#like. where is the corphish of the team

[perenlop]

At risk of sounding like a buzzkill, am I the only one who just doesnt care about Ash’s Melmetal. Like it just doesn’t feel right for him and I don’t really like Meltan or Melmetal at all tbh

Actually does anyone else wish Ash’s Alola team had a biit more substance or is that just me

[aestheticitii]

do you think the gym leaders+steven all text norman to let him know how his kid is doing

because norman is the only one with a kid among the gym leaders. wattson's got a niece but she lives outside of hoenn and drake from the elite four has grandkids but like he's not a gym leader

and it's just a way to bond with norman since he clearly loves his family and the only time he gets soft is thinking of them

like roxanne gets beaten by a lvl15 mudkip and nothing else, and when she asks why, the kid is like, "actually, i want to be a water type only trainer so that i can also be a gym leader"

she lets wallace know in the group chat that he has competition

steven casually drops the fact that his kid beat up a few team magma grunts and his dad is apparently very fond of norman's kid now to one of the others and it spreads like wildfire

brawly says that his kid's been camping out for like the past three days, trying to fish for a tentacool, and then they show up to battle with like 20 potions and their tentacool as their ace

wallace pipes in briefly to tell norman that he and his wife should turn on a specific channel and watch it together.

afterwards, norman jokes that his kid really is gunning for wallace's spot and thanks him for letting him see their kid branching out. wallace starts commenting more on them because lisia tells him a lot and he's kind of happy his niece has a good friend she can hang out with

wattson happily tells him about he caught them giving pointers to wally and how they gave their marshtomp bulldoze specifically for this match and won by the skin of their teeth

and also how they nearly got into a fight with the guy who gives advice because he was like "you can't fight with water types in an electric gym!"

flannery is oddly quiet when they come to town and that is because they end up befriending each other because they WANT to be a gym leader but they know they have to live up to their dad while flannery's already trying to live up to the sort of reputation one should have

all she says is "it's a secret"

norman shares a picture of him, his wife, and their kid at a restaurant he found specifically because they like that sort of food. in it, tentacool has evolved and they now corphish and surskit and a togepi

the togepi belongs to his wife now but he mentions that it makes for a great excuse for his kid to come home more often

steven says something about how they're very passionate and when prompted to speak more about the topic, he says they nearly fought with kecleon because it was preventing them from going into the gym

winona is grateful that they asked the kecleon to go away. she's the one who has the least amount of conversation with them but she does note them trying to convince gyarados to fly, then begrudgingly resigning themselves to being a land and water dweller

(steven has to laugh at that when wallace tells him.

he never says why but when he comes back from his travels, he has a swanna for them)

the twins hear about the kid being in town but the first time they meet is at the department store while they're arguing with a kid about the last slakoth plush. they pull the "my dad is a gym leader" card and when that fails, they end up resorting to a pokemon battle

everyone floods the chat with questions after the team magma/team aqua incident. norman shuts down the gym for a bit to be there for his kid and also do gym leader stuff and the only time the kid shows up on tv is a few days later when they're trying to get to the gym and a reporter stops them

they very confidently say they can be champion, but only if they can make it past through the reporter because they need their eighth badge

norman is SO proud

for wallace, he mentions how the first thing they say after beating him is asking him where he got his milotic from. they're actually extremely mad that they couldn't find any feebas and they didn't actually want to battle him without one but they also just want to head onto victory road

this actually jogs a memory of norman's, where he remembers that he took the family to petalburg before he moved to show them littleroot and just spend time with them while they're still in johto

and on one of the screens is wallace and milotic, and after that, the three of them decide to take some time to watch one of his contests on tv, which spurs a family tradition and the declaration that they will also have a milotic

he promised to get a feebas for them, but they turned him down so he kinda regrets not pushing it a bit more

so he like talks to his kid and they basically confirm his suspicions

milotic = happy memories so my own milotic = more happy memories and since i want to be a gym leader like my old man = water types only

it's all very wholesome

norman can't stay away from petalburg much longer and his kid doesn't want him to watch the matches because they're afraid of an ungraceful showing, but they do promise to send a photo with steven after the match and verbal confirmation from the latter that they won

also norman's kid just looks up to their dad so much, like the coolest person ever, and once they become champion, they go to him for advice on pokemon—it's a running joke in the family that it should be the other way around since they're the youngest champion in hoenn

as for the feebas, someone from the weather institute finds out that they want one so they call norman to tell his kid this secret for a guaranteed feebas

the next beauty master rank has people making the spiderman meme because wallace also enters with a milotic. he wins the battle, but they win the day because their parents come to watch them and they spend the entire day together

[yo9urt]

jpmd update post #6! for some reason i thought we were further than 6 by now

EVEN LONGER THAN USUAL!!!!!!! also today's post is ENTIRELY about the bidoof special episode because that is all i did today!

as always, cool observations and thoughts first:

PRONOUN TRACKER:

bidoof's mama calls him お前, he calls her 母ちゃん, his little brother calls him 兄ちゃん（あんちゃん）; bidoof's mama calls herself 私 and お母ちゃん

the camerupt npc called him あんた, marowak called him おめえ, the slakoth/slowpoke team called him きみ

jirachi (!) calls himself 僕 and calls bidoof きみ before properly waking up and learning his name (after that i believe he only calls him bidoof-さん)

not a pronoun but doesn't fit anywhere else; as mentioned in previous posts, bidoof uses あっし and でゲス which are both words i've never heard anywhere else, and he has a relatively unique voice/accent in english, so i was on the lookout for more unusual language, but...there wasn't too much...he did say "兆枚" which jisho tells me is a rare term, and when talking to the kecleons he also said "こんちは" and "すまない," the 2nd of which is essentially the same as すみません but i'd never heard it before (i think) so it was cool

ALSO not a pronoun but doesn't fit anywhere else - this was probably happening in past sessions but today in particular i noticed how many npcs use かい to ask questions (teddiursa, kangaskhan, corphish) which was kind of reassuring because the only other time i've EVER seen かい is in one singular song on my entire japanese playlist and i was almost doubting that it was a real thing lol

FUN AND SILLY DIALOGUE NOTES

the slakoth/slowpoke npc team has some funny dialogue early in the episode where they go "aren't you the guy who screws up all the time?" (textbox ends, new box starts) "yeah...us too"

marowak dojo is "ガラガラ dojo" - ガラガラ meaning (among many things) "rattle/clatter," "rough (personality/speech)," AND "almost empty/uninhabited/etc." which is kind of perfect - the clatter of bones, the rough personality of marowak, and the emptiness of the dojo...i understand why the localization team didn't bother with a stylized translation and just called it "marowak dojo" in english lol how could you capture all of those things the same way in english?

also, one thing i didn't know - if you visit marowak in this episode, he goes on a very long ramble about how the dojo has failed and it's kind of funny you showed up on the last day before he closes it, and then he gives you a reviver seed (!). also in that speech, he lengthens practically all of his vowels and says "ぜーーったい にーーーーーーー" and "だよーーーーーー！！！" a lot and sounds like an anime character lol

bidoof ends a LOT of his sentences with かね which gives him a really...like it makes him sound really unsure of himself lol poor guy

at the end, when he made his wish, he said he wanted "かわいい こうはいs" - i don't remember what he says in english here but i remember when he meets the protag team he gets teary eyed and refers to them as "juniors" and "rookies," and of course at the end of the special episode you watch your team chatting happily with each other while bidoof watches, teary-eyed again, from the side, and it was...very endearing...i do think this is something that might have gotten lost in translation because once i read かわいいこうはい i went "oh!" and knew exactly what he meant, it gives him more of a big brotherly feeling in relation to the protags, which is pretty cute when you remember he's the big bro of 2 siblings back home...almost like he missed being in that せんぱい sort of position :') it really recontextualized his relationship to the protags for me, very endearing

SPECIAL SECTION JUST FOR SNOVER/GLIGAR/BAGON

this group was FAAASCINATING to watch. they were NASTY. but of course, snover puts on a front at first, and i'll say i think the fact that japanese has specific and more strongly marked registers for (im)politeness made the big reveal much starker than in english

PRONOUNS: bagon said "俺たち" implying 俺 for himself, called bidoof お前, called snover きさま (!) before the reveal and お前 afterwards, pre-reveal he also called snover "そこのお前" lit. "you there" which made me giggle because that's what street fight NPCs say in yakuza games lol

PRONOUNS PART 2: bidoof called bagon/gligar "お前たち" in the reveal and called snover "きみ" before it; pre-reveal, snover used "僕" and lots of "でしょう"/"ません," post-reveal he switched to "俺さま"/"snover-さま" (omfg), he also started calling bidoof お前 (see above - super formal language vs. super...not...)

OTHER BITS: snover used assertive sentence ender さ, gligar used ぜ (very masculine and a bit rough/forceful/sneaky), snover used "ねえ" instead of ない which adds even more colloquiality, all 3 of them interchangingly used "な" and "ろ" command forms, both of which can be (and in this case, were) impolite. (this was very well timed because i JUST studied command forms this morning!)

