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Watching these reactions to the trailer is great, shows how high our hopes are for this arc
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I don't know if it's already mentioned, but is that Blastoise's leg in the special preview at around 0:05 sec? It would be sick if that's the case and that we will see Gary's Blastoise, but I won't get my hopes up.
That still doesn't solve the issue that many people here have already pointed out, which is the lack of meaningful battle screentime and development that Ash's Journeys team has been getting so far. If anything, having Ash job to Iris would highlight how poorly his team has been handled throughout this series. Gengar performed quite well in the battle against Visquez before jobbing against Korrina's Mienshao and then promptly being forgotten. Dragonite's last meaningful achievement was beating Mega Lucario, which was several dozens of episodes ago. Riolu received plenty of screentime before it evolved, but it's barely done anything notable as a Lucario so far. G. Farfetch'd jobbed in the first battle against Bea, and then the writers just awkwardly forgot about it for a dozen episodes or so before they remembered "Ah right, this thing should be getting some development." There were plenty of opportunities to develop all of these Pokemon, but it seems like most of those opportunities went to Pikachu instead.I had a thought on the subject of Ash using his reserves, what if he completely jobs to Iris in their 2v2 battle, and he realizes if he's going to advance to Hyper rank, he's going to have to stop with his self-imposed 'fresh start' philosophy and start using his reserves to progress?
I had a thought on the subject of Ash using his reserves, what if he completely jobs to Iris in their 2v2 battle, and he realizes if he's going to advance to Hyper rank, he's going to have to stop with his self-imposed 'fresh start' philosophy and start using his reserves to progress?
Unlike most of the regions where he doesnt care about winning or losing random battles, this is time when winning battles actually are important, as every ranked battle puts him closer or further from his goal of being in the tournament. He can't really afford to handicap himself for the sake of a challenge.
[Bold 1] That isn't out of character at all. Ash literally did this against Claire in the Johto region. His regular Johto team couldn't cut it, so he brought in Snorlax and Charizard to pick up the slack. In fact, it is in Ash's character to rely on his reserves in battles that he considers to be difficult for him.I think that it would be really out of character for Ash to think that way. Responding to a defeat by saying that he needs to rely more on his reserves instead of training his current team just would be jarring. It's also extremely odd to think of Ash sticking with his current team as being a handicap when it's a mostly fully evolved team. They're not unbeatable by any means, but they aren't inexperienced either. I'm kind of surprised by that notion given how people were generally excited with how different and unexpected Ash's team was seen at the start of the series. Even if they weren't mostly fully evolved, it seems kind of harsh way to view his current lineup instead of wanting them to become stronger/more prominent in the series.
I also don't think that the whole winning battles is actually important this time around really works with how the PWC has been handled. Yeah, each ranked battle puts him closer to his goal, but the matches clearly aren't given that kind of importance. Ash can climb up the ranks off screen, most of his matches aren't the main focus of an episode and the bulk of his progress in the Great Class has been off-screen too. Suddenly making it seem like he can't afford to lose when it is possible for him to just climb back up again would feel kind of forced. Ash wants to win all of his battles of course, but he's most likely going to be more laid back and just enjoy the battle rather than focused on how he can't afford to lose.
Besides all that, this doesn't really fix the issue of how his current team would just continued to be sidelined. I can't really blame people for being excited to see Ash's reserves and want to see them be used more frequently going forward. Ash hasn't used his reserves since the Sinnoh League and we haven't seen his BW or XY teams since the end of their respective series either. My concern is that if they can't really give a good amount of screentime/development for Ash's current team as it is, adding his reserves into the mix is just going to make that problem worse, or at least not really resolve it. If I had more confidence for them to balance out that focus and/or Ash's Journeys team was handled better up to this point, then I think I'd be more into the idea of Ash using his reserves. As cool as it would be to see Ash use some his fan favorite Pokemon again, I still would rather see him get new Pokemon and develop his current team instead.
