Poll: Which region was Ash's team handled best?

[TFSpock]

I couldn't find this thread otherwise, and if it exists elsewhere, please move it or lock it.

So I've been thinking lately, which region handled Ash's Pokémon best? Each had it's ups and downs.

For example Kanto, which gave a lot of focus to Ash's Pokémon, but only focused on a select few, like Charizard, and Bulbasaur. Then there was Johto, which gave more spread out focus, but overall less than Kanto. And there was Hoenn, where the writers gave most of Ash's Pokémon good focus while maintaining a reasonable amount of Pokémon. Then came Sinnoh, where Ash did not catch as many Pokémon as in the other regions, but overall gave all of them better focus, than, say, Johto. And of course, we have Unova, where Ash is catching many Pokémon, but only develops a few.

So what do you think? Which region did the writers handle Ash's team best?

 

[Cybersai]

Sinnoh. The only problem was Torterra evolved for no reason. It's final form has no wins outside of TR.

 

[Aestivate]

Moved to the Live Caster as this is a Contest-hall style thread.

Remember to indicate the reasons for your selections, everyone or else you may get Pointless Post infracted~

 

[AshK]

Hoenn. Not really counting the battle frontier but most of the generation the entire focus (minus pikachu) was on his hoenn team. Even the pokemon league were all them. They also seemed to be the most together team, and it looked that way when he was training with them in the beginning of the league. They all received some pretty good attention and character development as well. I am glad he gave my favourite hoenn pokes of his (swellow, corphish) the spotlight for the battle dome frontier battle.

 

[chimera]

Sinnoh was handled well besides Chimchar/Infernape eating up a lot of the spotlight.
Hoenn was handled well besides the fact that they all had terrible movesets.

 

[SolgaleoGX]

Sinnoh. All of his team members, except maybe Gible, got good development. And even if Gible didn't receive any real development, it was decently showcased.

Also the return of the reserves was handled decently. If anything was wrong with that aspect was the whole Tobias thing.

 

[Jukain]

I also said Sinnoh. Not only did a lot of them get a lot of attention, but most of them also had good characterization. (Staraptor and Torterra being the least there, although admittedly, Torterra only got gimped once he evoed) His Hoenn team may be more accomplished in how much they had to battle, but less of them did get to shine overall. Torkoal in particular seemed left out most of the time, but I may be remembering things wrong there.

 

[Blue1225]

Sinnoh. Overall it got a little better each region, except for Johto where Ash's pokemon were a mix of Kanto and Johto. Didn't really have a set team for Johto and I think the newer pokemon suffered from it. The only negative about Sinnoh was of course Infernape taking a lot of the attention away from the other pokemon, but even with that the others got decent development and had a chance to shine in their own right. The League was handled really well and was an opportunity that the writers used to the fullest, by taking the time to shine some light on a few of Ash's older pokemon. Hoenn is a close 2nd, because besides Pikachu every pokemon that was focused on was a pokemon Ash had caught in Hoenn. They got a lot of screentime during the region and the league and I think his team was recieved the attention they deserved. (Except for Torkoal)

 

[Joshawott]

You can't beat Sinnoh in that respect. Ash's Infernape is obviously one that stands out due to it's connection with Paul, however, each Pokémon received development at some point. Whereas in the past, there would always be a team member neglected - with Sinnoh, I can't recall a single one being neglected.

 

[Duque]

Sinnoh for sure. i say, look to the others! Kanto team was a so so, since we barely have them showing some signs of emotional development beside pikachu, charizard and, at last, bulbasaur. Pidgeot was shafted. Squirtle just got something to do by the OI.

Johto team started better, but, again, with noctowl's personality turning into blank, cyndaquil being the most used on gyms didn't help totodile and bayleef. And phanpy came too late.

Houenn is my second favorite team. Saddly, torkoal was the weak point, because it's a cool pokemon which got the worst treatment.

Sinnoh team had its problems (like gliscor and torterra's terrible battle records), but, overall, it was the best team, personality, development and charisma. Even gible. Pikachu, I have to say, was there just because... it's pikachu.

 

[Grave-E]

Ehh, kind of hard to say. This has always been a glaring problem with the show, imo. They have a bad habit of piling a lot of attention onto one pokemon, have another 1 or 2 as backup (one of which is usually Pikachu), and leaving the remaining guys in the dust.

