A filler region

Every Breaking Wave

Every Breaking Wave

Religion is a club
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Does anyone else have the feeling that the entire Johto saga was just filler? I'm not talking about the typical Johto episode, but the region as a whole.

We still see a lot of the Kanto characters (Professor Oak, Gary, Delia, Mr. Mime, and to an extent Forrest and Misty) as well as many of Ash's Kanto Pokemon brought back for the occassional battle (the most notable being Charizard of course, but Bulbasaur appeared in a Hoenn episode and most of the Oaked Kanto Poke's appeared in the Battle Frontier).

Hoenn only ended relatively recently so it's difficult to say much about the characters/Pokemon introduced there, although after the Hoenn region ended they did at least appear in Battle Frontier.

But Johto... characters like Professor Elm, Casey, and Jackson have not been seen since the end of the region. With the exception of Heracross, NONE of Ash's Johto Pokemon have made an appearance since the end of the region (not including the mandatory Pallet Town episode at the very end of Hoenn/beginning of Battle Frontier).

What is your impression of Johto: Was the Johto region just a region of filler, something to promote the G/S games until Gen III came out?
 
Matkin22 said:
With the exception of Heracross, NONE of Ash's Johto Pokemon have made an appearance since the end of the region (not including the mandatory Pallet Town episode at the very end of Hoenn/beginning of Battle Frontier).?
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Phanphy was brought back for BF and even evolved.

Meh, if it involves the games, then it's a main story. Even if it was filler filled. (That sounds awkward....)
 
I thought Orange Island was the GS promotion. What with the GS Ball and all.
 
Matkin22 said:
What is your impression of Johto: Was the Johto region just a region of filler, something to promote the G/S games until Gen III came out?
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Personally, I LOVED Johto.

And I thought all 3 seasons of Johto were pretty awesome. Master Quest was like, the icing on the cake for me (so many amazing things happened during the final season of Johto).


Sure, there were a lot of filler episodes during all 3 seasons, but I still enjoyed the fillers as much (or even more) than the gym battles.

And heck, Johto has some of the best filler episodes ever, in my opinion. Who could forget episodes like "Once In A Blue Moon", or "The Fortune Hunters"? Those episodes were great!! ^_^



But anyway, as for the Johto region itself being filler, I don't quite understand what you mean. If by filler you mean "unimportant", no, that's not true at all. A lot of important stuff happened in Johto that affected the series, like Ash catching Heracross, all 3 of the Johto starters, and then Phanpy (later on).

Also, I think that throughout Johto, Ash really improved his skill as a trainer overall. I thought most of his gym battles were spectacular. Sure, there may have been a few gym battles that weren't so good, but still, Ash had some great battles in the filler episodes too, which seemed to make up for that.
 
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Okay, I freely admit that I forgot about Phanpy.

What I meant by "filler" is that so far, every region that Ash has been too has had some sort of impact on his later journeys (whether by companions/Pokemon/techniques, etc.), but Johto seems to have been shunned in comparison to Kanto and Hoenn. I was wondering what other people's opinions on this was. Don't get me wrong, I really enjoyed most of Johto. It just seems to me that it's the "forgotten region" as far as the writers are concerned.
 
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Oh, the companion thing....

Well, at the beginning of Johto, Brock joined the group once again (which I thought was cool).


Personally, I think that rather than focus on Ash's companions or his Pokemon attacks, the writers during Johto were showing us different ways that Ash and his Pokemon were getting closer.

I mean, there seemed to be many Johto episodes that mainly focused on Ash's relationship with one member (or more) of his Johto team. Therefore making Ash's relationship with that Pokemon stronger, and also helping the two become more powerful in battle. I think that maybe the writers were just playing around with this idea at that time, so that's probably why nothing else seemed to happen.



But as for the writers thinking of Johto as "the forgotten region", I guess maybe that's because they aren't pushing it with the, unevolved Pokemon can be just as strong as evolved Pokemon, thing anymore. It could also be because their ideas/requirements for filler episodes are different now in D/P, than they were back in Johto.
 
