The Pokemon Contest Museum (TPCM)

[skynerel]

EDIT: I was going to dedicate this board to background contest coordinators only, but since I feel very passionate about contests. I decided I'll be writing about everything related to contests. I won't drop my series of background coordinators, but I will
also talk about other fun facts. *

I pay attention to detail when I'm watching the anime and one thing I like to pay attention to, is background characters. Some of them have interesting designs or tell us little things about the world of pokemon.

I decided to make a compilation of all the recurring background coordinators that appear in the anime. Usually these characters don't have dialogue or names and they only appear in various scenes in a couple of episodes. I will start with Sinnoh Contests and I might add Kanto and Hoenn subsequently.

I'll start with Coordinator number 1. To the top left of Zoey you can see a boy with a red ribbon. He first appears in the Jubilife Contest and makes it through the appeal round.

He is paired against Dawn for the first battle. Which means he is the first ever coordinator that Dawn faces in an official contest battle.

It's safe to assume this bidoof belongs to him because Dawn only had one battle before she faced Zoey and we know he was paired against her in the score board. Their battle is only shown in a still image.

We can see him on the background in multiple shots.

In some of those shots, his face changes and his hairstyle as well, but the clothing remains the same. I think that happens because the animators were just trying to fill the background with multiple stock characters and weren't that concerned about some minor inconsistencies.

Another one!

A character with an almost identical outfit appears in the Wallace Cup, but I don't think it's meant to be the same person. It's still interesting that the animators would recycle clothing for another background character.

He later appears in "Dawn of a Royal Day" and once again makes it through the preliminaries.

We later see him to the right of Kenny in the Grand Festival welcome party. So he at least managed to garner five ribbons to participate.

He is later seen in the contest waiting room to the right of Zoey watching the performances.

He didn't make it through the appeal round in the Grand Festival though.

 

[skynerel]

Coordinator number 2 is a guy that appears next to Jessilina and he makes it through the preliminary round of the Jubilife contest.

Then he is paired against Jessilina for the battle round.

They do show one still image of their battle. It's safe to assume this Rhydon belongs to him because we see Jessilina paired against someone else for her second battle.

We can see him here to the left of Ash. It appears his contest outfit is inspired in some sort of royal guard fashion or just royal outfit of sorts.

Here he is seen talking to another coordinator.

In the Floaroma contest we see someone wearing a similar outfit of a different color, the hair color is also different.

He is seen again at the Grand Festival welcome party. So just like the previous coordinator, he was good enough to win five ribbons.

He was also watching the contest performances, he is behind Dawn.

Unfortunately for him, he didn't make it through the appeals round. Ouch!

 

[skynerel]

Coordinator number 3 is to the right of Dawn. Just like the previous ones, she managed to survive the appeal round.

Here we can see her looking at the contest screen, she is wearing a mint green (I think) yellow dress and a necklace.

Here she is looking at the screen as well, but her face is not shown.

She is paired in battle against another background character.

She wins and it is later paired against Jessilina. She lost the battle, as later it is shown that Jessilina does make it to the final round to face Zoey.

She seems to have participated in the Floaroma contest, there's a character with the same dress and haircut looking at the contest screen, but her face is not shown.

She participated in the Arrowroot Town pokemon contest and made it through the appeals round once more.

Her dress has no green and it is completely Yellow instead.

I'm pretty sure that the lady in the pink dress at the Grand Festival welcome party is meant to be her. The main characters did change their outfits for the grand festival, so it is possible that this is her victory outfit (even though other recurring background coordinators didn't change their outfits at all). Her necklace also changed colors, but the design appears to be the same.

She didn't make it through the appeals round either. At least Kenny was not alone on that.

 

[skynerel]

In between Ash and Zoey we see coordinator number 4. She participated in the Jubilife contest, but did not make it pass the appeal round.

We can see her in various shots, she has a ponytail tied with a pink ribbon and her dress also has many ribbons.

She appears in the Floaroma contest as well. To the right.

Then a funny thing happened at the Floaroma contest. A lookalike of hers also appeared, but not in the same scenes. It appears she also suffers from the stock character syndrome. They are very similar, but the color of her eyes, dress and ribbons are different. Regardless of that, none moved to the second round.

So, another clone of her appeared in the Arrowroot Town contest lmao. The hair color is different. She also has a Dewgong.

We see a glimpse of her performance.

Then we see her again at the Grand Festival. The hair color goes back to how it was in her first appearance. I also noticed that she didn't pass through the first round in any of her contests prior to the grand festival, but hey she got those five ribbons. Nonetheless she also didn't make it to the battle round of the grand festival.

