#ag033

[torchickentacos]

Drew’s Travel Route (Part 1. Sigh.)

Ok, SO! I said I’d try to figure out the travel routes of the anime rivals, and I’m starting with Drew. First things first, starting with Hoenn, here’s the map- I’ve marked down the probable locations of places that the anime made up where relevant. LONG POST, and I’ve edited the map for clarity’s sake. Also, I am vaguely/loosely taking encounter locations from RSE, you’ll get it later, don’t worry about it for now. 

The beginning of his journey is a logical place to start but also we really don't know. He’s from LaRousse City, which is allegedly off the coast of Lilycove, according to Bulbapedia with no citation. He has three ribbons before meeting May and co., but we have no way of knowing where he got them or when or anything. We’re going to ignore those ribbons for my own sanity and just say ‘somehow he got from LaRousse to Slateport’, because otherwise I’d be factoring Solidad in here and it’s just a whole thing that we’re not worrying about. Fanon tends to agree that this isn’t his first contest circuit, so for all we know he didn’t even start from LaRousse. We just don’t know and we’re not worrying about it, and we're calling Slateport our start point because that's where he debuts. (Personal opinion? He's probably at LEAST been around Eastern Hoenn before, maybe down around the islands (Sootopolis, Mossdeep) at some point and around 121-122-123. We'll just assume he made his way from LaRousse>Lilycove>122>123>128>Mauville>110>Slateport, bringing us to our start point and gathering 3 ribbons along the way, but I'm not mapping that out because I have no real evidence).

So, that out of the way, let’s look at his starting point.

Drew first shows up in AG033 at a beach in Slateport City, where he stays until AG035 Win, Lose, or Drew!. After that, we don’t see him until AG050 Pros and Con Artists, set in Fallarbor Town. Now, Slateport and Fallarbor are far away and have a few different routes. We’re saving the desert route for later (I have my reasons to believe he only went to 111 later on), so north is out. You could also go a bit south to Oldale>Petalburg>Rustboro, OR north and then west through Mauville>Verdanturf>Rustboro. We’re assuming the former, as the latter would mean he visited Verdanturf before and didn’t enter any contests and that just makes less sense to me. Also it doesn’t matter. MAYBE he caught Masquerain as a Surskit in this stretch of traveling but it's inconclusive and largely irrelevant.

So, AG050, Fallarbor. He stays here throughout 051-Come What May!. The next time we see him is in AG061, Disaster of Disguise, set in Verdanturf. He stays here throughout 062 as well. Minor backtracking through 114, 115, and Rustboro, but nothing major.

After this, we see him in AG077, A Fan With A Plan, which takes place in, uh, Rubello Town. 

This is where it gets funky. Rubello Town is somewhere between ‘Littleroot and Fortree’ according to Bulbapedia, which is like saying that New Jersey is somewhere between Maine and Florida. So I took it into my own hands and decided that it’s PROBABLY somewhere around the intersection of Routes 118 and 119, or early 119, headed into Fortree. It’s the only place that makes sense given where May and Co. are in the surrounding episodes. We're really triangulating some shit here. Eventually I should try to figure out where all the fake towns are but that's a project for later. Anyways, Rubello Town, AG077, A Fan With A Plan. That episode deserves its own 'wtf' post tbh. Anyways. We're here.

So, from 118-119ish, Rubello Town, AG077, we then see him again in AG113, Who, What, When, Where, Wynaut (WWWWW). So, there’s a lot going on in this little stretch. It’s a big timegap from AG077-113. First things first, I’m assuming he took a detour through route 120 to catch Absol at this point. Absol debuts all the way in the Kanto Grand Festival, but it makes sense for him to have caught it this early on. So, we’re calling route 120 his next stop, maybe offscreen around AG80ish?

And now, we’re detouring back to Route 111. I agonized over this decision but it feels right to put it here.

You see, at some point Drew needs to have caught a Trapinch. Some of you guys who also trawled the bulbapedia ship pages before they got deleted probably remember that Flygon was specifically caught and trained for the theoretical situation in which he faced against May in the Hoenn Grand Festival. Because, you know, raising a pokemon up to at least level 45 is a thing you do for people you feel normally about. That’s a completely normal investment of time and energy and forethought and care. Anyways, I actually hesitated on assuming that Drew would have seen May as important enough to go out of his way to catch it this early-on, but we are three roses in with blatant flirting in 077, and WWWWW is up next (which people seem to agree is when he's like oh shit, those are emotions that I'm feeling), so it feels like a safe enough bet, and also Drew’s just Kind Of Like That™. Also, there’s no other time later in which it makes sense for him to have time to make the detour while also evolving it before the Grand Festival (and honestly even then we’re pushing it a bit). Any earlier and I doubt he’d have considered her in high enough regard to train an entire pokemon to battle her with (again, very large investment of time and energy to get a Flygon). So, with all that, we’re assuming that he goes back to 111 and catches Trapinch here. 

