Why is Paul / Shinji so popular?

Shinji's popular because he's different than Satoshi's other rivals and his personality is interesting.
 
yoshi12370 has got a point.

However, I see Shinji-kun as being rather unpopular by most fans because he's so different. I know many people who would love to argue with me over why they hate him and why I should, too.

Personally, I love Shinji-kun because he is different and because we share certain similarities about raising Pokémon. If they're not strong enough, I trash 'em, too, so we're on the same boat.

Besides, have you looked at Shinji-kun? He's freaking sexy! XD
Of course, don't get me wrong, I could go on and on and list so many more things. . I just don't wanna. =P Maybe later.
 
Paul is one of the reasons why I kinda like DP a bit and why I am back in the fandom! He's a character that is so different from some of the other trainers that I have seen, I wanna see more Paul in the coming episodes!
 
IMO Paul is nearly a better rival to Ash than Gary. Gary was just like a very annoying big brother to Ash. He was always several steps ahead and had tons of pokemon. He used the most powerful he had but never trashed the others and cared for them...and eventualy matured. But Paul is an anti-hero. He trashes his pokemon if they fail him and doesn`t bother keeping a big collection. He wants a few but he wants the best-this is his similarity to Ash. But Paul doesn`t strive to get his team stronger by friendship or even showing his pokemon that they don`t need to evolve-the polar opposite of Ash. I like him because he shows occasionaly and not when the conference comes. He is like a milestone Ash has to pass every time he wins a badge or evolves his pokemon.
 
Agreed that Shinji-kun seems to be Satoshi's polar opposite on-screen. . But that was only to Hikozaru. We've never seen Shinji interact with his other Pokémon, but they seem to like him and they even seem to get breaks now and again (see DP100), which just makes me wonder if he was only like that to Hikozaru.

Now, I'm not saying he's absolutely nice to his other Pokémon, but he doesn't seem to be as hard on them as he was on Hikozaru.

I'm also interested in knowing why Shinji-kun is such a jerk. His brother is definitely not a jerk, and look at how successful Reiji-san's been. So. . Why did Shinji-kun decide to be such a jerk to people he doesn't feel are worthy enough to even battle him? He's somewhat polite to Champions and Gym Leaders, since he sees them on a higher-level, as we've seen.

. . . I forgot where I was going with that. XD
 
Chances are that we get a traumatic backstory someday that explains why he acts this way.

On the other hand, he being somewhat of a jerk, just because he is one, and has some cold reason to back it is nice as well.
 
Because people love to hate him or something. Some like bad boys. I dunno.

Personally I want him to die horribly since he's such an ass to everyone and practically abused Chimchar.
 
Because after goody-two-shoes rivals and the overall , it's nice to have a rival with such a mean streak and a dissenting opinion on training. Not everyone in this world is going to agree with you, but with Ash its always seemed like everyone always did things the exact same way as himself. And its nice to see an alternative and someone who's his total opposite.
 
People absolutely adore their dark, brooding characters. He's an excellent juxiposition when compared to the normal cherriness of the anime in general.

It's the very same reason why Snape and Draco Malfoy were popular in Harry Potter. People find something attractive in such characters.
 
Because we had 10 seasons of nice, friendly characters aside from a few.

Did anyone wonder why almost all those filler characters are so nice and friendly?

Paul is different than what this show is used to, which is why he is popular. It only took us 10 years to get a character like him.
 
Because he's an ass. Thats apparently cool. Well, its different for Pokemon, so yeah.

Also, he's like a competitive battler. Ya know, does everything to get the best Pokemon. Like most people when they play the game.
 
Because we were waiting for something like this in a long time. And that he's the Silver in the anime. Long overdue.

PDL said:
It's the very same reason why Snape and Draco Malfoy were popular in Harry Potter. People find something attractive in such characters.
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I have to agree here. It's quite interesting.
 
PDL said:
People absolutely adore their dark, brooding characters. He's an excellent juxiposition when compared to the normal cherriness of the anime in general.

It's the very same reason why Snape and Draco Malfoy were popular in Harry Potter. People find something attractive in such characters.
Click to expand...

And Sasuke of Naruto, Hiei of YuYu, Akabane of Getbackers, etc... People eat up characters like these, as you said. It's apparently cool to isolate yourself.
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Paul's alright. I think some people like him more because he does so much. I honestly think Gary would get similar respect/praise if we got to see more of him during their rivalry. His fanbase was already big as it was.

