Pokemon the Movie: Mewtwo Strikes Back

Pokemon, the First Movie: Mewtwo Strikes Back

Okay, I probably should've reviewed this movie way back when I was reviewing the Indigo League arc of the Pokemon anime, since there is a subtle background plotline with Giovanni and the mysterious armoured Mewtwo that takes place in the initial Indigo League arc of the anime. Should've, but didn't. 

Mostly because... I really was a bit overloaded with just how many changes were done to this movie. And unlike most anime material or even the Pokemon anime in general, I can't just go "well, the original one was better". And... yes, the original one was better, but the final dubbed English product was also honestly a very solid story in and of itself! Click here for a more in-depth comparison of the two different versions of the movies. The most important part, of course, is that they basically changed Mewtwo's motivations in the two versions of the movies.

Mostly, I was waiting for my full DVD version that included both English and Japanese versions of the movie to arrive, and it took quite a while. I finally managed to sit down and watch the Japanese version of the movie earlier this year... and not just the Japanese dialogue either. There's apparently a 'kanzenban' ('full') version, which adds some 10 minutes of screen-time to the beginning of the movie that is based on a radio drama that tied into the story of the movie. 

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So, first, let's talk about....

The Uncut Story of Mewtwo's Origin!

And this one is honestly kind of... interesting. It starts off basically expanding the prologue we already know from the original version of Mewtwo Strikes Back, showing Dr. Fuji actually going to the South American mysterious jungle to hunt down the original Pokemon, Mew. But turns out that Dr. Fuji's whole deal is that he's trying to use Mew to resurrect, recreate or clone his deceased daughter, Ai. And after getting the sample of Mew's fur, Dr. Fuji is able to not only clone Mew and create Mewtwo, but also create clones of Bulbasaur, Charmander and Squirtle.

The young Mewtwo is thought to be non-conscious, but in reality it's able to use its psychic powers to hear the thoughts of the three starter clones... but also Ai-two, the clone of Ai. There's a fair amount of philosophical self-questioning on Mewtwo's part, as his interactions with Ai-two and the three starter clones have him questioning who he is and what he is; and what the difference between humans and Pokemons are. Dr. Fuji himself also get a flashback where he had been trying to clone his dead daughter even before the Mewtwo Project, and this attempt ends up driving away his wife, who angrily yells that he needs to move on and accept their daughter's deaths.  

And the whole short prologue is just such a melancholic story framed by this, and it gets surprisingly sadder from then on -- Ai-two shows the young Mewtwo scenes from her own memory and it's a lot of cute bonding moments there, but then in a discussion how the moon keeps people from being afraid of the dark, everyone dies. No, it's not implied, the scientists talk about how the Bulbasaur, Charmander and Squirtle clones are 'failures', and we get to see them disappear from Mewtwo's mind-psyche one by one, and the last one to go was in visible panic. Ai-two herself also expires shortly afterwards, telling Mewtwo goodbye and the poor genetic-created psychic Pokemon panics and feels sorrow and grief...

And then as Mewtwo's psychic power activates, Dr. Fuji's team ends up calming Mewtwo down by injecting an anesthetic and a memory-wiping serum. The movie then continues as most of us remember it, with Mewtwo awakening in the lab and questioning his existence, completely forgetting all the nice parts of humanity that he's experienced, or that he's learned what tears are and all that jazz.  

And... and holy crap! It's a pretty fucking depressing twenty minutes to watch. It's exactly the sort of story that a tube-grown psychic superweapon clone would go through, and in some aspects, it also helps to put in frame some of Mewtwo's later actions in the movie when we realize that he's essentially an artificially-grown child who's still trying to grapple with loss and just why he is created. But man, the fact that he gets amnesia at the end of this prologue really stings, doesn't it? Because it does mean that while it's a cool chunk of information to us, the viewer, Mewtwo himself doesn't remember anything that happens here. It's kind of a huge wasted effort, honestly -- I've never really cared for the amnesia trope in anime, and I really wished that they had simply rewritten some of the scenes so that it makes sense that they drive Mewtwo's actions in the movie proper, but the fact that he doesn't go into a monologue about his depressing and traumatic experience with death doesn't really affect the main movie. 

And as a side-note... holy shit, right? The Pokemon franchise in general barely deals with death at all, and the only times death have been brought up, I think, is in the Pokemon Adventures manga and even then it's Shonen-manga-style death where humans die in explosions and stuff. This doesn't just delve into the nastier aspects of cloning and genetic modification, it also has the surprisingly mature elements of Dr. Fuji's refusal to accept his daughter's deaths and turn to cloning experiments to bring her back.  Honestly, I actually did like the story of this little prologue, sans the amnesia bit at the end, but man does it feel so jarring placed next to the rest of this movie. 

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Mewtwo Strikes Back!

But hey. Here we are, starting with Mewtwo Strikes Back! I remember 1999 mostly because of this movie. No, I didn't get to watch it in the theaters, but my parents got a VCD of this movie and I watched it so many times. I wasn't really smart enough to really know about how the animation of this movie was more top-notch (it was), how it had a bigger budget for more Pokemon on-screen and more action scenes, and how its plot was significantly more 'epic' in scale compared to a typical Pokemon episode. 

And, yes, twenty years later and I know that there are a lot of narrative fumbles in the movie. There's also a lot of debate on whether the original existentialism story and motivation for Mewtwo, or the anti-violence/anti-racism message given by the dub is the superior story. Both have merits for sure. But man, I still remember 1999 when I first saw this Mewtwo fellow in a tube, asking the world "who am I?" This is Pokemon #150, the one that is at the absolute end of the original Pokedex, the one that we have glimpsed hidden in a fancy space-suit armour throughout several episodes in the anime... and what a great first showcase, huh? Mewtwo awakens in the lab, blows up the island and most definitively killed all the scientists there in the explosion, and is quickly identified as the 'strongest Pokemon'. 

Then good ol' Team Rocket boss Giovanni shows up with his helicopter and his cat and offers to let Mewtwo focus his power. And I still remember just how much this little montage spoke to me as a child, of how easily Mewtwo one-shots everything in its path. The giant Onix? No problem. A horde of rampaging Tauros? Easy levitation. The most powerful Psychic Pokemon in the original 150, Alakazam? So overwhelmed that even his spoons get bent. Magneton? He gets shocked by his own electricity. Gary's Nidoking and Arcanine? Not even a contest. Yeah, again, it's a bit of a cheap trope, but it most certainly works so well in showcasing that Mewtwo and his fancy armour does deserve the title of 'strongest Pokemon'. And, well, depending on the version you watch, this ends up either being megalomania (English dub) or Mewtwo being utterly uncertain about his place in the world, and whether he's merely a shadow of Mew (Japanese version).

And, well, after one too many arguments with Giovanni and some self-introspection, Mewtwo blows up the Team Rocket base and flies off, absolutely disgusted with Giovanni, Dr. Fuji, and every other human he's met in his short life. 

And, well, that prologue most certainly had an effect on young me, because I can still remember so much from that short sequence of Mewtwo being a badass more than I can the rest of the movie, or indeed most of the entire Pokemon anime in general. 

We then get to the opening credits, which, in a trend started off by this movie, will always feature Ash fighting against a random trainer with his team while the opening theme song plays in the background. In this case, this also features the debut of Generation II Pokemon Donphan, which was another thing that blindsided me as a kid and really made me go "holy shit that is so cool". Again, this mostly serves to showcase Ash's team -- Pikachu, Squirtle and Bulbasaur (who gets possibly the coolest Solarbeam in the Kanto era) -- and what they can do. 

A Dragonite interrupts their little picnic and gives them an invitation to arrive to New Island, setting off the main plot of the movie. Team Rocket, being Team Rocket, also intercepts the letter. We later get to see that Mewtwo has caused a massive storm around the nearby port, which is honestly pretty cool. In addition to Nurse Joy having been MIA in the city, Team Ash gets to see that there's a lot of Pokemon trainers gathered around the pier, and many of them are most certainly hardy enough and very willing to leap into action and brave the storm to get into the mysterious invitation where all the 'strongest trainers' are invited to. The animation at this point is kinda cool, with the stormy waters and everything, and after some comedic moments involving Team Rocket masquerading as a Viking rowboat (yeah I don't know) Team Ash manage to swim the rest of the way to New Island with Squirtle and Staryu. 

Also, Mew, the original Pokemon and the one that Mewtwo is cloned off of, shows up and playfully follows Team Rocket as they arrive on a different part of New Island. As a kid I've always found this subplot bizarrely distracting beyond giving Team Rocket something to do, but now I know that this is basically a way for exposition to happen -- Team Rocket and Mew gets to see a bunch of the stuff that happens at the beginning of the movie, and presumably it's what would lead to Mew eventually deciding to step in. 

Team Ash and company get to see three other Pokemon trainers -- Neesha/Sweet, Fergus/Umio and Corey/Sorao. And they all have full teams of mostly-evolved Pokemon, including some fully-evolved starters and pretty impressive ones like Gyarados or Nidoqueen. Again, back in the original 150, these honestly show off a bunch of pretty cool fully-realized teams, intended to make Mewtwo feel so much more impressive when he bitch-slaps them down. 

