Were we too hard on Iris?

[EscLucy]

They probably wanted to evolve Axew

Wanted to keep the cuteness factor most likely but they forget that Iris' main goal is to become a Dragon Master and without that what is she? I know!!! A waste of space in the anime, which she was haha.

I wasn't too fond of Misty as a kid, but they had time to mellow her. I find her overrated. I also don't like Jessie be sure she's *worse*.

I liked Misty as a kid - Misty opened me up to a whole new ball game which I found out later meant "sarcasm". Her humour was very funny to me and I enjoyed the arguments Ash and Misty had - very entertaining and Ash actually had good comebacks. I find her overrated too but she is a still a good anime character especially with her cute Togepi. I like the scenes where Pikachu and Togepi are being cute. I love Jessie because of the same reason, sarcasm. If you listen to her carefully, you can actually see that she is really funny and I enjoy her one-liners especially when she is triggered by not capturing Pikachu successfully.

Iris didn't have those times.

Iris was never funny - she tried to be and it got boring and repetitive. I didn't like that they tried to make her another Misty because it wasn't original and also the copy and paste failed because they are totally different.

Wow, I wrote a lot... I feel honoured to write the same amount as Hidden Mew LOL

 

[Huikyeong]

I'll be honest, even though i'm not the biggest iris fan, I liked her a little because after having two girls with the same goal which was contests, it was cool to get someone different also not to mention it was cool to get someone who wasn't (stereotypically) girly after having two girly characters. Nothing wrong with being girly in itself. I like the dress up stuff however the whole contest appeal thing got old after two shows and then it kinda happened in X/Y.

 

[HiroHunter]

I'll be honest, even though i'm not the biggest iris fan, I liked her a little because after having two girls with the same goal which was contests, it was cool to get someone different also not to mention it was cool to get someone who wasn't (stereotypically) girly after having two girly characters. Nothing wrong with being girly in itself. I like the dress up stuff however the whole contest appeal thing got old after two shows and then it kinda happened in X/Y.

The thing about that is I would had been fine with that, but Iris was more of a brat then anything.

 

[SinnohEevee]

We already got a vague type Master goal with Misty, did we need another one? We already have Ash''s vague goal.

 

[Hidden Mew]

I'll be honest, even though i'm not the biggest iris fan, I liked her a little because after having two girls with the same goal which was contests, it was cool to get someone different also not to mention it was cool to get someone who wasn't (stereotypically) girly after having two girly characters. Nothing wrong with being girly in itself. I like the dress up stuff however the whole contest appeal thing got old after two shows and then it kinda happened in X/Y. I want Ash's female companions to have different goals other than play dress up with their Pokemon and have them buzz around in fancy patterns, y'know?

I never had a problem with two coordinators in a row because May and Dawn's storylines were drastically different. Dawn benefited a lot from being the second Coordinator too because the writers had a better idea of how to handle Contests than when they were first introduced with May. I also wouldn't say that Showcases were akin to Contests. They were a really watered down version of Contests with no battles and were introduced roughly halfway into XY. They really aren't that similar enough to say that Contests returned in XY. I honestly miss Contests a lot. I know why they couldn't keep them in the show when they weren't featured in the games anymore, but it does feel like the anime lost something important and hasn't been able to find a good replacement for them after all this time. I also don't think that I'd brush off both May and Dawn as just being stereotypically girly. They liked traditionally girly things like clothes, but it always kind of bother me when people brush off any of the female leads as just girly for some reason. I can kind of understanding finding Iris' personality unique compared to previous leads, but considering she was really annoying and unlikable for me, I don't think a unique personality would matter that much.