BONUS OTHER BITS: gligar taught me a couple new words: "やがる," which is attached to a verb to show that the speaker has disdain/contempt/hatred for what someone else is doing, and "このやろう," which is rude to the point of being listed as "you bastard/son of a bitch" in jisho. also, ALL THREE OF THEM used くそ, and interestingly, くそ was always written in hiragana and always followed by a small つ pause, which was in katakana. weird!

i was genuinely surprised by how nasty their language was, even worse (way worse) than team skull (at least so far). but it was pretty effective writing! nasty fellas!

general notes: this was easily the best play session ive had so far, like, bar none. maybe its because i studied a lot yesterday and i had some residual smartness or maybe ive just made a lot of real progress but today i felt like i was FLYING through most of the sentences, and concepts/constructs i was mildly-to-moderately familiar with suddenly became so much easier to get!!! and the best part is that i've only played sky once, so unlike the rest of the game, i DON'T have hard-coded memories of the special episodes and their associated dialogue; all i had to go on here was what i remember from playing the game like 3ish years ago + the synopsis on bulbapedia (i was checking to see how long it is because i was getting tired lol). so, i'm REALLY PROUD OF MYSELF for basically wading into (young) native-level material that i'm only kinda familiar with and understanding it so well!!!!!! today was great!!!! i've never felt so 日本語上手!!!!!!!!! ^_^

GOOD SENTENCES (realistically i should put like 75% of the episode here, but i can't, so just some of the best instead)

(all translations are freehanded by me since i don't remember the real english dialogue lol)

90+% of the conversation between chatot and bidoof at the beginning of the episode. seriously i barely looked at the dictionary at all during this part and i could tell what they were saying and what the feeling was WHEEEE i'm so happy

"プクリンのギルドをそつぎょうできりゃあんたりっぱなたんけんかになれるよ" (said by camerupt to bidoof) = "if you can graduate from wigglytuff's guild, you can become a magnificent explorer" (lit. "wigglytuff's guild OBJ graduation DO-POTENTIAL-CONDITIONAL you magnificent exploration TARGET become-POTENTIAL-NONPAST NEW"

"じつはあっしってなにをやるにしても。。。どうもどんくさいようで。。。いつもギルドでしっぱいばかりしてるんでゲス" (said by bidoof to himself at the shop) = "really, no matter what i try/do, i always seem stupid/clumsy...at the guild, i do nothing but fail..." (lit. "reality TOPIC i QUOTE what OBJ do TARGET do-EVEN-IF...awfully stupid/clumsy likeness COPULA-CONN...always guild LOC failure nothing-but do-EXIST-IN-STATE EXPLANATORY (COPULA)")

^ proud of myself for understanding the sentence structure here, i think my particle-understanding and structure recognition are both improving by leaps and bounds

"いつかこんなひがくるかとおもってね。。。まえからすこしずつためてたんだよ。なにかこまったことがあったらつかっておくれ" (said by bidoof mom to him when giving him $) = "i figured this day would come eventually...i've been saving up money bit by bit for a long time. if you get into trouble, use it, okay?" (lit. "someday (when QUESTION) this-kind-of day SBJ come-NONPAST QUESTION QUOTE think-CONN SHARED...before since a-little-bit piece-by-piece save-up-EXIST-IN-STATE-PAST EXPLANATORY (COPULA) NEW. something (what QUESTION) trouble (troubled thing) SUBJECT exist-CONDITIONAL use-CONN-???)

^ i thought the "おくれ" on the end was from regular old "おく" but...maybe it's not...? maybe it's an irregular conjugation? i don't know...

"あっしはきがよわいからああいうやからとはあまりかかわりたくないでゲスよ。。" (said by bidoof to himself watching bagon/gligar pretend to harass snover) = "since i'm so timid, i really don't want to get involved with that group..." (lit. "i TOPIC ki SUBJECT weak since (distant)that-kind-of say-NONPAST group QUOTE TOPIC excess get-involved-with-WANT-NEGATIVE COPULA NEW...")

^ i'm endlessly fascinated by all the collocations of 気. i know it's usually translated as spirit, energy, mind, etc. but lately i've been experimenting with thinking of it as just the original chinese qi/chi concept (at least i assume that's what it is.....erm) and taking the collocations literally and it works surprisingly well - in this case "since my qi is weak..."

"いちりゅうのたんけんかになるというあっしのゆめもかなえてくれるかもしれないんでゲス！" (said by bidoof to himself while chatot tells him about star cave) = "maybe even my dream of becoming a first-rate explorer can be granted!" (lit. "first-rate CLASS exploration QUESTION TARGET become-NONPAST QUOTE say-NONPAST i POSSESSIVE dream EVEN grant-CONN-give-down-NONPAST QUESTION EVEN(?) know-POTENTIAL-NEG EXPLANATORY (COPULA)!"

^ how many particles do we need man???????

"ただ。。。あのばでちからまかせにうばうとさわぎになる。" (said by snover to bidoof in the cave) = "but...if we went full power and took it by force out there...there would've been an uproar." (lit. "but...that place LOC using-all-one's-strength ADV take-by-force-NONPAST CONDITIONAL uproar TARGET become-NONPAST")

^ i think i'm getting better at recognizing what と is doing in any given sentence, which is great because i hate how many functions it has, and my grasp of conditionals is getting stronger too! i kind of appreciate how japanese does it similarly to english (vs. spanish) - but that's a topic for another post

[zponds]

Hoenn Gang Tied Up

Here is the Hoenn gang tied up. This is from the moment in the episode “A Poké-BLOCK Party”, where Ash, May, Max, Brock and Alanna (in the original anime)/Brendan Birch (in my AG rewrite) are tied up by Team Rocket disguised as Trick House Employees as part of a plan to steal Pikachu and Whismur (in the original anime)/Brendan’s Spheal (in my AG rewrite). And Team Rocket tied up the gang right after a 10-lap jump rope contest and Jessie and James used the jump rope to tie up the gang. The gang remainded tied up like this until Ash wiggled his hand out from under the ropes and threw a pokeball, releasing Corphish. Ash told Corphish to use Cut and Corphish wasted no time using Cut, cutting the ropes and freeing the gang.

[poke-professor-in-training]

Pinned Post ~ Intro and Team

((Disclaimer: this is unreality, falling under the category of Pokémon blogs acting as if we are living in the Pokémon world. It's all for fun. My inbox is open, so let's all just have a good time in 'Rotomblr'!))

~

Hey! Welcome to the blog! Thanks for having a look and feel free to hang around! My name is Casey Acacia - I grew up in Kalos, and I'm currently aspiring to be a Pokémon Professor, so I'm travelling around the regions to learn more about all the different kinds of Pokémon, how they behave, evolve and live. I'd like to specialise in Pokémon Sociology!

This is my trusty team!

((Card made with Pokécharms))

I'll introduce you to them, just under the cut :p

Nixxie the Sylveon:

My starter - she's been with me since I was 10! I got her as part of a school program collaborating with the local Day Care. They were getting too many Pokémon in the Day Care from Breeders, so they decided to collab with a bunch of schools around Kalos. Most of my class got baby Pokémon to look after.

Nixxie loves decorating Pokéballs. Whenever we head into a general store for supplies, Nixxie will head right to the stickers aisle. She finished decorating her own Pokéball a while ago, and has since moved on to the rest of the team's.

She's quite competitive, particularly whenever we have to battle someone. For someone so graceful, she can really be quite intimidating, and fiercely protective.

Nemo the Swampert:

I got Nemo on my second visit to Hoenn - Hoenn is one of my favourite regions, so I was keen to revisit. A tiny Mudkip walked up to my table at a café and I couldn't not get him a pokétreat. He's was - and still is - very polite. Such a sweetheart, and very gentle.

Since then, we've gone back to that same café a couple of times! The staff are always thrilled to see how much Nemo's grown and always sneak him a free poképuff.

He's a powerhouse tank in battle, but he doesn't particularly like battling. Of everyone in the team, he probably likes battling the least. That suits us just fine - battling isn't our priority.

Hera the Flygon:

Hera helped us find our way through the dessert in Hoenn. I'd just run out of water and only learned later that there are apparently special goggles for trainers heading into the dessert?? Hera (still a Trapinch then) thought it was very funny.

Probably as a byproduct of living in a biome where seeing the sky clearly is rare at best, she's has an excellent set of internal directions. Whenever we get lost, we can always count on Hera.

Trapinch are generally solitary, so it was fascinating to see her adapt to a more social lifestyle with the team. She loves giving the smaller members of the team free piggybacks now that's she's fully evolved and can fly.

Borealis the Emolga:

He's quite shy, which is strange considering most Emolga are very social. He's warmed up to the team and I, and I'm so proud of how far he's come.

Despite his shyness, he is a devious little mastermind when it comes to pranks. He never lets it get out of hand, though, and is very respectful of everyone else's boundaries.

Lately, he's been getting into acrobatic tricks. I took the team to a Showcase in Kalos a couple of months ago, and Borealis was fascinated by the intricate dances and performances. He's getting quite good and is now moving on to choreographing full routines.

Brynne the Vaporeon:

Brynne joined the team during a stay in Alola for a festival and evolved in Dewford Town in Hoenn when she dug up a water stone buried in the sand. Looking back, we were probably lucky she dug up a stone, and not some random Corphish taking a nap.

Her favourite hobby is finding a patch of sand or dirt to roll around in. It's good for her skin! It gets rid of any dead skin cells and any toxins, so I don't stop her.

The best at finding nice camping spots in the middle of forests, caves, grasslands, islands, mountains... you name it, Brynne can find a perfect camping spot. Loves the attention and obligatory photo of herself showing off whichever spot she's found for us.

Moss the Venusaur:

Our most recent addition to the team! We ran into the local Professor in Kanto, and he gave me Moss's egg. Apparently, there haven't been many trainers going to him for starters lately. A lot of them just head right into the wild and grab the first bug, bird or rodent Pokémon they find, rather than waiting until their tenth birthday to see the Professor.

She's very proud of her appearance, and takes great care in maintaining the bouquet on her back. On a similar vein, she likes seeing the sticker formations Nixxie puts on the team's Pokéballs.

Moss really likes races. Win or lose, she loves it. When she was still a Bulbasaur, she also loved jumping in water puddles. She does still like that, but at least she's got the courtesy to wait until we're out of the splash range now.

I should also introduce you to Newt - he's a Joltik, and is Borealis' adopted brother. When Borealis decided he wanted to come along with the rest of us, Newt followed. He vehemently refused any initial offering of a Pokéball, so he just hangs out in my jumper pocket and gives everything the evil eye.