And Mewtwo, of course, shows up and does exactly that. And to be fair, a lot of the other trainers do act like assholes, talking down to Mewtwo because he's a Pokemon and trying to capture him. Fergus gets tossed around the room, and his attempt to counteract with his Gyarados and a Hyper Beam gets said attack reflected back at Gyarados. And Mewtwo, well... he just gives this speech about how humans are all cruel and abrasive, and how they enslave weak Pokemon who choose to associate with humans. Oh, and how humans have no right to rule the world. (In the English dub, Mewtwo declares that he's the only one fit to rule the world, but the Japanese version has him be uncertain about his role in things)

While all of this is going on, Team Rocket (and, unbeknownst to them, Mew) find out the cloning machines deep in the castle, as well as cloned versions of Venusaur, Charizard and Blastoise. Who have blotches on their skin -- thanks to the prologue, we now know that Mewtwo probably at some point re-cloned his dead friends. Even though... he's supposed to be amnesiac? Okay, sure. They accidentally activate the automated machine, hear some recorded dialogue from Dr. Fuji, and Meowth gets cloned. 

Mewtwo then summons Venusaur-two, Charizard-two and Blastoise-two, in order to show off that his cloned Pokemon are actually more powerful than 'natural' or 'original' Pokemon, leading the trainers to an arena. We get another pretty cool scene, where Neesha, Corey and Ash use their own respective Blastoise, Venusaur and Charizard to fight against Mewtwo. Also cool is when Charizard is initially released, where he tries to flamethrower Mewtwo and the fire attack gets easily blocked by Mewtwo's manipulation of water. Obviously, since Charizard is part of the main cast, the Charizard-vs-Charizard-two fight is the longest one, featuring a very cool Seismic Toss. 

Mewtwo then shows off his master plan, which is creating a bunch of black-coloured Mewtwo Balls that go around and capturing everyone else's Pokemon. This freaked me out as a kid, and I'm not sure why. I guess it's so ingrained in me from playing the video games that you can't steal anyone else's Pokemon and they can't steal yours? Everyone's Pokemon gets stolen and there's nothing you can do to avoid it! Even the Pokemon used by our heroes! Vulpix, Psyduck, Charizard, Bulbasaur, Squirtle... there's an admittedly funny bit where Ash uses Pokeballs to recall Bulbasaur and Squirtle, but then the Mewtwo Balls just capture those balls instead. We get an obviously long scene of Pikachu and Ash trying their best to fight the swarm, but Pikachu gets captured nonetheless. Ash gets dragged down into the cloning facility while gripping Pikachu's ball, while Mewtwo makes a speech -- depending on the version you watch, he either wants to prove the clones' superiority by making more powerful clones (the original), or to destroy the world with psychic storms and rule the world with his clones (the English dub). Either way, Mewtwo has some serious issues about being a clone and his worth, and whether the clones/copies have a right to live in the world

The cloning devices make clones of all of the captured Pokemon, but Ash's interference when he gets dragged into the cloning device causes an explosion that frees all of the captured Pokemon. Meanwhile, the clones are all released and stride off to join Mewtwo. Can I just say just how absolutely cool the animation was for the Pokemon gooping out of the lower part of the cloning tubes? They could've had the tubes open up their glass windows normally, but no, there's this weird slime-goop thing that they walk through. 

Which leads to the final battle. Mewtwo is surrounded by his army of cloned Pokemon, but then we get a very badass shot of Ash and the army of 'originals' walking out of the flames. Ash tries to charge Mewtwo, but he gets blasted away and saved by the pink psychic bubbles of Mew. Faced with the original that he is imperfectly cloned off of, Mewtwo and Mew engage in battle both with their psychic moves and some philosophical yelling. And this is a pretty cool shot -- the two god-like Mewtwo and Mew fighting in the air, while the rest of the Pokemon fight against their clones on the ground. 

Everyone is fighting savagely and this is more poignant in the Japanese version, I feel, which doesn't have 'Brother My Brother' playing in the background, and just has the pained roarings of the Pokemon as they clash and fall and hurt each other. The only ones that refuse to fight are Ash's Pikachu and both Meowths. 

Speaking of 'Brother My Brother'... I really don't have much against the song, but something I never quite realized until I watched the Japanese version is that the original Mewtwo Strikes Back has some really great orchestral and instrumental pieces that, if memory serves right, got replaced with music from the anime in the English version? I guess they had music copyright problems or something?

It's just... kind of a shame that the climax feels so shoehorned in. Mewtwo and Mew unleash their greatest psychic blasts at each other. Ash, angered at the violence, runs in the path of the blasts, and gets turned into stone. Pikachu goes through a very sad sequence of trying to wake Ash up, and cries, and all the original and clone Pokemon all stop fighting and cry together. Somehow, the tears come together, magically revive Ash, and brings him back to life. Mewtwo gets and epiphany about how the circumstances of creation are irrelevant, realizes that all life deserves to live, then, uh... psychically takes all the clones, wipes everyone's memory, and returns them back to the pier. 

It sure is a self-contained ending, but I honestly always felt kind of cheated out. There's certainly a lot of merit in having the ending not end with a huge showdown against Mewtwo, but basically having him see reason. Whether it's the existence themes of the original Japanese version, or the anti-violence themes of the English dub, I certainly approve that Mew or Ash's actions or Ash and Pikachu's bond or whatever is what shakes Mewtwo out of his plans. But on the other hand... I don't know. Between the instant-amnesia handwave as to why no one remembers Mewtwo, or the honestly rather silly revival tears (which I found to be a bizarre deus ex machina even as a child).

And rewatching the movie twenty years older than I was... it's honestly got a lot of holes in it. The story is certainly ambitious at how cerebral it intends to be, and how it tries to tackle some rather mature themes, but a good chunk of the movie is just building up how badass Mewtwo is, and the ending is rather clunky and rushed. The voice acting for Mewtwo really makes the movie work for both Japanese and English versions of the movie, and the animation was certainly fancy and stellar... but at the same time, it really doesn't fill up the holes in the narrative storytelling. And as much as I adore the 'Mewtwo Origin' prologue, the movie itself really doesn't build up much from that, does it? Neither does the Team Rocket origin of Mewtwo, for that matter, other than giving Mewtwo a skewed look at what humanity is.

Ultimately, I honestly did enjoy the Japanese version a lot more -- the story of Mewtwo asking to the world who and what he is ends up being so much more compelling to me. I can see why they decided to change it when localizing it, because it'd probably be a bit too hard for kiddies to wrap their minds around, and it's certainly not butchered the way that 4Kids One Piece or the US release of Digimon: The Movie ended up becoming... but yeah. It's certainly a pretty enjoyable cornerstone of Pokemon's history for sure. 

Featured Characters:

• Pokemon: Mankey, Mew, Butterfree, Mewtwo, Bulbasaur, Charmander, Squirtle, Persian, Onix, Tauros, Alakazam, Magneton, Nidoking, Arcanine, Togepi, Pikachu, Bulbasaur, Donphan, Machamp, Squirtle, Pinsir, Golem, Venomoth, Meowth, Fearow, Dragonite, Raticate, Kingler, Venonat, Electabuzz, Caterpie, Poliwhirl, Oddish, Nidorino, Weedle, Growlithe, Spearow, Sandshrew, Vileplume, Bellsprout, Slowpoke, Ekans, Raichu, Drowzee, Jigglypuff, Horsea, Pidgeot, Gyarados, Dewgong, Staryu, Weezing, Wigglytuff, Vulpix, Psyduck, Scyther, Hitmonlee, Venusaur, Sandslash, Rhyhorn, Seadra, Nidoqueen, Golduck, Tentacruel, Vaporeon, Rapidash, Nintetales, Blastoise
• Humans: Dr. Fuji, Ai-two, Giovanni, Gary, Brock, Misty, Ash, Raymond, Jessie, James, Nurse Joy, Officer Jenny, Miranda, Fergus, Neesha, Corey

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Random Notes:

