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SPOILERS: Masters Eight Discussion/Speculation Thread

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I'm guessing the Masters 8 goes like this:

Round 1:
Ash vs. Cynthia (I just hope that Ash uses reserves and doesn't stick to him current team)
Alain vs. Diantha (Diantha should go down like a dog for being the worst Champion here. Seems fitting it's against Alain)
Leon vs. Steven
Iris vs. Lance (Dragon trainer vs. Dragon trainer)

Semi finals:
Ash vs. Alain (About time Alain went down)
Iris vs. Leon (Yet another Dragon trainer losing to Leon)

Finals:
Ash vs. Leon
 
Handy Man said:
I’m fully anticipating most, or all, of Ash’s friends to watch the Masters Eight matches in person. Ash already told Serena that he’s participating, Clemont and Bonnie watched the Drasna match, and Cilan would have every reason to attend considering both Ash and Iris are in the Masters Eight. Considering how much publicity the Masters Eight seems to get in-universe, I’m sure a lot of Ash’s friends would already be aware of his success. I really hope it happens.
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Could explain why Brock was randomly camping out, maybe he's making his way to the stadium.
 
Articfoxgamez said:
Gotta love the master's 8 having two people with a Charizard as an ace. That's it that's all I have to add.
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Well it was obvious that there could be more Charizards besides Leon's Charizard, Charizard is one of the staff's favorites obviously!:lapras:
I wouldn't even be surprised if the PWC final was Leon vs Alain! LOL
 
isrrael120 said:
Well it was obvious that there could be more Charizards besides Leon's Charizard, Charizard is one of the staff's favorites obviously!:lapras:
I wouldn't even be surprised if the PWC final was Leon vs Alain! LOL
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Defeat fire with fire
Or in this case defeat Charizard with Charizard, it is the only way.

Also gotta love the image of all the masters 8 and their Aces. Just all of these people with this big powerful looking Pokemon, then there's just Ash with his Pikachu.
 
Articfoxgamez said:
Defeat fire with fire
Or in this case defeat Charizard with Charizard, it is the only way.

Also gotta love the image of all the masters 8 and their Aces. Just all of these people with this big powerful looking Pokemon, then there's just Ash with his Pikachu.
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It bugs me that the two shiny Pokémon don't mirror each other. Lance's Gyarados is the first one while Steve's Metagross is the seventh one. They should have been the 2nd and 7th ones or 1st and 8th ones. Same with the Charizards.
 
Articfoxgamez said:
Defeat fire with fire
Or in this case defeat Charizard with Charizard, it is the only way.

Also gotta love the image of all the masters 8 and their Aces. Just all of these people with this big powerful looking Pokemon, then there's just Ash with his Pikachu.
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yeah XD
I also like that official image, we have 7 strong looking mons and a cute rat!:LOL:
 
If we do get a bracket style tournament, this is how I see it:

Semi-finals
Leon vs Iris - Iris needs a round 1 win for her return to have purpose
Cynthia vs Ash - Cynthia at #2 makes it unlikely she would get knocked out round 1

Quarterfinals
Alain vs Ash - Obligatory rematch
Lance vs Iris - I tend to agree with others. If Iris is going to beat anyone, it'll be the Dragon guy
Cynthia vs Steven - Cynthia knocking off the #3 is probably the most respectable win she can get, I guess
Leon vs Diantha - Throwaway match
 
Yeah Diantha is definitely going to be a throwaway match. I'm assuming the only real reason she is here is because the champions from all the other regions are here too.
 
Ash has 'Battle this person' flags with Leon, Alain, Cynthia, and Leon, debatably with Iris too. We'll find out I suppose.
 
puddleths said:
If we do get a bracket style tournament, this is how I see it:

Semi-finals
Leon vs Iris - Iris needs a round 1 win for her return to have purpose
Cynthia vs Ash - Cynthia at #2 makes it unlikely she would get knocked out round 1

Quarterfinals
Alain vs Ash - Obligatory rematch
Lance vs Iris - I tend to agree with others. If Iris is going to beat anyone, it'll be the Dragon guy
Cynthia vs Steven - Cynthia knocking off the #3 is probably the most respectable win she can get, I guess
Leon vs Diantha - Throwaway match
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In thinking about the upcoming episode preview with Paul. My inclination is an alternate bracket is more likely:

Quarterfinals:
Lance vs Iris - Don't see this, or the outcome, changing
Leon vs Diantha - Same as above
Now here's the difference
Cynthia vs Ash - Paul having a training battle using Garchomp leads me to believe Cynthia is Ash's round 1 opponent. Paul could also inspire Ash to use Infernape.
Alain vs Steven - A conclusion to their battle in the mega evolution special

Semifinals:
Leon vs Iris - No change
Alain vs Ash - I think the possibility of Ash-Greninja getting used makes more sense here than round 1
 
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I hope that the battles aren't 1 v 1. That'd be omega cheap. Ideally, all of the battles here would be 6 v 6, but they can't spare the episodes.
Since I probably won't get my 6 v 6 wish, I want to see how the different champions interact with each other. Like maybe spend an episode or two on this. It'd also be fun for everyone to realize that Ash is the thread that binds them all.
 