((Art used with permission, @thefridgegoblin))

UPDATE! Bluey the Gulpin is also travelling with us now! We met him in Hoenn in the wild, where he was struggling to get by due to him being a shiny... So we helped look after him for a while, and apparently he's been missing us lately, so my friend in Hoenn sent Bluey over to us!

That's all of us! We look forward to seeing how we go in the online space during our travels :)

[goodbyenorthernlights]

if you had a pokémon team in a semi-realistic way (ex. iirc u live nowhere near any sort of desert and so probably wouldn't have a cacnea as one of ur first :V) what'd it consist of~?

I've always imagined that the pokemon where I live would be a lot like the population of pokemon in parts of Hoenn- particularly the areas around Petalburg and Rustboro- though that may be influenced as much by Gen 3 being the first games I played as anything else. And I can actually see my hometown as being The Place You Revive Fossil Pokemon.

So after some browsin' Bulbapedia, I think a semi-realistic team for me, in no particular order, might consist of:

Oddish. Oddish feels like it'd be a fairly common pokemon in general and as a kid who liked playing with dandelions and other random backyard plants, it feels plausible to me that I might have befriended an Oddish at some point.

Corphish. They just feel like something that would be common in my region, and therefore not hard to catch. :V I also think they're cute- fun fact, I have two Corphish plushes which I think were originally my brother's.

Ducklett. Y'know, we have ducks where I live. Also, I like Ducklett- they make me think of Princess Tutu.

Dustox. Just about every summer we get moths flying into our kitchen that I usually take it upon myself to catch with paper + cup and release outside so they can go do... Whatever it is moths do. So a moth pokemon feels appropriate for me!

Anorith. Maybe pushing it a bit for me to have a fossil pokemon, but they do seem like the sort of thing you'd find hereabouts.

Espurr because psychic kitty good yes.

[raccoongamejournal]

Pokémon X Chapter 5: To the Big City!

Continuing down Route 4, I almost immediately run into Roller Skater Roland, who decides to fight me with his level 10 pidgey. Thesaurus poisons it with Poison Sting and then I switch to Basil to avoid Thesaurus taking hits from flying type moves. Two Double Slaps and a Quick Attack later, the fight is over, and Basil and Thesaurus are now level 12.

This will either go horribly or be a brilliant idea. I'm in.

I was right in my last entry when I said that there was a cool-looking fountain up ahead. This turns out to be Perle Fountain:

...I don't really have anything more on the fountain, I just like it.

Also skating around the fountain is Roller Skater Calida, who also wants to fight me (surprise). I'd swapped Glorfindel into the lead spot on my team, but he's ill-equiped to deal with a flying type [edit: I somehow forgot to mention what Calida's pokémon was, sorry!] so I switch to Volta, whose Static immediately gets triggered by a Quick Attack. After that, it just takes a Thunder Shock and two Quick Attacks of my own before the fight is over - and Volta and Glorfindel reach level 12.

Right after Perle Fountain, I encounter and catch a skitty, who I name "Marie" (and Glorfindel falls in love during the battle). The next encounter is a ralts (ooh I can get a Gardevoir later...), who I name "Potassium" for no good reason. A few encounters later, Batman reaches level 14. The encounter after that, I find and catch a budew who I name "Sprinkle". Glorfindel gets poisoned in the process, however, so I decide to go back to the Santalune City Pokémon Center to heal up and purchase more pokéballs.

Back on Route 4, I'm presented with two paths. I go down the left one first.

Preschooler Mia decides to battle me after I've gone like 10 feet down the path. She sends out a level 9 budew, so I swap to Basil. The fight is over surprisingly quickly after Basil crits her second move (Tackle).

After another wild encounter, Glorfindel reaches level 13 and learns Fury Swipes. Basil then beats up some local wildlife until she also reaches level 13 and learns Mud Slap.

and then...

Thanks to the Exp Share, Browser levels up to level 16, and...

I guess this is the new Firefox update?

While I won't deny that I miss having fennekin, I do like how the ear tufts have gotten even more...everything really. The ear tufts have just gotten More.

In the area between the two paths, I find a Poison Barb, which I give to Thesaurus. I don't normally use many poison type pokémon, so I'm going to give it a try for at least a little bit. After an encounter to try it out, Thesaurus is now level 13; however, he declines to forget a move in order to learn Focus Energy (too angry to calm down I guess).

I then battle Poké Fan Gabe and his team. Gabe leads with a level 7 pichu while I lead with Volta, so I switch to Basil. After a super effective Mud Slap takes out pichu, I keep Basil in play for Gabe's next pokémon, a level 9 pikachu. Spamming Mud Slap might be a little silly, but it works...until Gabe heals up the pikachu. But wait...spamming Mud Slap still works, it just takes longer, particularly since the pikachu keeps using moves that drop Basil's Attack. In the end, however, Basil wins, and Volta grows to level 13 and learns Thunder Wave (guaranteed Paralysis on a hit - heck yeah).

Traveling through the maze on the left side, I meet Gardener Grover and his corphish. Since Volta is currently in the lead spot on my team, this is not a hard fight, and Batman levels up to 15. Grover then tells me the mazes are more accurately known as "geometric gardens", and I find a Net Ball nearby before heading to where the paths split earlier.

On the other path, I encounter Poké Fan Agnes and her team. Agnes leads with a level 7 Burmy, which stalls Volta for a turn with Protect before Agnes sends in her next...Burmy. I swap to Basil for this one, and then to Thesaurus for the last Burmy (the team has all three cloak colors).

There's a little kid wandering around further down the path who wants to show me this cool new pokémon that they just traded for...

It's Preschooler Adrian, with a...magikarp. Adrian is correct, magikarp is very cool - however, it's also very outmatched by Volta. After the fight, Basil reaches level 14. Volta also reaches level 14 after a wild encounter, and I keep exploring the flowers on this side before heading into the maze. Glorfindel reaches level 14, along with Thesaurus, and I decide to enter the maze, where I meet Gardener Fabian. Fabian's corphish is no match for Glorfindel, so very soon I am on my way again, after Fabian tells me to say hi to "Ramos from Coumarine City" for him if I see him.

After collecting the Ether at the end of this maze, Volta gets almost knocked out by a ledyba before Basil finishes it off. Browser then reaches level 17 from shared xp.

At the end of Route 4, I meet two people. One of them wants to know if I've heard of flabébé (I have). The two people (Sina and Dexio) then reveal that fairy types are a thing (cool!). They then show me the way to the lab as I enter...

Lumiose City. The biggest city in Kalos, and the main setting for the upcoming Legends ZA game. Dexio gives me the TM for Return as a gift (nice), along with the advice that walking with a pokémon builds friendship (handy).

I want to explore the city, but I think I'll go to the lab first.

I could use a haircut soon.

The Sycamore Pokémon Lab is a fancy building with pokéballs at the entrance. On the second floor, I am given Luxury Balls by a person in a lab coat. I'll have to remember those when I see an eevee (look, I really want to get a sylveon, ok).

On the third floor, I finally meet Professor Sycamore. AND I GET FALSE SWIPE YESSSSS. Thesaurus is the only one in my party who can learn it, so he does. Anyways back to following Sycamore.

After we talk for a bit, Shauna shows up, along with Calem.

Ok...

Despite saying "let's all", I'm Sycamore's only opponent. He leads with bulbasaur, while I lead with Glorfindel, so I quickly swap to Browser. Browser wins, and then he sends in a squirtle, so I switch back to Glorfindel - another fairly easy matchup, and Batman grows to level 16, declining to learn Flail. Sycamore then sends out a charmander (surprise), which makes me realize that I don't really have a fire type counter in my team, huh. I go with Basil since she knows a ground type move. Mud Slap crits twice, but then it's out of pp since I haven't healed up since Route 4. Basil takes a serious hit, so I swap to Batman. Yes, I have potions, I'm just not using them right now. One Peck is enough for Batman to win, and the fight is over.

Sycamore now wants to give me another pokémon - one of the three kanto starters he just used against me. I pick bulbasaur, and name it "Tacos". Glorfindel gets sent (probably temporarily) to the boxes to make room in my party. And then I get...a Mega Stone - Venusaurite.

Tierno and Trevor then show up. Sycamore gives a speech.

He wants to also have fun, and hopefully help solving the Kalos region's big mystery: Mega Evolution. Camphrier Town is apparently a good spot to check out Mega Evolution, since it has "a lot of history". Sycamore then advocates for tolerance to other cultures and ways of living and thinking, which is good advice. Calem seems to want to focus on Mega Evolution, Trevor wants to complete the Pokédex, Shauna wants to make "lots of good memories", and Tierno wants to dance. All very good ideas (I'm not meaning to mock Tierno here, I like this guy).

I go back down to the first floor to try to find a Pokémon Center...

...but who's this guy?

He wants to meet the kids. Sina introduces me to this guy, Lysandre.

I agree, but this seems a bit ominous maybe.

Yep, definitely ominous. But who knows? Maybe his "more beautiful world" is actually good.

Yeah, he didn't really explain, did he?

As I start to leave the building, the other kids catch up.

Shauna has somewhere to be, apparently (she doesn't say where). Calem wants to talk, and will be waiting in Café Soleil. Interesting... Tierno and Trevor are sort of confused by the intrigue, and want to stay out of it.

As a side note: I do like the 3D city, but I really want a way to control the camera so it's not constantly swinging around...

Ooh, a big tower.

Thanks to some helpful directions from some bystanders, I find the Pokémon Center (right across the street from the lab), and heal up.

I decide to keep Tacos in my party for now, since Mega Evolution is going to be important. Glorfindel gets to take a bit of a break.

And with that, this feels like a good spot to stop for now. I'll explore Lumiose City next time.

Stay safe everyone, and thanks for reading. See you next time.

[doubleddenden]

Pt 4 to DD changes Ash's teams for no reason except pure boredom and pettiness. Remember this is pt 4 to the AU I've made for Kanto, Orange Islands, and Johto so far.