• The theatrical airing of this movie featured an extra short, "Pikachu's Vacation". All Pokemon movies thereafter are always 'bundled' with such a short, which featured minimal human characters and almost exclusively just Pokemon. Pikachu and company get into hijinks in a huge park, this short is most notable for debuting Generation II Pokemon Marill and Snubbull. 
• In addition, Mewtwo Strikes Back also debuts Donphan, which was a huge 'what the fuck is that thing' moment for a little me. What is that huge elephant-rhino thing that's able to transform into a wheel, it looks so god damn cool and isn't anywhere in my 151 full Pokemon list!
• Among the trainers that we see flying off from the pier, there's a lady on a Fearow that never shows up again. I guess she straight-up got killed by the storm? 
• This is one of the few times in the earlier Pokemon seasons where nicknames are used, which threw me for a loop back in '99 when I first watched the movie. "Bruteroot" is "Bernard" in the Japanese version, and "Shellshocker" is "Kusukusu". 
• Raymond totally yells "OH MY GOD!" in the original Japanese version after Pikachu takes out three of his Pokemon at once. 
• From the anime's standpoint, this movie takes place after episode 65, which shows Mewtwo escaping from Team Rocket's Headquarters. 
• It was released in Japan between episode 54 and 55 instead, however, because of how the anime was placed on hiatus after the Porygon episode incident putting the anime in hiatus for months. 
• Dub Changes: (Dogasu's Backpack has a very much more in-depth dissection and comparison between the two versions of the movie)
• The English dub changes a lot about Mewtwo's motivations and the central themes debated between Mewtwo and Mew/the humans. The Japanese version had a heavy ethical theme of existensialism, and whether the clones have a right to exist despite being unnaturally created (there are lines of dialogue where Mewtwo asks if he's created by humans instead of God). The English dub changes it into themes revolving around Mewtwo being seeped in violence due to his upbringing, and learning about anti-violence. Mewtwo, in particular, is a lot more arrogant and boastful about his superiority and powers over humankind and natural Pokemon; whereas in the Japanese version he's confused about his worth as a clone.
• In particular, the English dub makes Mewtwo a bit more megalomaniacal -- his "the reign of Mewtwo will soon begin" is this in the Japanese version: "This is not an attack, or a declaration of war... but against all of you who brought me into the world, I will strike back." Thus, Mewtwo strikes back!
• Giovanni is never referred to by name in the Japanese version, but the English dub makes his identity explicit. 
• Giovanni's meeting with Mewtwo has Giovanni talk about how humans are superior to Pokemon in the Japanese version, while the English dub has Giovanni be more conniving and pretending to be a valuable partner. 
• The English dub adds some foreshadowing about Pokemon tears reviving people early on in the movie.
• In the original version, the clone Venusaur, Charizard and Blastoise seemed to arrive on the stage of their own will, whereas the dub makes it seem like Mewtwo summoned them.
• Mewtwo's end-game is just to make more powerful clones in the original version, but the English dub adds an extra 'I will use my storms to destroy the world' to make him more villainous, I guess. 
• Mew is a bit more confrontational in the original version, talking about how the 'originals' will not lose to the copies, while the dub has Mew talk about how shows of force prove nothing, and real strength comes from within. 
• The dub adds a line where Mewtwo 'locks' everyone's special moves to force them to fight with physical force. This isn't there in the original. 
• The original Meowth/Meowth-two dialogue in the Japanese version just has them look at the moon, a reference to the original ending them. The dub has Meowth think about how their method of creation really isn't that different since they live under the same sky. 
• The English dubs get several Pokemon referred to by the wrong names -- Pidgeot gets called Pidgeotto; Scyther is called Alakazam; and Sandslash is called Sandshrew. A commentary by the dubbing team noted that they left the Scyther/Alakazam error as it being Team Rocket themselves goofing up. 
• Errors:
• The animation of Machamp being sent out by Raymond is sent out twice, but this scene is fixed for most re-releases of the movie.
• Pikachu's electric-attacks takes out a Golem in the music prologue, which shouldn't happen since Golem is Ground-type. In the 3D remake of the movie, Golem is replaced with a Drowzee. 
• When Fergus/Umio sends out Gyarados, its lips are briefly blue instead of yellow. 
• When Fergus runs over after Mewtwo knocks back Gyarados, his Nidoqueen is miscoloured as Nidoking. 
• When Ash walks out with the army of Pokemon, the Rapidash is shown without flames. This one was fixed in later releases. 

Pokemon S01E113-116 Review: Gary Returns

Pokemon, Episodes 113-116:

Episode 113: Viva Las Lapras

We're almost done, we have four episodes before we wrap up the Orange Islands episodes. Man, I know that the Orange Islands are infamous for being so utterly mediocre, but I didn't realize it was going to be this hard to talk about this segment of the anime! Honestly, I do get it -- Pokemon episodes, at least until the sixth generation or whatever, aren't really created with any sort of overarching plot in mind, and it's just a way to have a fun adventure every Saturday morning and stuff. Sometimes I kinda wished they had done just a bit more, though I guess this season is a product of its time. 

"Viva Las Lapras" is an episode that I thought would be a lot sadder from what I remembered it being watching it as a kid, but comparing it to the other equivalent "Ash releases a Pokemon" episodes, particularly the famous Butterfree one... it just feels kind of obligatory? Even compared to Primeape or Pidgeotto. It doesn't help that Lapras himself doesn't really feel like an actual member of the party and more of a water taxi that makes funny noises every now and then.  

Still, the episode itself does itself credit by calling back to Lapras's debut episode and Lapras's own pokedex entry about being endangered and fearful of humans. The episode itself is mostly fluff, fighting against a bunch of gag pirates and their Tentacruel armada, while Team Rocket muck around and try their best to be a 'third party' in the whole thing. Captain Crook is way too silly even by the standards of this show, and while the visuals are honestly all right, the episode itself feels like it's just going through the motions -- oh, Lapras is ostracized, then proves himself in battle, and gets accepted by its herd. It's not a terrible episode, but it just feels so... perfunctory, y'know? 

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Episode 114: The Underground Round-Up

This one, meanwhile, is just straight-up a filler episode. It kinda feels like that Magnemite rancher episode, almost? I do know that a bunch of the Hoenn and Johto era episodes would have 'clones' of this episode's concept. A bunch of Pokemon rampage and cause havoc to human society, Team Rocket goes in to wreak havoc, while our heroes and a character-of-the-week try and find a peaceful solution. 

In this case, it's a horde of Voltorbs and Electrodes that have taken up a town. A local Diglett rancher called Clint Eastwood Poncho tries to make tunnels to transport the Electrodes away to an open field to stop them from getting stressed and exploding themselves; while Team Rocket goes in with their ridiculous mecha and forces all the Electrodes to use Explosion and blow themselves up before transporting them. 

And... and I know this is Pokemon, and no one dies in this children's cartoon, but I feel like a huge part of the conflict fell flat on its face when the Electrodes are just using a move that faints them? I feel like they could've added a couple extra lines from Ash and crew about how Team Rocket is hurting the Electrodes and whatnot. And there's not even considering the fact that Pikachu or Meowth or someone else could've talked to the Electrodes and actually communicate with them or something? Eh. I didn't mind this one as much, mostly because I liked the little random Togepi-befriends-a-Voltorb subplot.  

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Episode 115: A Tents Situation

And then we have these two last episodes that close out the Kanto and Generation I chapters for the Pokemon anime. And... it's all right? Wrapping up the whole Orange Islands league five episodes before the end of the season is an interesting thing to do, and these episodes feel like they were just created to give the animators some time and to tie up some loose ends. 

In the case of "A Tents Situation"... it's a cast reshuffling. As our heroes return to Pallet Town, Brock hangs out with the group, apparently having been dumped by Professor Ivy. There's a pretty fun little background recurring joke of Brock going into depression at any mention of the Professor's name, and in the first time since maybe his first appearance, the bland Tracey actually shows that he has some characterization by fanboying over Professor Oak. Oh, and both Oak and Mama Ketchum also show up and hang out with the cast; that's nice. 

Again, there's honestly not a whole ton here other than making sure the cast knows that Tracey is very much a huge fanboy of Oak and wants to stick around with him. We get to see some of the Pallet Town residents like Muk, Mr. Mime, Kingler and the rest, and we get a fight against Team Rocket. Always nice to see Muk actually do something, too! And then, well, Gary shows up and uses his Nidoqueen to save the day, sending Team Rocket blasting off again, and the episode ends with the two rivals glaring at each other. 

It's actually something that caught me by surprise, that Ash's going to get a Gary resolution after the Indigo League essentially cockblocked us by having Gary lose early. But...

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Episode 116: The Rivalry Revival

...but the actual fight in episode 116 lasts for maybe two, three minutes? It's Pikachu against Eevee, and after seeing Gary show off his other fully-evolved Pokemon, while Ash himself has newly 'mastered' Charizard... it's kind of a disappointment to see the Pikachu/Eevee fight be so mundane. It's just Quick Attacks and Double Teams, not the most interesting of Pokemon fights after more than a hundred episodes. 

I do like that Gary has actually mellowed out a lot, being a graceful winner and no longer being as stuck-up as he was at the beginning of the series. Again, I kind of wish that Gary actually was allowed to be a more major recurring character (the Sinnoh seasons had very good rivals, or so I've been told) but for what we got, it's actually nice to see Gary's rather gradual increase in respecting Ash. 

While the actual battle is kind of bland, I do like that Ash's defeat right after proving himself the champion of the Orange Islands League is the kick in the butt that makes him not rest on his laurels. Gary has gone off to the new Johto regions (beg your parents for that sweet sweet Gold & Silver versions, children!) to hone his abilities, and Oak sends Ash off to Johto to meet Kurt with the GS Ball. We get one last fight with Team Rocket in Kanto; the cast basically reverts back to the original trio of Ash/Misty/Brock, and... and as much as I don't hate Tracey, he is very one-note and bland, and Brock at least has a couple of neat recurring jokes. The Johto season will beat these jokes to the ground, but at least he's got something going on for him. 

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And... and that's it. Honestly, doing these Orange Island episode reviews was pretty hard because... so many of them were pretty boring that it ended up being kind of an episodic summary. The last couple of episodes were somewhat interesting, but I think it's by virtue of the Orange Islands segment ending. And I feel like this is where I'll stop with Pokemon anime reviews. I will not be doing Johto, because I know that's a season that's... not the best in terms of non-repetitive content. I might do the two Kanto-era movies just for completion's sake, but if we're going to do Pokemon anime reviews on this site in the future it's probably going to be one of the seasons I haven't watched. XY/Z is apparently pretty great as far as action scenes go; Sun/Moon is apparently the cheeriest anime out there; and the Sinnoh season has a pretty neat rivalry subplot? I dunno. Even if I do Pokemon reviews in the future it might be in huge batches of ten episodes or something. We'll see. 

