Do you think Best Wishes!'s pace is hindering the series' development?

[MizuTaipu]

Now, we all know that Best Wishes! has a quicker pace compared to Johto, Hoenn, and Sinnoh. Do you think that this pace is hindering the character development and rivalries? If so, how would you fix it (giving characters sufficient development while retaining the series' fast pace)?

 

[Hidden Mew]

Sorry for the delay, but the thread is approved. I suggest for people provide examples of how the pace is or isn't hindering the character development and rivalries in their posts.

 

[Cybersai]

Not really. Iris and Cilan don't have huge Contest-type quests so the pace of a series makes no difference to them. The rivals all have enough appearances, I can't complain there.

Its basically only Ash's Pokemon that hinder their development, and its not the pacing, its the amount of captures.

 

[Jukain]

If I were to change the chapters of some of my fanfics into episodes, my longer works would be even shorter than the anime is. I think it's possible for a story to still be engaging even if it's not as long. However, given that this is a weekly show, I wager they have to put in fillers not only serve as buffers between events, but to make it a suitable length. Even then, however, I think such things should be focused on character development. No, I don't think the faster pace messed them up. It's that they failed to put in adequate content.

 

[The Master]

i see some kind of patter here, first ash was inmature (OS), then they shitbomb us with fillers(johto in specific), then ash became mature(AG and DP) then he is inmature again and now there giving us more filler again, see the patern, so at least i'm hoping that ash becomes mature again gen VI

 

[Madame Pika]

The pacing here is both slow and fast at the same time, taking the worst of both. On the one had, it's got the lack of good character development of a fast paced show (I know there are exceptions, even in pokemon). On the other it's got the slow drawn out lull of a slow paced show with plenty of episodes that are pretty dull. Basically yes.

That said, I don't think that the pacing can be blamed that much, I don't think there's a point in this show where it's ever had good pacing yet it has given us decent characters and decent development. It's also worth noting that different characters and different things have been treated differently and still are. Dento's writing is different from Iris's. Kabigo's is different from Iris's though related. In some ways, the answer can be 'yes but that's the case every series.'

 

[Mikuri]

That's funny. There are people who say the Diamond & Pearl series dragged on forever and this damaged the story of some characters, and there are others who say the fast pace of Best Wishes! is hindering the development of the series. Personally, I think both assumptions are incorrect. I will not say the pace does not interfere in the story, of course it does, but that's not the main factor. Best Wishes!'s characters could have their stories expanded or deepened despite the fast pace. I think what is hindering the development of the characters are the decisions the writers are taking with these characters, simple as that.

Let's take Burgundy as an example, she has the opportunity to grow, but what the writers are doing with her? They are treating her like she's not important. Even in episodes that are supposed to focus on her, such as Clash of the Connoisseurs!, she is made of comic relief and is underused. And then she decides to participate in another tournament, only to be eliminated in the first round again. You see? The writers do not want to give her more than that. She is there to make Cilan, Trip, or whoever it is look better. That's what's hindering her development, not the pace.

Its basically only Ash's Pokemon that hinder their development, and its not the pacing, its the amount of captures.

I totally agree. If Ash had been smart and thought out a little bit before making his crazy captures, we would have six Pokémon with personality and a good amount of focus instead of mere battle machines. But he preferred to capture everything that moved in front of him, and that's why Boldore, Leavanny, Palpitoad, and Unfezant are suffering.

 

[HumanDawn]

Let's take Burgundy as an example, she has the opportunity to grow, but what the writers are doing with her? They are treating her like she's not important. Even in episodes that are supposed to focus on her, such as Clash of the Connoisseurs!, she is made of comic relief and is underused. And then she decides to participate in another tournament, only to be eliminated in the first round again. You see? The writers do not want to give her more than that. She is there to make Cilan, Trip, or whoever it is look better. That's what's hindering her development, not the pace.

Burgundy is handled differently from the other characters. She was mostly designed for comic relief and some development. The Clash Of The Connoisseurs! helped to establish and flesh out her flaws. It's wasn't her turn to shine and develop like the other characters. When it is, she'll get it.

I totally agree. If Ash had been smart and thought out a little bit before making his crazy captures, we would have six Pokémon with personality and a good amount of focus instead of mere battle machines. But he preferred to capture everything that moved in front of him, and that's why Boldore, Leavanny, Palpitoad, and Unfezant are suffering.

I don't think of them as being mere battle machines. They're a part of the family like everyone else in the group. They let the writers have freedom instead of being forced to use the starters and Pikachu for merchandising purposes. Getting 10 Pokemon to shift and train is also something completely new to Ash. I get more excited when they show up to battle xD.

Uhh, I don't think it hinders development. If this was DP, Burgundy's inevitable character development would come later to not get her character done with.

 

[Caseydia]

Best wishes has it's worse and that is it's writing. It wouldn't matter if it was slow paced or fast paced. I'm actually glad it;s fast paced because that would mean it would have more fillers and would be considered worse than Johto because of how shabby the development of the Pokemon and some characters are being handled.

