Controversial opinions

[Ghost Diplocaulus]

lol my "Alain did too" comment wasn't in reference to him developing his strength throughout the series - it was to the rival battles he had with Ash prior to the League, just like Sawyer; unlike Sawyer, his were all during XYZ.



Yes, Alain was indeed plenty powerful before meeting Ash.

ah XD sorry, my b

 

[Lightning Flame Blast]

Apart from that, Alain and his Charizard spent pretty much the entirety of their screentime just steamrolling over everyone else without ever breaking so much as a mild sweat.

Which raises an interesting but very important flaw in the writing: how do you keep growing stronger at such a fast rate when barely anything you practise on pushes you?

 

[Ghost Diplocaulus]

Which raises an interesting but very important flaw in the writing: how do you keep growing stronger at such a fast rate when barely anything you practise on pushes you?

This comment inspired me to make a meme. No points for guessing which button was the one ultimately pressed, lol.

Spoiler

 

[FluffleFi]

As much as I don't much like Alain, his Charzard or the species in general, I feel a little sorry for people who prefer its Mega-Y form over its X form. For people who likes its edgy for not only did they get to see it take on Mewtwo in Pokemon Origins, but they also got to see it take on other megas, fight legendaries, battle and defeat Ash and then take on Lysandre. While Y-Form..got defeated by its other form. It kind of feels like that's why they even had Trevor in the league, considering he, like his in-game counterpart, preferred meeting and studying Pokemon than battling.

 

[DankOverlord]

As much as I don't much like Alain, his Charzard or the species in general, I feel a little sorry for people who prefer its Mega-Y form over its X form. For people who likes its edgy for not only did they get to see it take on Mewtwo in Pokemon Origins, but they also got to see it take on other megas, fight legendaries, battle and defeat Ash and then take on Lysandre. While Y-Form..got defeated by its other form. It kind of feels like that's why they even had Trevor in the league, considering he, like his in-game counterpart, preferred meeting and studying Pokemon than battling.

Oh yeah, Y got shafted so badly it isn't funny. Like X gets to be godlike but Y only appears to be OHKOed. I really hope Ash can one day give the Mega form Justice but that ain't happening.

I do remember some folks on Serebii arguing that Trevor's Jobbizard Y was stronger than Ash's due to Mega Evos back when in 2016 everybody assumed Megas were automatically stronger than their base forms regardless of skill gap

 

[Ghost Diplocaulus]

As much as I don't much like Alain, his Charzard or the species in general, I feel a little sorry for people who prefer its Mega-Y form over its X form. For people who likes its edgy for not only did they get to see it take on Mewtwo in Pokemon Origins, but they also got to see it take on other megas, fight legendaries, battle and defeat Ash and then take on Lysandre. While Y-Form..got defeated by its other form. It kind of feels like that's why they even had Trevor in the league, considering he, like his in-game counterpart, preferred meeting and studying Pokemon than battling.

Mega Charizard Y is so ridiculously shafted it actually makes Raichu look like a coddled child by comparison, and what's worse is that it genuinely feels like it was purposefully created to be the neglected one among the Charizard family: Mega Charizard Y was actually revealed before Mega Charizard X, almost certainly for the purposes of giving the latter even more hype (since X not only has the coloration of the coveted Shiny, but also the Fire/Dragon typing fans had been clamoring for Charizard to get pretty much since the beginning of time). After that, Mega Charizard X is the one who got everything: Charizard's super form in both Smash and Pokken, Alain's unbeatable ace, merchandise, the works. Mega Charizard Y's only claim to fame is getting trounced by its X counterpart, just so that we don't forget which one is superior. About the only consolation the poor thing has is being slightly better in competitive, and even that's kind of debatable as far as I'm aware.

I find that especially frustrating because... why do this at all? Why create a Pokemon whose seeming only purpose is being the red-headed stepchild? Like... does anyone realize how mean this is?? I'm pretty sure Mega Charizard X would have still had plenty of hype and love without an "inferior" sibling to constantly compare it to. And if they wanted Mega Charizard X's existence to be a surprise, they could have very easily just kept all the Kanto Starter Megas hidden until after Origins, and then reveal Venusaur and Blastoise's Megas after Charizard X's debut. Or better yet, make it so that all three of them appear in Origins in some way or another. Granted, this would obviously require very heavy rewrites to the OVA, but still.

 

[Sai]

Would have been nice to see Ash beat Alan but given it’s like 5 years since XY ended I’m pretty much over it now. Though would have been nice to see Ash win a traditional league since that part of the series seems done with now. Would have made more sense too if they knew that league would be the last.

Only thing they’d have to explain is why Ash didn’t challenge the Kalos Elite 4 but they probably could have handwaved it away saying they were busy cleaning up the aftermath of the Flare destruction, and anyway Malva was arrested at the end of that arc so there wouldn’t even be an Elite 4 at that point anyway, heh

 

[Enzo]

Which raises an interesting but very important flaw in the writing: how do you keep growing stronger at such a fast rate when barely anything you practise on pushes you?

I won't literally ever get that frankly, because they made the whole deal about Alain (and by consequence his Charizard too) be about the good ol' classic ''I want to get stronger'', when he just never had to get stronger because absolutely nothing was a challenge for him besides maybe Siebold's Mega Blastoise, which also never really went anywhere so I'm not even sure if it qualifies.

People call him a Gary Stu and imo they are very much right.

 

[LuxrayOfTheWild]

Alain was already pretty strong to begin with and he was handed an even stronger power boost from Lysandre. This was a plot point at the very end. Alain decided to give up the stone and find a new one on his own. He was gonna work for it. Meanwhile, while he was handed this extra power, Ash had to work for the Battle Bond ability. He struggled a lot with it, but eventually overcame his struggles and doubt.