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Featured Characters:

• Episode 113: Viva las Lapras
• Pokemon: Lapras, Pikachu, Togepi, Meowth, Tentacruel, Marill, Goldeen, Poliwag, Staryu, Squirtle
• Humans: Ash, Tracey, Misty, Professor Oak, Officer Jenny, Jessie, James
• Episode 114: The Underground Round-up
• Pokemon: Pikachu, Togepi, Voltorb, Electrode, Diglett, Meowth, Dugtrio
  
• Humans: Ash, Misty, Tracey, Jessie, James
  
• Episode 115: A Tents Situation
• Pokemon: Pikachu, Togepi, Jigglypuff, Mr. Mime, Muk, Snorlax, Vileplume, Dodrio, Rhyhorn, Tauros, Kingler, Nidorina, Nidorino, Lickitung, Victreebel, Nidoqueen, 
• Humans: Tracey, Ash, Misty, Brock, Delia Ketchum, Professor Oak, Gary
• Episode 116: The Rivalry Revival
• Pokemon: Pikachu, Togepi, Eevee, Butterfree, Tauros, Onix, Parasect, nidoking, Venomoth, Machamp, Beedrill, Arcanine, Gyarados, Kadabra, Electabuzz, Rhydon, Rhyhorn, Mr. Mime, Scyther, Marill
• Humans: Gary, Ash, Brock, Misty, Tracey, Professor Oak, Kurt (picture), Delia Ketchum

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Random Notes:

• Ash's Lapras's mother has a slightly lighter skin compared to all the other Lapras in her pod. Shiny Lapras is actually purple, so this is just another case of the early anime giving alternate colours. 
• In an error that I think is unique to the dub, the Pokedex says that Tentacruel's Poison Sting attack can paralyze its opponents instead of, y'know, poisoning it. 
• Ash's Tauros is now in a regular Pokeball instead of a Safari Ball? I don't actually remember if Ash ever actually uses his Tauros ever again, so... eh?
• Ash and Gary fighting with Pikachu and Eevee is most likely a nod to Pokemon Yellow, where that game's incarnation of Gary/Blue uses Eevee as his starter. 
• I completely forgot about it, but Jigglypuff gets a cameo in episodes 115 and 116... and doesn't even get to do her schtick! She gets to do it ad nauseam in the Johto seasons, though!

Pokemon S01E109-112 Review: Orange League Finals

Pokemon, Episodes 109-112

Episode 109: The Wacky Watcher

We're almost done, we're almost done! Two more batches of episodes. It's just such a shame that this one is kind of a boring one. On paper, the idea of a kooky animal-watcher who's obsessed with documenting the changes in Magikarp is pretty fun. But... but that's all we get. The Magikarp lore is sure neat, but it's basically just 'salmon swimming up a river' and both Ash and Misty learning to respect the diversity in nature or something. And I'm not sure if it's just the voice the dub gives Quackenpoker, but he's just so bland. 

The Magikarp visuals as they try to climb the waterfall is neat, but the episode really doesn't carry enough content even for the short runtime that these Pokemon episodes have. Quackenpoker's lack of characterization just drags on and on that it's almost a relief when Team Rocket does their typical weekly spiel of catching Pokemon. Bulbassaur rescues Pikachu almost immediately, then Team Rockets gets absolutely bamboozled and gets sent blasting off again when the Magikarps turn into Gyaradoses. Very boring. 

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Episode 110: The Stun Spore Detour

I've always wondered where Misty's Poliwag came from, and turns out it's this episode! I never watched this episode. A significantly more interesting episode than the previous one, although still kind of a forgettable one. After a mishap with a Vileplume, Ash and Tracey are suffering from a stun Spore to the face. With no PARLYZ Heal in her bag, Misty has to figure out how to cure the two dumb boys, and she needs to gather some Salveyo Weed in the bottom of the lake near their cabin. What a coincidence! Also, Jessie is also simultaneously sick from Vileplume Stun Spore as well.  

As Misty and the team of James-and-Meowth hunt down the weed, they find a Poliwag with the weed wrapped around its tail, and James sics Victreebel on the thing. We get a battle where Goldeen (!) and Staryu beats the shit out of James' Victreebel and Weezing, while Psyduck uses a headache-confusion thing to blast Meowth and James away. Poliwag helps Misty get the weed, but then waddles off after her. James and Meowth keep trying to trap Misty to get the weed, but she easily sees through their disguises and leaves some of the weed for them after beating them up, which is a nice moment. 

A nice little episode for Misty, James and Meowth. I do think that we've had a lot better "aww, Team Rocket cares for one another" episode even in the Orange season, but good Misty focus episodes are few and far between. This isn't honestly a particularly spectacular one, but I did like it. 

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Episode 111: Hello Pummello

Oh shit, oh SHIT, we're finally here! The final fight of the Orange League tournament thing! There are still four more episodes to go in the season, but this two-parter actually finishes up what Ash set out to do in the Orange League. And in something that I don't think the anime has only ever done once before with Blaine, the fight spans two episodes with a cliffhanger! And this will be the norm for future 'epic' battles, if I remember things right. 

This one starts off pretty well, too, with the foreshadowing of our heroes witnessing Dragonite flying around the seas at high speed (and one-shotting Team Rocket, though that's not much of an accomplishment), as well as the Hall of Fame being shown to Ash to see what he stands to gain. The gym leader Drake also gets a brief appearance, even if his personality is, uh... he exists for Ash to fight. Shame that they didn't try to give him anything else, honestly.

I did like that Ash swaps out Snorlax (who's in a literal food coma) for something else. We get a nice little cameo from Muk and Kingler, but ultimately Ash withdraws Tauros, who he captured forever ago, and wants to go for a bit of a beginner's luck thing. I'm not sure about that strategy, but I've always been a fan of how much of a poor underdog Ash's Tauros horde is, so yay for that. 

Pummelo gym is the first official match that Ash has where he needs to use all six Pokemon, which is certainly something that I do like and felt like it was missing from the past bunch of battles. I think while the anime's gym battles will still tend to be 3v3, this sets a precedent that each 'season finale' will be a far more elaborate affair. The fight starts with a pretty fun one, between Ash's Pikachu and Drake's Ditto, who turns into Pikachu! Despite the repeated animation it's still pretty fun to see two Pikachus fight each other, though apparently Ash's Pikachu wins out because it's "in better physical condition". Yeah I'm going to have to call cop-out on that, I kinda hoped that there was a better explanation for that even if it's just "Ash and Pikachu have a better bond and understanding of Pikachu's abilities" or some crap like that. But oh well.

The next battle is pretty neat, too. Squirtle vs. Onix isn't anything particularly spectacular since we've seen Onixes before, but we get some nice visuals as Onix bursts out of the ground with Dig, then wraps around poor Squirtle's shell, before Squirtle uses Hydro-Pump out of his shell-holes and then Skull-Bashing the shit out of Onix. While they didn't call it out explicitly, I did remember that the Hydro-Pump-spin-then-Skull-Bash combo was something Squirtle learned in the Rudy gym battle, so nice callback there. 

The episode ends with the third of Drake's Pokemon, a Gengar. Gengar fights Tauros, but the poor cow's Fissure attacks are repelled by Gengar's Levitate floating. Poor Tauros is disabled by Confuse Ray, so Ash brings out Lapras and we get a pretty cool bit of Lapras using the water to hide before we get a pretty well animated Night-Shade vs. Ice Beam explosion for the cliffhanger. 

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Episode 112: Enter the Dragonite

Bit of a cop-out there, but both Lapras and Gengar just faint at the beginning of the episode. The fourth match is Venusaur vs. Tauros, and poor Tauros's Fissure just isn't hitting because of the terrain. Venusaur charges its Solarbeam, while Tauros's Take Down is also nullified by the terrain. Tauros manages to toss Venusaur into the air, survive the Solarbeam, then Takes Down Venusaur. Okay, that's pretty cool, in no small part due to me really rooting for Tauros, who's kind of the underdog here. 

Next up is Bulbasaur vs. Electabuzz, where poor Bulbasaur barely has a chance to do anything before he gets Thunderpunched to the ground. Ash sends out his biggest and final gun, Charizard, who dodges all of Electabuzz's attacks before doing a Seismic Toss and bashing Electabuzz to the ground. I did really like the Electabuzz fight, as short as it is.

And, of course, the final bastion of the Orange League, Dragonite, shows up. The fight between Dragonite and Charizard is pretty damn intense, first exploding with elemental blasts clashing at each other as Dragonite just summons one attack after another. Even Charizard's famed Seismic Toss is something that Dragonite breaks free of and actually uses against Charizard, which is pretty dang cool. After a Dragon Rage clash, Charizard is the one that falls down. 

