Why was Dawn's Piloswine and Mamoswine so disobedient?

[owenpeterson]

I've stated before my opinions on why Ash's Charmeleon/Charizard was so disobedient towards Ash. Dawn's Piloswine/Mamoswine however has no clear backstory that would lead to any indication why it would act disobedient towards Dawn.

Was it because of Dawn's inexperience as a coordinator? Was is it because of her used to only working with "cute" Pokemon? Was it just for laughs? The reasons for Mamoswine are much more ambiguous than they are for Charizard. Both were obedient when they were a Swinub and a Charmander, but then started acting rebellious and disobedient upon evolution into Piloswine and Charmeleon respectively and into their final evolution stages. Charizard however, has the traumatic backstory to fall back upon for people to draw conclusions as to the cause in the first place. Personally I can imagine some great interaction between Charizard and Mamoswine.

However the main question here is What caused Dawn's Mamoswine's disobedience?

 

[Hidden Mew]

Charizard's disobedience had nothing to do with its backstory. They clearly established that the reason it didn't listen to Ash was because it didn't respect Ash due to his poor skills as a trainer in the episode where Charmeleon first started to disobey Ash. Plus, they never really brought up how it was abandoned after Charmander's capture episode and there wasn't any sign that there was any emotional/psychological damage as a result of being abandoned, unlike Chimchar or Tepig, so that wasn't really a factor as to why it wouldn't listen to Ash.

In regards to Dawn's Piloswine/Mamoswine, they didn't really establish much of a reason if I recall correctly. I think it was just a matter of Swinub's personality changing after it evolved and as a result, didn't care to listen to Dawn. It wasn't so much as it didn't respect Dawn like what Charizard did with Ash. I think it was more like it was just lazy and didn't care. They did play some moments for laughs like when Mamoswine would charge at Dawn for Poffins, but not too many moments like that. They didn't say that Dawn was inexperienced or had poor skills like they did with Ash either.

Dawn barely used Swinub though. I don't think that was a factor as to why it refused to listen to her for awhile, but that did weaken the impact for the audience in my opinion. Ash used Charmander frequently and while they didn't have a lot of moments together, they did seem to have some connection, which made it kind of sad when it refused to listen to him. Swinub barely appeared between its debut and evolution into Piloswine, so there wasn't much of a connection between the two that would make me feel like something important was lost between them.

 

[garrison-san]

Charizard and Piloswine's respective disobedience arcs were both simple plot contrivances to shake things up and create extra obstacles for their trainers. It's not much deeper than that in either case.

Fan theories aside, there was essentially nothing in the show itself to suggest that Charizard's disobedience had anything to do with Damian. Charmander simply "changed" when he evolved - to the extent that he stopped respecting Ash - and that was it.

 

[Solar Beam]

Ash's Charizard's disobedience has nothing to do with its backstory. Since Pokemon are like animals, they would have a need to feel superior over their masters. Ash's Charizard's disobedience was a matter of superiority.

Dawn's Piloswine/Mamoswine was probably like that as well. Since it evolved, it probably felt superior to Dawn since it's stronger. I believe that it's only a matter of willpower for Trainers to bond with their Pokemon, like how humans train and bond with their pets in order for them to be obedient.

 

[Johtohfiller]

I think it was meant to be a parallel to Ash's Charmeleon/Charizard, vague reason and only staying at the second stage for a couple episodes included.

 

[PokefanDT]

Looking back on it, the whole Charizard disobedience thing kinda baffles me. Maybe if the change hadn't been so SUDDEN. With Charmeleon they could have at least had him start to grow more independent from Ash and aggressive, not an overnight change but more gradual.

 

[dman_dustin]

The strangest thing about Dawn's Piloswine is how much they pulled a retcon on its personality. In the episode where Ash shows Professor Oak Grotle, and Dawn shows her Piloswine (which I believe was the FOLLOWING episode after Swinub evolve), Piloswine actually seemed to like Dawn to the point where Piloswine jumped on her. But then in the episode Piloswine evolved into Mamoswine, it didn't give a crap about Dawn which was always head scratcher to me.

I mean Mamoswine not listening to Dawn actually makes sense, when you consider how it evolved from a Piloswine. Team Rocket were pretty abusive towards Piloswine when it was in the cage, it kept being attacked, and getting hit by Yanmega's Sonic Boom, Carnivine's bullet seed and then another more direct hit with a sonic boom. Mamoswine was utterly pissed once it was done evolving that it went berserk, and we've even seen this behavior before which cost Dawn the contest battle where Lyra and Khorury were spectators.

