wasn't it lucky she was last to perform ;-)) and she just got on with altering it

But again, the entire Tripokalon concept is inherently sexist and rather boring - fashion shows, baking and performing? What does the Master Class entail? How to land a husband?
(Sorry to keep referring to this, but I do feel that making them only for girls and leaving out any battling is a huge mistake)

I am happy Serena won her first key and is on the way to achieving her dream, regardless of how cliched it is.
 
I liked this a lot - though agree with the above - Jessie clearly had the better performance, so it should have at least been close.
 
But again, the entire Tripokalon concept is inherently sexist and rather boring - fashion shows, baking and performing? What does the Master Class entail? How to land a husband?
(Sorry to keep referring to this, but I do feel that making them only for girls and leaving out any battling is a huge mistake)

Yeah, I'm not a huge fan of the Tripokalon either for the precise reasons you mentioned above... I appreciate the writers creating a whole new competition in order to give Serena something real to strive for (especially as we had to endure both travelling companions just following Satoshi like lost puppies in Best Wishes) but the whole "Girls competiting in cooking, dancing and dressing up" competitions really rubs me up the wrong way. Plus the lack of any actual battles makes for a pretty boring event... maybe the Master Class will rectify this but I'm not holding my breath.
 
I liked this a lot - though agree with the above - Jessie clearly had the better performance, so it should have at least been close.

Unfortunately I don't see how. But that's just my opinion.

The only decent thing going for Jessie's performance was the final end with Meowth cutting up the berries into a "statue" of hearts, the whole Meowth bouncing against Wobbuffet while interesting was not all that appealing

I feel like Serena's performance showed how much her and her Pokemon were in sync, how much fun she was having doing it, which is why I think she won. The others seemed like they were just trying to appeal to the audiences just for the Princess Key, almost keeping their attention on them.

But Serena she focused mostly on her performance, and it seemed it was more personal to her to get the win.

Or if you didn't like Serena's performance that much, you could just assume that the audience felt sorry for her.
 
Still oblivious that the Pikachu special is an ACTUAL episode I see.. Literally everywhere else but here acknowledges that it's XY78.

As for the episode itself, it felt a little padded at times and somewhat uninteresting to watch. I still feel that contests were much better that this.

6/10
 
Considering the kind of competitions they held, Performances being exclusive for girls certainly looks not-right to me, but I don't really care about the lack of battles. I like that there's an important part of the series that focuses on other aspects and stuff that Pokémon can do instead of battling all the time.

By the way, Miette was overdoing it with the teasing here, which is awesome. I don't really believe she's interested in Ash like many people think, but she's just doing it to troll Serena. She is kind of not doing absolutely anything about her crush on Ash, after all. But I'm definetly going to miss Saori Hayashi... she gave Miette a pretty unique voice because of her way to pronounce consonants like the P, her calmer/quieter voice compared to the others, etc. I'm being pretty nitpicky here, but I kind of loved her voice and actually stood out to me back when that episode debuted, and the one she got here sounds very generic in comparision. In any case, Miette is good as a character so at least I'm glad she's back, I didn't expected them to change her voice actress instead of retiring her altogether.
 
, I didn't expected them to change her voice actress instead of retiring her altogether.

The producers really had no choice though, they wanted Miette to be an actual recurring/rival character. They shouldn't end a character on the sole purpose of something involving the voice actors/actresses personal life.

If Rica Matsumoto were to tragically die at this moment or she fell into a coma, or something else tragic, I'm sure they producers would have no choice but to replace her with another VA since I doubt they are finished with Satoshi, and I'm sure they are still producing episodes with Satoshi in it.

Plus this has happened before as well with some going on maternity leave (I think) and other illnesses as well where someone has stepped in for a short amount of time. Plus Miette only appeared once, so I don't think it was that hard to replace her VA.
 
I still can't bring myself to enjoy watching these Showcases. I mean, how much more boring a competition can get? The Theme Performance here was simply ridiculous. It was so not about the Performer's Pokémon. They were basically being used as tools and this saddens me. Miette's Slurpuff brought milk or whatever, Serena's Braixen opened the oven, so much for actually showcasing the Pokémon.

I'm also annoyed at the fact Miette's Free Performance wasn't focused on because we needed to see Serena fixing her furisode. I understand that they have to show Serena struggling but I find it hard to care about Serena when her dress is her major problem. This only goes to show Pokémon Showcases are all about girls being pretty with Pokémon threw in because the show's named after them. No wonder it's called Waifu Wars on 4chan.