I wouldn't dismiss Contests as just playing dress up with their Pokemon either. There was an emphasis on making fancy combinations, especially in DP, but there was clearly more to Contests than just being flashy and appealing to the crowds. May focused almost entirely on her flashy appeal for her first Contest and was unprepared for the battle round. Contest battles are still battles at the end of the day, so you need to be a good trainer to make it through the battle portion of Contests. It takes a lot of skills to become a successful Coordinator and getting five ribbons was more challenging than getting eight badges. Whenever Ash loses to a Gym Leader, he could just train and challenge them again. Whenever May or Dawn lost a Contest, they had to just go to another place that was holding a different Contest, so that puts more pressures on Coordinators compared to trainers in a sense.

While Iris did have a different goal than May and Dawn, I don't think that the goal itself was particularly interesting. She just wanted to be a Dragon Master, which isn't a huge difference from Ash wanting to be a Pokemon Master or Misty wanting to be a Water Pokemon Master. It's just a vague goal where she wants to be the master of some specific type. It's not really unique in that regards either. I also don't think that she was anywhere closer to her goal at the end of the series than she was at the beginning. She had a Dragonite and Axew learned more moves, but all of those accomplishments were handed to her rather than something she earned. Axew wasn't any closer to evolving and because she wasn't in a battle active goal like Contest, there wasn't a competition for Iris to work towards so that the audience could see a more steady progression of her skills throughout the series. They just kept handing her accomplishments to create the illusion that Iris had become stronger when she really hadn't done anything to deserve all of the praise she was getting in-universe. May and Dawn didn't accomplish their goals either, but they definitely made some progression during their journeys. It didn't feel like they were basically the same character at the end of their respective series as they were at the beginning.

 

[Mikuri]

Did people hate Iris because she was black? I don't think so. People used to worship her when BW first started, saying how different she is from the previous female companions, how she doesn't steal screentime, how cute she is with Axew, etc. Even if there was any race based prejudice against her, it's very minor compared to support she got.

Thank you.

It was so annoying to see people praising Iris at the beginning of Best Wishes. They would often comment on how groundbreaking she was for not being girly and how refreshing it was to have a female lead not interested in Pokémon Contests. They would literally praise Iris for climbing up a tree to pick an apple because apparently that kind of content was more interesting than, you know, watching a character actually working towards a tangible goal.

When talking specifically about Iris's appearance, I remember reading comments on how "decently dressed" she was, and people would make rude remarks about Dawn and her short skirt, saying she was often used as eye candy and whatnot. So there were people more than happy with Iris's design and portrayal in the early stages of BW, but the series as a whole went downhill fast and several of its characters were criticized.

People weren't exactly nice when talking about Trip, calling him a recolored version of Paul in terms of physical features and even comparing their personalities and how Paul was superior in every aspect. As the series progressed, people would praise BW for its fillers, the absence and new role of Team Rocket, and the fact Ash was actually catching more than six Pokémon, but that was it. The fandom consensus is that BW is a bad series and some want it to be retconned out of existence.

If Iris gets the most hate, that isn't because of race. People in this community have made very long posts detailing the reasons why they personally dislike Iris. I also would like to point out that, when reviewing a series of the Pokémon anime, we usually dedicate long paragraphs to the female lead. We don't remember Advanced Generation for the villainous team arc, or Diamond & Pearl for the Pokémon team Ash had at the League, it's the leading lady that everyone is going to remember, they are the representation of their series.

 

[Muur]

Lmao, I've actually said "retcon" BW" out of existence before.

Except for Krookodile. He was cool.

I do find what you're saying about the start of Iris to be interesting though... seems like she really was praised for such silly stuff.

 

[HiroHunter]

I still don't like how far she got i both tournaments. And I like how she loved for being the only pokegirl to beat Ash in a battle when she had the upper hand the whole battle and Ash was unable to do anything to beat her.

 

[Nicolas721]

I kinda liked her. She proved that a character can at least have a guideline and milestones for your development even if they aren't participating in gym-like activities, which is something that Clemont and the classmates should have taken notes of. Outside the Junior Cup and maybe the first Club Battle, she didn't make any part of BW less enjoyable for me, as every snarky comment wasn't that far away for a heartwarming moment or a moment where she shown that she was different from what was seen before. I see where the hate comes from, but we have to give her that at least she is fun to discuss.

