#rayquaza rising | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

star-arcana · 14 days ago

Text

My biggest Issue with Pokémon Horizons and the Timeskip, and why that could ruin the whole story!

Hello I am Star Arcana and I come here with me venting about the Time jump and why they are heading to make a horrible mistake with the direction they took! I will begin first how a good time jump works and then make the case on how bad the current time jump is!

Much of it is based on Mythcreants, a blog about fantasy stories and storytelling in general that helps us teach how to write better stories by critiquing popular stories. They are good and often better than most critics, even if harsh. And since I can be harsh too, I love being really harsh here, so let's get going!

How to do a Time jump correctly

A time jump is actually a really smart idea if you want to built up your setting and allow your characters to evolve, but it has to follow certian rules as to how to do this:

1.Anything you skip over has to follow an expected trend. Basically like in Wakfu with Yugo and his brother Adamai having a falling out with one another after the Ogrest crisis having them split up over the usage of the Doofus. And then season 3 happened and their relationship got worse, as Adamai became a servant of the big bad of that season until his change of heart through Yugo.

However if in your conflict you showed signs of them reconsiling then them becoming friends again after the time skip works, too. If there was an issue you had before the jump, then it should be solved in the time after the skip, not in between that time, because that ruins expectations and the audience cannot follow you, as it's too important to skip that.

So, if your create an instance that changes the course of the story, the characters and their relationships, their motivations, arcs, development, anyting that is relevant to the audience and just really anything important. Then, you cannot skip passed that, you have to show the change and how the change will come, because you make them feel missing something out. No one wants to see a story of dragons taken over the Kingdom and planning to destroy everything with a super death laser they most likely will build and the heroes doing nothing for 3 whole weeks...that's dumb.

In conclusion, just put important stuff never in between the jump, as anything relevant has to be shown directly to us. 2. A bit of a colloraly to point 1, but any event that you allude to frequently in the story, because it is relevant for what comes next, should never be in between the timeskip. This shouldn't be done, and it's especially bad, as to reveal later important twists and leave things mysterious. By doing this, you sabotage your main character by having important parts of their development be mysterious and be revealed later, because we are meant to see the things from their perspective and have to understand how they feel and think, whic is difficult, if not outright impossible to have important change be left secret.

For instance, Aang from Avatar The Last Airbender was unconcious after the events of Book 2 and woke up several weeks after Ba Sing Se was conquered. Aang was filled in on what happened afterwards and was feeling like a failure due to him not being able to win and ran away until he realized he cannot do that alone. We saw that instigator of change with his defeat and he acted immidiately, and not because of a mystery in between that. Like, if in your story a murder mystery happened in between a timeskip and changed the otherwise optimistic character, you wanna have this take place right after the murder happened and not a year, because you erase the expectations of your MC's personality and show this rather than telling us this.

Basically, mysteries aren't a good excuse to withhold important info that the character should be shown now for later development, as that can ruin relatability with your hero. 3. Also somewhat a collorally to all the other points, but perhaps the most important one: Don't have any urgent crisis happen in between the time jumps. If the villain has taken over your world and you end up stranded for months and then find a way back, that is fine, as we saw in The Owl House, as they had time to deal with that. Anything that is of pressing matter with the villain or if the stakes are too high, should be dealt with immidiately as to now make the character laze around and do nothing.

It ruins tension and makes the stakes of the story unimportant, because you need to make it feel like something bad or important is going to happen if they do nothing or have the villain not create an urgent threat from the get go and plot in secret, like how Eggman did that in the post credits for the Sonic 1 movie. In short, if there is a pressing matter, act immiediately or give the heroes time enough to laze around or plan, because tension is what matters and if you want to skip time, have nothing too pressing happen there or any big threat there already. So with that out of the way, how did Horizons fumble with that?

Horizons commited many mistakes with the Timeskip and many more (how to do a Timeskip incorrectly)

Horizons has created after it's tragic, yet somewhat bittersweet ending in Laqua numerous problems: The worst of the bunch is having left out important infos and plot elements that should have been relayed to us from the get go before the time jump:

In short, Spinel took over Laqua with the Explorers, Liko and the others lost Friede during their escape, the 5 of the 6 heroes are captured by Spinel, who took over Exceed and spreaded false info on the RVT being responsible for Laqua being destroyed and him claiming everything is going to be fine. Then we see Liko in her school uniform thinking about her adventures and trying to move on, but is still sad about it, and clearly loves her time on the Brave Olivine. Roy meanwhile found something and declares it's time to get everyone back...all of this happened within the span of a year!

What's the issue?

It left too many questions up in the air that needed to be answered right before the time jump:

Why did Liko and the others not try to get back Friede? Why did they not returned to Laqua? Why not look after the Six Heroes? What happened to Rayquaza and Zygarde? Why didn't Amethio took over the Explorers after Gibeon's death, if he is the heir of the Explorers? How did Spinel usurped Crave and Amethio? Why didn't Rayquaza and Zygarde interfere after Spinel left Laqua? How did Spinel frame the RVT for Laqua's destruction? Why didn't the RVT push back, if Spinel is so dangerous? Why couldn't their friends help? Why didn't the Paldean League do something? What happened to all their associatives? Why not reveal Exceed's corruption and where is Amethio? Why has Roy a Lucario and not more mons, if he was training? How did he met up Ult? What happened to the others after Friede was gone?

They commited all aforementioned sins by glossing over all of these important developments during the timeskip for simple mysteries and thus leave too many important stuff, we needed to know better, since we have no clear picture on how Liko and the others developed because of this, aside from promotional material, which in it self is a bad sign. On top of this, wouldn't Spinel be too big of a threat to be left alone? How did this whole thing even made the RVT leave like that, has he convinced everyone that he is just some philanthropist who wants to help? They really should have shown his plan and give us a lack of urgency as to not force the RVT for immidiate action as to justify a 1 year time jump.

