What? How is it irrelevant? Mega Evolution gives a substantial boost to the Pokémon in question in the anime. How is it only relevant to the game? Lucario being able to mega evolve is a factor in its strength...
Perhaps an analogy will work here, not relating to Pokemon but hopefully it makes sense as it relates the 2nd part of my argument (keep in mind the concept of baselines).
There is an item in a video game called "Permanent Apple" it boosts all of your character's stats in the game.
The anime adaptation the main character usually fights with normal strength, he's strong but not the best, but then he goes up against what was a boss in the video game. However the main protagonist doesn't battle the boss immediately there's no way to compare the main character and the "boss" character. The main protagonist eats the "Permanent Apple" gets slightly stronger permanently. After a tough battle the protagonist still loses to the boss character.
My argument in context of mega evolution, is that the Permanent Apple's effect of making the protagonist stronger is irrelevant in the context of the anime, and the only way we know that the protagonist is stronger is because of the game (primarily)
Your argument in this context is that because the protagonist merely ate the "Permanent Apple" and gaining a stat boost as stated in the anime, the protagonist should have won PURELY because it's a permanent apple boost. However we don't know how the protagonist would've handled the boss character in his non permanent apple state, and so that information is thus unknown (the context of the anime portion I said was irrelevant).
I'm ultimately arguing and I'm sorry for not expressing my point more clearly because I spaced out and not properly expressing this (I apologize), but the only reason to believe in context with the Pokemon anime a Mega Lucario can beat Dragonite is PURELY because it has a base stat total 625 whereas Dragonite is weaker at BST 600.
That is the game mechanic not an anime mechanic. Thus my argument.
As the anime boost is unknown to us because we don't have the variables as it was not provided to us in the form of baseline default Lucario battling Dragonite, the boost of mega evolution in the context of the anime is irrelevant and thus the default position in this argument can only be to fall onto the games in which Mega Lucario by BST alone is stronger than Dragonite. The only reason to assume Mega Lucario should've won, despite the fact, mathematically BST doesn't necessarily equate to strength is because it has more stat points in the game.
Being a Mega here because we don't have a comparison is irrelevant to why Lucario should've beaten Dragonite was my ultimate point which I will further explain in just a moment.
I’m confused because this argument is difficult to parse.
That doesn't really help but if I had to guess you don't understand the concept of baselines. I'm not sure how to explain this other than using mathematical or technical concepts like with the game. This is all hypothetical by the way.
Normal Lucario
Power Up Punch- 75 damage
Aura Sphere- 95 damage
Mega Lucario
Power Up Punch- 120 damage
Aura Sphere- 140 damage
Dragonite- 130 HP
If we go by this model, normal Lucario should've been enough to defeat Dragonite but somehow it wasn't able to, that's fine, so we get the mega evolution and we can say for certain that absolutely Dragonite should have lost, right?
That's because the normal Lucario should've been enough, that the Mega Lucario for example would've been MORE than enough. Correct?
HOWEVER we didn't get Normal Lucario vs Dragonite we got Mega Lucario from the start instead. So ultimately we got this:
Mega Lucario
Power Up Punch- 50 damage
Aura Sphere- 70 damage
Dragonite- 170 HP
As a result of this new model, as we can see its normal form is irrelevant, we didn't see it, so this supposed mega evolution boost that you think should've been the deciding factor, just wasn't it. Because unlike the previous model we didn't get a baseline to justify the stat boost of mega evolution being more than enough to handle Dragonite because we didn't SEE it. Remember, when Lucario was sent out against Dragonite it then mega evolved. Normal Lucario never fought Dragonite.
Instead in the fight against Dragonite, Mega Lucario was its baseline power fighting Dragonite, and as I've already said, because this is its baseline strength, it's power from mega evolving is ultimately irrelevant from the context of the anime, and to bring it back, the only reason to believe the boost should've been more than enough to beat Dragonite is because of the games saying "Mega Lucario " has a stronger BST (base stat total) than Dragonite.
A power up is only relevant if its a factor in the battle, which it technically wasn't a factor, because we never had the concept of "power down" as it were. Thus the only relevancy that the "power up" would be ONLY because of the games as the anime made the "power up" irrelevant as an argument for why Lucario should've won.
WHICH is WHY I SAID: If normal Lucario was holding its own against Dragonite then mega evolution would be a reason for why Lucario should have won, or even if Lucario was kicking Dragonite's butt, but Dragonite still came out on top somehow and then Mega Evolution kicked in then Lucario again should have won.
There was no baseline to derive the concept of "power up" due to mega evolution because the "power up" was the baseline in the fight therefore it wasn't a "power up" in the justification for why Lucario should've won.
In other anime examples, let's use Goku from Dragonball Z and you kind of don't need to know it to get my point. Goku has a power up that makes him 1,000,000 times (hypothetically) stronger than his base form (very inaccurate I'm sure but stay with me here), this form will be called Super Sayian for argument sakes, right? Let's say he fights an opponent we'll call Cell. Normally Super Sayian would be a power up for Goku, it's been said it makes him a million times stronger. So he goes up against Cell and uses this "power up" from the start, he didn't fight Cell when he was a million times weaker and ultimately he gets his butt kicked. Thus Goku didn't benefit from this power up. He didn't benefit by getting a million times stronger, because he never fought Cell in his normal form, and perform admirably in that form to justify being a million times stronger means he should've beaten Cell. His million times boost power up, was his default baseline of power in that fight.
Or in the most simplest of terms: Cell was just that strong.
Or here in the Pokemon: Dragonite was just that strong.
Saying that "mega" should be enough for a victory implies a baseline that powered up to be stronger than a threat, that was JUST not possible here. You say Mega Lucario was twice as strong a Lucario, that means nothing when Lucario never battled Dragonite to begin with it was Mega Lucario that did.
Not sure if that helps or not.
In the context of the episode discussion, it is awful. It doesn't add anything to the discussion and it should be redirected elsewhere. You can have a negative opinion of an episode, but his views are a pattern. His negativity stems from Miyazaki's work and any further or past episode featuring his scores will amount to similar comments. It isn't right to hatefully bash a composers work.
Now more relevantly, I do hope to hear Miyazaki's pieces more often because I think it has been surely missed in the anime.
If I may add my take on this. I ultimately will never understand people's obsession/passion over music, it's mostly the most irrelevant thing to me in the anime. I don't focus on it as much as other things.
But that doesn't mean people can't express their opinions. It's the art of "ignoring" the irrelevant parts. It's why most people ignore my posts, LOL, it just doesn't interest them, not their cut, not their jibe as it were.