I also would like to point out that, when reviewing a series of the Pokémon anime, we usually dedicate long paragraphs to the female lead. We don't remember Advanced Generation for the villainous team arc, or Diamond & Pearl for the Pokémon team Ash had at the League, it's the leading lady that everyone is going to remember, they are the representation of their series.

I agree that sometimes the fandom feels that way, but it feels sexist to me.

 

[Hidden Mew]

Thank you.

It was so annoying to see people praising Iris at the beginning of Best Wishes. They would often comment on how groundbreaking she was for not being girly and how refreshing it was to have a female lead not interested in Pokémon Contests. They would literally praise Iris for climbing up a tree to pick an apple because apparently that kind of content was more interesting than, you know, watching a character actually working towards a tangible goal.

When talking specifically about Iris's appearance, I remember reading comments on how "decently dressed" she was, and people would make rude remarks about Dawn and her short skirt, saying she was often used as eye candy and whatnot. So there were people more than happy with Iris's design and portrayal in the early stages of BW, but the series as a whole went downhill fast and several of its characters were criticized.

I remember some of those praises. I guess people wanted a more tomboyish/non-traditional girly female lead, which isn't a problem in itself, but treating Iris like such a breath of fresh air for such shallow reasons was kind of strange. I also think fans were reading too much into Dawn's short skirt if they really think she was being used for eye candy. The whole stealing screentime bit is especially strange now considering we generally want the other characters to have more screentime. I like Ash, but he doesn't suffer from a lack of exposure in any series. Plus, he's going to be sticking around for future series due to being the main character. The female leads on the other hand only have one series to make some progression towards their goal, so they do need screentime.

I still don't like how far she got i both tournaments. And I like how she loved for being the only pokegirl to beat Ash in a battle when she had the upper hand the whole battle and Ash was unable to do anything to beat her.

I haven't heard people praising Iris for beating Ash. If anything, she didn't deserve to get to the finals of that first Club Battle tournament, let alone win, because of Axew suddenly learning Outrage out of nowhere. It never even used that attack again, so it was done primarily to give Iris a victory. Maybe that wouldn't be bad if the tournament was built up for her victory, but it really wasn't. Besides that, Misty also defeated Ash in the Whirl Cup, even though that was also fairly cheap due to her Psyduck's deus ex machnia Psychic attacks, so it's not like Iris was the only female lead who ever defeated Ash. Not to mention winning a one on one battle isn't that impressive. That was an issue I had with the Club Battle tournaments. If they were at least two-on-two matches, it might have been more engaging and they wouldn't have to rush through so many battles.

I kinda liked her. She proved that a character can at least have a guideline and milestones for your development even if they aren't participating in gym-like activities, which is something that Clemont and the classmates should have taken notes of. Outside the Junior Cup and maybe the first Club Battle, she didn't make any part of BW less enjoyable for me, as every snarky comment wasn't that far away for a heartwarming moment or a moment where she shown that she was different from what was seen before. I see where the hate comes from, but we have to give her that at least she is fun to discuss.

I actually thought that Iris proved that the writers needed a battle active goal to give the female leads proper development. She didn't really have a guideline for her goal and the milestones were all just accomplishments handed to Iris on a silver plate. Clemont's development felt a lot more believable to me by comparison. He didn't have a battle active goal, but he became a bit more confident over the course of the series and that progression was handled well. Granted, his storyline was pretty much done by the time he had his Gym match with Ash, which resulted in Clemont not doing much for the rest of XY, but I think he had the most development out of all of the supporting male characters thus far. Even though Showcases didn't involve battles and were a really boring competition, that did provide Serena with some pretty solid development as well. Iris's development in much more questionable at best and that at least partly does come down to how she didn't have a more tangible goal to work towards. The fact that the were trying way too hard to make her look like a child prodigy after the beginning of BW made her look like a rookie trainer probably didn't help either.