And I do like what follows next, even if it's kind of a prolonged one. Every other one of Ash's Pokemon is weakened from an earlier battle. (There's also a Team Rocket interlude here where they try to net Dragonite, but it's just a distraction). Squirtle's perhaps is the one that's the most desperate-looking since poor Squirtle is an itty-bitty tortoise that keeps weathering Thunderbolts and Body Slams onto poor Squirtle. Tauros also gets taken out, but not before whittling some of Dragonite's health with the terrain-trick from before. 

And it comes down to Pikachu, who avoids Dragonite's deadly Hyper Beam by using its tail as a spring to jump into the sky, latch onto Dragonite's antennae, and just clings on for dear life because Dragonite's big stubby fat hands can't reach his head. I also absolutely love that Dragonite's weakened after using the Hyper Beam, something straight out of the games. This allows Pikachu to unleash Thunder straight to Dragonite's head, and I do like the cliched glaring staring contest before Dragonite falls to the ground. 

And Ash wins his first (and for nearly two decades, only) league, even if it's in a huge filler arc! But that's okay. It's honestly a pretty awesome battle, and one that I remembered catching on live television (despite missing a huge chunk of the Orange Islands) as a kid. And the stadium, the Pokemon being used -- fully evolved monsters like Venusaurs and Gengars and Dragonites! Rarely-seen members of Ash's party like Lapras and Tauros doing things! And while the huge fanboy moment is obviously the Charizard-vs-Dragonite fight, I did really enjoy these two episodes. Perhaps not the best fight the Pokemon anime has got to offer, but I really did enjoy this. Shame Drake's kind of a bland cardboard cutout, but at least what he and Dragonite represents -- a really tough battle -- is something that the anime delivers well. 

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Featured Characters:

• Episode 109: The Wacky Watcher
• Pokemon: Lapras, Togepi, Pikachu, Magikarp, Gyarados
• Humans: Ash, Misty, Tracey
• Episode 110: The Stun Spore Detour
• Pokemon: Pikachu, Vileplume, Togepi, Psyduck, Meowth, Poliwag, Victreebel, Goldeen, Weezing, Staryu, Arbok, Lapras
  
• Humans: Ash, Tracey, Misty, James, Jessie
  
• Episode 111: Hello Pummello
• Pokemon: Lapras, Pikachu, Togepi, Dragonite, Meowth, Lapras, Squirtle, Charizard, Bulbasaur, Snorlax, Chansey, Kingler, Muk, Tauros, Ditto, Onix, Gengar
• Humans: Ash, Tracey, Misty, Drake, Jessie, James, Nurse Joy, Professor Oak
• Episode 112: Enter the Dragonite
• Pokemon:  Lapras, Gengar, Pikachu, Togepi, Meowth, Venusaur, Tauros, Electabuzz, Bulbasaur, Dragonite
• Humans: Ash, Drake,  Misty, Tracey, Jessie, James

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Random Notes:

• Man, "the Wacky Watcher" has a whole lot of Lake of Rage vibes, huh? 
• The 'Hall of Fame' is mentioned a lot of times in 111 and 112, and that is certainly something that you do in all the games since the first one, where the trainer and the team that beats the champion is immortalized there in photographic form for all eternity. 
  
• Misty reads the title card for episode 110 in both English and Japanese versions. The title of the Japanese version actually is "Nyoromo to Kasumi" (Poliwag and Misty) which makes it a lot more significant sounding.
• Oh hey all those dub-watchers who never got to watch the Safari Zone episode are really baffled at Tauros, huh? Though the Orange Island episodes aired notoriously out of order, so maybe they're just assuming an episode would explain it later on? 
• Despite catching Tauros in a Safari Ball, Ash will always call out Tauros with a regular Poke Ball. 
• I found it hilarious that Ash gets surprised at the idea of a "FULL BATTLE!!" with all six Pokemon. I didn't quite realize that none of Ash's formal battles have really extended beyond a 3v3. I guess it's because the anime simply never had the budget, or something?
• Gengar floats over Tauros's attack, something that was originally impossible in the games... but hey, turns out that Gengar would later get Levitate when Abilities were implemented in the third generation, making this a completely and totally valid thing that the anime coincidentally stumbled upon!
• Everyone and their mother keeps calling Dragonite a 'legendary' Pokemon over and over again, confusing a young me back when I first watched these two episodes.
• I completely forgot that there's a weird 'field change' thing going on with the Drake fight, which really don't amount to anything but neat visuals. 
• Ditto transforming without bead-eyes really bamboozled me; I keep forgetting that the button-eyes is supposed to be a flaw of Duplica's Ditto that became so popular that Nintendo basically shrugged and said it applies to all Dittos. 
• Dub Changes:
• In the dub, Tracey yells out that there's no move that's strong against a Ghost-type. The original Japanese one has Tracey actually know that Gengar's a Ghost/Poison, and tells Ash to use Psychic or Ground type moves, which is why Ash brings out Tauros's Fissure. 
• Confuse Ray gets mis-spoken as "Confusion Ray". Other mis-naming of attacks had Charizard's Fire Spin being referred to as Ember, and Squirtle's Bubblebeam being referred to as Bubble. Dragonite also uses Skull Bash to beat up Team Rocket when the Japanese version never specifies the move (and the move was exclusive to the Squirtle line in the games).

Pokemon S01E105-108 Review: Charizard's Character Development

Pokemon, Episodes 105-108

Episode 105: Charizard Chills

Okay, this episode is one of the more significant episodes in the Orange Island episodes, for the simple reason that... -gasp- Charizard finally listens to Ash! Charizard being insubordinate is one of the biggest parts of the early seasons of the anime, particularly the late Indigo League season and almost the entirety of Orange Islands. It's an interesting quirk, and it's a neat show of how Ash's basically winging it through his Pokemon career and is nowhere as badass as he thinks he is. And this episode, "Charizard Chills", is... an interesting one. And certainly nowhere as badass or sad as I had remembered watching it in my childhood. 

Anyway, Ash fights Tad, who is some dude with a Poliwrath (the championship belt and title is a nice touch), and as with any time Ash gets frustrated in a battle, tosses out the big guns in Charizard. And Charizard naturally immediately disobeys Ash. Tad, pissed off at being made fun off, surprisingly goes in a particularly brutal (for this part of the anime) series of attacks and freezes Charizard solid with an Ice Beam, leaving Charizard freezing and shivering. The episode probably doesn't want to portray Tad as particularly unlikable... but he's kind of a twat for freezing someone else's pet dragon and leaving him to essentially freeze to death, yeah? 

And Ash ends up re-earning Charizard's respect by essentially giving it his all in trying to warm Charizard back up, and getting that tail-flame flared up again. It honestly doesn't quite reach the same emotional impact as the original Charmander episode, or, honestly, even the earlier Scyther episode in this season, but like Charizard, I did appreciate the effort. Ash gives a monologue about how he admits he's not the best trainer but he will keep trying, and both the speech and the gesture of trying to keep him alive all night ends up getting through. 

Then we get the requisite action scenes. Charizard lets Ash ride him when Team Rocket attacks, and learns Dragon Rage to blow up Team Rocket's mecha and save Pikachu. And... it's nowhere quite as spectacular as Charizard's Seismic Toss, but it's still pretty cool! We get the rematch with Tad, where Charizard ultimately follows Ash's orders (mostly in dodging) and ends up taking down Poliwrath with a Seismic Toss. And... and honestly, I did kind of like this episode a bit. The fact that the thing that humbles Charizard is quite literally a more powerful Pokemon is a nice touch, and of course it's Ash's commitment to caring for his friends that comes through. It's a nice showcase of what our dumb protagonist is all about, and the episode overall is nice even if it's not quite as super-dramatic as I half-remembered it to be. 

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Episode 106: The Pokemon Water War

A pretty generic episode-of-the-week... and honestly, one of the reasons why reviewing through Orange Islands episodes is a bit slow for me. If we ever do Johto (don't look forward to it) I honestly could do ten to fifteen episodes in a single page, I wager. 

Anyway, the Pokemon-of-the-week is the Squirtle evolutionary line, with Ash and company arriving and helping out the local firefighters, who use an army of Blastoises, Wartortles and Squirtles to put out fires. Ash's Squirtle gets into a rivalry with a scarfed Wartortle, and, naturally, Ash and company get roped into firefighting training. It's mostly pretty fun fluff as Squirtle tries to compete with the Wartortles. There are a lot of fun visuals in the training. 

The conflict of the episode happens when a successful Team Rocket raid has them abscond with Pikachu, Squirtle and the Wartortle squad, but Squirtle and Wartortle ends up working together to vomit up more water than they could possibly store inside their body (physicslul) and free themselves. I did like the fact that the heroes end up having to also deal with a fire at the same time, forcing the humans to split up their forces. Squirtle and Wartortle arrive in time, get Blastoise-shotted into the building and work together and earn each other's manly respect. Ultimately, not the most super-relevant episode, but not a bad one. 

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Episode 107: Pokemon Food Fight

This one, though, is kind of unmemorable. I just watched it and I don't even remember much about it. Basically, our heroes come across Gulzar, a bratty kid who is angry that they mistook his flower-headband (made of real flowers) as free-range flowers. He fights Ash with his Gloom, and after a bit of Poke-Ball mix-up, Ash ends up tossing out Snorlax to fight Gloom. Snorlax being Snorlax, he is unbothered by a Solar Beam, tries to eat Gloom, then does eat Gulzar's lunch. In the process, though, Snorlax's Pokeball is damaged, and our heroes have to push him up to the Pokemon Center. It's not the first time we get a 'ha ha Snorlax fat, get it moving' plot, and this one isn't even funny like the first two times. 