One thing that bothers me about Paul is his perspective on Pokemon. His methods are a bit questionable to me. I mean countless times we've seen him remove a Pokemon from his party that he views unfit. He ditches them, so that only the strongest Pokemon is part of his team. That makes me wonder, is he anti hard work? But then I see all that he put Chimchar through, so there's a lot of contradicting instances in his methods.
 
He also serves as an excellent foil to the happygolucky main cast, too.
I also like the dynamics between Shinji and Satoshi, as well as the addition of Jun.
Overall, this season, Satoshi's rivals are handled veryyyyy nicely.
 
Aladar said:
IMO Paul is nearly a better rival to Ash than Gary. Gary was just like a very annoying big brother to Ash. He was always several steps ahead and had tons of pokemon. He used the most powerful he had but never trashed the others and cared for them...and eventualy matured. But Paul is an anti-hero. He trashes his pokemon if they fail him and doesn`t bother keeping a big collection. He wants a few but he wants the best-this is his similarity to Ash. But Paul doesn`t strive to get his team stronger by friendship or even showing his pokemon that they don`t need to evolve-the polar opposite of Ash. I like him because he shows occasionaly and not when the conference comes. He is like a milestone Ash has to pass every time he wins a badge or evolves his pokemon.
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I remember one time in one episode called "Different Strokes For Different Blokes" when Paul captured a Stantler in a Poké Ball like usual after Ash and co had to go through all that trouble with him. Before then, he murmured to himself that that Stantler must be a very strong and powerful Pokemon or else he wasn't going to keep it. When he saw that Stantler could only do ONE MOVE called TACKLE, he immediately and automatically released it and told it to "GET OUT." As you can see, he checks for what moves his Pokemon knows by using his Pokedex Scanner. It scans for all attack and defense moves his Pokemon have got. Ash bumped into a tree full of Beedrill and then the Beedrill came running after him and attacking. Ash bumped into the Ursaring that Paul was going to capture and then Turtwig used Bite on it, Pikachu used Iron Tail, and then that Ursaring launched a very strong and powerful Hyper Beam and then Ash, Dawn, and Brock were blatantly frightened by that Ursaring until Paul stepped in as a Pokemon Trainer, but not as a very responsible trainer as one should be. He had his Chimcar used Ember to weaken the Ursaring and he used a Poke Ball to entrap the Ursaring. He kept that Ursaring for a while, but my opinion was that it probably wouldn't have obeyed his commands since he caught a real powerful Pokemon with probably 0 to 1 gym badges probably at a really high level like past level 30 in which you need at least 3 gym badges to control those Pokemon, or win things like Pokemon Contests like May or Haruka has been doing in the Hoenn region; and Paul is so abusive. At the beginning of that episode, Ash and Paul were having a Pokemon Battle: Chimcar VS. Turtwig. Ash battled Paul and lost the first time and then Paul said that Ash was just a waste of time because he lost. Because he lost? Because he lost? Paul doesn't realize that if he wins, his opponent loses, nor that if he loses, his opponent wins. In fact, since they had 2 battles, Ash had lost the first and second time and in the end Paul called "ASH" a "LOSER" like he always does to his opponents and says that any foe that he could defeat are weak. He acts like such a mean, sad, horrible, and miserable person. BUTT MUCH? I could say or interpret that he's been a BUTT for almost 2 possible years straight.
 
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I also think his appearances make him popular too.

We've already seen Paul in more episodes than we saw Gary in all of Orange and Johto combined.

With a few more appearances, it'll get to the point where Paul has been in more eps than Gary for the entire series, and Paul has only existed for 2 years compared to Gary's 5 year run + cameos in AG and DP.
 
He's definitely a compelling character. Paul's not someone I would want to know in real life, but he adds conflict and makes for a more character-driven narrative. Also, yeah, it's a good change of pace from the normal "life is wonderful and everyone's so nice and here kids come stay in my cabin isolated in the middle of the woods overnight and somehow not be molested or murdered because there are no bad people in the world" characters.

And yeah, actually being there certainly helps. They mishandeled Gary so horribly for the length of the entire series that it's downright embarrassing. And kinda annoying when people crown Ash/Gary as the best rivalry of the series when it's really anything but.
 
I dunno, I always liked the Ash/Gary rivalry, but I suppose since we never did see as much of Gary, Paul makes for a much better rival, and consequently, more popular.
 
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