Amourshipping Thread V3

[cricketlaxwolvesbandy]

I just want Greninja to beat MCX. Prepare for justice

 

[Spider-Phoenix]

Thanks, guys, you are making this thread surprisingly interesting! And I'm not even a die-hard on Amour (though I support it)

Just end up like an adult loser like Team Rocket or something based on some alleged Shudo notes.

Forgot to elaborate on that one before so I'll do it here:

What I recall from his blog posts was that he wanted to end it with a timeskip showing Ash older and reminding of the adventures of his youth.

Now, that's my own interpreation but Shudo seemed to want to portray Ash as a "morally better". His point would be that even though Ash isn't the best battler, he wins by just being a better person morally. Putting Pokémon's happiness and well-being above his own desires, getting them to their side rather than just capturing them "the game way, etc"

Ash's victory would be he is the one able to grow up and let Pokémon be free.

Granted that was because back then the franchise was still in its infancy so he probably went to plan it as something that was going to have an end.

Perhaps that's why Serena's love for Ash is emphasized to be that young, kind boy who helped in the forest, smiling at her and telling her to never give up. That is the Ash she fell in love with it, that is the true Ash, and that is why her love endured despite Ash being so dense about romance. If Serena had loved an edge lord like Pixiv Red, then I think she loved a shadow rather than a character. That is a character that she needs to get over and moved on, even if "Red" is more grownup than Ash. Because really, that Red isn't grown up or mature at all when you look behind the surface. Even Ash is more mature and grown up than Pixiv Red.

They probably make her love him because of his edgelord status. Some shippers like pairing those kind of characters for some reason.

One of the official animator of anipoke made this lovely illustration with a blue ribbon in the back. Note that this is made as a fanart/tribute and by no means owned by the official anipoke PR (but hey, at least one of the animators acknowledged the blue ribbon so that's good too)

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1515258577510105090

I can finally change my phone's wallpaper

Love the pic but I'll keep my Gumdramon wallpaper lol

Yusuke Oshida is his name, by the way.

Lovely art. Very kind of him sharing it with us fans.

This is sort of reminiscent of when Iwane, Ohashi, and Nishiya all went on their social medias and mentioned their discontent with Ash losing in the Kalos League finals way back when.

They did it? I don't remember reading anything about it back then.

Gotta love it when even then-current anime staff wasn't on-board with the whole Kalos loss. Really makes you wanna believe in the whole 'Ash losing Kalos was last-minute' thing.

I dunno, sometimes I still feel that was the idea at some point and they had to revert it because of the status quo that was dominant at the time.

This is looking like an unpopular opinion, but I don't feel like Ash's journey must or even should end if he becomes the Champion of a League/PWC

Same here. I think there's still a lot that can be done with his quest.

Really, I don't mind neither he staying nor remaining 10 years old forever.

 

[Satoshi no masara]

I don't know if people actually think " official animator drawing the ribbon " proves anything. I'm pretty sure Oshida wasn't even credited on the episode. I don't know about him, but most animators are freelancers. Implying that they're anime staff the same way directors, producers, etc are is a mischaracterization of the amount of influence an animator has.

Edit: Lol, I just checked his Twitter account again and he literally has " illustrations are not official and are just fan art " in his bio.

Yeah, which is why I put a disclaimer that this is considered a fanart/tribute. By no means it's officially acknowledged by official anipoke.

It was still nice to see one of the animators to include a ribbon in their illustration since they could have made this without it. It doesn't mean much but hey, at least one of the illustrator is aware of its significance to Ash and Serena

Also, I'd consider this as an indirect promotion for Serena's return considering the lack of promotion from the officials outside of the minor post-ending chibi art (and maybe the animedia magazine that went silent after the leak)

 

[Spider-Phoenix]

I stand by my belief that part of the reason her return wasn't more hyped is because they knew they had to make the reunion short (so they aren't forced to delve too much into Amour) and they knew revealing it like the others would cause hype to create unrealistic expectations for the episodes. Basically a compromise: we show Serena without potentially harming the ship while also making sure people will watch the episode for what it was intended to be (development for Chloe)

The other is the theory about Animedia paying money for the exclusivity in the scoop lol

 

[Manqoba]

I stand by my belief that part of the reason her return wasn't more hyped is because they knew they had to make the reunion short (so they aren't forced to delve too much into Amour) and they knew revealing it like the others would cause hype to create unrealistic expectations for the episodes. Basically a compromise: we show Serena without potentially harming the ship while also making sure people will watch the episode for what it was intended to be (development for Chloe)

The other is the theory about Animedia paying money for the exclusivity in the scoop lol

My personal theory is that they want to build excitement for the ending stretch of Journeys by making it seem like anything could happen in any given episode. The idea being along the lines that if a major character return could be unknown even 72 hours before airing, who knows what else could happen. And to that point, the new episode this week had cameos/references to Brock and Cilan with little fanfare even though that would've been major news in any other series.