There's a conflict plot with Team Rocket, who holds the food hostage and sort of tries to get the other trainers to hand over Ash's Pikachu, but the annoying brat-of-the-week somehow warmed up to our heroes and speaks up for them. Meowth gets to fight in some sort of funky armour, but of course, Snorlax wakes up. Meowth's attacks literally bounce off his body, then Snorlax unleashes Hyper Beam and blows up Team Rocket... then eats all the food. No real conclusion there, just... Snorlax eats, then cut away to his ball being repaired. It's honestly boring, and the fact that we've had better Snorlax episodes before makes this kind of bland. 

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Episode 108: Pokemon Double Trouble

Oh, hey, a gym battle! The final Orange Crew gym leader in Kumquat Island, and, uh... the gym leader is a bizarre one. Luana is a lady with some issues. She hugs Ash and mistakes him for her missing son Travis. It'd be just eye-rolling if this was part of the plot, but the resemblance to the gym leader's missing son is a plot point that goes nowhere. So I dunno. Team Rocket attacks with a Mecha-Rhydon, but gets blown away by a Charizard/Alakazam team-up. 

Most of the episode is otherwise just the gym battle, which is... a double battle! Two full generations before it debuts in the games! It's a neat little 'variant' that's actually pretty fun, and the fact that the fighters need to pick Pokemon with good synergy is kind of displayed pretty well in the battle, even if it's a bit too on-the-nose. I do definitely believe that Ash will just toss Pikachu and Charizard (he listens to orders now!) into the ring without thinking about it... not realizing that Charizard's kind of a solo act, and Pikachu is a catty little bitch who gets angry when Charizard accidentally knocks it over early in the fight. 

Luana's Marowak and Alakazam has some really neat moves even if, again, they are honestly kind of overly-situational. We get some fun reactions from Pikachu (his shrug!) and some neat tricks like Alakazam psychic-moving Charizard into the way of Pikachu's Thundershock. But ultimately, seeing Charizard take a whole lot of hits, Pikachu helps out, and the two team up (mostly they just trick Marowak into bonemeranging his buddy)

Honestly maybe it's just because I'm slowly getting burned out by Orange Island episodes, but this one felt kind of perfunctory. The animation's kinda nice, at least, and it's nice to see Charizard being a friend with Pikachu.

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Featured Characters:

• Episode 105: Charizard Chills
• Pokemon: Lapras, Pikachu, Togepi, Poliwrath, Charizard, Meowth
• Humans: Ash, Misty, Tracey, James, Jessie  
• Episode 106: Pokemon Water War
• Pokemon: Togepi, Lapras, Pikachu, Staryu, Squirtle, Wartortle, Blastoise, Meowth, Weezing, Scyther, Venonat, Marill, Arbok
  
• Humans: Misty, Ash, Tracey, Officer Jenny, Jessie, James
  
• Episode 107: Pokemon Food Fight
• Pokemon: Togepi, Pikachu, Gloom, Squirtle, Snorlax, Chansey, Meowth
• Humans: Tracey, Ash, Misty, Nurse Joy, Jessie, James
• Episode 108: Pokemon Double Trouble
• Pokemon:  Lapras, Pikachu, Togepi, Meowth, Lickitung, Arbok, Weezing, Alakazam, Charizard, Raichu, Wartortle, Machop, Sandslash, Electabuzz, Poliwhirl, Marowak
• Humans: Ash, Tracey, Misty, James, Jessie, Luana

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Random Notes:

• Thanks to episode 105 showing that Charizard obeys Ash, this places the second Pokemon movie to take place after 105. 
• Whether it's just a reuse of an available model, Tad's Poliwrath does wear the same P1 Grand Prix belt that was showcased heavily in the Ash's Primeape episodes. 
• In the English dub, apparently the Pokemon world's version of "eenie meenie miney moe" is "Eevee Mankey Hitmonlee".
• I did like the continuity nod between 106 and 107, and the reason our heroes are stuck there is because a lot of damage has been done to Ascorbia Island by the fires. 
• Episode 108 actually shows off Double Battles a full three years before it became an official part of the games in Pokemon Ruby & Sapphire. It's not particularly revolutionary or anything, and we've had full-on rumbles between Team Rocket and Ash's squad before, but it is the first formal battle with two-on-two. Notably, Orange Island's double battles end when one Pokemon faints. 
• James yelling at Weezing to use Hyper Beam, knowing full well that his Weezing isn't trained to do it, is kinda funny. 
• Bonemerang shouldn't hurt Charizard! He's flying type! But I guess Pikachu's thunderbolt can zap Marowak, so clearly type immunities simply don't exist at all in this episode. 
• Dub Edits:
• Episode 106 cuts out a scene of Meowth scratching Jessie and James's faces and drawing blood, swapping it for still shots of stars on a black background. (Oh, and of course, the obligatory removal of all Japanese katakana from the flags that the Squirtles and Wartortles carry). 
• The international shot of episode 108 cuts a segment of the training montage, specifically a group of Pokemon at a fitness gym, because it shows Jynx in its original black-skinned design. 
• One of Marowak's attacks is mis-translated from Double Edge into Body Slam in the English dub, not that you can really tell. 

Pokemon S01E101-104 Review: Lightning Farmer

Pokemon, Episodes 101-104

Episode 101: Get Along, Little Pokemon

Yeah, I'm just watching these Pokemon episodes on and off. Sometimes I get enough material to do a bunch of these 'batch' episodes, but... but the Orange Islands episodes just aren't all that interesting, y'know? 100 episodes down the road and they're all very samey, and unlike some of the newer seasons, they don't even have the excuse of having fancy visuals -- there is a distinct sense of 'well, we don't have that huge of an animation budget' with these episodes. 

"Get Along, Little Pokemon" is... it's a very, very interesting concept, actually, for a Pokemon world, and I'm frankly surprised this didn't show up more what with the first generation already having a Power Plant area and whatnot. But basically, Ash and company meet up with a goddamn lightning farmer-cowboy, who rides around a Tauros and leads a small swarm of Magnemite (who he doesn't keep in Pokeballs for no real reason beyond he likes it that way). The idea of farming lightning from thunderstorms, storing them on Magnemite and selling them to supply cities and towns is a bit of a bizarre idea... but we really don't get to explore it much after the exposition. Cowboy man gets his leg injured, Ash gets to go on a "heroic" run to bring the Magnemites to the city waiting for them, one of them is a bit of a goofball and gets separated from its pack. They fight Team Rocket, and the goofball Magnemite gets brave enough to fight back and evolves into a Magneton. 

Again, the concept is nice but it feels like it's the content of around half an episode or something. None of the action scenes are particularly noteworthy and it's not like the plot is anything particularly novel or honestly even fitting with the idea of spotlighting Magnemite and Magneton. 

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Episode 102: The Mystery Menace

This is another one that feels all right in a vacuum, but also feels like it has the sense of 'been here, done that'. Doesn't help that we've already done a fair amount of 'abandoned Pokemon' stories far, far more effectively in this series' first dozen or so episodes. The fact that Ash's Bulbasaur is prominently featured in this episode makes it feel like there was going to be some payoff... but nope, Bulbasaur literally just shows up because the other Pokemon is also a Bulbasaur. There's a huge missed opportunity here and I feel like they don't quite capitalize on it at all. 

The plot's pretty simple, a take on the 'alligators in sewers' trope, turns out that -gasp- the 'monster' in Trovitopolis is actually an abandoned Bulbasaur! And the abandoned Bulbasaur once belonged to the mayor, who grew up to be an asshole! The mayor himself alternates between being cartoonishly dumb, or being surprisingly dark (by this show's very tame standards), at one point wanting to send a SWAT team to block up the sewers with concrete, and if three kids should starve to death beneath it, well sucks to be them. I mean, it all worked out fine (and even then if it didn't Ash could just Charizard his way out) but still, that was surprisingly a different tone compared to most of the series. At least the mayor's ex-Bulbasaur absolutely loathes its previous trainer, though, which is clearly the best conclusion here. 

Overall, a huge missed opportunity, and the fact that we spend so much time dicking around the 'mystery' on what the sewer monster is (it's a Pokemon show, so of course it's a Pokemon) makes this one feel like it dragged on longer than it should. 

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Episode 103: Misty Meets Her Match

A gym battle! Which means we're around eight or ten episodes before the Orange Islands season ends! Whether I ever do Johto or not (random Elekid cameo in this episode, BTW) is going to be another matter entirely, but I'm definitely going to try to finish Orange Islands. I know Johto gets real repetitive, though, and I'm barely keeping up with Orange Islands even with this 'two or three paragraphs per episode' deal. 