We're now at Hoenn and the Battle Frontier- I did group them together despite being kinda separated like Kanto and the Orange Islands were, but that's mainly because we're now reaching the point where I started missing a lot if the episodes as a kid. I can't really rewrite a story I don't know, yknow? But I can redo teams and make my own diverging points.

So... yeah. Remember I evolve or replace what I want, no hard feelings.

For the Hoenn Saga

And the revamped *Sevii Islands* Battle Frontier saga

I'll explain what I can below, but I do want to aim for shorter posts. Still a long read tho.

Starting with Hoenn:

Personally I would have loved to have given him Swampert or Blaziken instead, but Blaziken is important for May, and Swampert- while my personal favorite of the Hoenn starters- would make for repetitiveness given how in this AU, we've already fully evolved Blastoise and Feraligatr. Plus Ash's Sceptile is way too cool to get rid of.

The minor changes thus far would be simply to evolve Grovyle to Sceptile BEFORE the Hoenn League. I like Grovyle, don't get me wrong, but starters take way too damn long to evolve in the anime, especially Sceptile, who didn't evolve until towards the tail end of Battle Frontier. Didn't like that, so we're gonna say he evolves during Juan's gym battle to give the audience a healthy balance.

Corphish evolving into Crawdaunt might upset someone lol. I even agree Corphish is just a better design- but I've always, I mean ALWAYS hated it when a Pokemon more than capable of evolving in the anime just... doesn't. Made no sense to me as a kid. It also just doesn't help that Corphish was probably one of my least favorites of the crew because of his annoying voice and attitude, so i wanted to give the good ol college try (i almost deopped out) and try to salvage it somehow. I only made it slightly better imo. I could see Corphish evolving into Crawdaunt after having to climb Mt Pyre and dealing with a bunch of Ghost types, gaining a Dark type move like Knock Off and eventually Crunch to make use of that extra typing.

The last big change for the Hoenn team is just completely replacing Glalie with Aggron. I don't remember how Ash caught Snowrunt or evolved it into Glalie, it just never felt right as a kid though. Like it just kinda came out of nowhere and doesn't really feel like an Ash Pokemon to me. I don't think it ever did any big battles, either? It was a late league addition that I remember he dumped with Torkoal at Oak's lab the moment the writers saw their chance.

Enter Aron, who imo would be caught on Dewford Island and be a much better replacement- and also a favorite of mine. Aron would be a bit timid at first, but his typing would make him Hella defensive in battle, which Ash would utilize often. He'd look up to Pikachu, Tailow, Treeko, Corphish, and Torkoal because of how they seem unafraid to fight. It wouldn't be until he evolves into Lairon, right before Flannery's gym fight, that he finally becomes brave enough to fight on his own. He'd be a pretty cheerful Pokemon but easily spooked by ghosts or invisible Pokemon, or just sudden noises, but Ash would take pretty good care of it. Max also takes up a habit of giving Aron, Lairon, and eventually Aggron a nice polish to his metal armor, which spooked him at first but became one of their favorite bonding experiences.

Lairon would finally evolve right before the league after being inspired by Sceptile to try harder, and in turn prevents Team Rocket from stealing a bunch of League goers' Pokemon. Also, it'd be at this point that- surprise! The gang finds out Aggron is a *girl,* and she apparently has a crush on Sceptile after his amazing fight with Juan. Aggron would be an amazing powerhouse to the team that would help carry Ash to the top 4, but she'd gain a strange habit of acting meek and shy around Sceptile, so double battles just didn't work from that point onward.

Interesting enough, it's not some nobody with a Meowth in cowboy boots that beats Ash. The Hoenn League would actually be double battle focused, and instead he'd have to fight a rather... peculiar trainer with a blue coat and a strange device on his arm.

This would be Wes, the same Wes from Colosseum, accompanied by Rui of course, and his team would be as follows

(Based on my own Colo team)

Wes ended up being granted special permission to participate in the Hoenn Pokemon League by Steven Stone after Wes managed to show his skills against Steven during a trip to Orre. He's not a jerk per se, but he's not friendly, either, except to Pokemon. Quiet and reserved, but a terrible liar according to genki Rui. Ash and Wes have a moment to bond after the two get lost in Victory Road during separate training sessions, and both came to a mutual respect, Ash even finding a talking point about how he has an Espeon of his own.

The league battle was tough. Ash brought his usual brand of Shenanigans and Team work, but Wes is a hardened double battler by necessity. Wes makes use of amazing combos and strategies- having a Raikou definitely doesn't hurt, either, which caught EVERYONE off guard with the flawless coordination of Mantine's Rain Dance and Raikou's Thunder, which would take out Pikachu and Swellow after an attempted Thunder Armor pt 2, and deal serious damage to Aggron, Sceptile, and Torkoal. In a moment of desperation, Torkoal learns Sunny Day and Sceptile learns Solar Beam, this combo being just what they finally need to defeat Raikou and Mantine. Sceptile would take down Misdreavus, but not before it uses Perish Song. Typhlosion would take out Torkoal with the boost from Sunny Day, and even take out Crawdaunt with the lessened power towards its water type moves, leaving the unfortunate combo of Sceptile and Aggron, who is of course still smitten by Sceptile. After seeing Sceptile get messed up, Aggron finally overcomes these feelings and takes out Typhlosion, leaving only Wes's Umbreon and Espeon left. Sceptile and Aggron put up a fight, but Perish Song finally takes out Sceptile, leaving Aggron alone and damaged. She puts up a good fight, but Umbreon and Espeon's teamwork just prove too much, and Aggron and Ash lose the league. Wes would go on to win the league, but not without giving Ash a solid congratulations for coming this far, since most people don't make that far. He would then tell Ash that if he's ever in the Orre region, they should have a rematch, and part on good terms.

The rest would go about as normal with Ash and Co returning to Kanto for a bit- but it's not long until Scott invites Ash to participate in the Battle Frontier challenge he has set up out towards the Sevii Islands. I chose this instead of Kanto as a good tie in to FRLG, whose only contribution with the Sevii Islands in the anime being Chronicles, where Richie meets an old man, a Chikorita, and a Salamence as they fight Moltres... speaking of old man Silver, tho- well first.

Coming back to Oak's lab, everyone meets Ash's old Pokemon. While there, Crawdaunt decides that he wants to party with Feraligatr for a while, and Torkoal starts helping Deliah, Mimey, and Primeape with baking, so Ash decides to give him a break with his Mom.

Of all Pokemon to come say hello, it's Ash's Slowpoke. When Misty comes to visit, she tells Ash about a King's Rock she found and gifts it to Slowpoke. A Shelder from a lake hops out and clamps onto Slowpoke's head, and Slowpoke evolves into Slowking. Slowking is now much smarter, and now he is so excited to actually be able to think that he wants to travel with Ash, so Ash gladly takes him. Slowking would finally get its chance to shine with powerful psychic and water type attacks, and even make use of Skill Swap to trip up enemies.

Donphan- still being pretty young, gently persuades Ash to take him as well, so Ash proceeds to take the gang with him to the Sevii islands to complete the Battle Frontier challenge. Donphan matures a lot and learns very powerful moves like Earthquake to help bring victory.

Meanwhile, May's contests are moved here as well.

Most of the journey through Sevii is about the same as original Battle Frontier, but with certain filler plot replaced with island relevant plot.

Since Mt Ember is on One Island, we'd do the Battle Factory challenge there and have the Frontier Brain use Moltres instead of Articuno, and in a twist of fate, Ash's Blastoise would show up to fight, showing off his new move: Hydro Cannon.

7 facilities, 7 Islands, no brainer. The islands are big enough to have a few episodes on each just traveling around anyway. I'd imagine Ash would reunite with Butterfree for a bit, the gang would run into Lorelei on 4 Island, even have encounters with Deoxys, the Latis, and even Mew.

There's another arc where Ash and Pikachu reunites with Richie and Sparky, and also meet Silver- no not the GSC rival.

This Silver from the Chronicles episode. It's been a long fan theory that he might know Ash somehow due to his reaction to Richie mentioning him, some even think he's Ash's father, but I think he's too old for that. Instead, we're canonizing him in this AU as Deliah's father, and thus Ash's grandfather (keep in mind in official canon, Deliah apparently had Ash when she was only 19, so this can track). Silver is of course pretty brash, but he and Ash get along famously. Silver tells Ash about how proud he is of Ash in his last few league matches, but couldn't attend due to being so far away- one of which was chasing the legendary birds, and is amazed to hear Ash beat Moltres quite recently.

Silver would sort of join the gang for a bit as a coach to both Ash and May- for Ash, he helps to really drive home better tactics for the kind of pokemon he uses and to really tune into their feelings on a deeper level, and for May he's actually quite adept at move combinations that can wow judges. He also gives sage yet crude advice to Max at times to really help him decide what he wants to do with his life someday, and the same to Brock- actually being the first to point out that Brock can't be a breeder if he doesn't even BREED pokemon, so that'd plant the seed for Brock to change career paths in Sinnoh.

Silver's training would help May evolve Blaziken and it would learn Blast Burn, Brock evolve Marshtomp into Swampert and teach it Hydro Cannon, teach Sceptile Frenzy Plant, and he even helps Max catch his first Pokemon- a Sentret.

And this is the team I'd imagine him having

Ash would be familiar with Gengar and Alakazam from his younger days, but the rest would be completely new. Salamance is his ace for sure and his main mode of transport, and he literally fought and wrestled Armaldo for dominance before catching it, and Houndoom is Silver's pupper he hatched from an egg a year ago. We'd get a bit of background for Chikorita, and it turns out he was abandoned for being weak, so Silver took him in and is training him visually so he'll be prepared for an actual fight some day, and then they plan to find and show up the loser that abandoned him- Chikorita has taken a bit of Silver's rough and tough personality, and Silver loves the little guy's spunk.

