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So the Pokemon XYZ anime is getting large amounts of flack recently.


IceBrand
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Not gonna lie, was salty after watching that. Especially since they built up Alain as this unbeatable guy that beat Ash twice before the league. This would be like if Ash lost to Paul in the Sinnoh League

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What's the point of the journey narrative, if the protagonist never learns anything or gains anything from the journey?

To have fun?

You act like journeys need to be epics. Ash's goal in life is foremost to have fun with his friends and to meet new Pokemon. That takes precidence over being a Pokemon Master.

I don't see why Ash needs to change anything.

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He needs to not hit the reset button every region.

This in and of itself is really, really annoying, since they don't take the obvious action of focusing on a new protagonist in favor of sending the same character through the same stuff.

That is my problem with Ash.

I also dislike the fact they completely shelve the male player characters as new outfits for Ash and that's it, don't follow the games as faithfully as they should (especially BW/BW2), and not including certain rivals from the games at all (Silver, Wally, Hugh), but that has less to do with Ash as a character and more to do with my opinion of the anime in general.

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He needs to not hit the reset button every region.

This in and of itself is really, really annoying, since they don't take the obvious action of focusing on a new protagonist in favor of sending the same character through the same stuff.

That is my problem with Ash.

This is a big reason why I don't like Ash as well. A while ago, I watched a youtube video that made me think of an interesting question -- in Western media, there are a lot of characters who just don't grow up. So why is it that Ash can't do the same? It's because Ash is always on a journey. Ash's journey has some sort of chronology to it. You can't watch it "out of order" and expect to have the same understanding and appreciation for it, while a lot of western animation has few "timeline" indicators, or they are inconsistent and just throw in obligatory holiday specials. Barring instances when new characters are introduced, you can generally watch them out of order.

Moreover, a lot of these shows with unchanging time are comedies, they have no real plot and are just meant to be funny. Pokemon is an adventure show and the characters are moving from location to location, and time is changing. And for Ash to start over on his journey every season like a new player means that he will lose to gym leaders and new players. An Ash who keeps his character development wouldn't realistically lose to new players or gym leaders, so he never gets proper development that lasts from season to season. And that gets boring after a while.

Plus, Ash is just getting boring in general. Pokemon X/Y is my first Pokemon game, but I would've actually watched the XY anime seriously if the main character were Calem (or heck, even Serena) instead of Ash.

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This is a big reason why I don't like Ash as well. A while ago, I watched a youtube video that made me think of an interesting question -- in Western media, there are a lot of characters who just don't grow up. So why is it that Ash can't do the same? It's because Ash is always on a journey. Ash's journey has some sort of chronology to it. You can't watch it "out of order" and expect to have the same understanding and appreciation for it, while a lot of western animation has few "timeline" indicators, or they are inconsistent and just throw in obligatory holiday specials. Barring instances when new characters are introduced, you can generally watch them out of order.

Moreover, a lot of these shows with unchanging time are comedies, they have no real plot and are just meant to be funny. Pokemon is an adventure show and the characters are moving from location to location, and time is changing. And for Ash to start over on his journey every season like a new player means that he will lose to gym leaders and new players. An Ash who keeps his character development wouldn't realistically lose to new players or gym leaders, so he never gets proper development that lasts from season to season. And that gets boring after a while.

Plus, Ash is just getting boring in general. Pokemon X/Y is my first Pokemon game, but I would've actually watched the XY anime seriously if the main character were Calem (or heck, even Serena) instead of Ash.

I agree with basically everything you said, I really don't have much to add.

The lack of protagonist reset buttons is why I prefer Special by a wide margin, though Special isn't without its problems (for example, the only thing about ORAS's arc that isn't an absolute mess imo is Ruby's character and interactions). The protagonists are also significantly more interesting than Ash is overall, they work to attain their goals and achieve, they aren't necessarily pleasant people to start and develop in that regard (Ruby and Emerald are probably the most notable), but the older protagonists still get to come back later with all development intact to help out.

...I do worry for both Kusaka and Yamamoto's health, though. I'd imagine working on a series as long-running as Special would be incredibly demanding and such.

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This is a big reason why I don't like Ash as well. A while ago, I watched a youtube video that made me think of an interesting question -- in Western media, there are a lot of characters who just don't grow up. So why is it that Ash can't do the same? It's because Ash is always on a journey. Ash's journey has some sort of chronology to it. You can't watch it "out of order" and expect to have the same understanding and appreciation for it, while a lot of western animation has few "timeline" indicators, or they are inconsistent and just throw in obligatory holiday specials. Barring instances when new characters are introduced, you can generally watch them out of order.

Moreover, a lot of these shows with unchanging time are comedies, they have no real plot and are just meant to be funny. Pokemon is an adventure show and the characters are moving from location to location, and time is changing. And for Ash to start over on his journey every season like a new player means that he will lose to gym leaders and new players. An Ash who keeps his character development wouldn't realistically lose to new players or gym leaders, so he never gets proper development that lasts from season to season. And that gets boring after a while.

Plus, Ash is just getting boring in general. Pokemon X/Y is my first Pokemon game, but I would've actually watched the XY anime seriously if the main character were Calem (or heck, even Serena) instead of Ash.

You put my point much more eloquently.

I agree with basically everything you said, I really don't have much to add.

The lack of protagonist reset buttons is why I prefer Special by a wide margin, though Special isn't without its problems (for example, the only thing about ORAS's arc that isn't an absolute mess imo is Ruby's character and interactions). The protagonists are also significantly more interesting than Ash is overall, they work to attain their goals and achieve, they aren't necessarily pleasant people to start and develop in that regard (Ruby and Emerald are probably the most notable), but the older protagonists still get to come back later with all development intact to help out.