 

[Falconmaroni]

It might also be because they didn't want to reveal Serena's new design before the ep aired. If you noticed she's the only returning character with a major clothes/design revamp. All other returning characters like Dawn, Brock, Bonnie/Clemont, Iris (besides the champion dress she wore when battling), Korrina, the SM cast, etc. all have the same clothes and design since they last appeared. Serena's clothes/design revamp was also part of her development from the end of XY, so it was a bigger deal.

It's noticeable how the writers tend not to give characters new clothes anymore when they come back, it really hasn't been a thing since Misty in AG or May in DP. Even Dawn in BW looked the same, and Misty/Brock in SM had their Kanto outfits again besides some Alola vacation clothes for the second one, and now Brock reverted back to his DP clothes once again.

 

[Epicocity]

I stand by my belief that part of the reason her return wasn't more hyped is because they knew they had to make the reunion short (so they aren't forced to delve too much into Amour) and they knew revealing it like the others would cause hype to create unrealistic expectations for the episodes. Basically a compromise: we show Serena without potentially harming the ship while also making sure people will watch the episode for what it was intended to be (development for Chloe)

The other is the theory about Animedia paying money for the exclusivity in the scoop lol

Personally I think it's Animedia paying money, but also that it was probably supposed to air yesterday instead of a week ago. Wasn't this week's episode originally slated for last week, after all? So in that case the magazine would have streeted a whole week before the return instead of that very day.

Or I'm completely nuts and have no idea what I'm saying.

 

[Power Up]

They did it? I don't remember reading anything about it back then.

Ohashi deleted the tweet and Nishiya has since deleted his Twitter account. Iwane wrote his thoughts on his blog. It'll take me sometime to dig up what Iwane and Nishiya said exactly, but this is what Ohashi said before he nuked the tweet:

しっかしホント、なんで優勝させて貰えないんだろうね… (´・ω・)子ども向けアニメなんだし、もー少し夢を持たせてあげても良いのでは…?とは思う

If I remember correctly, Nishiya was making sarcastic comments about kids having to wait another 20 more years to achieve their dreams and Iwane was questioning why they had to make Ash lose all the time. Note, the latter two are purely off of memory of what I had seen before. Could be incorrect.

 

[cricketlaxwolvesbandy]

Ohashi deleted the tweet and Nishiya has since deleted his Twitter account. Iwane wrote his thoughts on his blog. It'll take me sometime to dig up what Iwane and Nishiya said exactly, but this is what Ohashi said before he nuked the tweet:

しっかしホント、なんで優勝させて貰えないんだろうね… (´・ω・)子ども向けアニメなんだし、もー少し夢を持たせてあげても良いのでは…?とは思う

If I remember correctly, Nishiya was making sarcastic comments about kids having to wait another 20 more years to achieve their dreams and Iwane was questioning why they had to make Ash lose all the time. Note, the latter two are purely off of memory of what I had seen before. Could be incorrect.

What does that mean? Can’t read Japanese

 

[mehmeh1]

Great art by Oshida. I wish he did more KA for JN. One of the show's strongest new animators, but it seems that he's been held back a bit by the production at times for individual episodes

His work in Evolutions shows what he's capable without the main anime's limitations

 

[Manqoba]

Personally I think it's Animedia paying money, but also that it was probably supposed to air yesterday instead of a week ago. Wasn't this week's episode originally slated for last week, after all? So in that case the magazine would have streeted a whole week before the return instead of that very day.

Or I'm completely nuts and have no idea what I'm saying.

You're correct that the air date was changed but it's not entirely clear when that change was made. It was known by March 23 but they could've communicated it to their media partners earlier. Did the article include an air date for the episode? If it still had the old air date it could clarify things.

 

[Spider-Phoenix]

Personally I think it's Animedia paying money, but also that it was probably supposed to air yesterday instead of a week ago. Wasn't this week's episode originally slated for last week, after all? So in that case the magazine would have streeted a whole week before the return instead of that very day.

Or I'm completely nuts and have no idea what I'm saying.

I'm leaning more towards it myself too. Something is really fishy with rescheduling the TR episode when that one was supposed to air in the same day the characters were celebrating the 25th anniversary of their first appearance. Only the influence of a higher bid would make them lose that opportunity.

The other part about "not getting people to get unrealistic expectations which would lead to backlash" just happens to be an added bonus.

 

[masdog]

I'm leaning more towards it myself too. Something is really fishy with rescheduling the TR episode when that one was supposed to air in the same day the characters were celebrating the 25th anniversary of their first appearance. Only the influence of a higher bid would make them lose that opportunity.

The other part about "not getting people to get unrealistic expectations which would lead to backlash" just happens to be an added bonus.