About the performances, huh, the writers aren't even trying anymore. In the past, attack collisions would result in a shower of sparkles but here Pokémon are perfectly capable of producing glitter themselves. I also didn't like how Braixen was all dressed up while Pancham was only using sunglasses. What I did like to see was Jessie receiving a lot more votes from the audience than what she got last time, although Serena winning by a large margin is still cheap. I found Jessie's grand finale a little unbelievable but I guess Meowth is just really skilled when it comes to using Fury Swipes haha. XD~

Nice to see Gena again but the judging process still irks me. I was a little puzzled when I saw the judges were actually Furfrou, Jigglypuff, and Mime Jr. as their Trainers were there only to voice their Pokémon's opinions. Also, I can already see Sherman appearing in the future when grooming is used as theme and I'm all for it. It's SO much better to have professional judges that know what they're doing instead of the audience deciding what's worthy a Princess Key and what's not.

I didn't like how Miette was wasted here. Her performance didn't receive enough focus and she only interacted with Serena outside the Showcase theater. I think this proves she was only brought back to tease Serena about Amour. I honestly couldn't care less about Serena's feelings for Ash so seeing Miette reappear just to tease her about it did nothing for me. I would have preferred to see Nini again. I hope Miette stays out of the show for another 50 episodes, returning only when it's time for Serena to compete in the Master Class.

Lastly, I think the writers should stop showing us flashbacks all the time. I'm tired of seeing them and I hate how they are basically used to trick us into thinking Serena is really dedicated towards this mind-numbingly boring goal when we all know she did jack squat since battling Aria more than two months ago.
 
Just finished the episode.

First of all I would like to talk about Jessie. Jessie put up a performance that I would say is on par with Serena's. In fact it should have been better than Serena's but I think the crowd too felt the theme of 'Happiness and Love' is good, but Jessie's action during the Pokepuff section pushing Meowth away lessen the impact of the performance.

And Jessie having Meowth to scout the flavour of the three judge's Pokemon is the best yet I have seen from Jessie. Instead of making one Pokepuff that fits all three Pokemon they made three different types with one of them nailing the three Pokemon. This is a smart tactic and I am pretty surprised Team Rocket came up with it.

Miette served her purpose in this episode in my opinion. She strolled through the Pokepuff round as expected. Her teasing of Serena provided enough for shippers to be happy about, but as a non-shipper I think there is only two lines that actually made me smile. One being the the one she said to Serena and Bonnie reacted to (and its basically Bonnie making me smile, her reaction is hillarious) , and the other one being the one at the end (she pulling Serena towards her all of a sudden just to say that line is very funny).

Her performance round is quite disappointing to be honest. Both Serena and Jessie's performance has an ending, and Miette's doesn't. It was cut off and I wish I could see more of it.

Finally Serena. I love the flashbacks she got in this episode, lots of them has emotionsthat acts as a fuel for me to cheer for her performance. Her Pokepuff section was less fun than Miette's to be honest, it might be because I am actually looking forward to Meitte's Pokepuff. Her performance round is very well done, the dancing while Fire Pillars surround her was very well done, the Stone Edge combo seen in XY64 is brought back and is handled as good as I thought! And the ending is amazing. However, Jessie put up an on par performance in shorter amount of screen time, as her theme is actually the most well thought out of all contestants.

Another good thing is the Japanese music going on in the background during Serena's performance. It was a pleasure to listen to.

And the MVP of this episode, is.................... quite some number of people actually.

Professor Sycamore, Grace, Aria, Shauna, Trevor and Tierno. Their support is the best thing in this episode. I enjoyed watching them being happy over Serena's win.

But again, the entire Tripokalon concept is inherently sexist and rather boring - fashion shows, baking and performing? What does the Master Class entail? How to land a husband?
(Sorry to keep referring to this, but I do feel that making them only for girls and leaving out any battling is a huge mistake)

The problem is Tripokalon is for the Kalos Queen. If there was ever a contest for Kalos King it will never be relevant to the show as no one is participating, and why will Ash participate in one? Ash only participated in contests in the past because being told by someone, one of them is by Wallace, the other time I actually forgot. And all the contest Ash participated in has the May or Dawn participating too, and its almost mainly about them as they are the one actually aiming for the Grand Festival.

As for having no battle, I can only say that Its adding more diversity from most episodes, as Ash is battling at a pretty high frequency at the moment. Although you may like battles more, but they can't appeal to both sides at the same time, so I guess you have the rights to complain. XD
 
After checking the screenshots at filb.de, I'm even more disapointed by the way Jessie was handled, because she got the least amount of votes. Shallow Kalosian smh.

The real MVP is the dog nosed lady, who appreciated Jessie's performance and voted for her.
 
The anime's obsession with Amourshipping is back in this episode when they had Miette attempt to take Ash from Serena. Why couldn't she take someone more minor instead?

At least Serena learned about not making her accessories too long during intermission of the performance that they nearly get tangled and the person/Pokémon wearing them trips.
 
After checking the screenshots at filb.de, I'm even more disapointed by the way Jessie was handled, because she got the least amount of votes. Shallow Kalosian smh.