 

[skynerel]

Coordinator number 5 was Dawn's opponent in the Wallace Cup. She made it all the way to the top 8, but ultimately lost because she ran out of time and had less points.

She has a Pelipper, which lost against Dawn's Pachirisu.

She was talented enough to be in the Top 32 coordinators in the Grand Festival, although we don't know what her final ranking was. Must've have been somewhere between top 8 and top 32, since we know who the top 4 were.

She is also popular enough to appear in some of the merchandise Team Rocket was selling at the Grand Festival shops.

 

[skynerel]

So, the Floaroma pokemon contest introduced a few recurring background coordinators, so bare with me. Coordinator number 6 has a Sealeo, which he used for his performance.

His performance was good enough to advance.

Then he is paired against another recurring background coordinator.

He is on the back when Dawn is being congratulated.

He also made it to the second round of the Arrowroot Town pokemon contest. The funny thing is, he didn't win here and this was the last contest of the season. So was he participating just for fun or did someone generous also gave him his fifth ribbon? Which also applies to all the other recurring coordinators that somehow made it to the Grand Festival after this. Nevermind me, we are not supposed to notice this stuff hehe.

He has a Bellossom, that's cute.

He made it to the Grand Festival and can be seen mingling with other people multiple times.

He was also there to watch others perform.

He did not make it to the top 32.

 

[skynerel]

Coordinator number 7 is the lady with the glasses Not Jessilina, but the one on the left corner.

So we see that she is good enough to advance and faces the coordinator I talked about in my previous post.

One of these two pokemon belong to her, however we have no way of confirming which one. I'd like to think it's Solrock since she appears to be exited about that tackle.

She appears in the Arrowroot town pokemon contest and she has a Magnemite.

A glimpse of her performance, which looks pretty good, but she didn't make it to the second round this time. Damn judges, not remarkable!

To the right of Dawn there's someone who shares her hairstyle, but the color is different. The dress is also similar, but with different colors. I assume this is her victory dress.

Then she turns around because Brock is going crazy over some girls.

In a later shot, we apparently see her again, but this time she isn't wearing glasses.

 

[skynerel]

Coordinator number 8 wears a bandana around his hair and also has a red ribbon as a part of his outfit. He is clearly good enough to advance.

He is there to congratulate Dawn with the other participants.

He is later seen in the Grand Festival (to the left of Nando).

However, he didn't advance to the second round.

 

[skynerel]

Coordinator number 9 performed with his Buizel.

He is also good enough to advance and faces bandana guy in the second round.

He is also there to congratulate Dawn.

He is seen in multiple shots at the Grand Festival. Was that orange juice the only beverage or was it too good that everyone was having one lol.

He is seen here to the left.

To the right on this one.

Behind Dawn and Zoey.

To the right again. I feel like I'm playing where is Waldo with this character lol.

Then he is seen again when their announcing who is going to advance and no, he doesn't make it.

 

[skynerel]

We find coordinator number 10 at the Hearthome contest. She is wearing a red, yellow and pink dress with a big green ribbon around her waist and she is the only coordinator that is not watching the performance. She looks concerned and like Dawn, she had an early night that day, meaning that she did not make it to the second round.

Later she appears in Wallace Cup. On the left corner, below May. She made it through the appeal round.

Unfortunately for her, she had to face Zoey and we know what usually happens to people who face her lol. She made it to the top 8.

Her Mothim tried I guess lol.

She returns for the Sandalstraw Town pokemon contest, but is eliminated in the first round.

Then she comes back for more in the Arrowroot Town pokemon contest and makes it to the second round.

Murkrow is her second confirmed pokemon.

I didn't see her at the Grand Festival so I guess this was her last rodeo.

 

[skynerel]

To the left of Jessilina we can see a blonde guy. Coordinator number 11. Sandalstraw Town pokemon contest.

He makes it to the second round and has to face Jessilina. By the power of hierarchy of importance, he is destined to be eliminated.

His slow Gastrodon couldn't handle Seviper.

Here he was waiting for the results of the first round.

Watching the performance.

He returns for the Grand Festival and is placed right next to Jessilina? Coincidence? I think not.

He is placed on block A.

However, for some reason he ends up facing Jessilina, even though she wasn't on block A. Technically speaking he should've faced Dawn in the top 16, but his destiny was to lose to Jessilina. None only that, she depleted all of his points lmao. This was on the top 8, after this the announcer goes on to talk about the Top 4 semi-finalists which makes Jessilina the last coordinator to reach the semifinals.