I agree with all of these things except on Pikachu getting development-Pikachu hasn't received any proper development since OS. The writers clearly have an issue on remembering the fact that Ash's Journeys' team even exists, which is really disappointing since all their individual personalities are actually all really interesting but we never see how they operate as a team. The closest thing we ever got to that was Dragonite holding Riolu and Pikachu in one of the Darkest Days episodes...and...that's it. That was the closest thing to a sense of camaraderie I felt from this team. A background scene. How would Dragonite and Gengar interact? We have no clue, despite them living in the same place. How would Gengar and Sirfetched interact? No clue, once more. We don't even see team shots except in the opening. Despite the heavy marketing and attempt at showcasing every kind of pokemon more than any other series, Journeys is ridiculously bad at making the pokemon feel an essential part of the show. They don't even feel relevant at this point.That still doesn't solve the issue that many people here have already pointed out, which is the lack of meaningful battle screentime and development that Ash's Journeys team has been getting so far. If anything, having Ash job to Iris would highlight how poorly his team has been handled throughout this series. Gengar performed quite well in the battle against Visquez before jobbing against Korrina's Mienshao and then promptly being forgotten. Dragonite's last meaningful achievement was beating Mega Lucario, which was several dozens of episodes ago. Riolu received plenty of screentime before it evolved, but it's barely done anything notable as a Lucario so far. G. Farfetch'd jobbed in the first battle against Bea, and then the writers just awkwardly forgot about it for a dozen episodes or so before they remembered "Ah right, this thing should be getting some development." There were plenty of opportunities to develop all of these Pokemon, but it seems like most of those opportunities went to Pikachu instead.
[Bold 1] That isn't out of character at all. Ash literally did this against Claire in the Johto region. His regular Johto team couldn't cut it, so he brought in Snorlax and Charizard to pick up the slack. In fact, it is in Ash's character to rely on his reserves in battles that he considers to be difficult for him.
Johtoo said:[Bold 2] This is an important point here. Ash hasn't used his reserves since Sinnoh, and this has been long overdue. Is Ash supposed to just forget his Pokemon forever? What about the other undeveloped Pokemon on his list? Should they just fade into obscurity? The anime has always been careful about this in the past and made sure that previous Pokemon that were left underdeveloped were developed later on. Look at Quilava, phanphy, etc. Instead of worrying about Infernape stealing the spotlight, think about the possibility that other Pokemon that deserve greater development might actually get that.
I hope so, really. The battles wont get easier. So we can forget the possibility of Gary in the PWC due the Project Mew trailer?Wait i just realized. The opening has a shot with a lot of Pokemon in it, but we also see Corphish and Palpitoad there. Initally, we thought this might point towards Goh catching them. But what if Ash takes all of his Pokemon with him to Sakuragi or slowly puts them in there.
I just hope we'll at least get a mention or even just a cameo from Tracey. I know a lot of people really hate him for his Orange Islands role, and I think he was kinda lame there too, but I really liked him as a supporting character as Oak's assistant, especially in Chronicles. Although I know his original voice actor died so idk.
Yeah, I was trying to say that many of the opportunities (i.e. PWC battles) that could've been used to showcase or develop Ash's Journeys team were used to just give Pikachu more screentime instead. Probably should've made that clearer.I agree with all of these things except on Pikachu getting development-Pikachu hasn't received any proper development since OS.
There's still the other form of Urshifu that Ash could get as a counterpart to this one. Perhaps during a future Isle of Armor arc.Also relieved that we don’t have to worry about Ash/Goh getting Kubfu/urshifu now.
Johto was a time when Ash hadn't yet adapted the philosophy of resetting his team for every new region, so I don't think it really counts as evidence.[Bold 1] That isn't out of character at all. Ash literally did this against Claire in the Johto region. His regular Johto team couldn't cut it, so he brought in Snorlax and Charizard to pick up the slack. In fact, it is in Ash's character to rely on his reserves in battles that he considers to be difficult for him.