Continuing on-

The final battle in the Battle Pyramid would take place in the Tanobi Ruins on Seven Island, and Ash would of course employ similar tactics to fight Brandon with Pikachu and his Kanto starters.

However, despite how thrilling the adventures would be, it and Hoenn would be condensed a little, because there's one more adventure I wanna squeeze in before Sinnoh.

After Ash declines the offer to become a Frontier Brain, the gang see what appears to be Shadow Lugia in the sky. They end up chasing it all the way to 4 Island with Brandon, where Team Rocket (not Jesse or James, the organization) are teaming up with Cipher in order to learn about Shadow Pokemon.

Ash and the gang end up fighting against them, but in the midst of the chaos, Shadow Lugia shows its power and steals the SS Libra containing an entire hoard of stolen Pokemon, and Sceptile and Aggron get caught up on the ship. Ash and Pikachu bravely climb aboard as it takes to the sky, leaving Brock, May, Max, and the rest of Ash's knocked out Pokemon behind. However, Silver quickly gives chase on his Salamence.

Ash gets caught by Cipher aboard the ship, and he and his Pokemon get knocked out. Little do they know that they would be riding all the way to Orre.

...which will be pt 4 :D! Pt4 will be a custom arc based on Colosseum and XD, since the anime avoided that like the plague. I already wrote more than I intended. Sigh. Well, tomorrow will probably be more detailed.

But anyway, thanks for reading. Tune in next time for a What If AU of Ash going to Orre... which may or may not come tomorrow or the next day. Unsure.

[atomicpizza64]

I’m talking about gardevour when it comes to waifumon. You know, the one she made a whole ass comic about? Also, misogyny, from the fact I hypothetically don’t like a Pokémon? You are the most obnoxious person ever, and it’s especially rich coming from someone who called the Pokémon dev team misogynistic for not liking lusamine.

also 2001 is unironic peak fiction and I legit think you are too stupid for it, and don’t even get me started on how she LIKES HMs????

also, how can it be possible to hate world building as a whole? Now it makes sense lily’s favourite anime is for toddlers lmao, anything harder than that hurts her brain.

As for difficulty, 2:53:52, (start with ralts, swap to a better mon, win the battle dumbass), 2:54:58 (she’s right next to a zone where you can get water types). if she got an actual starter, either chespin, bulbasaur, froakie or squirtle, she would have an automatic defense. Ralts is available after the first gym anyway, she’s just too stupid to know that. Also for that gym, she could have used:

diggersby, simisage, simipour, bidoof, marill, gyrados, wormadam, corphish, seaking, psyduck, roserade, skiddo, pangoro, flabebe, scraggy, oddish, crogunk, ducklet, hoppip, meditite, meinfu, wingull, binacle, tentacool, wailmer, clauncher, staryu, horsea, sandile, hippoptas, rhydon, aromatisse, swirlix, onix, machop, cubone, mawile, the fossils, starters or any of the evolutions of aforementioned Pokémon, all of which resist or deal super effective damage to Grant’s team.

I never said Lilly has no friends/supporters, that’s the problem, because she is being defended by people.

also trying to be edgy with a hazbin reference? AND that reaction image? 🤢

Anyway, BLOCK, BABY BLOCK! SHOW ME YOU’RE REAL

🖕

so one thing someone pointed out on reddit is that lily is a massive fan of world of Warcraft, which bleeds into her Pokémon video. To quote someone on reddit:

“World of Warcraft is...

-A game where dialogue is minimal and easily skippable.

-You don't have to grind against enemies in the world to level up, you can just do quests.

-Has a point A to point B style of questing.

-Has a huge focus on exploration of the vast and grand world.

-Once you get to a certain level you can basically curb stomp your way through all of the early parts with no effort.

-Are able to just skip all the cutscenes to fight the boss”

are you fucking kidding me. No knowing that she has the media literacy as a smashed egg on toast this just compounds it. They are different games you fucking dumbass

[perenlop]

Aim to be a Pokemon Master: Episode 1: The Road Most Traveled

This is a pretty solid start to the miniseries! There is a lot of promise in this first episode: we get to see Ash’s rotation team, the start to the Latias arc, a good mix of Pokemon from every generation, and it does read like a typical Pokemon episode you’d find in the middle of some other season. Which works! This season is supposed to feel like that.

Ash actually works very well on his own with no companions but Pikachu. Honestly…. I get why Misty and Brock came back here, but I’d have taken a miniseries with Ash and Pikachu on their own. That scene at the beginning where Ash and Pikachu disagree on where to go, and Pikachu zaps Ash’s hat off when he goes on the opposite path, and Ash teases Pikachu that he’ll leave him, and Pikachu responds by zapping his hat again? That’s cute! It’s a fun way to show how far these characters have come socially. They feel like cheeky best friends here and it’s nice!

I also said so before, but I also like Latias here. We’ll see later on that she’s from Alto Mare, and I appreciate that there’s a clear continuity here from that movie that the fans can understand, while people outside of the loop can still latch onto the plot easily. I like that she’s clearly a different Latias too, one that doesn’t recognize Ash and is distrustful towards humans because of a mysterious event that had damaged her. This isn’t meant as a jab, I promise, but I feel like Pokemon media likes to make Latias super docile and cutesy compared to Latios, so it’s refreshing to get something different with this one.

Team Rocket though… unsurprisingly if you’ve kept up with me, I think they’re the weak point here. They’re not THAT bad here (the little gag near the beginning where Ash is pointing out surrounding Pokemon to Pikachu and enthusiastically points out Meowth in front of him- who’s giving him a big cunty smile- before realizing “EW ITS THAT ONE” was genuinely pretty funny) but I believe they’ve ditched the Gacha machine gimmick by this point? I might be wrong on that. Either way they didn’t use it here. Which would be welcome… but they don’t get their real Pokemon back until much later in the miniseries. So they’re unarmed here and just using all their old tricks, which is kinda distracting. (Actually unlike Ash, they never explain why Team Rocket scraps their Pokemon at HQ after gen 5? They just kinda do? Like in Unova it made sense, and then they gave up their Pokemon at the very end of that series. But why not get the old team back for Kalos besides “well we have to for marketing?” Why ditch the Kalos Pokemon after that? Idk it’s weird to me because they weren’t scrapping their teams in gens 1-4 at all. Later on here they act like they’ve all been sitting in HQ but…. why??? It’s the same issue with Ash’s Lab Pokemon in JN- if they want the TRio at their best, why not let them have everyone on hand right from the beginning?)

Anyways, as I said, I feel like there were also some missed opportunities, like Latias bonding with Noivern perhaps since she gets some spotlight in this episode, buuut I can get why they didn’t go for that I guess, since Ash will be rotating his team. (Ignoring Corphish and Clauncher in the next episode but whatever)

Overall, a decent episode! Probably like an A-? B+? Idk it’s been forever since I’ve done one of these

[team-heavenly]

A Comprehensive List of Potential Chapter Titles Provided by Me

Thought up at 11 PM. For funsies. This list will be much safer in terms of thematic material (refer to this post and this post). Rated T for swearing, references to (mild) drugs, alcohol.

Are the vast majority of these memes and references? Yes, yes they are. (Bonus points if you can identify where they come from!) But it’s less about creativity than comedic value. So... take this as you will.

There is no official total btw, I’m just listing as many as I can!

Y yo a ti

Do not pass GO, do not collect $200

I won't hesitate, Bitch

IT LOOKS LIKE YOU FUCKERS HAVE COME TO A STANDSTILL AT FOGBOUND LAKE

i Amn just....... a little creachure

None pizza with left beef

lol Get stickbugged

Is this Loss?

Goddammit where's Lucky Luciano?

It's the Great Pumpkin!

Snoopy and the Red Baron

Luke, I am your father

Make it so

Flim-flam shabam

What is love?

Baby don’t hurt me, don’t hurt me, no more

HEY NOW, HEEEEY NOW

How can a river catch on fire 12 goddamn times?

*Pink panther theme*

Let's-a go!

LET'S GO LESBIANS LET'S GO!

Let's GO GAMERS!

Why are you like this

Honey You Got A Big Storm Coming

I'm THE KING OF THE WORLD!!

you and what army?

Let's see how far we've come

Have some choccy milk

No, this is Patrick

Carmen Sandiego?

NOOOO MY COOKIE!

To die. To sleep, no more.

What an absolute mad-lad

Looks like you're going to the Shadow Realm, Jimbo

MY EYES!!

mY LEG! MY LEGGGG!

*Roblox death sound*

*Lego Star Wars Death sound*

*Wilhelm Scream*

Some-

-BODY ONCE TOLD ME-

You wanna be sleeping with the fishes, kid?

The U.S.S. Enterprise

Never mind that

And to your left you can see me, ruining everything

If you forgot, then it wasn't important

Calvin and Hobbes

Elmo and friends

Marty! Marty, we have to go back!

I challenge you to a duel!

Pokemon! Gotta catch em all!

It's you and meeee. I know it's my destiny!

Team Rocket is blasting off againnnn!

Ha! You better have burn heal!

I like shorts! They're comfy and easy to wear!

The Top Percentage of Rattata

Take the breadsticks and run

November 5: Destiel Election edition

The 21st Night of September

bRING OUT THE CRABS!

It's over Grovyle, I have the high ground!

69? Nice

Let's have a champion time! *gets pummeled to death*

Falling from cloud 9

The River Styx

Nooo, don't steal the Time Gears, you're so sexy aha

mrow? Mrrrp?

Corphish, those pincers are HUGE

Yeah can I get uhhhh-

White Mocha latte frapiatto espresso triple shot

Good tea. Nice house.

It's Pon Farr night at the Vulcan Nightclub

YOUNG MAN. THERE'S NO NEED TO FEEL DOWN

Back at it again at the Krispy Kreme

Look at this photograph

Cuz Everytime We Touch, I get this feeling

*Cinemasins ding*

I was there, Gandalf...