...I do worry for both Kusaka and Yamamoto's health, though. I'd imagine working on a series as long-running as Special would be incredibly demanding and such.

Another thing is how has Ash not learned anything in all his travels? How is he still 10 and the same dumb kid? To go with the above, it's a journey, the whole point is to gain something from the experience. How does he fit journeying through 6 regions and not age at all? He doesn't have to be 30, now, but maybe give him a year for each new region he goes to. It seems like each Pokemon Championship would be held annually, anyway, so it makes sense.

And the idea that kids need someone exactly their own age to be the protagonist is dumb. When I was a kid, I didn't want to be like the kids in the shows, I wanted to be like the teenager/adult characters. There's a reason that Disney Princesses are all teenagers or early 20-somethings and not 10 year olds. Even JRPG protagonists are usually around the 17 year mark.

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You put my point much more eloquently.

Another thing is how has Ash not learned anything in all his travels? How is he still 10 and the same dumb kid? To go with the above, it's a journey, the whole point is to gain something from the experience. How does he fit journeying through 6 regions and not age at all? He doesn't have to be 30, now, but maybe give him a year for each new region he goes to. It seems like each Pokemon Championship would be held annually, anyway, so it makes sense.

And the idea that kids need someone exactly their own age to be the protagonist is dumb. When I was a kid, I didn't want to be like the kids in the shows, I wanted to be like the teenager/adult characters. There's a reason that Disney Princesses are all teenagers or early 20-somethings and not 10 year olds. Even JRPG protagonists are usually around the 17 year mark.

Funny story, someone apparently calculated all the seen day/night cycles, and got a result of several years on top of unseen day/Night changes.

But yeah those are valid grievances against Ash's writing.

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I watched the last part of the battle and I call bullshit on Alain's Charizard: Take 1 Thunderbolt, 1 Cut, a couple of powerful empower Water shuriken and it still doesn't go down?

Maybe Ash made a mistake by not using a water move before the rain run out but last time I checked, Mega evolving your pokémon doesn't heal it.

The writers really fucked up big times.

EDIT: I'm not sure if this official or not but apparently, the writers who wrote this episode were not the same as the rest of the entire X and Y saga. Those who wrote this episode are those who did the best wish series which might explain why this episode end up being stupid (because best wish is crap).

Edited by Nym
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I watched the last part of the battle and I call bullshit on Alain's Charizard: Take 1 Thunderbolt, 1 Cut, a couple of powerful empower Water shuriken and it still doesn't go down?

Maybe Ash made a mistake by not using a water move before the rain run out but last time I checked, Mega evolving your pokémon doesn't heal it.

The writers really fucked up big times.

EDIT: I'm not sure if this official or not but apparently, the writers who wrote this episode were not the same as the rest of the entire X and Y saga. Those who wrote this episode are those who did the best wish series which might explain why this episode end up being stupid (because best wish is crap).

no, in fact the writer for this episode is the one everyone loves, mr whatever his name is

tomioka? yeah

he was the head writer for diamond and pearl, which was probably the worst arc of the anime

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Oh man, I haven't watched the Pokémon anime for years now. I forget where I quit watching, haha. I stopped watching it because I had a feeling Ash was just gonna keep on losing Pokémon league campionships and repeating the whole darn cycle.

As long as the Pokémon anime keeps going, Ash is just gonna keep on losing, and losing, and losing.

So I quit watching the Pokémon anime, and Off to sleep I go~

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Oh man, I haven't watched the Pokémon anime for years now. I forget where I quit watching, haha. I stopped watching it because I had a feeling Ash was just gonna keep on losing Pokémon league campionships and repeating the whole darn cycle.

As long as the Pokémon anime keeps going, Ash is just gonna keep on losing, and losing, and losing.

So I quit watching the Pokémon anime, and Off to sleep I go~

Now you know my pain as a Cubs fan. They better not screw it up this year.

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i pray to god that nobody in this chat holds their sport teams to the same 'literally best in the country or bust' standard tbh

After 100 years, it's not an unreasonable aspiration

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i pray to god that nobody in this chat holds their sport teams to the same 'literally best in the country or bust' standard tbh

I stopped caring about sports when I was five tbh.

I was really into watching football as a toddler for some reason, I'm not sure why. My mom sometimes reminds me that she would ask what I was watching and I'd reply with the team names like it was the most obvious thing ever.

The current me wouldn't be able to do that.

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no, in fact the writer for this episode is the one everyone loves, mr whatever his name is

tomioka? yeah

he was the head writer for diamond and pearl, which was probably the worst arc of the anime

Quick update, I was ''right'' I guess. The guy who wrote the episode is Shinzō Fujita, he wrote the battle of Ash vs Cameron in B&W which may explain why this episode sucks.

Source: http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Category:Episodes_written_by_Shinz%C5%8D_Fujita

The episode is X131.

Edited by Nym
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Ash vs Cameron technically wasn't even that bad

it was fairly inane how Ash lost, but the battle itself was well done

Yea Ash starts by wasting Boldore and Oshawoot on Hydreigon instead of you know... using Pikachu?

Then Cameron had the good idea to send Ferrothorn against Pignite.

Samurrot vs Pikachu was... ok I guess.

Swanna vs Pikachu, great idea again, Cameron.

Multiple Force Palms? That's not an attack, Cameron.

Then of course, the evolution that somehow heal the pokémon to full health.

Yea, no.

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