Was Trip/Shooti A Good Rival?

[1rkhachatryan]

So how do you guys feel about Trip and the way he was handled??

Personally I don't feel like he was handled well at all.

*He was largely ignored for most of the saga
*His Pokemon were ignored for the most part as well, in fact, only Serperior really got any sort of attention. Conkeldurr might have appeared in all three stages as well but he was defeated every time and showed no distinct personality
*His whole goal wasn't really developed well and his past with Alder was rushed for the most part


What do you guys think, was Trip a good rival or was he largely left untapped??

 

[P0KEM0N]

No, he wasn't a good rival. He was just a carbon copy of Paul.

 

[Ben 10]

He was okay nothing great but nothing too bad. Personally he only seemed worse because of how the writers treated him and how shallow the fandom was towards him. But unlike what haters love to say he was not a Paul clone. -_-

 

[Muur]

I thought his character was good but he didn't do enough really and only one guy towards the end of his saga really made hin underwhelming.

 

[Satoshi_Pikachu]

He wasn't handled well at all, it was awful... He's already a bland character, but the way he barely interacted with Satoshi and that stupid 1 on 1 finale to their rivalry made everything even worse. It's even worse when I remember how awesome Shinji was... And no, I don't think he was like Shinji at all.

 

[Meowstic]

He had great potential, but the writers simply didn't give him the attention he needed to become a noteworthy rival. I had high hopes for Trip, but sadly, he didn't meet my expectations.

 

[Grabbergirl]

He's nothing but boring, racist (the way he calls the Kanto people names and stereotypes them as hillbillies), and he's off in his own world, and anti-social (he talks to himself instead of talking to others and not making new friends). Why does he need a camera? Can't they explain why he's illustrating his journey? Is he doing it make himself feel better (stress related)? Is it a project for school? Why?

Or is he an autistic?

 

[Masato]

They could have made Trip into a much better character and rival. Instead, they made Trip into this completely broken trainer. He's only starting out, but he's battling as if he had been training Pokemon for years. They might as well have him be some battle prodigy (At least that would explain his brokenness). His attitude was also completely arrogant.

 

[AwesomeRalph]

No. He was too boastful and at first I thought he was stronger than Ash, but after the episodes, he was just a rival of Ash's that didn't give enough action.

 

[Supreme Leader Palpitoad]

In the start he seemed good. He had a strong pokemon, he could make great use of his pokemons moves and abilities and he had three revealed pokemon as of BW10. I have no problems with his Snivy defeating Pikachu when it only was able to use two out of four moves and Ash did not know about Leaf Tornado. And he had an interesting backstory with Alder. He was a promising rival in my opinion.
But then it all changed. He became a punching bag in Club Battle and Clubsplosion and the only pokemon he had that got more than one real appearance was Conkeldurr and Serperior(no, Tranquill throwing away Venipedes from Castelia does not count as a real appearance). He had six pokemon and 2 were used. Awful. Ashs main rival was a underused punching bag. Ashs Palpitoad was handled better. And then out of nowhere the writers want to get him to shine again(and finish his Alder plot in a terrible way). So they make him own the shit out of everyone in the worst tournament in the whole anime before losing to the champion and finishing his Alder plot. Worse than bad. The only good thing was that Serperior was proofed to be strong. But we had not seen that thing since like 60 episodes earlier so, it was still bad handled.
Then comes the league where Ashs rivalry with Trip is finished in a One on One battle and Trip loses in the first round of the league!
In short, he sucked.

 

[Kailey10129]

I agree that he did fall short. He should have become more of a challenge to Ash. I don't consider him to be a carbon-copy of Paul (is it the shoulder-length hair lol?). Paul, in my opinion, was the ultimate rival for Ash thus far. It was kind of hard to follow up after Paul. Paul was the complete opposite of Ash in many ways and that just created a nice and interesting contrast. Paul was also skilled, no doubt about it. He presented a challenge.

 

[G50]

When Trip first started out, he was portrayed as someone who was starting their journey but also understood a lot about Pokemon prior to his journey. It seemed that he was very knowledgeable on how battles work, abilities, types, etc. and was able to start off using that knowledge to battle strong to start with. Due to that, I think he was okay as a pretty strong rival in the beginning.

Unfortunately, there wasn't enough of a rivalry as the series went on I felt. Ash and Trip didn't battle each other very much except for a few side battles to strengthen the current rivalry. In the tournaments, they didn't face each other until the final tournament. Due to the lack of battles against each other, I feel that their head-to-head strength comparisons and contrasts is difficult to determine.

I did like how his past was shown, and his thoughts about Alder. That allowed more interaction between Ash and Trip, and showed Trip's determination in the tournament to face Alder and battle Ash hard to get there in their rivalry battle. It allowed them to show how much they grew with each of their strongest Unova Pokemon up to that point.

The league rivalry battle was between both of their first Pokemon, I felt the rivalry battle would've shown more of their growth if they had a 3-on-3 or 6-on-6 battle later in the league instead with Pokemon they both used in previous rivalry battles.