Do Not Cite the Deep Magic to me Witch

WELCOME TO MOE’SSSS!

Hey this isn't a leaf stone

Are you high?

What in tarnation-

Been up since 2 am

When in Rome...

Do you know what you've just done?

Where's Waldo?

Allergic to sunlight

The imposter......

The Great Glacier

Sky Tower

The Voidlands

Once upon a dream

Holy shit that's so many deer-

LOCUUUUSTS!!

It started to rain!

You! What year is it

*Lightsaber noise*

*Darth Vader breathing noises*

The Riker Maneuver

Now close your eyes...

For my next trick, I'll need a volunteer

What's 8 ÷ 4 + (7 - 2)?

Country roaaaads

Take me home, to the place I belong

WEST VIRGINIAAAAA!

Welcome to the 74th annual Hunger Games!

My name is Jared, 19

YOU LOSE! GOOD DAY, SIR!

Miracle whip

Alcremie

Pecan soup

Operation Yellow

"Do you remember?" "REMEMBER WHAT?!"

I hope you die. I hope we both die.

Hand in unlovable hand

Annnnd there she goes

Now go see a Star War

Cat no banana

Leg-bouncer

42

Are you fucking possessed?!

Japan is a small island nation with limited natural resources

Crazy frog

Episode IV: A New Hope

hsSSSSSS-

Dat you?

Surf's up, dude!

NFTs crashed lol

Shhhh! Quiet! We're in a library

I Will Never Again Be Human (And That's Okay)

Hi my name is Hero and I'm an alcoholic

Pull the lever, Kronk!

WRONG LEVERRR!

Oh, yeah. It's all coming together.

The Macy's Day parade

*Calls Dusknoir babygirl*

Dig it in there, Mr. Spock-

There's coffee in that nebula

ACAB

Save the bees, plant more trees

Pokerus? Haven't heard of her

The Secret to End All Secrets

Fucking hell, dude

IT'S FUCKEN WIMDY!!

Tell me what you want, what you really really want

Level 7

World 5-8

OFF WITH THEIR HEADS!

Arson

I have a Bad Feeling about this

Trust no one, not even yourself

And I'm all out of gum

Shall we dance?

Can't have shit in Apple Woods

Gengar hates u

Dorothy, Sophia, Blanche, and Rose

Let me call an Uber

Warp core breach in 3 minutes

‘Tis but a scratch!

A scratch? Your arm’s off!

The government owes me money

Crying and screaming and throwing up

Comrades!

Take a shot every time someone says "the planet's paralysis"

The Three Sacred Treasures

Lake Bikal

In Soviet Russia-

Capitalism

Communism

Adele's "Hello"

Spyro: Year of the Dragon

Another soulless Marvel film

I Have No Memory (of this place)

The Return of the King

Road work ahead? Uh yeah, I sure hope so

Four Score and Seven Years ago

Y E E T

Sacrificing your rival to the rain gods

Bede is a lil' bitch

BITES YOU BITES YOU BITES YOU-

you're an idiot <3

Bitch u thought

no <3

Top Ten Greatest Hits

Just keep swimming

HERE'SSSSS BRUCYYYY

Are we.... You know.....

Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme

AGH!

XXXXXX

y = mx + b

Pangea

The sacred texts!!

smh

Under the sea

The GAY CAR!!

Father, I Crave Violence

*coughs*

WATCHOO!

Gesundheit

Pass me the aux

Guzma and the real Team Skull

*dies*

Facing God and Walking Backwards into Hell

Sitting on a throne of lies

Aren't you a wiseguy!

The Future Trio is GAAAAAY!!

Drop the Mic!

Wherefore art thou Dusknoir?

TFW Decoy Orb gets reflected onto you

Blorbo from my shows

Dugtrio's a terrible dad

Developing PTSD

You know! For kids!

This is so sad, Chatot play Despacito

Unown J

Bro I just Live Here

CITIZENS ARREST! CITIZENS ARREST!

Throwing Gravelerocks in glass houses

It is..... Green

Wonder Gummis galore!

For every Roselia, there is an Iron Thorn

Ingo?!

Garlic. Butter, even.

Space. The Final Frontier.

IT BURNSSSS

Not in front of the Klingons

*points at Dusknoir* GAY

Qwerty

uwu

Apocalypse Now

Lemon-lime soda

The Dimensional Scream Strikes Again

It's Drifloon Friday!

Apricorn Balls

War is War and Hell is Hell

Out of Touch Thursday

Jesse. Jesse we have to-

Mecha Tyranitar

You Get Framed in a Witch Hunt

The Gang Goes to Therapy

Freudian slip

Occam's razor

Murphy's Law

Do Androids dream of electric Mareep?

Sleep deprivation

Well... Wynaut?

The Deplorable Word

Turkish Delight

I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me

Ah Shit, Here We Go Again

Into the Woods (2015)

Zero Isle West, 72F

The wildest Crossover AU

Lemonade IS NOT SPRITE, DAMMIT!

ROYGBIV

ERROR 404

Volo Breaks the Dimensions (because he can)

Q

Remember to take your meds

Hydrate or diedrate

Super Smash Bros. for the Wii U

Leroy Jenkinsssss

Fuck this, I'm outta here

We don't get paid enough for this

SHOOP DA WHOOP!!

Fuck it, Nyan Cat in 2020

I’MMA FIRING MY LAZOR!

Au revoir!

Spinda's cafe gets robbed

Boop! Got your nose!

Time Gears? In my possession?

Fire types rule, water types drool

Let's take ibuprofen together

Gouger

This is Not a Place of Honor

Arceus yeets you into Hisui

These Ginsengs don’t do shit

I AM THE SAND GUARDIAN, GUARDIAN OF THE SAND

Texas

Florida man

Jake, from State Farm

Never Eat Soggy Waffles

Can we be honest?

Oops! I did it again

Kilograms of glitter

Lil Nas X

Getting Friendzoned

LIPSTICK IN MY VALENTINO WHITE BAG?!

7-11

And there is no Queen of England

Make sure to like and subscribe!

The Down with Cis bus

*ploink*

It’s puce

Am I alive or barely breathing?

Just so you know...

Primal Dialga tramples you to death

*Minecraft villager noise*

The Llevan Polka

Futurama

I’d have two nickels

Salt n’ Vinegar

*distant screaming*

Everybody dance now!

E = Mc^2

Spooky scary skellingtons

But y tho?

Fist bump!

The Hindenberg

Did you know? A Wailord is less dense than air!

I am a Gummy Bear

...To be continued...

Go Imagine those Dragons

Don’t forget to floss!

Just take the L, dude

Trans your gender

Uhhhhh...

Shoving your sins under the rug

Going to Purgatory

Lemme think about it- NO

The One With the Whales

Fallout: New Vegas

Annnnd that’s all, folks.

[torchickentacos]

Battle Frontier Arc Episode 3: A Real Cleffa-Hanger!

So, we have our first filler it seems. We're headed to the battle factory, and Misty is along this time! I somehow missed this episode as a kid.

Quick Daisy cameo, love her. She's so fun-especially in Chronicles, which I recently watched an episode of with friends!

So, we're at the base of Mt. Moon. Max makes sone snide remark to his sister about how EvErYbOdY knows cleffa never reveal themselves to humans. So a cleffa, fueled by spite if I were to assume, reveals itself .5 seconds later. This looks like a classic 'help lost pokemon get home' episode so far. Not bad, but we've seen it many times over. Cleffa comes over and immediately starts playing with the other pokemon (bless corphish, he looks so concerned lmao).

Turns out, Cleffa loves the pokemon but is scared of humans, or at least May who immediately approaches the wild animal. But this is pokemon, where that's a normal and usually safe thing to do, so I'll let it slide. Max makes yet another snide remark about how Cleffa is running from May's scary face and then 'hides' behind Misty. I LOVE THE MISTY AND MAX FRIENDSHIP. SO MUCH. I assume it's youngest sibling solidarity, but I'm the oldest so I wouldn't know. Either way, SUPER fun dynamic I wish we saw more of. Also, cleffa's voice is very noticeably just Misty but whatever.

Team rocket shows up with one of their sucky machines (which. by the way. What's the power of those? Because in this episode it only gets Azurill and Cleffa. but in Who What When Where Wynaut, which yes, I do have entirely memorized thank you for asking, it manages to get all pokemon, all party members plus drew who did not ask to be included in any of this, and it's magikarp shaped, as if that makes it LESS conspicuous. Do they not standardize the sucking power of their machines??? Is it just random every time???? What do you even call units of suckage??? Moving on from this before I make an inevitable suck/blow power joke here.) ANYWAYS. Swellow gets them back, and oh-nevermind, THERE'S the powerful sucking that picks up all of them but not the humans this time. Again, no standardization. Moving on. A single poison tail from Seviper does a lot of damage to pikachu, nonexistent power scaling, hello my old friend, you guys know how this goes. Also, this.

All pokemon get blown out when Jessie accidentally puts it in reverse, this seems to be an incredible waste of time honestly, but we have 20 minutes to fill. AG is so funny with this because some episodes, it's just FULL of crazy/entertaining shit happening (not a moment of spontaneous combusken is dull, for better or worse) and other times they have to call in team rocket to waste time.

TR explodes their own machine, which somehow only blows Max and Misty away???, and there's our plot, I guess. Similar to Who What When Where Wynaut, I assume this episode is going to be 'team members get split up, let's find them'. Except in this case, the split-up team members are actually both somewhat functional human beings who I imagine will NOT fall off of a cliff into a river with an oncoming waterfall, but we'll see.

Oh. nevermind. No waterfall this time, though. Not joking, I pause and write these as I watch the episodes, and I had no idea this would be the very next frame after I unpaused.

Shoutout to Misty's bag, which I would pay a lot of money for to own irl.