Sinnoh did well with this, but was largely inconsistant. It would almost always be a case of a pokemon being used frequently, before suddenly being ignored for the duration, or vice versa. Looking at it in hindsight, it kind of evens things out, but when actually following along with the show as it aired, it tended to be really jarring.

In terms of being consistant about it, I suppose AG was the closest to giving all his 'mons balanced screentime. Initially it was really lopsided, with Taillow being ignored while Treeko and (ugh) Pikachu were the only two Ash had to rely on. When Corphish came along, things steadily got better, and then came to it's peak once Swellow evolved. If you're willing to say the extensive Ice Beam training and league matches from Snorunt/Glalie were good enough, the only real casualty in the long run was Torkoal.

 

[Cybersai]

I think Sinnoh proves that Ash should get no more than 5-6 pokemon a region. In Sinnoh they *almost* got it right, but as said Torterra happened too late and Gible of course was a late capture. It really bugs me about Torterra though, the only evolution to not amount to anything.

Hoenn would have been close to perfect if only Torkoal wasn't treated like crap every time it was used. I would have liked Snorunt a bit earlier too.

 

[TeddiUrsa]

I think Sinnoh proves that Ash should get no more than 5-6 pokemon a region. In Sinnoh they *almost* got it right, but as said Torterra happened too late and Gible of course was a late capture. It really bugs me about Torterra though, the only evolution to not amount to anything.

Torterra isn't the only victim of poor balance within Satoshi's team.
Buizel was terribly ignored in Sinnoh's later half, Gliscor was shoved off the team before it could really shine, while Gible only got one ( albeit very good) win in the whole series ( plus its training grew tired pretty quickly, which is a shame due to Gible's awesome character ), Muku.hawk had big shoes to fill after Oosubame ( just like Shooti after Shinji ) and didn't really get enough screentime either. As awesome as Infernape was it stared in Gym 5,7 and 8, beat 2 out of 3 Pokémon in the 7ths gym AND was the key in beating Shinji, so it had more than enough screentime in my eyes.
Pikachu thankfully took a backseat in DP though.

 

[Cybersai]

Buizel still got plenty of focus. It didn't matter it was toned down a bit. Used in most of the Gyms and outside in fillers.

Gliscor got the best treatment of a 6th slot pokemon in the series, it lasted for nearly 100 episodes. Gible also didn't fair badly either for being so late.

 

[TeddiUrsa]

Sure, Buizel got a decent focus until the middle, but so did Turtwig. Buizel's last gym battle in which it did anything besides being the fall-guy was DP 102. Almost 90 episodes before the series' ending. The pacing was the problem with the DP team. Buizel and Turtwig recieved a good treatment early on but kinda faded into the shadows after DP's halfpoint. It just was worse with Turtwig because it evolved twice and still got shafted.

And while Gliscor had the bonus of being caught early it never did much battling in its saga which is a shame. Sure, it has been around for almost 100 episodes, but it was mostly the comic-relief character at the sidelines ( not that I didn't love those scene, but even those were kinda rare when you look back). For example: Why did Gliscor have to be the fall guy in the 7th gym?

Nya, that's crying over spilled milk I guess. ^^

 

[LuxrayOfTheWild]

Sinnoh was definatley handled the best and arguably Ash's strongest team.

 

[Ampharos King]