I'm not sure Animedia could pay enough to change the order that the episodes would air in. That would be...very expensive, but I can't rule it out entirely.

I think this kind of change could only be initiated by TVTokyo or TPC.

I think there are a few other possibilities besides Animedia paying for a scoop:
1. This episode number as aired (JN105) is the same as the episode number where Serena's Sylveon evolved (XY105). If they had waited a week, they wouldn't have lined up, and maybe they wanted these to line up for some reason.
2. Someone at TPC or TVTokyo wanted to follow up the Lumiose siblings return with Serena's return.
3. This was a planned switch to maintain the secrecy around Serena's return.

Yeah, TR was screwed by the schedule change. Especially since they had a great episode that really celebrated their role in the series.

 

[Dragonsoldier77]

I stand by my belief that part of the reason her return wasn't more hyped is because they knew they had to make the reunion short (so they aren't forced to delve too much into Amour) and they knew revealing it like the others would cause hype to create unrealistic expectations for the episodes. Basically a compromise: we show Serena without potentially harming the ship while also making sure people will watch the episode for what it was intended to be (development for Chloe)

The other is the theory about Animedia paying money for the exclusivity in the scoop lol

It’s not really an exclusive since PASH also has stuff for it. Though it hasn’t spread around because apparently PASH went as far to not include the pokemon stuff in the digital version. We’ve seen some pics of their poster though.

I’m still of the opinion that they just wanted it to be a big suprise and so they switched the date with the TR one so that the magazine doesn’t spoil stuff a week in advance.

 

[Speed22]

So, apparently the new spam on 4chan is the fact that Serena's episode didn't crack the top 10 in ratings last week. Even though there was little promotion for her and that Pokemon doesn't do well in the ratings in general either. Also conveniently, ratings are almost always brought up to throw shade at XY.

 

[Sham]

So, apparently the new spam on 4chan is the fact that Serena's episode didn't crack the top 10 in ratings last week. Even though there was little promotion for her and that Pokemon doesn't do well in the ratings in general either. Also conveniently, ratings are almost always brought up to throw shade at XY.

…. I mean the episode was spoiled days before it aired and the poster was leaked early. So it’s not like a good portion was unaware.

 

[Manqoba]

So, apparently the new spam on 4chan is the fact that Serena's episode didn't crack the top 10 in ratings last week. Even though there was little promotion for her and that Pokemon doesn't do well in the ratings in general either. Also conveniently, ratings are almost always brought up to throw shade at XY.

people can complain about their (from what I've seen, unsourced) ratings all they want, but all I know for sure is that Serena's return was trending on Twitter and that's not something that just happens every week

 

[Speed22]

…. I mean the episode was spoiled days before it aired and the poster was leaked early. So it’s not like a good portion was unaware.

Well, outside of all of that. You get the idea, some don't look at all of that.

people can complain about their (from what I've seen, unsourced) ratings all they want, but all I know for sure is that Serena's return was trending on Twitter and that's not something that just happens every week

Yes, but don't let that get in the way of the fact that: "Serena is bad and no one likes her!"

It got so bad on 4chan, that some idiot decided to edit Serena out of a fanart that a prolific fan artist did in celebration of the 25th anniversary of the Ashime and replace her with Korrina, just because they didn't like Serena.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1510943492872314881

But here's the worst part, most of the shade, was thrown, by Dawn fans.

I know I shouldn't complain about this, but it has been non-stop for the last month, and 105 only made it worse.

 

[Dragonsoldier77]

So, apparently the new spam on 4chan is the fact that Serena's episode didn't crack the top 10 in ratings last week. Even though there was little promotion for her and that Pokemon doesn't do well in the ratings in general either. Also conveniently, ratings are almost always brought up to throw shade at XY.

Setting aside how relevant ratings really are in the age of streaming, it works even less for this episode since serena’s return was a suprise. Part of the reason it was even trending on twitter was people being shocked about it after the episode and diving back to watch it.

In return, the online version of the videos got a lot of views. The one on the pokemon channel on YT got to 900k while the one on TV tokyo’s channel got 300k which is probably even more suprising. I didn’t check NND tho.

For comparison’s sake for a more normal ammount of views, this week’s episode is only nearing 300k on the pokemon channel and only 20k on TV tokyo’s. It’ll still increase till thrusday, but it won’t even be close since the lion’s share of views is on the first few days.

But here's the worst part, most of the shade, was thrown, by Dawn fans.

Make sense actually. Dawn is easily the 2nd most popular of the pokegirls, so they’re probably the most competive since they feel they’re the closest.

I think it’s the same even in the JP side considering some of things i’ve seen.

 

[Pokegirl Fan~]

Eh ratings don't really impact the anime that much and are pretty meaningless these days.

Im a fan of Dawn's and I can't stand Korrina; I definitely prefer Serena over her and I really don't see the appeal of Korrina at all lol.