We see a clefairy and clefable looking for Cleffa. These two run into Ash, May, and Brock.

Max is such a little shit tbh. He rags on May and Ash for not being the best like no one ever was. I KNOWWWWW he's the annoying little brother but it feels needlessly rude in this episode, honestly. Though, I think it could be that with Misty, he has a place to actually get it all out? Idk, maybe this is just venting but in an eight year old asshole kinda way.

Oh. here we are again. May and Drew have been beat in the 'falling off of a cliff' category, 2 to 1.

We get a sweet little sibling moment with Misty and Max. (Though. Max says may is practically helpless without him, which...whatever helps him sleep at night).

Everybody runs into eachother again, cleffa family included, team rocket shwos up, does their thing, Misty uses bubble and it looks like the cgi from the celebi movie, TR goes away, end of episode. Cleffa and friends use emtronome and somehow all get the same move instead of a tail whip, tackle, draco meteor, stun spore, et cetera. Munchlax also joins, which is fun. I do like that they remembered Munchlax here. Cute, better filler than we get other times but we've also had filler better than this. MIsty and Max are the main draw here, though Max could have been written better.

Pros: Misty and max bonding, and the clefairy guy from gen 1 didn't show up. This guy. Glad to not see him tbh, he irks me.

Cons: ag filler, could have had fun moon stone for skitty????

[inkweaver22-blr]

I think I'll build a new team of only Kitakami Pokemon to experience the DLC with. It'll be a fun challenge!

Current team is Yanma, Wooper, Cutifly, Poochyena, Sewaddle, and Spinarak.

I think I'll keep the Yanma as my "starter". Will need to come up with a name for him. I'll also probably evolve him right away.

That seems to be everything in this area, off to the town!

UH OH! First bug! I picked up some items and nothing happened!

Hell yeah Corphish! He's being added to my team for sure! I'll swap out the Sewaddle.

Ah here are the anime hair characters. Let's see what their deal is.

Carmine... I don't like you. Be nice to your brother.

Oh no... She's Tsundere...

No one likes a sore loser honey.

"Fine I'll you in but only if you become one of my grunts-" STABS YOU STABS YOU STABS YOU

I bet she's one of the bullies Team Star ran off. REALLY dislike her so far.

OH THE NURSE JOY HERE IS CUTE

Named my Yanma Gildar and my Corphish Evice. Bonus points for those who know where the names came from.

To distract myself from the Unity bullcrap going on, I'm going to live blog my experience with the Scarlet DLC! Everything will be kept under a Read More so you won't have to look at it if you want to avoid spoilers.

First off, why don't I get a choice on if I want to go on this trip? What do you mean my mom already said yes? Hello, I am autistic and need to have these things told to me in advance. /j

I am big SUS of you Briar. Your outfit, weird eyes, and desire to get into the Great Crater is giving me all sorts of red flags.

Also are you related to the grass type gym leader?

HUH?! WHAT DO YOU MEAN THE BLUEBERRY ACADEMY IS IN UNOVA?! WHAT?! Gen 5 Confirmed?

This new Pokedex better have Iron Leaves and Walking Wake in it I swear...

More to come!

[jumaanboruto]

🕶 : Are there ‘troublemaking’ Pokémon on your character’s team? If so, how do they tackle these troubles?

Troublemaking Pokémon... Oh, where to start?

Pikachu. It was only really in season one, where Pikachu would often be unreliable, or not care for what Ash is doing at the moment. He was fiercely independent, though that's not so true, anymore.

Occasionally, Pikachu does start a fake beef with Ash on social media though, just for laughs on both their parts. However, he's stopped doing this, since people often flocked to Pikachu's side and legitimately labeled Ash a bad trainer; the bias of a cute little mouse is strong, and he didn't like his trainer catching a bad rap. So they've stopped their fake internet arguments. True story, courtesy of @piikabolts.

Charizard. Is this story really news to anyone? As a newly evolved Charmeleon and Charizard, he didn't listen to a word Ash said. After a near-death experience in the Orange Islands, though, he changed his tune. He and Ash have been close ever since; though, he does like to give Ash affectionate Flamethrowers. Ash is fine with it; he's probably too durable and quick to heal for his own good, though the frequent flames combined with Pikachu's shocks have given Ash minor nerve damage and numbness.

Gengar. Ash's Haunter was rather unreliable, and... actually, wasn't really his at all, but an ally who'd flee on a whim. After being left with Sabrina, though, she did a pretty good job at teaching him some discipline, before Ash re-challenged her Gym and met him again. Haunter insisted on being part of things to the point of interrupting their first rematch. After Ash defeated Sabrina properly, Haunter pleaded to join Ash on his journey. Ash agreed, and Sabrina provided a trade machine to evolve him into Gengar. Gengar occasionally pulls pranks, but Ash will scold him if they become too dangerous or go too far. He's a rascal, but responds strongly to guilt and shame.

Crawdaunt. As a Corphish, Crawdaunt was prone to anti-social behaviors; not out of malice, but simply his capricious and self-centered personality. Ash had to scold him and punish him a couple of times during their time in Hoenn. These behaviors re-emerged, somewhat, after evolving into Crawdaunt. Though whenever he goes over-the-top, Ash is sure to lecture him, if one of the other Pokémon don't first. He's learned firsthand that pissing off strong team members backfires.

Garchomp. Garchomp, like Crawdaunt, is never really willfully malicious. If anything, he's not really thinking much at all. He adores chomping things, though, and is easy to lead into mischief; particularly by his little unlikely paramour; Dawn's Pachirisu. If he gets out of line, Ash will scold him very directly, and place his palm down on the top of Garchomp's nose. While this doesn't physically stop him in any meaningful way, it's a strong sign that Ash is taking charge and letting him know he's done something wrong. He quickly becomes docile to it. Ash also keeps plenty of chewing and enrichment toys around for his bite-happy Pokémon, and sprays any metallic structures and equipment with a non-harmful spray that makes chewing them taste awful. This repels Garchomp, as well as his many Meltan, or Melmetal when combined.

Meema. Ash's Zoroark isn't really much of a troublemaker, though she does have a habit of protecting the peace and her loved ones a little too far; if not stopped, she will kill evildoers without hesitation. She's learned the bounds of human law, after a lengthy time with her trainer and wider human society, and will show some restraint, these days. Though if the situation calls for it, she will claim that maiming someone dangerous was self-defense, and justified.

Dewott. In his Oshawott days, Dewott was a classic case of a problem Pokémon. Selfish, petulant, gluttonous, cowardly, and greedy, he more-or-less did what he wanted, and would often grow jealous of Ash's other Pokémon in vying for his attention; even throwing off the flow of battle and ignoring Ash's direction.

During one of the group's scuffles with Team Plasma, however, he saw just how costly it could be to disregard the needs of his team, and evolved with a change of heart. He doesn't really need to be scolded these days, though his womanizing ways continued for quite a while, until he courted Lapras . . . And then realized that he batted for the other team, and rekindled his interest in the male Purrloin he'd met on his Unova adventure. They've happily settled together after Ash took to social media to help Dewott find him.

Decidueye. Ash's Rowlet was often seemingly acting on a whim, sleeping whenever he chose, even at the most inconvenient of times. With a little research, though, he was found to be afflicted with Narcolepsy. He does stay on a treatment of medication, and has had some coaching to regulate his sleep patterns. When necessary, Ash will train with him at night, when he's more active. Ash's Noctowl assisted in tutoring him, as well, being nocturnal by nature, albeit with a more consistent sleep schedule. Decidueye isn't always consistent in his waking hours, but he's faring better than before.

Lycanroc. After evolving into Dusk Lycanroc, she began experiencing irregular behavior; not over a muddy coat, like in the anime, but she would randomly become uncontrollably enraged, combined with a mysterious power that increased her strength. With the help of Tapu Bulu and Nanu, Ash came to understand her struggle; it wasn't willful disobedience, but a subject of an odd phenomenon surrounding the rare Dusk form; something that Nanu coined as Midnight Impulse. While Dusk Lycanroc ordinarily followed the Midday form's patient, tactical, and loyal nature, shades of the Midnight form's behavior slipped in, and manifested in bouts of extreme aggression, when either understimulated from a lack of exercise and battle, or getting carried away in intense combat. Juggling two extremes made her rather difficult to train, but Ash persisted in his belief in her, and helped her hone greater control of the form. It increases her power greatly, possibly powered by the green flash that helped her evolve, but it makes her overly rowdy and wastes energy quickly, so it's a form that is used sparingly and strategically in battle. Ash assists her in regular exercise, though with him often busy, and many other companions, these days, she often is entertained by + spars with the wide roster of Pokémon that they live with.

Golisopod. Ash found an adorable Wimpod that he and Pikachu assisted in saving from being trapped in a cliffside, when they visited Treasure Island by themselves, on the day they first met Tapu Lele. Wimpod asked to join them on their journeys, and they happily accepted. Being a difficult-to-raise Pokémon, due to their low stats and lack of confidence, Wimpod accompanied Ash after his Alola trials were cut short, and followed him while he worked with his more experienced team. Witnessing his more powerful members like Pikachu, Greninja, and Charizard, Wimpod quickly grew to admire their radical strength. The trouble started, however, when she evolved. Suddenly a very strong Golisopod, she ‘pulled a Charizard,’ as one might say, and considered herself far too strong and capable for Ash, and became frequently disobedient. He considered calling the Flame Pokémon to talk to her, but decided against it. Ash wanted to get through to his unruly Pokémon himself, this time, and do it right. Rather than proceed with strictness, he allowed her to enter battles where her humility was tested, and without Ash’s assistance, she lost. Repeatedly. Reality clocked her in the head with the fact that she was a big fish in a small pod. In hindsight, she felt guilty for treating Ash poorly, but was touched when he quickly forgave her. They’ve been a solid team, ever since.

