Why do you think the G/S rival never appeared in the TV series?

Dogasu

Dogasu

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So we all know the guy the fandom calls "Silver," right? The guy in the original Gold & Silver games who had ong, red hair and stole Utsugi-Hakase's pokemon from his lab. And then he went around the whole game, talking about how pokemon are merely tools and how he doesn't want any weaklings on his team.

Well...other than a brief blink-and-you'll-miss-it cameo in the opening theme for "Raikou - The Legend of Thunder," he never made it into the animated series. Instead, the series just recycled the rival from the previous region.

Personally, I would have liked to see Shigeru beaten at the end of the Orange League and then go back to Kanto to train some more (and, eventually, become a Gym Leader). And then, when Jouto started, Satoshi would get a new rival. Fast forward a few years, and Satoshi's fighting Shigeru at the very beginning of the Battle Frontier.

Granted, the series would basically just copy Silver when they went and made Shinji, so introducing the character *now* wouldn't really do much of any good.

But why do you think he was skipped over back in the early 2000s, when Jouto was brand new? What, if any, were the benefits of removing him completely? Do you guys think the Jouto saga would have been better off if the character was around to mistreat pokemon? And if he did exist, how would DP have fared without a Shinji-like character?
 
The whole Johto saga in general refused to take risks or introduce any new major characters. Its like the writers purposely avoided bringing in new Johto characters whatsoever and just stuck to the same cast from Kanto.

Can you believe the only new character Johto gave us was Casey, who was essentially a minor character who only appeared in a grand total of 3 episodes?

Looking back, the Johto saga didn't really take advantage of any new Johto characters at all. We got the Johto Gym leaders, but that was about it. The whole core cast from Johto was entirely ignored, and we were lucky to get that one Raikou special with them.

As for in comparison to Paul, I don't think Paul's impact on the anime would have been as great if we had the GS rival. I see Paul as the writers way of apologizing for the lack of the red-haired rival through their own anime-exclusive character.
 
I agree. Paul was created to be the rival from Gen II. I wish Silver had been in, but Paul makes up for it.
 
I guess at the time they thought that a character like that was too much for the show and/or they didn't think Satoshi could handle such a character. I also agree with Scott that the writers were too afraid to take such a big risk. Pokemon was such a worldwide phenomena that you don't want to risk messing with the formula too much.

I guess with Satoshi (and the original audience) maturing they thought this would be a good time to give such a character a try. Since HGSS took three years to make, the writers may have decided to throw in Shinji since the games would reintroduce Silver in a few years time.

I really can't say what DP would be like without him. He's made such a big impact of Satoshi that things would be too different to speculate on. Same thing on if he was in Jouto. It would have made so big a difference you can't really speculate.
 
The Jouto saga, hell even the Hoenn saga neglected alot of characters. Kamon is just one of them. If the writers ever decided to work with Giovanni's character further we could maybe see Kamon. Hell, I'll be satisfied with just another cameo. I already gave up on seeing the likes of character like Kamon, Brendan and Leaf in the anime. =/

It's one of the many things that irritates me about the anime. Why keep introducing lame COTD's no one will ever give a damn about while they can not only make us happy, but probly add more plot driven episodes by adding game characters? That's the thing I like about DP.
 
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I think Musashi hit the nail on the head. The writers didn't want to risk screwing with the show. Things got popular with that forumla, why touch it at all? Course they soon realized that definitely didn't work, but by then it was well too late. Many fans had abandoned the show and many wouldn't come back until years later, if at all.

Another reason I think they may have neglected Silver was because the Raikou special didn't fare too well. Had it done extremely well with the fans, I think they would've probably brought the characters over into the main series or something, but since it didn't, they probably figured "nobody wants that..." and just ditched everything relating to it besides minor cameos.

In the end, I think the only reason we even GOT Shinji was because of Naruto. After how popular that show ended up being, I think the writers realized the potential behind a character like that, so they made sure to put one in when they could. Even the original promos for DP showcased Satoshi, Hikari and Shinji like they were the new group. As to how the show would've been with Silver in Jouto...I wanna say it would've definitely been more interesting, but not if the writers would've handled him just as bad as they did Shigeru. Or anything else in Jouto. If that was the case, I think Shinji still could exist since Silver would practically been non-existant in Jouto anyways. ._.
 
Dogasu said:
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I'm not seeing the Naruto connection at all.
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Seriously? A group of three kids? One is your typical shounen, one is a cute girl who worries about her appearence, and one is a brooding boy with family issues? Like I said, I'm basing this off the original promo images released. Before we knew Takeshi was even gonna show up, that's all they showed to us. Although they ultimately decided for Shinji to be a jerk rival, I still think it matters that they decided to go with that type of promotion rather than show who actually would be the main characters. It was like they wanted to see what the response would be to that type of grouping.
 