He also gets a ribbon somewhere in this time gap (his fifth). In the anime, pretty much every town seems like it holds contests. I really don’t know. I’m ASSUMING that on his way to Route 131 (we’ll get there in a second), he picks up a ribbon from some made-up location that we aren't privy to.

Now. Gonna be real. I don’t know where in the actual hell they are in the beginning of WWWWW and his next appearance. Vaguely around Pacifidlog? Two episodes ago they were in Sootopolis, one episode ago they were on some random island, and they’re just in the ocean in the next one so I don’t know. Best I can figure is somewhere around Route 131. Why is Drew out in the middle of route 131? Don’t know. He has all 5 ribbons and isn’t going to Pacifidlog to watch May (something he goes out of his way for later but I digress). I really have no earthly clue why the fresh hell he’s out in 131, but HE IS I GUESS and who am I to question it? Did he just want some ocean time??? I don't know why he's here. Usually him being in out-of-the-way places is because May's there, but no, he's not here for her this time, he doesn't watch the Pacifidlog contest to the best of our knowledge, he's just. HERE. I GUESS.

So. Fine. Whatever. We’re on 131 FOR SOME REASON, he ‘travels’ to Mirage Island if you’d call that travelling, they head back to wherever they were on 131.

It’s more straightforward from here- he heads back to Slateport for the Hoenn Grand Festival, AG121-123. We’re assuming he takes a boat, I’m not sending this dude all the way back through mainland Hoenn. Tbh he has seasick vibes, which several unrelated fics from over the last 15 years seem to agree on for whatever reason, but that’s his problem and not mine. 

SO. FINALLY. END OF HOENN (but not end of AG, there’s that part 2 at some point). We’re all the way back at Slateport- his first and last Hoenn appearance is maybe/probably on the same stretch of beach, intentional or not. And with that, we have his PROBABLE travel route throughout his appearances in the Hoenn section of AG!

Kanto gets its own post because this is over 1k words long and took 2 hours to figure out last night :)))))))

(and @silverncats , here it is!!! I hope this is interesting, and I'm planning on doing more! This was super fun, albeit tedious and full of guesswork)

[zponds]

May has Beautifly start the practicing and training by controlling its Gust, and May catches frisbees, and she proved to be great at it. However, her happiness was cut short when Drew shows up and judges May’s performance and her Pokémon, making her furious, and making her friends furious too. Right off the bat, Drew is shown to be a jerk. May angrily says that she’ll definitely win the Slateport contest after enough training.

Episode: AG 033 - “Now That’s Flower Power!”

[pokemonmaxpics]

[pokemonislanderprincess]

Pokeani Re-Watch: AG

My favorite AG episodes are under the cut! This list I cut up between Hoenn and the Battle Frontier, since the latter actually takes place in Kanto.

Hoenn

AG001 - Get the Show on the Road!

AG003 - There’s No Place Like Hoenn

AG004 - You Never Can Taillow

AG006 - A Poached Ego!

AG007 - Tree’s a Crowd

AG009 - Taming of the Shroomish

AG013 - All Things Bright and Beautifly!

AG015 - Gonna Rule the School!

AG017 - Stairway to Devon

AG020 - Brave the Wave

AG023 - Gone Corphishin’

AG025 - A Mudkip Mission

AG033 - Now That’s Flower Power!

AG035 - Win, Lose, or Drew!

AG039 - A Poke-BLOCK Party!

AG042 - Love at First Flight

AG044 - The Princess and the Togepi

AG045 - A Togepi Mirage!

AG050 - Pros and Con Artists

AG051 - Come What May!

AG060 - Delcatty Got Your Tounge

AG061 - Disaster of Disguise

AG062 - Disguise Da Limit

AG068 - A Double Dilemma

AG069 - Love, Petalburg Style!

AG070 - Balance of Power

AG071 - A Six Pack Attack

AG072 - The Bicker the Better

AG077 - A Fan with a Plan

AG078 - Cruisin’ for a Losin’

AG086 - Lights, Camerupt, Action!

AG103 - A Cacturne for the Worse

AG108 - Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snorunt!

AG109 - Do I Hear a Ralts?

AG113 - Who, What, When, Where, Wynaut?

AG121 - Hi Ho Silver Wind!

AG122 - Deceit and Assist

AG123 - Rhapsody in Drew

AG129 - A Judgement Brawl

AG130 - Choose It or Lose It!