I'm not sure if I'd say it's fun to discuss Iris either. I do enjoy talking about Pokemon in general and I am happy that this thread has gone off without any drama so far, butI don't think I'd call an Iris discussion fun due to a combination of how I feel about her character and remembering how chaotic Iris discussions used to be here.

I just rewatched Iris' backstory with Excadril. I was focused on how strange it was for Iris to win nearly a hundred battles in a row with Drilbur, which is still bad, but I forgot that she spent a lot of time actually practicing with Drilbur to work on its moves. This still feels incredibly jarring when she didn't do this kind of training with Axew to master Dragon Rage. She would just keep using it in practice matches, hoping it would work and just go "Oh well. You tried." when it didn't work. Maybe this wouldn't be that bad if she was a new trainer, but when the show goes back to claim that she was such a child prodigy that she won nearly one hundred battles in a row after learning how to battle with her forest Pokemon friends and she spent a lot of time training with Drilbur in order to improve its moves, it does make her training method with Axew far more questionable than it should be.

She still doesn't come off in a good light with Excadril for me either. Cilan still basically had to tell her the problem instead of her realizing in on her own. Plus, this had been a problem seemingly for years. Based on how small Iris was in the flashback, it must have happened a year or two prior to the start of the series, unless Iris had a quick and sudden growth spurt. If they actually showed Iris trying to cheer Excadril up, it might have been okay, but she would only call it out when she was in a desperate pitch and even wanted Georgia's Beartic to attack it in order to get it moving for their battle. I will give Iris that she did seem to genuinely feel sorry for not understanding Excadril's feelings and that she does care about her Pokemon. It still felt too easy of a solution though. If we had seen Iris try to reach out to Excadril more often throughout the series, instead of just hoping it would listen to her whenever she was in trouble, maybe it could have worked. They spent most of the episode on the battle with Georgia and explaining their backstory that the resolution feels a bit rushed due to being in the last few minutes of the episode. I don't think that it needed to be a two parter necessarily, but actually showing Iris attempting to reach out to Excadril instead of telling the audience that she did this would have probably been enough to make Excadril listening to Iris again more believable/earned.

 

[HiroHunter]

Did she win any battle or where they all handed to her?Because I feel like shes has more plot armor than Serena.

 

[CynthiaLover]

Color me surprised, but I'm quite amazed, and yet very impressed and pleased, to see that this thread hasn't descended into madness. Iris is a fanbase-breaking character, and after the bloodbaths of past "debates" regarding her, this is a breath of fresh air to see. I have to give the people who posted here props, as Iris can be a touchy subject to some, myself included, but the fact that this thread has remained very civil shows just how far we've come as a community. Anyway, onto the subject at hand.

I have to say I 100% agree with @Hidden Mew on all fronts. Hidden Mew hit the nail on the head repeatedly in regards to Iris, and I feel the same way. Iris was a poorly handled character. To me, she was a failed attempt at a Misty 2.0 to reenact the dysfunctional, yet successful, dynamic between Ash and Misty. The fact that she was buttered up as this "child prodigy" just made things worse. Let's look over my views on the subject.

1. Vague Goal: As we learned from Misty, specializing in a single type may mean she could learn the pros and cons of it, but the problem is just how is one to achieve such a vague and broad goal. As with Misty, her "attempts" at her goal were rarely successful, especially since she focused more on Excadrill and the brat known as Emolga than Axew, who was supposed to be the means to her goal. Having a goal that broad leaves a lot to work with, but also makes it hard to find out where the goal post is. So her goal was a pretty poor choice, as it left her, and us, with more questions than answers, especially when she neglected the Mon that was supposed to help her get to that point in favor of two unrelated ones.