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I liked Johto for the same reasons Lisa just explained.

Johto was the most important region, in my opinion, when it comes to Ash's character.

Ash was an idiot in Kanto (no offense, Lisa), and throughout Johto he matured into the great battler he was in Hoenn.
 
The reason Johto seems to be forgotten is its the "inbetween saga" of the Pokemon anime.

It doesn't have the beginning or nostalgia feeling going for it that Kanto/Orange has, and it doesn't have the fresh start or revamp feeling AG has, nor does it have the current saga feeling (or plot-driven feeling) that D/P has. Johto is stuck between all the other sagas, and as a result, most of the events from that saga are either being forgotten or ignored.

Aside from the climax of the Ash/Gary rivalry and the departure of Misty, there's really not much else that happened that saga. Sure, Ash caught some new Pokemon and met lots of filler characters, etc, but there's nothing about it that stands out compared to everything else. I think the fact that no new characters were introduced gives it that feeling as well.

There are definitely some good episodes in Johto, but overall, the saga definitely seemed to be largly forgotten by the fandom once AG started. And now that we're in D/P, its going to just be "there" without much reference. The longer this show goes on, the more individual sagas will be forgotten, considering there's just far too many episodes now.
 
Wow! Those are good points, Shane! ^_^


And Scott, that is one reason why I wish the writers give us some kind of reminder about Johto. I don't want people to forget about that region....


Maybe some of the COTD's from Johto could reappear? I liked most of those one-shot characters! They were awesome! ^^

And it's a long shot, but maybe they could remind us of Johto by having a gym leader from that region appear. Or they could have Eusine appear again, since he's looking for Suicune.... (there's one in the Sinnoh region, apparently)


Of course, I wouldn't expect anything that big from the writers. I think that if they want to remind us more of the Johto region, they could at least show more Johto Pokemon in the anime, since some of them are catchable in D/P, like Wooper, Quagsire, etc.

If anything, at least give Dawn a chance to see them and scan them with her Pokedex. XD
 
PokemonTrainerLisa said:
And it's a long shot, but maybe they could remind us of Johto by having a gym leader from that region appear.
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IIRC, Jasmine does make a cameo in the D/P games on the way to the Elite Four. She may get a reappearance then (although it will probably be in 3 years at the current rate of the anime).
 
Yeah, I did think it was rather mean of the writers not to have Ash use his core Johto team in Battle Frontier at all.

We got to see Heracross and the return of Phanpy (who evolved into Donphan), but his three starters and Noctowl were completely ignored. Those four haven't been in ANY battles since the Johto league....and that was nearly 300 episodes ago!

The real problem is, as I said, the length of the anime. Now that there's over 500 episodes, a lot of people simply don't have the time to rewatch every saga and tons of episodes are bound to be forgotten. Its unfortunate, but that's just what happens.
 
Yeah, and you could tell that Ash really missed Pidgeot in, "Fighting Fire With Flyer", when he saw Falkner's Pidgeot.

I guess the writers didn't want him to have one, or something.
 
Ash should have gave his Noctowl to May. It whould have been great for the Contests.
 
I personally loved Johto, especially the league. The league was better than both hoenn and kanto, most because of 3 very popular characters, especially Harrison who I personally feel is the best rival Ash has had yet. The other 2 are Gary and Charizard.

Hell, Charizard alone made that league full of win. Would be so fuc*ing awesome if Harrison also was in Sinnoh, and then they could have a charizard vs blaziken rematch!
 
lol. I actually wrote a big essay a long time ago about how HOENN was a "filler region", because ultimately Ash wouldn't be any closer to becoming a Pokemon master at the end of the region as he was at the beginning. We knew that he would lose the league, and then likely go on to another region and do it all over again, so it seemed kind of pointless to me in the big scheme of things. Johto, on the other hand, at least resolved the rivalry between Ash and Gary, which had to happen at some point before Ash completed his goals.
 
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