I guess in the beginning Mamoswine resented the way Dawn didn't do anything to help it at all, that it had to evolve because it kept being attacked. Mamoswine clearly got over that when it realized Dawn cared about it, and then there's the whole Mamoswine going crazy against Fake Jessie in that one contest, clearly showed Mamoswine doesn't like to be abused or whatnot, because it was getting trounced.

So I think that was the reason Mamoswine was disobedient against Dawn, was because of how much abuse it took resulting in evolution.

As for Piloswine, that will always be a head scratcher. The only thing I can think of is Piloswine just wasn't a very happy Pokemon, I mean I can see how the Piloswine jumping on Dawn could be interpreted as it was still getting used to its new evolved form, and still had residual Swinub emotions, but I guess the next episode was when it completely adjusted to being a Piloswine, and wasn't really happy about the whole thing. That's the only way I can rationalize the weird discontinuity between the episode. At least for an "in-universe" explanation.

It's pretty clear that most likely Yonemura the writer for the (Rotom episode) wasn't quite clear about the direction of Dawn's Piloswine/Mamoswine which is probably why they are so different. Probably some miscommunication. It's also possible Yonemura was just so happy about Piloswine that Yonemura included it in for the hell of it just so it could get another appearance to pad out the evolutions by at least one episode, not realizing the direction Piloswine was going to take in the following episode, just made Piloswine jump on Dawn for a few seconds.

 

[Hidden Mew]

I mean Mamoswine not listening to Dawn actually makes sense, when you consider how it evolved from a Piloswine. Team Rocket were pretty abusive towards Piloswine when it was in the cage, it kept being attacked, and getting hit by Yanmega's Sonic Boom, Carnivine's bullet seed and then another more direct hit with a sonic boom. Mamoswine was utterly pissed once it was done evolving that it went berserk, and we've even seen this behavior before which cost Dawn the contest battle where Lyra and Khorury were spectators.

I guess in the beginning Mamoswine resented the way Dawn didn't do anything to help it at all, that it had to evolve because it kept being attacked. Mamoswine clearly got over that when it realized Dawn cared about it, and then there's the whole Mamoswine going crazy against Fake Jessie in that one contest, clearly showed Mamoswine doesn't like to be abused or whatnot, because it was getting trounced.

So I think that was the reason Mamoswine was disobedient against Dawn, was because of how much abuse it took resulting in evolution.

I don't think that Dawn could have done anything to protect Mamoswine from those attacks though. Team Rocket, at that point, had all of their Pokemon and I think that the Ash, Dawn and Brock were in a hole or cage at that point. Plus, there wasn't much any of them could have done to stop their attacks on Piloswine at that point. The attacks probably further enraged Mamoswine, but I don't think that contributed to why it wouldn't listen to Dawn, especially when it already didn't listen to her before Team Rocket attacked them. Mamoswine went crazy during that Contest not because it was getting trounced or because it didn't like to be abused. What triggered it was Carnavine grabbing Mamoswine's Ice Shard before it could eat it to create the Ice Armor. It was only after Mamoswine had already lost its temper was it getting trounced. I think that had more to do with Mamoswine not being used to things not going its way during a battle more than anything else. If Dawn had more experience with it in battle before that Contest, they could have been able to deal with not being able to use Ice Armor better than they actually did.

 

[garrison-san]

Mamoswine went crazy during that Contest not because it was getting trounced or because it didn't like to be abused. What triggered it was Carnavine grabbing Mamoswine's Ice Shard before it could eat it to create the Ice Armor. It was only after Mamoswine had already lost its temper was it getting trounced. I think that had more to do with Mamoswine not being used to things not going its way during a battle more than anything else. If Dawn had more experience with it in battle before that Contest, they could have been able to deal with not being able to use Ice Armor better than they actually did.

Agreed. Mamoswine's rampage in that contest had nothing to do with "abuse" - Carnivine's techniques simply threw a curve at it, and Mamoswine didn't know how to respond other than to fly into a blind rage. It came down to Mamoswine's pride and lack of practical battling experience more than anything else.

 

[mr.platinum2800]

Mamoswine had no excuse! It was listening to Dawn just fine! It was just deliberately choosing not to listen to Dawn. When it comes down to it, it has nothing to do with Team Rocket, abuse, or lack of prior practical battle experience. It has a lot to do with Mamoswine just simply not caring and once again choosing what it wants to do, and it chose to go into a blind rage.