Espeon. When Ash was discouraged by Greninja's injury at Team Rocket's hands, Ho-oh sent him a Rainbow Wing and a vision, to travel to Mt. Tensei. But, those weren't the only gifts that the Rainbow Pokémon bestowed upon Ash, during that pilgrimage. Third, was a young and playful Eevee. She insisted on following Ash no matter where he meant. He feared her being hurt by association with him, and tried to leave her behind. She persisted. A day came where he trekked through the Ice Path, north of Blackthorn. Eevee found the Icy Stone, wishing to play around it. Ash tried to plead Eevee not to do this so carelessly, knowing that she'd likely evolve without getting to make that decision for herself. There, he learned something he very much needed to process — that he can't control everything. He learned to let go, and left Eevee alone. This, ironically enough, made Eevee become bored with the Icy Rock, and she abandoned it. After this, Ash caught Eevee, and accepted her as his partner. Once he reached Mt. Tensei's peak in the early morning, Eevee evolved into Espeon. She agreed to continue staying by his side.  Espeon is a rude, difficult, and mischievous Pokémon who amuses herself by annoying others and making jokes. Although not malicious, she is something of a self-described jackass. Her antics stop short of doing actual harm. She describes crossing that line as "pretty fucked up." It’s something that Ash never really gained control over, but her own moral compass keeps her from doing anything too destructive. She’s a rather independently minded Pokémon, but wouldn’t hesitate to throw herself on the line for Ash’s safety.

Draco. Ash’s Flygon, who he caught on an excursion to Hoenn’s desert, on Route 111. Draco was a rather feral creature, who hadn’t quite gotten the memo that following the carnivorous food chain was frowned upon in peaceful communities of humans and Pokémon. This sparked a lot of conflicts with Ash, and Pikachu in particular. Over time, though, Ash helped Draco farm less destructive passions in providing him space for gardening in their territory, where he happily farms berries; favoring Yache berries. Also, weed.

Riley. (No, not the Aura Guardian.)  Ash’s Cinderace was originally offered by Chairman Rose as a gift to Bede in his beginnings of the Gym Challenge; a rare, ideally bred starter with the hidden Libero ability. Bede wasn't interested in the Fire-type; that not being his specialty, and coldly abandoned her in Motostoke.  She developed an abandonment complex that bred a distrust for humans. This veil was cracked, when she saw Ash and Pikachu, freshly arriving in Motostoke. Jealous and bitter towards what seemed to be an unbreakable bond, she stole their food, sourly eating it all by herself.  Ash and Pikachu found her. Expecting hostility, she kicked an Ember at Ash; igniting his beard. Once Pikachu doused it, Ash kindly told her that if she was hungry, she could've asked for some food. In her anger, she'd stomped on what remained of the food, and reluctantly accepted. After this, she took to Ash and Pikachu quickly, idolizing them and vying for their affection. Unfortunately, this manifested in her becoming threatened by the idea of any other team members, and she began kicking away every Poké Ball Ash threw. This persisted until the group approached Stow-on-Side; Ash went three whole Gyms with only Pikachu and Riley on his team. The pattern finally broke when she fainted in an unofficial battle with the Gym Leader, Bea. Ash planned to send Pikachu in, but a Galarian Farfetch’d who’d fought the group several times volunteered. Ash accepted his help, and they lost. Bea was perplexed by the Champion’s nonchalance, but he brushed it off and caught Farfetch’d. Riley was extremely reluctant about her new team member, but after encountering Bede at the mural, she fought and defeated him by evolving into Raboot. Farfetch’d express cool and detached support for her emotional burden, but support, nonetheless, encouraging her to move past her past trainer who was unworthy. This sparked begrudging respect that turned into comradery, and Riley hasn’t stopped Ash from capturing Pokémon, since. She still vies for absolute strength and recognition, and trains incredibly hard, even without Ash’s pushing. He often even has to remind her to take a breather. But, she’s gained a healthy relationship with him and her peers.

[scalproie]

God i think the expedition arc in pmd eos is pretty underrated and also might be one of my favorites...

"Having multiple dungeons in a row to indicate a big trip and being away from the main town for a while" is a pokemon mystery dungeon staple, but i think the expedition arc had such an impact on me because compared to say, rescue team, the stakes arent exactly high, it really feels like youre going on a trip with your fellow "classmates".

The excitement when they first tell you about this big thing and how the townfolks tell you the guild shared the treasures from the previous expedition with them..

the whole planification beforehand, Chatot showing you the locations on your map like you actually have to follow it even tho the game is planned that way.

The way the teams are split to travel (which REALLY feels like "we could afford a bus but itll be easier if everyone group up and travel with their own cars" to really hammer that college feel in), and the fact that Bidoof is your first main cast guest, which btw, if you played his special episode JUST before, has even more of an impact...

Mt Horn absolute BOP of a theme.

And then the sprites design of the camp, like the wigglytuff tents, mixed with the mist and the music of the forest... with a little red herring for the mystery of the Hero so far, featuring Cryptid Uxie Legend.

After that, a little focus on Corphish of all pokemon, which is nice, and then the gorgeous reveal of fogbound lake. And you can tell by the sprites that its HUGE.

Team skull ending their arc (for now) by being absolutely destroyed by Wigglytuff. With only IMPLYING what Wigglytuff is actually capable of, and i didnt caught it the first time, but theres even a reference to his special episode as well. Joyous payback for the perfect apples.

The buildup to "Groudon", and hearing the Roar™ for the first time.

Then later, when the rest of the gang catch up and theyre talking as theyre running, the absolutely dramatic way (which is also pretty funny in insight) of chatot saying how Groudon's a legendary pokemon and how it would crazy and suicidal to even think of fighting Groudon, as they're way to powerful, like all legendaries..... all while showing the Hero and Partner about to fight Groudon.

And THEN afterward you have the scene with Uxie and the lake where you see in person your very first time gear and the full time gear theme plays for the reveal, chills guaranteed.

And then you all go back home, which really seals for me the road trip "our lives have been changed but it also was just another weekend" vibes.

[punz4lyfe]

Hopeful Plotential: Ash’s Old Pokemon

yeah im using hopeful instead of wasted becuz im optimistic shut up

One trend that has kiiiiinda been dying in the Pokemon Anime is Ash bringing back or at least reuniting with his older mons. To me, I really don’t see why such a trend would have a need to be toned down. Yeah, Ash should always put a lot of focus and emphasis on his current roster (which is very crucial in Journeys considering Dragonite and Gengar haven’t been used in an on-screen official battle since episode 25 and Dracovish has yet to be used at all), but at the very least remembering older veterans would be a nice gesture for viewers who are fans of them.

Ash’s journeys in Johto and Sinnoh honestly did this justice, as Ash mainly focused on his current roster throughout the entirety of those series in order to give his new fighters the development and screen time they would need before deciding to also rely on older mons at the League, giving old faces a fresh, new return and while also diversifying his current team members with them.

But after Ash’s Sinnoh adventures, this is kinda when the trope started to die a little. Best Wishes does get a pass, though, since not only did Charizard return at the near end, Muk made a few cameos, and we even got a flashback for Butterfree, but the openings and endings for the final batch of episodes showcased Ash’s older mons at the lab, which was basically a message from the writers that, yes, they do remember all those beloved old faces. The icing on the cake was the picture frame Delia decorated her walls with at the end of the final episode, depicting Ash at Oak’s ranch with both his Unova team AND all of his Pokemon left at the lab. (which was sadly only showcased in the Japanese version.. for some reason)

XYZ didn’t even bother to showcase any of Ash’s old mons, not even for a cameo, and while Sun and Moon did a slightly better job with the episode where Ash and his friends go to Kanto, it honestly was kinda... lackluster. The only true reunion Ash had was with his Bulbasaur. Meanwhile, Muk and Tauros were only used comedic gags instead of anything proper, Charizard was only in a flashback, and Totodile and Corphish didn’t even get to see Ash at all. Everyone else was no where to be seen and, for some reason, Squirtle was there too... even though he and his squad have no reason to be at Oak’s lab, and if it was for a visit, why didn’t he get to reunite with Ash for at least a moment like Bulbasaur did?

I’m not asking for much, I’m just saying that at least a more proper depiction of Ash reuniting with his older mons, even if it’s brief, would be a good way of showing appreciation for them. Like in episode 2 for example. Imagine alongside the shot that showed off Ash’s past accomplishments, there would be another shot somewhere on the Ketchum Residence Walls depicting an updated group picture of Ash and his older mons at Oak’s lab next to another frame featuring Ash and his Alola Team in front of Kukui’s house. As I said before, the freakin’ manga wasn’t afraid to show Ash’s past mons, so I don’t see why the anime would be. Or maybe you could use Ash’s old mons to make episode 30 a lot less insufferable by having Pikachu pass by the ranch when he makes it to Pallet Town, causing him to realize just how freaking petty and entitled he’s been acting by being jealous of Riolu when he himself should be mature enough to know that Riolu, being the team baby at the time, should receive all the attention it can get to reach his and everyone else’s level AND that, compared to literally everyone at the ranch, he’s having it lucky.

Again, not asking for much, and even though it’s kinda ridiculous Ash hasn’t even mentioned any of his previous mons even though he’s literally still in Kanto, you could easily excuse this by just giving the Coronation Series a strict ruleset for participants to only have up to 6 Pokemon on their team, which could also explain why Ash hasn’t used Mimey since the Frontier Cup. With that said, that doesn’t Ash can’t use his older mons to help train his current team. Charizard could help Dragonite with aerial combat, Muk could help Gengar with evasion, Lucario could throw hands with Infernape, Buizel, or Scraggy, the possibilities are just endless honestly.

And while I’m positive we will get more of Ash’s Alola team, maybe even having Ash’s Incineroar battle for the first time, I’m just a little miffed that the best thing we got for any of Ash’s mons pre-Alola is a still flashback image of Ash’s Bayleef. Wonderful.