Pokemon S01E05 Review: Bad Parenting

Pokemon, Season 1, Episode 5: Showdown in Pewter City

Yeah, not an episode that aged particularly well, I think. As a kid, I was distracted by the big, badass battle against the giant rock snake and didn't really care all that much about the framing story. And, yeah, let's get the game geek frustration out of the way first: Ground-type Pokemon are immune to Electric-type attacks, and judging by game mechanics, this entire episode is a bizarre impossibility.

But, hey, we start the episode off somewhat promisingly, with Ash and Misty finally arriving in Pewter City (Nibi City in the original Japanese). After a fun little trip to the Pokemon Center and a re-establishment that Pewter City's Nurse Joy is the sister of Viridian City's Nurse Joy despite looking alike, we quickly get to see the poster to the Pewter City gym, and Ash basically gets introduced to the whole concept of Pokemon League tournament. Get eight badges from League-sanctioned gym leaders, and then go and join the tournament for glory! Okay, sure, that's the big plot of the season, then.

Oh, and we also meet this strange bearded hobo selling rocks outside the town, called Muno (Flint in the dub), who's surprisingly helpful, but enigmatic. Misty is all cocky about Ash taking the gym leader challenge, hinting that she knows more than she lets on, but Ash refuses to get her help and wants to win with his own Pokemon. Sure, it's admirable... at least for the first part of the episode.

Ash quickly challenges the Pewter City gym and meets up with the tanned, squinty-eyed Brock (Takeshi in the Japanese version), who is pretty ominous as he is all serious and asks Ash about how experienced he is in handling Pokemon. Brock then sets this huge, rock stadium, and then summons his mighty ONIX! Who, at this point in the franchise's life, is one of the largest and most monstrous Pokemon available.

Adorably, Pikachu rushes up Ash's pants and pats at Pidgeotto's Pokeball. "Pika pika" indeed. Ash tells Pikachu that he can't just pass the baton elsewhere when he doesn't feel like battling... but... giant rock snake monster! Pikachu's attacks against Onix turns out to be ineffective, and as Onix catches Pikachu in a bind attack with massive boulders, we get a pretty agonizing moment as Pikachu gets squeezed harder and harder. Ash can't recall Pikachu because the Pokeball beam can't reach, and Ash ends up renouncing the match to Brock for fear of his Pokemon being "finished".

There's a weird bit in these early episodes where the anime is still in full "never say die" mentality, but between Caterpie nearly getting eaten by Pidgeotto, and Ash's freaking out in this episode, it's written with the mentality of death being a possibility, huh? Subsequent episodes would just go with "I don't want my Pokemon to suffer".

And... and this is a pretty good set-up. Ash fights the powerful gym leader, loses, and goes off to train to fight Brock again. Obvious, simple anime stuff, but the execution and the presentation? It kinda sucks, actually, and is very unfortunate thanks to a couple of writing choices.

For whatever reason, instead of treating Pikachu in a Pokemon Center, he follows Muno, a man he's had all of two conversations with, even though Pikachu is wounded. Sure, Muno turns out to be a helpful-if-enigmatic mentor instead of a dangerous hobo, but still, that's weird after the past couple of episodes emphasizing that Ash needs to be responsible for his partners' health. Muno then tells Ash about how Brock could've probably made it big in the Pokemon leagues, if not for the fact that he's also responsible for like ten younger siblings, because Brock's parents are horrible people who left their family to go off -- his father to become a pokemon trainer, and his mother because she's stressed. And, yeah, Brock is a pretty great parental figure, but, shit, Muno's assessment that Brock's parents are scummy is pretty true.

Ash then gets the idea of needing a "power up" to defeat Onix, and we go through this utterly bizarre scheme to use a water mill to increase Pikachu's electricity and allow him to handle high-intensity voltages, and Ash has to use his own legs to run the water mill's generator. Not only does it make no sense, it also plays into the whole "how the fuck does this 10-year-old pedal enough electricity to empower Pikachu?" Misty shows up to offer her help again, and Ash... Ash is a dick to her, telling her that he's going to win on his own without help from anyone. Despite accepting help from an ambiguous hobo and using the pretty bizarre water mill. Honestly, I'm not sure why this episode didn't just go through with Misty helping Ash out. I know they're withholding parts of Misty's backstory, but I'm sure there's a writing way where this could work out.