 

[Mikuri]

Burgundy is handled differently from the other characters. She was mostly designed for comic relief and some development. The Clash Of The Connoisseurs! helped to establish and flesh out her flaws. It's wasn't her turn to shine and develop like the other characters. When it is, she'll get it.

I don't see much difference. All female rivals are used as comic relief in this series, but Bianca managed to redeem herself a little thanks to Clubsplosion. Burgundy's situation, on the other hand, gets worse every episode she appears. Her flaws had already been established and fleshed out, that episode only showed that she has not improved at all since the last time we saw her.

I don't think of them as being mere battle machines. They're a part of the family like everyone else in the group. They let the writers have freedom instead of being forced to use the starters and Pikachu for merchandising purposes. Getting 10 Pokemon to shift and train is also something completely new to Ash. I get more excited when they show up to battle xD.

I don't like to think of them as mere battle machines, but unfortunately, that's what they seem to me. Apart from the episode where they were captured, they had no memorable moments with Ash, and that hinders their development. I also like them and get excited when they show up, but I want to see Ash bonding, training, and having memorable moments with them, but that's asking too much.

I find it funny that for years there were people who railed on Ash for not catching them all, but now he does and the question is: What happened to the character development?

I never wanted Ash to catch them all, I'd rather see him build a team and dedicate himself to this team, spend some time bonding and training this team. But maybe that's just me. XD

To be honest, I always wanted Ash to rotate his Pokémon. On the one hand we get character development and screen time for the new ones, but his old ones are left to rot forever. It's like that argument he had with Gary way back when, Gary rotated his Pokémon a lot, and Ash did not. Personally I think they were both wrong, Gary rotated too much and never developed them enough individually, while Ash focused on a select few and left the others behind whether they had reach their full potential or not. Poor Phanpy having to chase after him at the beginning of the BF comes to mind.

The old Pokémon already had their time to shine; now it's time for the new ones. It's awful that some Pokémon like Gible did not have much screen time, but I prefer to see the new Pokémon having their glory days than seeing an old one returning to steal the spotlight from someone who really needs it.

 

[Yankees4life]

I compare Gen 4 to tiki-taka. Gen 5 is parking the bus. You can't say that Gen 4 didn't hinder the series development. It was soooo slow and the build up was like tiki-taka. Passing the rock without almost anything happening. Not even a shot on goal...

 

[Chiplet]

In Ash's case, maybe. But I don't know really, because it could just be because of the fact that he catches a whole lot of Pokémon in this series, and not the pacing itself. Regardless, I'm perfectly fine with it, really. The training episodes always bored me to tears, and the fact that there were a whole lot of them back in DP didn't make it any better. Yeah, I know, this is ''Pokémon'', but I much more prefer seeing the gang go out on ''mini-adventures'' than seeing them messing around doing some lackluster training. Seeing them train once in a while though I'm perfectly fine with, like the one time we saw Oshawott learn to open its eyes under water, but that was because the training actually was interesting, and created a whole plot itself. I'm also fine with the episodes starting of with short training battles, as that's quite enough for me to pleased.

Oh, got a bit off topic there. But I don't know, really. I definitely don't think that Iris or Dento are affected by it in any way, and neither is Ash, really. It's the fact that he caught too many Pokémon that's hindering development, really.

 

[Peppermint Phoenix]

Plenty is happening it just what is happening is lame. The rivals appear a lot but they don't make me care about them like Morrison and Paul did. Iris gets plenty development she got a lot stronger but nothing that made her a likeable character in the eyes fifty percent of us. Trip gets tons of focus. I have no problem with Ash's pokemon being battle mechine I don't think Ash needs that much development right now he justs needs to be portrayed as competent and I don't think development is going to change how competent he is or looks all that much.

 

[weeaboo_girl84]

No, the crappy writing is hindering the development. Don't blame the pace. ^_^

 

[lordbryan567]

well, old pokemon or not, bw and kanto seem soo very similar to me, how does muk, tauros and kingler relate to palpitoad, boldore, leavany and unfezant? they are in almost every way similar in terms or development. in both cases, ash hardly ever used them, hardly ever bonded with them, hardly ever trained them. the only time i remember ash training tauros was for the rematch at the battle tower. kingler won 3 in a row at his pokemon league debut, muk sadly lost all his matches save once against bellsprout. i think similar thins will show in the unova league, in which the development of these "filler" unova pokemon would have been so bad that giving them a win like kingler did would seem too unrealistec while a lose would seem too harsh to viewers, so i think the writers got themselves in a lose -lose position.

remember how tauros was used to win the orange league? i couldnt believe it, with that little development in them. but if BW does go into a phase like Ol and BF as in knato and hoen, the series could be saved as in those 2 prev series, ash did focus more on the pkm he left out in the past. so who knows? may be too early to tell

 

[Ashfangirl22]

i see some kind of patter here, first ash was inmature (OS), then they shitbomb us with fillers(johto in specific), then ash became mature(AG and DP) then he is inmature again and now there giving us more filler again, see the patern, so at least i'm hoping that ash becomes mature again gen VI

Thats what I'm thinking will happen here, I'm thinking Ash will return to his Johto self in the next series, towards the end of that series he was starting to mature and become a better trainer.