I am going to say that Ash's Sinnoh team was handled the best so far:
- Ash obtained a full team of pokemon within the first 65 episodes of the series. In AG, it took well over 100 episodes for Ash to obtain his sixth Hoenn pokemon. Even prior to Ash catching his sixth pokemon, the writers still focused on the other pokemon that the trainer had on him at the time.
- The writers have given Ash the opportunity to battle numerous times in this series. If Ash wasn't battling against some of his rivals like Paul or Barry, Ash would battle recurring characters like Reggie and COTDs. To sum it up, Ash fought more often in DP than he had in previous sagas.
- Ash's Sinnoh pokemon were outside of their Poke Balls various times throughout the series. There was a larger emphasis towards training in DP than in the previous sagas. If Ash was planning on training specific members of his team, he would send out all of the pokemon he had on him at the time. This wasn't the case in any of the other series thus far.
- Speaking of which, there were literally entire episodes that focused on one of Ash's pokemon learning a specific move. This included Ash's Turtwig learning Energy Ball, Staravia learning Brave Bird, and Buizel learning Ice Punch. Oh, and don't get me started on how long it took for Gible to master its Draco Meteor. Hoenn and Johto had relatively less training episodes.
- Pikachu has taken a backseat throughout the majority of DP, allowing the writers to focus on the other pokemon Ash had on him at the time. This was especially true towards gym battles. This had not been the case in the majority of the other series, where Pikachu was always the center of attention in gym battles.
- Ash participated in specific competitions such as the Wallace Cup, the Hearthome Tag Battle, and the Pokeringer allowing the writers to develop and narrow their focus on one of his pokemon. This was rarely done for members of Ash's teams in the previous series.
- Unlike past sagas, most of Ash's Sinnoh pokemon were given defined personalities right from the get go. Aipom expressed her love towards contests, and there were episodes that had focused on this subplot. Ash's Buizel feuded with Pikachu before its trainer's gym battle against Crasher Wake, but eventually reconciled their differences after the pokemon saw how far Pikachu was willing to battle for it. Gligar's inability to glide in the air, as well as its fear of heights, provided some comic relief during training sessions. Although this had been the case in previous sagas, the writers had very rarely acted on these pokemons's personalities in relevant, episodic scenarios.

Buizel and Turtwig recieved a good treatment early on but kinda faded into the shadows after DP's halfpoint. It just was worse with Turtwig because it evolved twice and still got shafted.

Not necessarily true. Grotle had received a lot of development after it evolved from a Turtwig. Grotle was Piloswine's sparring partner after the latter pokemon evolved a few episodes earlier. In that same episode, both Ash and Dawn have registered these pokemon to compete in one of Team Rocket's "exercise regimens." Grotle learned Rock Climb in the Snover episode. Ash used Grotle in his gym match against Candice, and it successfully defeated Candice's Sneasel using the training style that Paul's Torterra had taught it. Ash had also used Grotle in his battle against the Frontier Brain Palmer, where the pokemon gained an accidental power-up after it swallowed its Energy Ball attack. Grotle was used as Dawn's Cyndaquil's training partner in the episode after the pokemon hatched from its egg. Grotle was seen swallowing its Energy Ball attack again in order for Dawn's Mamoswine to imitate the same concept using its Ice Shard so it could be used in contest battles.

It is important to remember that Ash's Torterra had evolved into its final form very late into the saga. It was during the time period when the writers needed to resolve Dawn's Grand Festival storyline. Torterra had largely been overshadowed by Ash's Infernape and Gible during later filler episodes of the saga. Nevertheless, Torterra was used in two important battles prior to the Sinnoh League, which were both losses. Torterra understandably lost against Bertha's Hippowdon, which was a pokemon commanded by a member of the Sinnoh Elite 4, but it still gave a good fight. Torterra was also the fall guy in the gym battle against Volkner to prove a point that Volkner's Electric-type pokemon were capable of defeating Ground-types. Of course, the writers had wanted to focus on Ash's Infernape, who had only recently begun to control its Blaze ability. It also certainly didn't help in the Sinnoh League when the writers decided to allow Ash to use his Oaked pokemon in the competition.

Yes, Torterra was screwed during the later parts of the saga, but it had been the case for Ash's Buizel and Staraptor as well. The former was fortunate in that the writers spent an episode having the pokemon learn the Ice Punch attack, which would prove to be useful in only one important battle against Paul's Gastrodon. On the other hand, Staraptor received brief cameo appearances alongside Dawn's Togekiss. Coincidentally, all three of these pokemon were defeated by Paul's Drapion in the Sinnoh League within mere seconds of one another. This could have been the case because the writers had wanted to focus on, yes again, Ash's Pikachu, Infernape, and the Gliscor that had disappeared for 30 episodes in order to train with the Air Master.

For example: Why did Gliscor have to be the fall guy in the 7th gym?

Ash's Grotle and Staraptor needed to win over their opponents to justify their absence in the past two gym battles. Ash's Chimchar was also used to defeat Candice's Snover and Abomasnow, understandably so because both of those pokemon were weak against Fire-type attacks. I am glad that the writers justified Ash's decision to use Gliscor in that battle because it knew Fire Fang and Steel Wing, but it was still 4x weak against Ice-type attacks due to its typing. This was why Gliscor lost against Snover.

 

[Almonds]

Sinnoh for the well balanced team