Thoughts on a hypothetical Female Rival

[matt0044]

Excuse me if this was done before...

Since Serena's going to be Ash's new companion, what do you think of the concept of a female rival for Ash as others speculated she'd be? That is, his main one like Trip and Paul. And I don't mean just for XY just so we're clear.

Try to answer these three questions as your response:

Would the writers even consider such a thing and go through with it (maybe to test the waters)? Best Wishes showed there was a first time for everything.

How could they do it right? A stopped clock is right at least twice a day.

How could they do it wrong? Having traits of a Shonen Anime, there's obviously going to be some biased towards males with a TV executive's "boys like boys characters in main roles" mentaility.

 

[Zexy]

Ι think that going with a female rival at this point would be risky.

Firstly, Best Wishes and its tests caused more animosity than goodwill towards the anime. More than ever, they will have to stick to the old ways (AG-DP) in order to keep their audience intact.

If needed, it can be done right. Just give her a good reason to fight or a fitting personality, and treat her like Paul or Gary even though she is a girl.

There are lots of ways to do something wrong. As said, the fact that it is Shonen means that females are treated more like "eye candy" than serious characters (this is not always the case, ex May/Dawn and the Contest arcs in general). Said mentality is inevitable, and shipping with the rival is not something the writers would like to try.

 

[matt0044]

Firstly, Best Wishes and its tests caused more animosity than goodwill towards the anime. More than ever, they will have to stick to the old ways (AG-DP) in order to keep their audience intact.

Well, they tried if anything.

 

[Johtohfiller]

I think Iris should have been a rival, her personality would make more sense that way. She was way too unfriendly to Ash to be convincing as a companion.

 

[Almonds]

Remember the league fiasco where Bianca was defeated by Cameron in Best Wishes?

Not having that again

 

[PiccoloX]

She will either be hyper feminine, goofy, clumsy, cutesy or annoying. You will never see a female rival that is mature, serious and caused the male lead to strive to beat. What you need is someone like Hunter J to be a rival, but you will never see that in this show.

I know this because every season copies the first. That, and with Hunter J being the only exception this shows been a hyper stereotypical Japanese culture spinoff and very little thought is put into character development.

 

[Lis]

To answer your questions:

- I don't think that writers will even glance at the concept of a female rival, simply because the the girls in the main cast tend to follow the japanese stereotype of the ideal woman (carefree, and pretty-thinker with butterflies in her mind that shows little personality deepnes and is used to develope the role of the "eye-candy" in the group. Sad) So then, since they are just dolls it would be unlikely to see a girl recieving so much "coolnes" for as to dare face Ash and ocassionally defeat him so that he increases his rage and determination (same o'l story) Yet, personally, i think it would be terribly interesting to see that.

- How could they do it right? Well, that's hard to say. If they look for a challenge to Ash then she'll probably have to be a little more serious than the common "poke-girls" that we see when battling, and her pokemon would have to be certainly challenging at first (at least) Yet again, a "tsundere" character would be suitable to my perspective, but since they are fashionable, it would probably go for a boy character (we stopped having tsundere girls after Misty, and she was not really as "extreme" as Paul)
However, a femenine version of Paul might be a little too "heavy", giving the series little.. versatility. I would love to see a rival just as pokemon-loving and forward-going as Ash is for him (similarities, actually, can impulse two people to compete even more than the differences between them) I think that it would be tasty enough to see that, having Ash being challenged in the strongest aspect of his trainning techniques: his blind perseverance and trust in his pokemon !

- Doing it wrong would mean that there was no genuine rivalry between them, that there was no "friction" or sparkle of power or ambition and even a little enemity during their fights (i think that this would make any rival fail as such, not just a girl one. I mean, despite his/her sex a rival is a rival afterall) I don't see how she being a girl could ruin her role as a rival, really. Wehether she's an otaku, likes to wear belts on her forehead as head bandades or skating shouldn't interfeer with her battling developement, her decency as a trainer and her strategical habilties, now should it? At most i think it would add originality to the character the fact that the main's rival is a girl, and also a sense of reciprocate acceptance as equals, who see in eachother nothing else but defeatable greatness.

 

[Supreme Leader Palpitoad]

It could be fun. A really evil girl like Ursula. But more skilled and smarter.

 

[Covershot]

I never really got why some fans (not necessarily referring to the OP here, just in general) want so badly for Ash to get a female rival. That's not to say I'm against the idea, because I'm not, but I don't see how it'd be different for any more than the one episode she first appears in. I think she'd likely just settle into the same pattern Gary/Paul/Trip did - "establish rivalry with Ash, show him up a few times, get development episode(s), lose to Ash in the League, get written off the show". That's not to say there's anything wrong with a female rival of course, but in the end she's not going to be that much different than a male one.

 

[MarshiyanMisutaa]

That's not to say there's anything wrong with a female rival of course, but in the end she's not going to be that much different than a male one.

But that's the point. She should be a real rival, not some joke, who is female.

 

[matt0044]

That's not to say there's anything wrong with a female rival of course, but in the end she's not going to be that much different than a male one.

But that's the point. She should be a real rival, not some joke, who is female.

Exactly. A female character who can be taken seriously as a rival to Ash. Bianca, cute as she was, was just a flanderization of her game counterpart and could've at least been a female rival who gave Ash a challenge but was friendly.

I think Iris should have been a rival, her personality would make more sense that way. She was way too unfriendly to Ash to be convincing as a companion.

I think as a companion, it'd makes for a good dynamic between them (the problem was in the execution mostly). As a rival, I can see that. Maybe she'd be on a League journey to become Drayden's successor.