Now ask for the topic itself, it does feel like Best Wishes has made the series go backwards, D/P series seemed like it was improving Ash while he wasn't funny so some people thought he was the most mature there and knew what he was doing, Dawn was treated = To Ash without really stealing his thunder unlike another person we all know and love in this series. Rivals have also taken a turn for the worse, hey remember that Trip guy who was supposed to be Ash's main rival? I sure as heck don't, when Best Wishes ends I don't think any one will remember him and be like "Trip who?" You don't have to skip Best Wishes either, he hardly appears.

 

[blowsave]

Now, we all know that Best Wishes! has a quicker pace compared to Johto, Hoenn, and Sinnoh. Do you think that this pace is hindering the character development and rivalries? If so, how would you fix it (giving characters sufficient development while retaining the series' fast pace)?

A show with dozens and dozens of episodes like BW isn't allowed to use "we didn't have enough enough time" as an excuse. The series is (and has been since Johto started) terrible at how they handle their time. A quick pace by Pokemon standards would get most shows canceled for wasting so much time, even other shows made for kids (what's the length of most kids shows on Nick? Still 65 episodes and done?). What's hindering the series development is Black Wishes being an objectively terrible season of TV, and that's because of a huge list of problems including the pace.

 

[Owain]

Best Wishes's problem is not the pacing, which I actually preferred over DP's tortoise-ness, but rather they are the writer's choices, and that they are afraid to take risks, and end up banging their fingers with the hammer every time they try to be original. While I have no problem with their fillers,which, to me are a world more entertaining than DP's bland training episodes, but due to the lack of meaning behind many of the plot's events, we end up not caring about what happens, eve if something good is estabilished sometimes, it seems to be cleaned up as the next episode comes. Also, they're using their characters very badly, while I do buy many of these characters, this only saddens me more, since I'm seeing them doing the opposite of progressing.

 

[Ampharos King]

I agree with the above statement. It's not the pacing that is making this series' writing terrible, but instead the types of episodes that the writers decide to place in between major story arcs. I liked the initial parts of the BW storyline because there were not as many fillers (there were only about 3 in the first 20 episodes), and at the time most of the main characters had a lot of development. After Ash received his third badge, this is when the writers decided to use more filler episodes. Remember that this was during a time period in which most of the main characters' rivals were introduced and/or developed. Unfortunately, most of the storylines during this breaking point of the series had Ash and co. interacting with random COTDs and other pokemon (which usually debut in that week's episode), instead of focusing on Ash's pokemon or any of the recurring rivals. Most of the recurring characters didn't even appear outside of the tournament arcs for a good portion of the series; Bianca really was the only exception to the rule, and Trip's appearance during the Alder episode was simply to flesh out a character point that was introduced in BW031.

I feel that the 20-episode gap between the third and fourth gym battles could have been handled better. I would have wanted the writers to develop the recurring characters in ways that they didn't feel like showcased COTDs. Most of the tournament episodes were fine, but there were just so many fillers in the middle of BW that you could have easily skipped over without missing anything. Unfortunately, character development was given way in favor of those filler episodes. Consequently, the recurring characters in the BW arc (Trip, Bianca, Stephan, Burgundy, and Georgia) hardly progressed in the dozens of episodes that aired since their respective debuts. We hardly saw any engaging rivalries between the main characters and these recurring characters. All of this could have been mitigated if the writers spent their time fleshing out these individual characters. I might have cared more about Iris and Georgia's feud with Dragon-types or Burgundy's grudge with Cilan for beating her, if the writers decided to have episodes that detailed these characters maturing and learning in ways that did not include obtaining new pokemon or badges.

I felt that the 100-episode range was an appropriate time between the start of a regional journey and the respective regional league competition. Unfortunately, most of the episodes that aired in this two-year timeframe didn't really amount to much development or growth. The fact that we didn't even get to see half of the recurring characters' teams (even in the Unova League) is proof that the writers didn't really invest much time to develop any of them. Even though some of the DP rivals had pokemon that were only featured once, they still made their mark on their respective series by influencing how the main characters would develop their own teams. Ursula and Kenny really did not appear much in DP, for example, but their unique contest styles greatly influenced how Jessie and Dawn used appeals in future contests. Paul, Barry, and even a few E4 members like Flint and Bertha had some influence on the battling style that Ash used in the Sinnoh League. I never got the impression that Bianca, Stephan, or Trip's presences influenced Ash's battling style for the Unova League.

Granted, this series did have a somewhat faster pace than expected, and the writers could have waited 10-20 more episodes before they began the Unova League. During that time, we might have seen some full battles between Ash and a few of his rivals (probably Trip and Bianca), or Cilan interacting with a much more experienced S-rank connoisseur that would have influenced his pokemon evaluations. Nevertheless, the series' pacing was a secondary reason as to why this series had poor writing and character development.