"Misty Meets Her Match" is one of those 'big' episodes that everyone talked about as a kid because shipping. And... and honestly, in this show? It's clearly not meant to be much. Every bit of attempted Ash/Misty shipping goes straight over Ash's head, Misty herself is a bit flustered (what girl her age wouldn't be?) and the supposed love rival, Rudy? He's a complete lunatic, the sort of over-the-top "my eternal love!" sort of trope you'd see a lot in anime. And... and that's really about it to be said. There sure was an attempt, though, for Rudy to offer Misty the chance to stay around Trovita Island, and Rudy's little sister was putting on the wingman charm real strong... but... eh, y'know what? Considering how much it shook the fandom at the time, I'm going to say that it probably qualifies as a success in that regard, but I really don't care about the shipping side all that much. 

That aside, compared to the other episodes I'm reviewing today, "Misty Meets Her Match" does have a fair amount of obvious animation budget allocated to it. From the rescue mission in the beginning to the surprisingly large amount of Pokemon Rudy has in his gym, and the battle scene... it's pretty neat, and probably one of the better action sequences in Orange Islands... although that's speaking more about the general quality of the rest of Orange Islands in general than this battle.

That aside, it's a typical gym battle episode. There's the obligatory Island Trial style non-battle element, which... which feels more like an obligatory thing and a vehicle for the writers to show Rudy's hilariously blatant attempts to flirt. The dancing thing doesn't really go anywhere, and ultimately it just ends in a regular battle. It's been a while since we had one of those, though, and we really haven't seen Electabuzz and Exeggutor a whole ton. The episode ends with an interesting (albeit nonsensical, in video-game logic) of Squirtle learning Skull Bash like some sort of secret art, which is pretty cool. It also features a rare case of an anime Pokemon being explicitly highlighted for an unusual TM movepool. 

Ultimately... it's not my thing, but I did definitely appreciate them highlighting Rudy's antics in this 'love triangle' . It sure fits some grade school tomfoolery if these characters are supposed to be in their early teens! I didn't love this episode, but it was definitely a decent one. 

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Episode 104: Bound for Trouble

Yeah, throughout this episode there was definitely a huge sense of "Island of Giant Pokemon did it better", and so did some equivalent Pokemon-only or Pikachu/Meowth episodes either in the mini-movie OVA's or in like the later seasons. "Bound for Trouble" is reasonably solid, though, anything with Meowth in the spotlight -- particularly one where he interacts with Pikachu -- is definitely neat to watch. It's just that... well, it's sort of what we expect. After the two of them get bound together with some bizarre waist-to-waist cuffs, Meowth gets absolutely bullied and is the butt-monkey of the show. Pikachu acts like a bit of a dick (which is something that's definitely rare after the first dozen or so episodes) but we laugh because we're supposed to root for Pikachu and jeer at Meowth. Then there's that brief moment of Meowth being all melancholic and thinking about how different things could be if they weren't on opposing sides or whatever. Again, this honestly won't ever go anywhere since this is a static show, but it does make it feel just that much more special. 

The setting of this episode isn't terrible, either. Fairchild Island's gimmick are larger-than-normal Pokemon (well, specifically just Rhydon and Pidgeot, according to Tracey). No reason why they're all dicks to Pikachu and Meowth, but we do get some neutral antagonists here. The English dub that I watched did have a fair bit of fun with the dialogue, too, particularly everything surrounding the fake fruits and pitfalls early on in the episode. Ash's acting at being separated from Pikachu and with his companion possibly in mortal danger isn't quite that distraught (probably because of that out-of-place background music) as it would have to really tug at the heartstrings, though. 

So this time around we've got two decent solid episodes and two forgettable ones. We have less than ten episodes before Orange Island concludes, so we'll see just how it really ends. 

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Featured Characters:

• Episode 101:
• Pokemon: Pikachu, Togepi, Magnemite, Jolteon, Tauros, Meowth, Chansey, Arbok
• Humans: Tracey, Ash, Misty, James, Jessie, Officer Jenny, Nurse Joy
• Episode 102:
• Pokemon: Togepi, Pikachu, Meowth, Bulbasaur, Weezing, Muk
  
• Humans: Tracey, Misty, Ash, James, Jessie, Officer Jenny, Nurse Joy, Professor Oak
  
• Episode 103: 
• Pokemon: Pikachu, Togepi, Seel, Staryu, Lapras, Meowth, Charizard, Squirtle, Bulbasaur, Elekid (image), Exeggutor, Electabuzz, Starmie, Hitmonchan, Golem, Alakazam, Venomoth, Rhydon, Pidgeot, Ninetales
• Humans: Ash, Misty, Tracey, Rudy, Jessie, James
• Episode 104:
• Pokemon: Pikachu, Togepi, Meowth, Arbok, Weezing, Pidgeot, Bulbasaur, Staryu, Marill, Persian (vision), Rhydon, Snorlax, Victreebel, Psyduck
• Humans: Misty, Tracey, Ash, Jessie, James, Giovanni (vision)

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Random Notes:

• Episode 101 has Team Rocket show up with anti-electric-attack gimmicks. I think this is one of the more blatant ones among the ones they showed up with. 
• So yeah, the anime and games are pretty consistent at having a single Magnemite become a single Magneton, despite what pokedex entries say. 
• I feel like this batch of episodes features a fair amount of the Game Boy games' music, like the cave theme. 
• Muk! It's nice to see Muk show up, even if he shows up for like ten seconds and could definitely have been utilized more. 
• Apparently there was a lot of talk about how episode 103 added more romantic subtext to the dialogue, but really, from what I can glean it's like extremely minor stuff and mostly on Rudy's part, but it's overblown by shippers. 
• Rudy's Starmie being able to use random TM shit like Thunderbolt reaaaaally is something that I wish that the video games actually did more of. 
• More regional variants on the Orange Islands, although these are just bigger variants than usual. Pokemon Go, anyone? 
• In Japan, the second movie debuted after "Bound for Trouble". Which... reminds me that I really need to review the first movie. 
• At this point Elekid would've definitely been finalized since he's going to show up in the little 'bundled' mini-movie in Pokemon 2000, so he gets a brief cameo in episode 103 as a silhouette of a mysterious Pokemon not in the original 151 that Tracey glimpses. 
• Good lord, though, Rudy's gym seems to be utterly dangerous. Not just for Ash's Pokemon, but for Rudy's as well. If Bulbasaur hadn't vine whipped it, that poor Exeggutor probably would've been smashed. It's not even like Blaine's volcano or whatever where Blaine's Pokemon would be fine if they fell into lava. 
• It's never said out loud but there was definitely the heavy implication that Pidgeot's bringing Meowth and Pikachu to feed to its chicks.
• Jessie really just sent Arbok to bonk onto Pidgeot mid-air. Somehow Arbok is absolutely fine after landing to the ground off-screen. 

Pokemon S01E97-100: Alpha of the Group

Pokemon, Episodes 97-100

Back to Pokemon reviews!

Episode 97: Tracey Gets Bugged

It's been a while since I did one of these, huh? I do want to get at least the Orange Island adventures done before going into a far, far shorter version if/when I ever watch the Johto seasons... and that is if I don't just jump off to the newest season of Pokemon to review instead. Anyway, these are actually not particularly terrible episodes as far as Orange Island episodes go. "Tracey Gets Bugged" ends up focusing more on Tracey, because after his debut episode... he kind of gets reduced into a literal background presence, even moreso than Brock. I actually wonder why they didn't capitalize more on this and give Tracey a lot more to do in the Orange Islands... but oh well. 

Arriving on Murcott Island where it's famous for Bug-type Pokemon (and I do like that the writers remembered Misty's distaste for bugs) our heroes end up finding a badly injured Scyther. And, again, the story is simple and it's a variation that'll be repeated several times down the line (the one I can think on top of my head is Ash's Treecko) where our heroes comes across a member of a local group of Pokemon that gets injured, our heroes help it out, and it joins our heroes. Scyther's story is a bit different, though. It's an older specimen, the former alpha male of its pack, and like many other wild Pokemon it's distrustful of humans. Tracey ends up putting Scyther to sleep with his Venonat and catching Scyther in order to get it some help in a Pokemon Center. It's a classic case of a Pokemon not trusting humans and Scyther is not trustful of Tracey at all, and a good chunk of the plot ends up being them trying to figure out ways for Scyther to regain his confidence. 

Our old Scyther's tribe, meanwhile, ends up running afoul of Team Rocket (who crash-lands thanks to a swarm of good ol' Beedrill). Its new alpha, who has two scars on its face, ends up really pissing off Jessie by cutting off her hair -- a hilarious gag that rightfully drives Jessie angry and actually got Team Rocket whipped into competence as a result. A glue bazooka later, and they actually manage to capture the entire Scyther swarm in one go. The cries of his tribe ends up attracting Tracey's old Scyther, and between the animation and the voice-acting, they actually do a decent job at illustrating just how wounded and tired Tracey's Scyther is. 

We also get a pretty cool scene of Team Rocket actually bringing out all their manpower. The lesser-seen Lickitung and Victreebel joins in on Arbok and Weezing, and even Meowth joins in on the fight. Despite being outnumbered five-to-two, Old Scyther has something to prove -- not just to its tribe, but to itself. To this end, Old Scyther ends up shooing Pikachu away from the battlefield... and while this is an Orange Islands episode so the animation isn't anything particularly special, I did enjoy this a lot. Ultimately it's just Sychter doing a lot of speed-blitzing and slashing, but seeing it take down five enemies after spending the entire episode being weak and struggling is certainly nice to see. I do like that the anime doesn't quite go over the top. Scyther takes out like four out of the five Pokemon before he gains the respect of the new alpha of his tribe, the scar-faced Scyther, and together with Pikachu they send Team Rocket blasting off again. And the episode closes off with Tracey's Scyther making peace with Scar-face and leaving the tribe to him. Again, the plot is pretty basic, but honestly it's a lot more than we receive for a Pokemon captured by someone that's not Ash, and I'm a huge fan of this episode. 