2. Informed Abilities: Iris was always portrayed as this special "child prodigy", but failed to live up to any of that. She was a rookie. She acted like a rookie. She trained like a rookie. She battled like a rookie. Simply put, that's all she was. The fact that we were constantly reminded about this informed prodigy abilities yet she repeatedly failed to even portray the slightest bit of actual skill that she was padded up to have made that a very hard thing to swallow. The fact she often took shortcuts to get her way was another problem in that regard, such as the infamous Dragonite, who I'll talk about later. So she never lived up to this hype of having immense potential when she barely did anything to show it, taking any shortcuts she could find, which, in a series where hard work pays off, is glaring.

3. Undeserved "Victories": Simply put, Iris had a lot of things handed to her on a silver platter. Victories, accomplishments, and even most of her Pokemon themselves, were all just given to her instead of actually earning it. This became especially noticeable with Dragonite, a brute of a pseudo-legendary that was just given to her no questions asked. Even Ash never got the honor of getting a pseudo until the next series, and even then he had to release it (since Ash is rarely allowed to have nice things), so that was a very bad slap in the face. The fact that Dragonite was a temperamental Pokemon who would blow a temper tantrum (which, as we saw in one situation, could've endangered a lot of people) when things didn't go its way showed very bad skills as a Trainer. This even applies to Axew, who struggled to learn Dragon Sneeze yet pulled out Outrage and Giga Impact with no effort (and never used those moves again, mind you, which screams of cheapness). Everything she "accomplished" was merely handed to her instead of actually WORKING for it. It's times like that I can really value Georgia calling her out multiple times, because she was 100% right, even though Georgia could be a sore loser most of the time, she was right regardless. So everything Iris "gained" was simply handed to her, which further padded this the above "child prodigy" thing, making both even more unjustified. So instead of earning her keep, she merely had it given to her without any actual work on her part.

4. Hypocritical Tendencies: Iris was a hypocrite, no doubt about it. She'd call out everyone, especially Ash, over stupid things, yet proved to be no better, if not worse. The main kicker here is her ever-famous catchphrase: "You're such a kid!" which could very easily apply to her instead. This, combined with her constant bashing of others, and her ego, made her very, very difficult to tolerate. While Ash getting hit with the Dum-Dum Ray was bad on it's own, Iris's constant bashing and hypocritical comments was just the icing on that miserable cake. And yet she was never called out for it, or at least very rarely, which obviously left little impact. At times I feel her only reason to tag along with Ash was simply to make a mockery of him, since she never really had A reason to do so. At least with the other girls they had a plausible reason (usually involving BBQed bikes or Ash acting as a mentor of sorts), but Iris just simply tagged along, chewing him out along the way. That's what made her very hard to deal with, as she was relentless with her remarks, never called out for them, and never really had a genuine friendship form. At least when it came to Cilan, he and Ash did do some fairly decent bonding, so their friendship was more believable. So Iris's tendencies to be a blatant hypocrite is what made her character very toxic to others.

I think that's enough for now. Wow, I wrote a lot, but I hope I kept it civil, since Iris is a sore subject for me, being the sole reason I fazed out during the BW anime era (which only got steadily worse with bigger problems, such as idiots like Cameron, but that's a different can of pain... I mean paint). But that's my 2 cents on the subject without going overboard (unless this is overboard, in which I apologize, as I admit I have a tendency to get overly descriptive on various subjects). But that sums up my feelings about Iris without opening old wounds or lighting fires.

 

[Hidden Mew]

Did she win any battle or where they all handed to her?Because I feel like shes has more plot armor than Serena.

I'm honestly not sure. All I remember are her cheap victories. She might have earned her victory against Burgundy during the second Club Battle tournament, but that might have been more of a case of that victory not bothering me as much as all of her victories in the other tournament arcs. Plus, the second Club Battle tournament was a noticeable improvement, so that might have affected how I remember her battle.

 

[ii kanji]

I also think fans were reading too much into Dawn's short skirt if they really think she was being used for eye candy.