Poor guy, that was the last we saw of him. To think she decided to quit contests after this festival too lol. Who got the last laugh?

 

[skynerel]

Between Jessilina and Dawn we can see Coordinator number 12. He first appeared in the Chocovine Contest and made it through the preliminary round.

He can be seen behind Jesselina when she celebrates going to the second round.

Later on he makes it to the Grand Festival and is on the top 32, to the left of Dawn.

He is assigned to block A. He may look a little different because this is late DP and the animation was being updated.

 

[skynerel]

We can see coordinator number 13 watching Dawn's performance. He is wearing a light colored scarf over his neck.

He advanced to the second round.

He is facing off against Jessilina.

We know Jessilina wins and battles Ursula in the following round, so it's safe to assume hippopotas is one of his pokemon.

He is later seen in the Grand Festival, but his scarf is orange. It's possible that Makuhita and Tyrogue are his pokemon too.

He makes it to the top 32. He is the fifth coordinator in the first row if you read from left to right.

 

[skynerel]

I spotted other two coordinators that appeared in more than one contest, however their appearance is even more insignificant. The boy in the blue tuxedo (coordinator number 14) appears in the Sandalstraw Town pokemon contest.

He is seen again in the Grand Festival roster.

He was placed in block A.

And now, for the last one of the Sinnoh recurring background coordinators (number 15). She first appeared in the Wallace Cup. She has two pearl earrings and a pearl necklace. She is right next to Kyle in the second row (number 4) and she advanced to the second round.

She can be seen here to the left.

She also appeared in the Grand Festival top 32 coordinators roster. She is right above Dawn. I almost didn't spot her.

With this I conclude this series! I'll be posting some fun facts next and then I'll pick up Hoenn and Kanto recurring background coordinators.

 

[ii kanji]

That was very cool! I’ll never be able to watch a contest episode and ignore the bg characters again

 

[skynerel]

That was very cool! I’ll never be able to watch a contest episode and ignore the bg characters again

Thanks! I didn't think anyone was gonna read all that lol. I wish contests were still a thing in the anime!

 

[skynerel]

Fun Trivia: Contest Rules!


1- Is it not against the rules to borrow a pokemon from someone else to participate in a pokemon contest. Jessie uses many of Jame's pokemon multiple times.

We also see Jessie borrowing Harley's Cacturne and Banette for the Mulberry pokemon contest.

2- If two coordinators refuse to battle, they are issued a yellow card because they are not giving the judges anything to judge. Both coordinators also lose a lot of points and are warned that a second yellow card would result in disqualification. There's an example of this in the Saffron contest when Harley refused to attack Jessie's Wobbuffet for fear of being hit with counter attack.

3- While most people in Sinnoh dress up for contests, is it not against the rules to participate in street wear, as we see Ash and Princess Salvia participated in Sinnoh contests without switching to a more formal attire.

4- "Battle off" is when the judges deem that one of the pokemon is not able to continue battling. It happened to May in her first contest battle.

5- "Ilegal performance" is when a coordinator resorts to cheating to win a contest. Such as Meowth using a fake transform to battle, as seen in the Pacifidlog contest.

6- "Sudden Death Overtime" is when two competitors are tied in points and the time runs out. The battle continues (without the clock running) until either side loses all of their points or knocks the other out. It happened in the Mulberry pokemon contest.

BONUS ROUND: You can't impersonate someone to participate in a contest Jessie lol.

 

[skynerel]

Fun Trivia: Pokemon Contest Announcers

Before Vivian took the role as contest announcer, there was a different unnamed host for the first pokemon contest ever. He never appeared again after that contest.

Funnily enough, an announcer with his same face, clothing and hairstyle is seen much earlier in the anime, in the Queen of the Princess Festival in Kanto. Although I know this sort of thing happens because the animators sometimes recycle characters with small roles, it's still funny to imagine that this is just the same guy getting gigs at different events.

Below the MC's for the contests in Hoenn, Kanto and Sinnoh.

Vivian

Lilian

Marian

 

[skynerel]

Fun trivia: Lilian has a pokemon

She is the only contest MC known to have a pokemon. She commanded her Espeon to perform a beautiful practice performance, which was necessary to prepare the contest stage production the day before the official event took place at Saffron City.

 

[skynerel]

Fun trivia: Jessie was a reporter for pokemon contests

Under her alias Jessadia she worked as an assistant reporter for the Kanto Grand Festival and The Wallace Cup. MC Lilian and Marian recognized her for the good work.

Interviewing Ash and other coordinators who had already lost.