Overall, I feel that Trip as a rival had some good points, but also some bad points and could have used some improvement in those areas.

 

[Peppermint Phoenix]

There was no rivalry. He beat Ash's main pokemon with a untrained starter. His xenophobia wasn't explained. He was kinda boring and he rarely did a non 1 on 1 battle? Other than his team he was completely dis likable

 

[MattySadler]

He genuinely started off well and I thought he was going to be great, but in the end he was just kinda crap and unmemorable. Personally, I was screaming for a Boldore/ Gurdurr trade-to-evolve story between him and Ash but it never happened and he just mysteriously turned up with a Conkeldurr, bit of a cop out.

His battle at the league was pathetic as well.

 

[PokémonJesus]

Well, I didn't have a problem with him really! He wasn't the best rival out there, but he wasn't that bad either, in my opinion.
But I do have to admit he could have been written better and his league battle with Ash was definitely BS!

 

[Necrozma]

No.

1. He did not care for Ash.
2. He appeared scarcely.
3. His development was rushed and without any build-up
4. He just didn't care.

So no, he was not a good rival imho.

 

[Hidden Mew]

No, I think he was a terrible rival. He was overpowered right from the start just to make Ash the underdog of a rivalry again. He was just far too knowledgeable of abilities, moves and too skilled in battle to be a rookie trainer. Even if they said that he was a prodigy or gifted, it would have still come off as an excuse to explain how ridiculously overpowered he was. Maybe it could have worked if Ash actually got upset that he, a trainer with a ton of experience, lost to a rookie. That could have at least given some reason behind the rivalry besides Ash just wanting to battle Trip just because. That was another major issue with the rivalry too. There just wasn't any driving force behind why Ash wanted to battle Trip to make him stand out from just any trainer Ash wanted to battle. With Paul, they had their conflicting methods and ideals of Pokemon training. With Gary, there was the desire to prove himself against Gary due to how stuck-up he acted. They could have done something to give Ash a more personal reason to battle Trip. The two of them barely interacted with each other, losing to Trip had no significant effect on Ash and Ash didn't have anything to do with Trip's rushed development. It was all because of Alder, which made him look more like Trip's rival than Ash did. Even the writers didn't seem to care that much for this rivalry considering that Trip was eliminated from the Unova League right away, although I still think that's exactly what that so-called rivalry deserved.

If there had been any actual effort to his character and the rivalry itself, he might have been able to turn out at least a decent rival. As it is, I think he's the worst rival introduced thus far.

 

[Ben 10]

I think Trip had potential but was ruined by constant inconsistencies with his portrayal and the lack of effort. I wouldn't say he's the worst because tbh he isn't but he isn't a good one either. I also feel he gets to much crap thrown at him for his lack of rivalry with Ash when Ash himself gave Trip no reason to give a damn to begin with and is just as much to blame for the lack of rivalry. The guy honestly had no connection to Ash other then the fact Ash always followed after him and kept butting into his business.

 

[Hidden Mew]

I think Trip had potential but was ruined by constant inconsistencies with his portrayal and the lack of effort. I wouldn't say he's the worst because tbh he isn't but he isn't a good one either. I also feel he gets to much crap thrown at him for his lack of rivalry with Ash when Ash himself gave Trip no reason to give a damn to begin with and is just as much to blame for the lack of rivalry. The guy honestly had no connection to Ash other then the fact Ash always followed after him and kept butting into his business.

While I agree that Trip had potential and could have been at least decent with some effort, I would say that he is the worst. I can't really think of any other rival character who I'd consider to be worse than Trip at the moment. I'm not sure if Ash is just as much to blame for the lack of a rivalry, but he isn't blameless either. He didn't react to Trip's insults or his attitude to potentially spark something to create a rivalry, but just because Ash didn't do anything to help create a rivalry doesn't make Trip look any better to me.

 

[Ben 10]

While I agree that Trip had potential and could have been at least decent with some effort, I would say that he is the worst. I can't really think of any other rival character who I'd consider to be worse than Trip at the moment. I'm not sure if Ash is just as much to blame for the lack of a rivalry, but he isn't blameless either. He didn't react to Trip's insults or his attitude to potentially spark something to create a rivalry, but just because Ash didn't do anything to help create a rivalry doesn't make Trip look any better to me.

I'd probably put anime Bianca as a worst rival since as flawed as Trip was at least he wasn't falling around making a fool of himself at all times and at least had passion and determination in accomplishing things. But regardless I don't think it's supposed to make him look better since in this situation it's meant to call out both sides who are equally to blame. I know that you and a lot of people on here hate Trip but he isn't more guilty then Ash in the reason why the rivalry sucked because quite frankly rivalries involve two parties and one side can't be more to blame then the other considering that the other half can easily salvage the "failing half." This rivalry had no redeeming sides and was just put together because. The only redeeming thing Ash had in this was that he had opportunities to be involved in better things past this.