Episode 98: A Way Off, Day Off

The follow-up, "A Way Off, Day Off", is a pretty interesting one as well. It's an episode that I don't think is the sort of thing you'd see in the seasons post-Johto, but ultimately the entire episode is sort of our characters decompressing and having lunch together. I don't think it works particularly well since the Pokemon anime isn't like anything super-tense, but it sure is thematic! There's some sort of vague plot about the Farfetch'd migration, a bunch of fruit on the island, a Jigglypuff cameo and an obligatory Team Rocket fight, but ultimately it's just a nice way to see the full parties of Ash, Misty and Tracey out and interacting with each other. 

The highlight of this, of course, has to be the meeting between Charizard and Scyther. Charizard is ill-mannered and a big asshole, but Scyther is an old dinosaur-lizard that's the leader of its own pack. I do like that the two of them would glare at each other and basically try to size each other up as the 'alphas' of the group, but they don't actually end up fighting and basically sort of ignore each other with a huff... and when the two of them work together to fend off Team Rocket, they have a manly mutual eye-contact-nod. Also, between Charizard's assholishness and Snorlax eating everyone's food, yeah, Ash isn't a particularly good trainer, huh? 

Not a whole ton takes place, again. We do have Ash reminding the audience about the GS ball and how he's totally wondering what's in it, but the foreknowledge that it's going to be a plot point that's ultimately dropped does make this feel even more pointless in an already filler episode. 

Episode 99: The Mandarin Island Miss Match

This one has Lorelei on it (renamed Prima by the dub), in an episode that was kind of famous for, uh, some cleavage-y fanservice. Honestly? It isn't really that bad. It's sort of a bland episode, though, another one of "Ash learns to be humble, sort of, but he's also a dunderhead so it passes over his head" episode. After a string of victories in Mandarin Island, Ash and company ends up coming up on battle extraordinaire Prima, who happens to be Misty's idol. 

And the episode basically has our hero interact a lot with Prima, whose personality is... kind of an airhead? Sort of a zen-spouting character, but also an easily-distracted airhead. She's unfazed by Ash's excitement and battle-battle-battle mentality, but when Ash tries to show off his battle skills to the super-perfect Prima, an attempt to pull out the big guns and toss out Charizard ends predictably when Charizard ends up rampaging, beating the Tauros... and also burning everything in sight until Prima and her Slowbro disables Charizard and takes it down. Ever since the championship, there's this vague bit of 'oh no, Ash, you can't control Charizard, when will you learn?' storyline sort of going on in the background... but, again, that isn't actually resolved here. 

The episode sort of goes around to show that Prima is, of course, an elite trainer that defeats everyone she meets, and there's an attempt where Ash thinks Prima is doing some reverse psychology on him... but Prima's personality is just really very easygoing. Prima beats up Pikachu with her Cloyster, before one-shotting Team Rocket with her Jynx. And... and again, there is a setup in this episode for something, and I don't know if it's just something that got lost in translation or what, but ultimately the meeting with Prima ends up being kind of a dud episode that ends up with "oh hey look at Prima, she's badass" and the moral of the episode being... uh... be like water my friend, I guess? A Bruce Lee quote?I dunno. Kind of disappointing. 

Episode 100: Wherefore Art Thou, Pokemon?

One that is a guest-star-of-the-week episode and perhaps one that isn't particularly memorable. It's a Romeo and Juliet spiel, but instead of Romeo and Juliet it's a pair of Nidorans owned by a young rich boy and a young rich girl who also happen to be neighbours and very, very competitive. Except the Nidorans love each other, because they're cute baby rabbit-porcupines who really couldn't care less about their owners' feud and they just want to frolic and make Nidobabies. The Nidorans being treated as basically prized show-dogs or show-cats are pretty neat, and the vibe of the episode is pretty interesting for one of these filler, guest-of-the-week episodes. 

The episode doesn't actually do much, but it's pretty sweet. It flows basically how you expect it to -- Misty is the one that catches on the quickest on the Nidorans and the one that's the biggest shipper; the two owners realize their Pokemon's feelings are more important and end up building a house for the Nidos between the two big houses and stuff. We do have a bunch of fun moments here and there, too, like Meowth convincing the two Nidorans to elope (when they wanted to capture the Nidos) or Misty trying to play matchmaker with letters and gifts and making things worse. Oh, and Team Rocket also cosplays as a bride and groom at one point, which is fun. Ultimately, of course, the two trainers learn to work together with their Nidorans, who end up fighting to protect each other and later fighting together to beat up Arbok and Victreebel. Nothing super exciting or notable, but not a terrible episode. 

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Featured Characters:

• Episode 97:
• Pokemon: Lapras, Pikachu, Togepi, Marill, Venonat, Beedrill, Caterpie, Pinsir, Scyther, Meowth, Weedle, Venomoth, Paras, Metapod, Chansey, Arbok, Weezing, Lickitung, Victreebel
• Humans: Tracey, Misty, Ash, Jessie, James, Nurse Joy, Professor Oak
• Episode 98:
• Pokemon: Lapras, Pikachu, Togepi, Jigglypuff, Staryu, Goldeen, Farfetch'd, Squirtle, Bulbasaur, Snorlax, Charizard, Marill, Venonat, Scyther, Psyduck, Meowth, Arbok, Victreebel, Weezing, Lickitung, Seadra (flashback), Blastoise (flashback),  Nidoqueen (flashback), Electrode (flashback), Geodude (flashback)
  
• Humans: Ash, Misty, Tracey, James, Jessie, Cissy (flashback), Danny (flashback)
  
• Episode 99: 
• Pokemon: Bulbasaur, Butterfree, Togepi, Pikachu, Meowth, Squirtle, Persian, Tauros, Charizard, Slowbro, Machamp, Marowak, Dewgong, Alakazam, Cloyster, Jynx
• Humans: Ash, Misty, Tracey, Prima/Lorelei, Jessie, James
• Episode 100:
• Pokemon: Togepi, Pikachu, Nidoran F, Nidoran M, Marill, Pidgey, Vulpix, Caterpie, Raticate, Oddish, Meowth, Arbok, Victreebel, Staryu, Nidorino, Nidorina
• Humans: Misty, Ash, Tracey, James, Jessie

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Random Notes:

• Tracey's Scyther is one of the few members of a member of a main character's team in the anime that has a non-standard design; with the little side-burns that denote its age.
• Lost in the dub is the joke at the end of episode 97. The very non-catchphrase-y "I caught <insert name here>" pose that Ash does is actually a catchphrase in the Japanese version, where whenever Ash catches a Pokemon he goes "<insert name here> getto da ze!", basically going "Pidgeotto GET!" Tracey is attempting to basically copy Ash's quirky pose and catchphrase, which is why Ash looks so snotty in teaching Tracey how to properly do it. 
• Dub Changes:
• A big one! In order to fit with the lip flaps of the episode, Lorelei gets given a brand-new English dub name as 'Prima'. Lorelei's Japanese name is 'Kanna', which has two syllables instead of Lorelei's three. Also, all references to the Elite Four is removed in the dub. 
• A dub error related change in episode 97 is "Poison Sting" being dubbed as "Poison Needle", which is the literal meaning of Poison Sting's Japanese name.
• Episode 99's English dub ends up giving a Kadabra the cry of an Alakazam. The dub also mis-dubs Jynx's Ice Punch as Ice Beam. 
• Episode 100 has a fair amount of dub changes where Misty is angry at Ash who keeps pointing out that she's "a kid" too in regards to romance, whereas the dub changes this to Ash just completely missing any sort of romance from anything going on and making him a battle-obsessed kid.
• It's really, really interesting that Swords Dance, in anime-land, can be used to clear smoke. 
• Based on Generation 4's gender differences, Tracey's Scyther (and all the pre-Gen-4 models) actually has the larger abdomen of a female. 
• In episode 97, Ash references his Caterpie by noting that he hasn't captured a Caterpie 'in a long time'. 
• In a bit of an error, Misty is happy that Marill and Venonat aren't gross Bug-types... despite Venonat, y'know, being one. 
• Persian can learn Thunderbolt and Thunder via TM even from Generation I. 
• The Who's That Pokemon segment for Episode 98 features Porygon, in the single time in the entire run of the English Pokemon dub that Porygon's English dub has been heard. 
• Episode 99 has since been removed from active rotation due to its featuring of Jynx's original design. A scene zooming in on Prima's breasts is also removed from some versions of the international dub. 
• There is a joke regarding CD's and $18.95 cassette tapes in the Prima episode that I actually found pretty funny. 
• The real-life country, England, is mentioned by Misty early in episode 100. 
• Episode 100 refers to "Pokemon Contests", although it's a fairly long time before the genesis of Pokemon Contests as an actual part of the Pokemon lore in Ruby & Sapphire. I guess it's just them adapting pet contests?