“Why can’t you just ditch Brock, have Ash, have Misty, and then bring in a new boy? That would be switching up things instead of having a new girl.” His following answers made me laugh my head off I had to pick it up off the floor and reattach it. He stated that they like to switch up the girls because it gives the boys some new eye candy every once in a while.

 

[HumanDawn]

I thought the dislike and criticism was justified (not always though) but the expression of said dislike and criticism was annoying for me. I let myself get caught up too much into it and I would rather have not visited this subsection because I was enjoying BW! a lot and it made it harder to enjoy, and I too was being annoying. I could have left but I cared too much about what others thought. I've decreased my interest in flavourful hate comments other people make and I try not to show it to other characters because I don't want fans of said character to take it against me, when such comments are better said privately. The Internet is so big, somebody can have a big personal connection to a character, and saying a flavour hate comment could really bother that person, especially with so many young people which can be so impressionable who are watching the show. I learned a lot though, and still had to learn after, and will still need to learn. I remember that every time somebody makes an emotionally negative response to something, it's their impression and response which has to come from something to make them feel that way. I am sure they could write something emotionally positive about something I don't like at all, and I wouldn't be connected to it, and it's okay, because we're different and arguments based on personal impressions and experiences have us care differently with different tolerances.

That's just my viewpoint on this and the stuff that happened 6-7 years ago here. Ever since then I believe I have improved a lot personally and I could focus a lot more on what I enjoy than what others don't. I could argue about some of the things said here, but I know that I will be just sharing a differing opinion from what I am okay with and my interpretation so I'll just leave it at that as I should have years ago.

 

[EscLucy]

If I may sum up my view on a large number of posts that I haven't commented on. I really think that the attacks against Iris are not because she is black or because she isn't a coordinator etc. It is simply because her character development was non-existent, the character development wasn't even planned out and the anime writers seemed to have just forgotten about it. Her lines were repetitive and she made no valuable contribution to the anime except having some Dragon-type fillers and the Drayden storyline, which was boring and predictable (I mean you knew that Iris was going to be able to connect with the Deino from the moment you saw the situation). The anime writers have completely forgotten her Dragon Master goal and her Axew didn't even evolve. She won battles with luck and it was so obvious that it (Clubsplosion etc.) was just written in for the sake of making Ash not win once in a while.

Granted she did seem unique from the first couple of episodes and I was excited to see where it would all go, but it was a downhill slope from there.

 

[Hidden Mew]

I do remember that comment from that interview in regards to why they replace the female leads, although it's a bit outdated now considering that they also replace the secondary male characters with every series too. My issue was with the notion that they were using Dawn specifically for eye candy because of her skirt, which seemed like a huge stretch.

 

[SinnohEevee]

I do remember that comment from that interview in regards to why they replace the female leads, although it's a bit outdated now considering that they also replace the secondary male characters with every series too. My issue was with the notion that they were using Dawn specifically for eye candy because of her skirt, which seemed like a huge stretch.

I wonder why someone in a cold region will have such a small skirt (and is it appropriate for a kids' shower?) but that's just one tiny detail about Dawn that can be easily forgotten.

 

[Hidden Mew]

I wonder why someone in a cold region will have such a small skirt (and is it appropriate for a kids' shower?) but that's just one tiny detail about Dawn that can be easily forgotten.

Well not all of Sinnoh is cold and I don't think that show focused on Dawn's skirt nearly as much as some fans did. I don't think it was inappropriate for a female character to wear a short skirt. Not to mention her outfit is the same outfit she had in the games, so you can't blame the show there either.

 

[SinnohEevee]

Well not all of Sinnoh is cold and I don't think that show focused on Dawn's skirt nearly as much as some fans did. I don't think it was inappropriate for a female character to wear a short skirt. Not to mention her outfit is the same outfit she had in the games, so you can't blame the show there either.

I have to add that it's not very noticeable. Reducing Dawn to eye candy is really silly. She was the co-star of a whole series after all, and love her or hate her, one can't deny she receive great character development.