After this bizarre, ambiguous power-up, Ash challenges Brock again in the next day, and we have Geodude fighting against Pidgeotto. Considering the utter failure of actual game mechanics shortly after, I find it hilarious that Misty and Brock take the time to educate Ash how "Flying-types are weak to Rock-types". Geodude defeats Pidgeotto mostly off-screen, poor jobber bird. Pikachu shows up, and then one-shots Geodude with his brand-new power-up lightning blasts. It's Onix versus Pikachu again, round two, and the same Bind attacks disable Pikachu again, but then it becomes a battle of attrition as Pikachu's physics-defying Thunderbolts damage Onix, while Onix is binding Pikachu. Brock eventually tells Onix to stop when he sees Pikachu hurting too much, but then the emergency sprinklers activate, pouring water on Onix, which Pikachu uses as a cheap shot to help damage Onix, because "water damages the Onix" or something.

And then Brock's little brothers and sisters suddenly show up and cling onto Ash, telling Ash that he shouldn't bully their big brother's beloved Pokemon, you big bully... and have these kids never seen Brock fight in gym battles before? Brock tells his little gremlin swarm to stand down, but then Ash calls off the match and resigns, noting that the sprinklers was an accident and he can't win like this -- especially after seeing Brock's kindness in telling Onix to stop earlier.

And then Brock chases down Ash, giving him the Boulder Badge, and recognizes his defeat. Somehow? Honestly, the situation is so muddled and both Ash and Brock are just being gentlemen that I'm not really sure if Ash really even deserves this. Brock then goes through this spiel about how he wants to be a breeder, not a battler, but also recognizes that he can't move out of the city since he has quasi-parental responsiblities.

Then Muno shows up, and reveals that he is Brock's dad... and, wow, what a shitty excuse of a human being, huh? Like, he abandons his family, and fails to make it as a Pokemon trainer. Okay, fair, but it's implied that he's been living as a hobo selling rocks outside of the city for some time, instead of taking responsibility and actually, y'know, being a parent? And instead of taking time to reconnect to his children and apologizing, he instead mentors this random kid? Honestly, I'm surprised Brock didn't punch him in the face. I would. Instead, Brock is all too happy to go out into the world and travel with Ash, after a gag of handing over a super-long list of responsibilities of raising nine or ten kids to Muno. A man who's practically a stranger to his family, honestly. That's not an ending I liked, especially upon rewatch.

Overall, this whole episode is just bizarre. Like, I get that they're trying to give Brock more depth, but the way it's handled, and the way Misty was turned into a non-entity, feels pretty weird. I love Brock and I'm happy that he ends up becoming the third member of our main cast, but ultimately this episode ends up feeling like one of my least favourite ones in these early episodes.

(Team Rocket shows up in the opening and ending of the episode, digging a pitfall, falling into the pitfall, and getting knocked back down when Ash, Misty and Brock run past them at the end). 

Pokemon Index:

• Pokemon: Pikachu, Onix, Geodude, Pidgeotto, Meowth
• Humans: Ash, Misty, Muno/Flint, Nurse Joy, Brock, James, Jesse

Assorted Notes: 

• I should've pointed it out earlier since the posters did show up as early as episode one, but the Pokemon posters in the first season use the type symbols from the official TCG, which is always a nice little brand tie-in I appreciate. The same type symbols also show up in the first shot of the Japanese opening. 
• Having all the Joys and Jennys look alike is actually a nice bit of cost-cutting -- the character models don't go to waste, and they can have a regular voice actress show up every other episode. 
• The way that the rock stadium clicks into place is extremely dangerous and Ash and Pikachu has to run out of the way. That's very unsafe, particularly in a gym where Brock has a lot of little children running around. 
• I've never realized that Onix's/Iwark's "IWOOORRK" voice from the Japanese audio is retained for the English dub. The English dub tends to replace any Pokemon voice that doesn't match between the two languages, but apparently they decided to keep Onix's "Iwark" growls. 
• The Games Do Not Work Like That:
• Pikachu's electric-type attacks are able to damage both Geodude and Onix. As part Ground-types, they should have immunity to electric types. Even if we factor in the bizarre water wheel training into the process, in their first battle, Brock's dialogue is less about "electric types are ineffective", but more "that's a weak electric attack, it won't hurt Onix".
• Less of a complaint, but we basically learn that the anime world's gym battles work on individual house rules (in this case, two vs two) instead of "fight until a trainer runs out of Pokemon". 
• Dub Changes:
• A particularly bizarre line change has Brock's dad tell Ash that Brock's mom has passed away. In the original Japanese version, Brock's mom is only noted to leave the family behind shortly after his dad due to stress, and considering English dubs' reluctance to even mention death, it's a particularly bizarre change... especially when Brock's mom would actually show up in a future episode. Whoops!