I guessing Iris will battle Cynthia since she is her idol. Feels kind of weird to start advertising Iris now when she has been irrelevant for so long (hint at BW remakes?). She didn't even get a cameo in XY or SM and now she is suddenly important enough to be in the Masters 8??? Even though this might be the arc where Ash finally becomes the champion for real?

Perhaps they should have skipped Koharu and made Iris the traveling companion in Journeys instead. Then they could have listened to the criticism people had towards both Iris' characterization and BW as a whole and redeemed her somehow. Now it feels a little jarring that she is ranked higher than Ash since all of her progression happened off-screen which was apparently so amazing that she is now stronger than Ash despite all the development he had since BW.

Having a strong female protagonist who battles is great but it's important to show not tell. I still want to see a girl who has a badge quest or at least something similar. The format of Journeys would have been perfect for that kind of plot. It almost feels like this is a half-hearted attempt to make up for excluding Koharu so much.

I also wish Cynthia was the final opponent instead of Leon. She beat Tobias and his legendaries so she should logically be the strongest. Besides what even happened to Tobias? Who was he and why did he have all those legendaries? Was he just a reference to that Japanese TCG player and nothing more? So many questions and no answers...

I also wonder if Cynthia has a Giratina like she does in Pokemon Masters. If they can reference her Kommo-o from the mobile game maybe she also has one in the anime as well. That could actually explain how she beat Tobias without making her even more of a Mary Sue than she already is. Not to mention it would have been a fun callback to that dream episode in DP when she had a Rayquaza!

Wouldn't that make for a cool final battle? Especially since Ash is becoming the champion now which has been his goal since the OG anime two decades ago. Instead of even more Charizard promotion...
 
We've finally reached the Masters 8. The PWC has been a messy ride, but we re finally here. We know this will function as a tournament, and its almost certain Ash will make it to the finals. His dream has been to face Leon since the beginning. He's been the endgame since day 1. Who will be the two opponents Ash will have to face to fight Leon?

We have...

1. Leon
2. Champion Cynthia
3. Steven Stone
4. Lance
5. Diantha
6. Alain
7. Iris
8. Ash

Of all of these, there are a few matchups I can think lf that would be great to see.

Ash vs. Alain: Alain is an opponent Ash has faced multiple times and lost to each time, especially at a time he shouldn't have. While it won't fix what happened in the Kalos League finals, Ash deserves the chance to FINALLY beat Alain, who has been needing a good defeat. I'd hope that they use reserves here and Greninja gets to defeat Alain's broken as hell Mega Charizard X.

Ash vs. Champion Cynthia: This is a battle that has been years in the making. Ash has interacted with the queen on several occasions, more than anyone that isn't his former travelling companion, Iris. Champion Cynthia has always hoped to face Ash and even expressed her desire to see him in the Champion's League one day.

Alain vs. Steven Stone: The two have battled before and worked together before. Something about a battle between them just feels right.

Iris vs. Lance: The battle of the Dragon Masters. This is one I'd love to see, especially given Iris' goal of becoming one of the strongest Dragon tyle trainers. I think having one of Ash's former traveling companions here does give the chance for some good interactions and I'd just like to see them rooting for each other.

I do think Alain and Champion Cynthia will be the two Ash has to face, and I think they'd be the most meaningful for him to face. While Iris is a former traveling companion, Ash has already faced her in Journeys. Alain is a character he deserves the chance to defeat after multiple losses to him and being realistic, why else would they bring him back? Champion Cynthia just feels like there's been build up for. He's had many interactions with her over the course of 3 different series. Its time for a battle between them.
 
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So the Masters 8 is finally here huh? Looking at that line-up, it does have the unfortunate catch-22 of being boringly predictable since if the Regional Champions weren't there it would be strange. I also can't muster up great excitement about the combatants since we haven't spent much time with most of them as individuals barring Iris and maybe Leon.

Hopefully the battles will be good though.
 