 

[cricketlaxwolvesbandy]

I wouldn’t have liked if Ash lost to Sawyer because Sawyer is a newbie. I hate that Ash lost to Alain but if he lost to anyone it would be him.
There was buildup that Ash would win Kalos from THE FINAL EPISODE OF BW. We were robbed, and Alola is not a consolation.

 

[Jewel the Quaxly]

Alola is not a consolation.

Who thinks Alola is a consolation? The whole idea that Ash shouldn't have won the Alola league because he lost Kalos genuinely frustrates me at this point. Like, there was no reason for him to have lost Kalos, but there was no reason for him to have lost Alola either. It makes no sense to me to complain about Ash winning a league simply because he was supposed to win the previous one: as if that even invalidates his win.

 

[FluffleFi]

People'll complain no matter what Ash does. I bet if he HAD won in Kalos those same people will be saying he should've won in Unova. If he had won in Unova they'd be saying he should've won in Sinnoh, so on and so forth.

 

[Enzo]

One of the things that sadden me about Ash is because it sometimes feels like they kid just can't win something in a certain sense you know?

There's quite a lot of people who say that his Alola win wasn't a ''true win'' because the League was on the easier side (and some of those are still salty he didn't won Kalos so they get mad that he won the next and try to diminish his win but that's probably another conversation), but can you just imagine the sheer rage if Ash hadn't won that League??? Man, forget the past controversies surrounding the past competitions: Ash would've been clowned to hell and back to this day.

Ash is someone who literally can't win at point, it seems.

 

[Jewel the Quaxly]

wasn't a ''true win'' because the League was on the easier side

This is actually why I don't buy the "Ash never won a league" statement, because there's literally no clarifications for what a "true league win" actually means. Like, it isn't true that "he never won a league": he won the Orange Islands, but nobody counts it because it's too easy and isn't a legitimate game league. Now Ash wins Alola, a legitimate game league, and it STILL doesn't count.

Some people are just never satisfied, I guess.

 

[Unireon]

My main issue with the Alola Conference was the lack of full battles.

That alone diminishes the impact.

It is also the reason behind the easy-league argument.

 

[Daren]

I think some of the complaints about the Alola league would have been allayed if Kukui had been the final opponent in it instead of a post-tournament exhibition since it feels like a lot of people stopped paying attention right after Gladion was defeated.

Of course even though Alola is from the games and Kukui is an actual last boss from the games people would find reasons to ignore it, like with the Battle Frontier.
(Ironically in the games the BF is vasty, vastly, vastly harder than any of the leagues. Funny how often people ignore).

Ultimately though? Yeah, Ash can't win because he's had a huge hatedom since the first season and nothing he does will ever be good enough for them. Look at how some people cheered for Paul throughout DP if you look at old threads.
It cooled off a bit since then but it's still there, with people writing about how the show would be more successful without him.
I'm curious about if the instant a new protagonist failed they'd turn on them too or not.

Trust me; if he beats Cynthia in JN they'll claim it was "hax" or something and doesn't count.

 

[DankOverlord]

I think some of the complaints about the Alola league would have been allayed if Kukui had been the final opponent in it instead of a post-tournament exhibition since it feels like a lot of people stopped paying attention right after Gladion was defeated.

Of course even though Alola is from the games and Kukui is an actual last boss from the games people would find reasons to ignore it, like with the Battle Frontier.
(Ironically in the games the BF is vasty, vastly, vastly harder than any of the leagues. Funny how often people ignore).

Ultimately though? Yeah, Ash can't win because he's had a huge hatedom since the first season and nothing he does will ever be good enough for them. Look at how some people cheered for Paul throughout DP if you look at old threads.
It cooled off a bit since then but it's still there, with people writing about how the show would be more successful without him.
I'm curious about if the instant a new protagonist failed they'd turn on them too or not.

Trust me; if he beats Cynthia in JN they'll claim it was "hax" or something and doesn't count.

It partly has to do with people not seeing the series after the OS (hence why there's still the ridiculous stigma that Ash "releases" his strongest Pokemon and barely earns any badges when neither statement has been true ever besides the first league and only if you stretch Butterfree/Pidgeot/Lapras to be his strongest mons). And the utter toxic fandom of Red that loved to make the same shitty meme over and over with the first part furthening the idiotic comparisons that only got worse once Origins came out and people shilled the hell out of that short and praised Red even though his strategizing was godawful and the special was Charizard shilling

 

[Sai]

I do remember when the Kalos league was going on people were already acting bitter if Ash won that league. People were saying, “Ash shouldn’t win a league without using old Pokémon” or “AshGreninja is a cheap way to win a league” or “XY has no continuity with past seasons this is a terrible time to win a league” etc.

So yeah. Even if Ash had won the Kalos league, you would have seen the usual condescending and pessimistic posts with people hating Ash’s win there for the reasons I listed above just like you see people do with the Alola league.

Some people can just never be happy, I guess.

 

[HiroHunter]

"AshGreninja is a cheap way to win a league”

How do people think that Ash-Greninja is a cheap way to win when Megas are a thing in KL and its on the same level as them?

 

[DankOverlord]

How do people think that Ash-Greninja is a cheap way to win when Megas are a thing in KL and its on the same level as them

I suppose some saw Ash getting an uber-special power-up exclusive to him as a bit too much protagonism favoritism. I myself didn't really mind it besides the Diantha fight which made it seem way too OP since AG was basically clowning the regional Champion's Ace to the point it gave the wrong impression that it was straight-up an "I Win" Button besides Plot convenience