Naruto didn't start any of those archetypes you mentioned, nor did it popularize them. They were around long, loooooooooong before then.

I think that initial promo image was to just get people talking. And it worked.
 
Yotsuba said:
I think Musashi hit the nail on the head. The writers didn't want to risk screwing with the show. Things got popular with that forumla, why touch it at all? Course they soon realized that definitely didn't work, but by then it was well too late. Many fans had abandoned the show and many wouldn't come back until years later, if at all.
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I think the reason Johto didn't change the formula is because Tracey didn't become a popular character.

If you stop to think about it, the original idea behind Johto was to reunite the original trio and try to make things like Kanto again. So they got rid of Tracey and brought Brock back, and kept Misty and Gary.

Of course as Johto progressed it became obvious the saga was going to be nothing like Kanto, but you can tell the writers were worried that new characters weren't going to be received well judging by how people reacted to Tracey the first time.

Of course, once everyone complained about Johto, the writers revamped the show afterward and never looked back. Its pretty much the proof that the writers do at least have an understanding of what the general consensus is in the (Japanese) fanbase.
 
Because, back in the day, it's not like Crys or Gold appeared either. Some characters just get shafted, and that's just the way it is.

But i'd swear that Silver's HGSS design looks a little bit more like some sort of crazy fusion between his original design and Paul's design, but I might just be like, running away with my thoughts here.
 
I wonder if SIlver is Paul. In the anime, it says that Paul capture a couple pokemon when he was in Johto, so he could also could go into the lab and stole a starter pokemon. He has a who-cares attitude, so it is posible...
 
Hmm. Then I wonder what the reactions were, mostly for the Japanese fanbase, when Duplica, Todd, Richie, Suzie, Cassidy and Butch returned for the Jouto series?

I've never thought the writers would hold back on new major characters simply because they feel people would not like the idea, now that you mentioned it. However they also should know there's no satisfying everyone. If they've followed their instincts more, Jouto would have been a fresh series instead of a somewhat longer version of the Kanto series.

But since the topic speaks for Silver to be in the TV series, the same can be said for Jimmy and Marina. Regardless of them being in a Jouto special and Marina's advertisements in DP, only Jackson was in the series while we got no word of the other 2 yet in the series.

I'm going to agree that the Jouto writers were feeling disagreed on more major characters. I always thought they simply ran out of ideas (outside of those incredible Gym battles) before this other possibility was mentioned.
 
Same reason Brendan, and Lucas, won't appear out of cameos, or Leaf will never have a counterpart(unless she appears in another game..).

They just decided to leave him out, other then that cameo, and give him a counterpart. If we see Marina and Jimmy, maybe he'll appear.
 
I think paul is the silver in the anime look how he treated chimchar like it was nothing that he thinks training is stupid and if he looses he get rid of the worthless pokemon rather then be like other trainers who work hard to make there pokemon strong like ash.

latly in the anime I havent seen paul since the ring contest thing ill defintly say hes not like his brother with the additude.
 
He's a male character from the video games. They don't like to include those unless they're Gym Leaders.
 
We probably never got the G/S rival at the time because Ash's rival at the time was Gary and mildly Ritchie/Casey. (Even though they RARELY show Gary in the anime and focus on a lot of filler arcs).
And for now, we have Paul who is essentially a "clone" of the rival but a LOT more badass as he actually WINS his battles. The only real interest I have of the G/S rival is his connection to Giovanni and Team Rocket, which have more or less, disappeared in the anime as a whole organization.
 
To me, the lack of the rival from Gold/Silver is just one of the many reasons that Johto didn’t work. Having a rival like that during that saga would have really made Johto a much more memorable saga, but back then Johto was all about the status quo.

Still, without the Gold/Silver rival in Johto, it made Paul that much more memorable and is one of the reasons that has made the current Sinnoh saga as much fun to watch as it has been.
 
I sometimes wonder if the "fad" of Pokemon in the early days is what prevented the writers from introducing more villainous characters.

So instead of the GS rival, we got a girl who loved baseball. It didn't help matters that Johto got rid of the violence/guns that Kanto had...what a shame.

Zeta said:
He's a male character from the video games. They don't like to include those unless they're Gym Leaders.
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They did bring Barry into the show, so as long as it isn't a male protagonist like Brendan/Lucas, they seem to be fair game.
 
I think they are saving him for some big team rocket arc,because now it has been confirmed in the game that he is giovanni's son.I am guessing another celebi related episode.
Don't be hopeless,this anime has not ended yet .They are probably going to put leaf/green/blue,silver,wally etc.once they are all out of ideas.
 
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