 

[G50]

A female rival that is Ash's main rival would be a nice thing to see. She could be a very serious person, but at the same time not overly aggressive like Paul, Ursula, and Burgundy. The main reason why I'd like to see it, is that it would be a major change from always having male rivals.

 

[Pokemaster97]

While I don't see it happening, I think it'd be refreshing for Ash to have a commendable female rival to give Ash a run for his money. I'd love to see a rival much like Katie from the Hoenn Ever Grande Conference, who used several impressive strategies during battle, even going as far as switching Pokemon out more than once to maintain an advantage over him.

 

[Pikafanboy]

I think Iris should have been a rival, her personality would make more sense that way. She was way too unfriendly to Ash to be convincing as a companion.

Good idea, I like it. What I think should have happened is that Trip never existed, and Iris was the main rival in his place. The way she looked down on Ash and kept calling him a kid would make her fit right into what they were going for with Trip, and it would have a whole lot more tolerable only hearing that catch phrase whenever she appeared in an episode than every single one. A dragon trainer as a rival would have been awesome, assuming she actually used more dragons than she did in the actual show.

 

[Master Cyrus]

She should also have gratuitous fanservice.

 

[matt0044]

She should also have gratuitous fanservice.

If Pokemon had a PG rating (if by fanservice, you mean the pervy kind)...

 

[Legacy]

Let's see a rival with fire red hair in a side pony, a skimpy yellow top with suspenders and short shorts.

 

[Covershot]

But that's the point. She should be a real rival, not some joke, who is female.

I get that. What I don’t really get is what’s going to be so different about Ash’s hypothetical female rival that so many fans seem to want to see it, especially if all she’d be doing is covering the same bases that Gary/Paul/Trip already did. What I guess I’m really asking is, what could you really do any differently with this female rival that you couldn’t do with a male one? And wouldn’t the novelty of her being female would just wear off after her first couple appearances, anyway?

I’m not against the idea. I don’t even see it as an impossibility (it’s not like Ash has never gotten his butt handed to him by a girl before). But I’d be more concerned with this hypothetical new rival presenting some different kind of challenge for Ash instead of whatever their gender is, especially since when you get right down it, male or female it’s ultimately just going to be the same thing.

 

[MarshiyanMisutaa]

I get that. What I don’t really get is what’s going to be so different about Ash’s hypothetical female rival that so many fans seem to want to see it

Why it's have to be so different? So many fans wants to see it, because, they want to see a female rival who actually competent and a real threat to Satoshi. They don't need excuses.

What I guess I’m really asking is, what could you really do any differently with this female rival that you couldn’t do with a male one? And wouldn’t the novelty of her being female would just wear off after her first couple appearances, anyway? But I’d be more concerned with this hypothetical new rival presenting some different kind of challenge for Ash instead of whatever their gender is, especially since when you get right down it, male or female it’s ultimately just going to be the same thing.

These points are irrelevant to the hypothetical new rival's gender. I'm not even sure what you're arguing about.

 

[Covershot]

Why it's have to be so different? So many fans wants to see it, because, they want to see a female rival who actually competent and a real threat to Satoshi. They don't need excuses.

You seem to be under the impression that I have a problem with people who want a female rival and think they need to justify it. I don’t. But when I see comments (both in this thread and elsewhere) suggesting that this person going to be something different/refreshing purely on the basis of being female, I question what about it was going to be different about her that a male rival couldn’t offer (besides the gender, obviously). No, nobody has to have a special reasoning for it and I never meant to say that they did. But I thought it was a perfectly legitimate question to pose anyway, since this is a thread to discuss it and those claims had been made here.

Anyway, to answer the OP more directly: Maybe there’s something I’m missing (I can’t claim to be an expert on anime/Japanese media in general) but I don’t see why, eventually, Ash couldn’t get a female rival who isn’t a joke. It’s not like this show hasn’t been able to showcase girl characters who were stronger Trainers than Ash before, and he’d have to beat her eventually.

To do her right, she’d have to pose some sort of challenge to Ash that’s different from what his previous main rivals already did while still pushing him to raise the bar higher. Ash and Gary had a different kind of rivalry than Ash and Paul did, so whatever the basis of his rivalry with this hypothetical new person is, it would need to stand out from them somehow. There’s actually a good example of such a character in the woman Ash battled in the Hoenn League, Katie (... I think?), who I think could have made an excellent rival for him in AG (better than Morrison or Tyson, anyway). She was clearly older, more experienced than Ash, and battled in a way that was different from how he did things.

Such a character could pose a realistic challenge to him that raises the stakes from his feuds with Gary, Paul, and Trip and pushes him to become a better battler that way. How does Ash beat someone more experienced than him? After all, he’s only feuded with people either on his level (Gary, Paul) or below it (Trip, who yet somehow was still superior to him). Katie could have done that, thus giving Ash a female rival who fills all the bases of actually being a threat. Sadly, the show seems to favor making the main rivals characters who are more on the age-level of the main protagonist.

To do her wrong... well, there’s a lot ways. I guess the major one would be to do her in a way that makes the character, and by extension the rivalry, either boring or overly derivative of what’s already come before (see: Trip). To do her wrong, she’d be someone who doesn’t really push Ash to strive higher or evolve his battle style. And while I don’t think she needs to be overly serious or antagonistic (we’ve seen that done three times with Gary, Paul, and Trip), I would agree that BW!Bianca, while perfectly fine for a secondary rival, would be the perfect example of how you could screw up a main, female rival for Ash.