Battle Frontier (Kanto)

AG132 - The Scheme Team

AG133 - The Right Place and the Right Mime

AG134 - A Real Cleffa-Hanger

AG139 - On Cloud Arcanine

AG143 - The Saffron Con

AG144 - A Hurdle for Squirtle

AG147 - Sweet Baby James

AG153 - Tactics Theatrics!!

AG156 - From Cradle to Save

AG157 - Time Warp Heals All Wounds

AG160 - Harley Rides Again

AG162 - Spontaneous Combusken!

AG163 - Cutting the Ties That Bind!

AG167 - What I Did for Love!

AG174 - New Plot, Odd Lot!

AG175 - Going for Choke!

AG177 - Grating Spaces!

AG178 - Battling the Enemy Within!

AG180 - May, We Harley Drew’d Ya!

AG181 - Thinning the Hoard!

AG182 - Channeling the Battle Zone!

AG187 - The Unbeatable Lightness of Seeing!

AG189 - Gathering the Gang of Four!

AG192 - Home is Where the Start Is!

[itstimetodrew]

If there's settei for AG033 and AG050 for Drew than do you think there's settei for AG146?

Drew doesn’t appear in AG146. Do you mean his brief cameo in AG141? :o

Either way, I doubt it. The same settei seem to be reused by animators unless there’s some sort of outfit change that would require a new drawing. There wasn’t any outfit or style change to Drew in his appearances, so I’m pretty sure only a base one exists for him. The only ‘new’ settei for episodes after AG033 would be height charts that include characters new to the episode, but even then a character’s image in the height chart is copy-pasted from an already existing reference. 

[musashi]

i keep tabbing over to photoshop and seeing this and tabbing out

[torchickentacos]

Yeahhhhhhhhhhhhhh anon, so I see what you mean lmao. ag033 specifically is apparently IMPOSSIBLE to find subs of. I'm in the trenches searching right now but I will find SOMETHING

[torchickentacos]

Hey again! it's the same anon as before! sorry for the trouble but I can't seem to locate a few episodes, (which was the issue I was trying to communicate before, apologies if I worded it weird), namely, eps between 293-319 (overall) and 321-364 (overall), which correlate to eps 20:"Brave the Wave"-46:"Candid Camerupt!" and 48:"ZigZag Zangoose!"- 91: "Lessons in Lilycove" if I'm doing the math correctly. idk if it is more an issue on my end than anything cuz there are a few more episodes that seemed to be sprinkled in but yeahhh

I mainly want to see "Now that's Flower Power!" and "Come What May!" because I need to observe how weirdly the salad head talks even in japanese

Thanks again!

No worries at ALL! I hadn't noticed those episodes were missing, actually, sorry about that! So, I've spent an hour on this now, and turns out most of them are straight up just a lost cause [AG033 (Now That's Flower Power!) specifically just straight up is IMPOSSIBLE] . I looked everywhere. I ended up on a romanian film review website. I ended up crashing internet archive. I ended up on page 269 of bulbagarden's advanceshipping forum (??? thanks google. it wasn't helpful. by the way). I clicked about everything that wouldn't kill my computer and nowhere gave me anything helpful. If I ever DO find them, you'll be the first to know! Though I guess you're on anon so that's not possible, but like. in spirit i'll tell you first. in reality i'll jsut post about it and pray you see it.

I CAN say, though, from other episodes I've seen subbed/dubbed, AG (and the resulting beloved-slash-clowned-on salad head character within) is actually WAY WEIRDER in english. Like, by a lot. An incomprehensible amount. AG Eng dub is definitely the chaotic one of the two (though AG's chaos transcends the barriers of language). Tell you what- using whatever episodes I do have dubbed, later tonight or tomorrow I'll make a masterpost about how he's presented in each and the differences I notice!!! It's not the same but it's something. SO sorry I couldn't really help out here, but if I EVER find anything I'll post about it!!!

[zponds]

Having arrived in Slateport City, May wants to practice and train for the upcoming Slateport Pokémon contest. She and the others head to the beach and May brings out Beautifly. Ash even gives May some advice and/or encourages her and she accepts.

Episode: AG 033 - “Now That’s Flower Power!”

[zponds]

May decides to do another stage of her training... by having Beautifly go against Taillow. Later, the battle ensues and despite Beautifly putting up a good fight, May unfortunately looses the match. Soon, a man: Mr. Big approaches, saying he’s a former Coordinator, and May is eager to know everything about being a successful coordinator.

Episode: AG 033 - “Now That’s Flower Power!”

[pokemonmaxpics]