The real MVP is the dog nosed lady, who appreciated Jessie's performance and voted for her.

I thought, from the same screenshots, that she came second...
 
Finally, the 2nd Showcase. I've been waiting forever.

So Miette's back as a performer. Well, that's one thing I never expected to happen. I suppose it could be interesting. Serena could use a few more serious rivals. I like how Bonnie actually greeted Slurpuff. Lol, looks like Miette is still teasing Serena about Ash. And OMG Bonnie's face. Does she know? Because that would be the funniest thing ever. I like how they showed Grace, Shauna's crew, and Aria watching the Showcase. But I sure as heck didn't expect Sycamore to be watching. When did he even find out Serena was a Performer. Am I forgetting something?

Oh gosh Slurpuff is so cute:) But anyway, I actually didn't care too much for the PokePuff baking round in this showcase as I did the Styling round in the previous one. Just my preference. But I am glad they do have different themes rather than doing the same thing over and over like with contests. I also like how they brought back Gena from XY26 to judge the PokePuffs. I also noticed that the girl with the Psyduck from the previous Showcase. Damn, Jessie's PokePuff must have only won by taste because it looked awful. I love how much work Pancham did assisting with making the PokePuffs since he didn't get to anything in the first Showcase. And OMG when he and Braxien grabbed Serena's hands before the judging. That was too precious. LOL, Sycamore's reaction to Serena winning was priceless.

Now moving to the the Free Performance, I'll be honest, I actually thought Jessie's was ok at the end. Too bad her and her Pokemon's outfits were horrid. Braxien on the other hand looked beautiful and I like how Pancham had is 2nd pair of glasses on. I wish he would have had more clothes aside from that though. And of course Jessie has to be a b*tch and knock Serena to the ground. Man I wish Pancham and Braixen would have attacked her. So Serena thought back to Fennekin falling in the first showcase from her long bow to solve her ripped dress problem and cut it short. Well that was interesting. And I loved Serena's free performance. It was beautiful. Yet at the same time I was shocked to see that she won by such a huge margin. DAMN!

Lol, Miette really gets pleasure out of teasing Serena doesn't she. Anyway, great episode over all. Can't wait for the next Showcase. 9/10.
 
This episode has something I'm particularly intrigued about: has Kalos found its recurring Contest Showcase judges like how Mr. Contesta and Mr. Remarkable kept popping up? :-/
 
Last edited:
The problem is Tripokalon is for the Kalos Queen. If there was ever a contest for Kalos King it will never be relevant to the show as no one is participating, and why will Ash participate in one? Ash only participated in contests in the past because being told by someone, one of them is by Wallace, the other time I actually forgot. And all the contest Ash participated in has the May or Dawn participating too, and its almost mainly about them as they are the one actually aiming for the Grand Festival.

As for having no battle, I can only say that Its adding more diversity from most episodes, as Ash is battling at a pretty high frequency at the moment. Although you may like battles more, but they can't appeal to both sides at the same time, so I guess you have the rights to complain. XD

This is not a good excuse, especially when we have seen the Battle Chateau being featured in the anime. The Chateau gives Trainers titles of nobility based on the rank they achieve through their victories. Viola was shown to be a Duchess while Grant was a Duke before defeating her. It could be the same for the Master Class tournament of Pokémon Showcases: if a boy wins, then he is crowned Kalos King, but if a girl wins, she will be crowned Kalos Queen.

We have no reason to assume there are boys-only Showcases being held across the Kalos region. Even if we don't have a main character participating in them, the writers could have shown the Kalos King standing next to Aria in one of the million cameo appearances she makes in the series. It also wouldn't hurt to see a male Performer earning a Prince Key through a PokéVision video. The writers can change this at any moment, of course, but right now we just can't say there are male Performers out there. If they do exist, it is a total shame that Tierno isn't one.

I think the lack of battles in Pokémon Showcases wouldn't be so much of a problem if boys were allowed to enter. By making Showcases a girls-only competition with no battling but a lot of activities traditionally perceived as something women should do such as cooking and dressing up, the writers are essentially sending the wrong message to the kids watching the show. It's like girls are relegated to cook! They have to sit and be pretty while the boys are battling. Add this to the fact Serena is in love with Ash and there you have it, a girl improving herself to become a good wife for her man.

There's really no reason why a boy couldn't be interested in dressing up his Pokémon nicely and baking Poké Puffs. We have seen boys competing in the Hearthome Collection and the Poké Puff Contest so it makes no sense at all. It's just sexist and absurd and I think it's so sad we have to see activities being assigned by gender in a kids show.

Also, your point about Ash is moot because it's obvious the writers wouldn't have Ash expressing any interest in participating in a girls-only competition. However, Chespin has been shown to be interested in performances, and I would love to see Clemont and all of his awkwardness dancing on stage. That would be entertaining.
 
Please note: The thread is from 8 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