This development, the way they did that, is especially bad for her character: Liko has been characterized as someone that while sensitive, kind, and while often in self-doubt, grew in confidence, so she should at the very least try to set things right, fail and then go back into school and we see then time jump, to make the downfall even more impactful, because this is too important to leave it out. This is how it most likely will play out, but they have not shown that and it left with many people wondering how all of this happened and hurt Liko's relatability and gave the ones wishing for Roy to take over more credence and justification to think this is the case (side note, I predicted Roy getting the next arc more focus, as he is without Rayquaza pretty much the weakest character). However the expectation that Roy is becoming MC and taken over is still BS of course, because suddedly shifting MC's is a bad idea historically as you ruin all the attachment you have for your current MC as they had been the one we are following, you do not do this, Liko exists mainly as our eyes and voice for the story, HZ is her story, not that of Roy and Dot. That is not my opinion as a Liko fan, I would say the same thing if Roy had been MC, so believe me when I say that I am being objective here.

Speaking of Roy, I feel like their development is also cut short and made not relatable. Roy has gone of training, but why didn't he catch six mons by now, if he wants to get stronger? and what was Dot up to? They left no explaination for either of these developments and rely on mysteries to do so, which also hurts their characterization, as no first instance gave us any precedence for this. With Roy it is getting also worse, as he fails expectations because he cannot be as competent as Friede was, as he lacks his skills and experience, so he will be mostly even with Liko and Dot, which also makes the Mega Lucario deal less impactful. Dot also not being promoted as a major character is also bad, the story would have functioned better, had they created a trio from the start.

Anyway, this Time Jump can not really be salvaged and even if they explain this in the next episodes via flashbacks(flashbacks are not the best tools for exposition unless they can impact the future or current storyline, hence they are best to explain lore stuff or things our MC's don't know), it won't be as impactful as having it happen on screen, so the purpose of moving forward in time is also ruined, since instead of skipping to the future, we turn back to the past, a horrible idea. I do think we get satisfactory explainations as to what they were all up to and how all this happened, but it won't be as effective as having just shown us the time and then skip it, and having left the Explorers as no immiediate threat than skipping and then show the time.

This is something Pokémon Scarlet and Violet's Teal Mask and Indigo Disk storyline did much better than Horizons: They showed that Kieran was unhappy with us constantly winning and have him go insane in his room and swearing he becomes stronger and then we met him and he is stronger. That is how they should have done it in Arc 4, show us our heroes losing hope and then flas forward and how they lost so hard, only to get back up!

So I am cautious, this could go bad, as this would take all away episodes showing us their current development rather than enhance that.

Tell me what you think in the comments below.

#star arcana revelations #pokemon horizons #pokemon liko #anipoke #rayquaza rising #mega voltage #spoilers #writing tips

19 notes · View notes

ecargmura · 2 months ago

Text

Pokemon Horizons Episode 83 Review - The Path Of The Anti-Hero

Okay, I admit defeat. I keep debating with a friend on social media whether Gibeon is Amethio’s great-great grandfather like how Lucius is with Liko, but it doesn’t seem to be the case as of this episode. Other than that, Amethio fans will definitely love this episode as it is clearly focused on him. I can totally see him taking him the anti-hero path now.

I really liked this episode because it gives so much characterization and depth to Amethio. He’s clearly a major player in this story, but how he was handled wasn’t great at times, but now, he’s getting that redemption. He has a mother who is revealed to be related to Gibeon and that he was once close to her but she died in a traffic accident; his Ceruledge has been with him ever since it was a Charcadet too. I found those details nice. I also like his relationship with his subordinates, Zirc and Onia, but I wish it was explored more. I want to know how these two met Amethio and why they’re so loyal to him.

I found it amusing how Hamber was info-dumping the stuff about Gibeon’s past history with Lucius, Rystal and Laqua in a powerpoint presentation like he took the time and effort to compile information that’s supposed to be kept secret. Was it because he was going to tell Amethio sometime in the future? The whole segment felt like Amethio, Zirc and Onia going to a a seminar hosted by Hamber. I really would like to learn more about Hamber’s past from how he met Diana to how he stumbled across Gibeon and became a part of his family--and what purpose the Shiny Zygarde Cell he possesses will serve...

One of the great things about Horizons is the constant mysteries shrouding the story. There are two in particular that piqued my interest in this episode. The first is Spinel’s possible betrayal. If you’re new here, I just want to let you know that my favorite Horizons character is Spinel. If I am not the biggest Spinel fan, then I don’t know what I am. Anyways, he’s a very suspicious character and he’s been trying to sabotage Amethio since the early days and now, it’s hinted that he might even betray Gibeon if they ever reach Laqua. His goal is potentially harvesting Lakurium but for what? What does he need it for?

That’s where the second mystery comes in. Lakurium is the thing sustaining Gibeon and calling it Eternal Blessing meant that it’s making him immortal. The fact that the Rising Volt Tacklers all figured this out without needing someone to explain it to them shows that they’re all smart people. Mollie was able to figure out the functions of Lakurium just because of her job as a doctor. The explanation of how cells work really was profound. They were even able to figure out that Gibeon is alive and that he’s not someone else named Gibeon.

Now that the group has somewhat reached Laqua, I do wonder where the story will head. Is the story reaching the end or will there be more after the Laqua ordeal? I apologize for posting this review so late. What are your thoughts on this episode and for the future of the show?

15 notes · View notes