Turbo said:
I don't know who Ash will replace but this is my guess for who will be there when Ash gets there

And if to rank them
1. Leon
2. Lance
3. Wallace
4. Cynthia
5. Iris
6. Raihan
7. Ash
8. Flint

I can see someone like Paul being there instead of a Flint or Wallace as well but idk
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so my prediction was wrong lol
Not really concerned about the Wallace thing as he and Steven were interchangeable for me just didn’t know if Steven would be that into battling in this tournament despite being champion so I picked Wallace cause of the opening

I figured Flint and Raihan would stay as everyone kept saying they couldn’t introduce new characters like Diantha and Steven so I thought they were safe but no lol we didn’t even see Flint fall out
(I wonder if Iris beat Flint since she’s 7 meaning she probably just got in there before Ash)
But I’m perfectly okay with Diantha, champion had some Kalos love since she made sense

Alain I’m still iffy on but of all his “rivals” Alain made sense only would of preferred Paul becahse he was hinted to appear because of the opening so his role is still up in the air

And I nailed Iris! I didn’t even love Iris like that but everyone being against her made me want to pull for her
She just made sense to me, you can discuss that in her debut in journeys she was written more like a gym leader but they said she was champion then so when she reappeared in the opening I thought it was a lock and her inclusion doesn’t hurt no matter how much people say her story was done

All in all I love the master 8 selection

Now for how the master class will go…
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I don’t truly know
I feel the obvious battles for Ash would be Alain, Cynthia, then Leon as Alain seems almost only for Ash if not then for Steven to win against
Cynthia the Gen 4 rep because of the Gen 4 love plus her and Ash have that history
And Leon is Leon

But Lance always being in the end credits for PWC stuff, Diantha and Ash have history and honestly I know people will hate it but I can see an Ash vs Iris rematch as a more friendly match seem somewhat possible for a curve ball

MimeyTheKeeper said:
Now that we know MC members, good time to resurrect this thread, don't you agree?

So we have
1. Leon
2. Cynthia
3. Steven
4. Lance
5. Diantha
6. Alain
7. Iris
8. Ash

I would not be referencing my Blueprint Thread much, since the aim of that post was different kind of speculation.
But I will pull off some ideas from there.

Frankly, seeing those names, I partially hope that we will not have tournament tree system, although round-robin is also very unlikely and will be difficult to follow.
The reason why tournament tree is little bit souring is, that with these names and in order to make at least some seeding sense (no Leon vs Cynthia in 1. round), narratively it is almost settled.

Since TOP seeded guys should match up against lower 5-8 and we almost certainly know Leon vs Ash is finals, then almost only one path emerges.

Ash vs Cynthia (Leon is off limits, this match is 15 years expected, more logical and desired than Lance or Steven)
Alain vs Steven (bros from Mega Evolution specials, it almost begs to finish Mega Charizard X vs Mega Metagross)
Iris vs Lance (with her goal to become strongest Dragon Master, the most logical choice)
Diantha vs Leon (Leon's quaterfinal challenger would always be the least intersting, because he will obviously win, but Diantha makes reasonable challange with her speedy mind-controlled Mega Gardevoir)

Ash vs Alain (like really, that would be subverting expectations of century not to have them compete again now)
Iris vs Leon (I have my problems with Iris being here, despite in fact quite liking her character! But OK, since we are hyping her, this would provide emotional engagement in other semifinals. And there is little to be gained by having Lance defeat her and then be defeated by Leon again)

Almost anything else is hard to justify by logic or narrative.
On the other hand, if that is the case, I will be definitely looking forward to almost any match, despite its outcome being rather obviously telegraphed.

One bummer though, if I am not mistaken, that would mean we will not see Lance to win one big match on-screen in whole 25 years of Anime. That makes me sad.
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I like MimeytheKeeper’s prediction

If i had to have a different one then
Round 1/Quarterfinals
Ash vs Alain the revenge match
Steven vs Diantha the XYZ champion debate settled
Cynthia vs Iris battling her idol
Lance vs Leon the previous finals rematch

Round 2/semifinals
Ash vs Cynthia the destiny battle
Leon vs Steven “President” vs “King”

Round 3/Finals
Ash vs Leon the Promised Battle

Or for something less predictable lol

Round1
Ash vs Lance Kanto natives
Alain vs Diantha Kalos natives
Leon vs Iris still a little kid
Steven vs Cynthia the mature ones

Round 2
Ash vs Diantha the rematch we never thought would happen
Leon vs Cynthia who really is the strongest? 1v2

Round 3
Ash vs Cynthia

Or Leon lol the final battle

Idk but looking forward to these 8
9BF76D5E-E00D-442D-B337-E1B670343A0F.jpeg
 
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