Anime rivals development

[shoz999]

It is just my own opinion, but do you think that quality of rival's characters and story is getting worse and worse since AG and DP?
Paul was the pinnacle of rival's character development and his conflict with Ash was the most interesting part of this series. Coordinator rivals of May and Dawn also were kinda well-balanced, except maybe Kenny and Nando, but secondaries are always getting pretty shafted.
BW rivals had a great potential, but turned out kinda meh. They all were very fun characters with cool personalities and chemistry with Ash/Iris/Cilan, however, none of these rivalries got a conclusion. I feel very bitter about Trip the most, cause he started as a total jerk, but keeps getting more friendly towards the end of series and battle with Alder. Trip revealed to Ash the reason behind Oshawott's inability to use Aqua Jet, helped during venipede invasion and started to understand that power is not the only key to a victory after unexpected strategies of Ash and Bianca. After Junior Cup he had greatly subdued his nasty attitude, having been humbled by his battle with Alder too. Along with his newer persona, he showed a genuine interest in battling Ash in the League, and along with that ceased his past tendencies of mocking him.
So the writers could turn that fact into something similar to Sawyer-Ash friendly relationships. While Trip would learn unusual tactics from Ash, the latter would use more strategy and rely on abilities and switches in battle. However, we did not see even a proper full battle. Trip would have a pretty menacing team of Chandelure, Conkelldur, Serperior, Unfezant, Vanillux and Jellicent, but only his starter got some time to shine and Conkelldur surpassed Torterra's overwhelming losing streak. The same thing applies to Georgia and Burgundy and to a lesser extent to Kenyan and Bianca.
Original XY rival trio of Shauna, Tierno and Trevor started kinda well, but were completely downplayed to background later. Ash has no proper battle with Tierno before the League. Shauna/Miette/Nene never really defeat Serena and just not feel like real rivals and threat, Serena never lose because any of them outshined her performance. Sawyer is okay, Alain is Marty Stew, and Amelia is an example of wasted potential.
SM series brings only one rival that is Gladion, however, he feels like a recurring character, not a main rival. He had some interesting conflict with Ash about UBs nature (Ash considered them as just Pokemon from different dimension, while Gladion thought they are monsters) and that could lead to potential showdown between Naganadel and Silvally, but alas...
Hau is pretty loveable and interesting character from the games who got just one episode and was eventually defeated by grass type Z-Move with 0,25 x effectivity -_-
Do you think that nowadays rivals are poorly handled and have a less impact on the main characters?

Outside of Paul, Alain, Sawyer, Conway, Trevor and Tierno, I never thought any of the anime rivals were good. I do think Gladion and Zoey are fairly entertaining but they don't really feel like real rivals.

 

[Dream Lad]

Again, that is a problem that you have with the concept of Showcases. It's entirely subjective and has nothing to do with the actual rivals.

The thread topic is about the declining quality of anime rivals. Even if Showcases are subjective, the writers could have had Serena lose to the rivals without having to justify it as her own fault/Pokemon's fault, but rather because the rivals were superior.

Personally, i do think that it takes skills to do any of those activities, whether it's dancing, coreographing, styling, sewing, modeling, cooking or anything else that performers do. But i guess things like these are dismissed as real skills because they are often seen as "feminine" and, therefore, frivolous.

So not once did I bring gender into this, but okay. And I was only talking about clothing. Showcases are a major Kalos pastime; Serena could walk into any shop and get her Pokemon's clothes properly outfitted.

"Serena never lost because she were outperformed, she just lost when she made a mistake" First off, if she made a mistake on her performance and the others didn't, then she were indeed outperformed. Out performing means to perform better than someone else. If that someone else commited a mistake and you didn't, then you did outperform that person.

Put the semantics aside, you know exactly what I meant. Every occasion when Serena checked off all the boxes, she defeated her rivals. Shauna, Miette, and Nini didn't have their Pokemon trip over outfits or have stage fright; they just lost to Serena because she was simply better. That's why it wasn't compelling. If Serena lost a Showcase to Shauna despite having good outfits and a good Freestyle routine and without any glaring mistakes, there could have been more tension to the rivalry and room for Serena to develop in that regard.

 

[DatsRight]

I think what can be owed to this very divisive opinion of how much Serena changed up her performances is maybe down to the fact there were no significant roadblocks or progression steps. She was a girl they wanted to emphasise as being a 'determinator' but had issues making proper obstacles that she could overcome on her own. The performance missteps were just tragic isolated incidents that were solved the very next showcase, not really severe weaknesses they had to develop her methods significantly to solve like you sometimes see with battling arcs. Eevee pretty much lost all her timidness after she evolved. Hell a lot of the other rounds almost felt tailor made specifically for her.

Again none of the rivals really enforced any serious curveballs in how she had to approach things, so she remained kind of complacent in how she actually set about the showcases. She may have changed things here and there but the significance and incentive she might have actually stood a chance of losing if she didn't wasn't really there. The activity as a whole lacked enough substance to demonstrate such a requirement of agency.

Combined with the fact the only other activity her rivals competed with her in was battling, something she was never made to get better at but plot armoured to NEVER officially lose at, their lacked a significance to how the rivals affected her agency, besides pivoting the odd DEM boost from her Pokemon. She felt tacitly untouchable by them, no matter how competent she was, even the odd times she straight up lost anything felt formulaic. That's a bad side effect for rivals to inflict, to actually punctuate how little agency this character has to the plot and results.

 

[Kintaro]

Trevor was the worst rival of the franchise next to Trip/Cameron. At least Tierno had his dancing, his battles with Ash, and a good battle against Shota in the league.

Trevor felt like he was just there because he was part of the games XY trio. The writers clearly didn't want to use him at all. I laughed when Alain pretty much destroyed him in a mostly off-screen battle.

 

[Epicocity]

The thread topic is about the declining quality of anime rivals. Even if Showcases are subjective, the writers could have had Serena lose to the rivals without having to justify it as her own fault/Pokemon's fault, but rather because the rivals were superior.

So then this would be the question: keeping Showcases the same...how do you do that? There are no judges, just a popular vote. How do we as the audience know Serena was inferior to her rivals just from a popular vote? There's no relative measurement to go by. Because all you're saying is "well, the audience wanted to vote for this person...I don't know why, but they did".

 

[Dream Lad]

So then this would be the question: keeping Showcases the same...how do you do that? There are no judges, just a popular vote. How do we as the audience know Serena was inferior to her rivals just from a popular vote? There's no relative measurement to go by. Because all you're saying is "well, the audience wanted to vote for this person...I don't know why, but they did".

Off the top of my head:

1. Serena uses a similar routine to the one that won her first Showcase while Shauna changes her routine. Serena loses, and Palermo tells her that audiences want more creativity and range.
2. Serena uses the same 2 or 3 Pokemon while Shauna changes her Pokemon combinations. Serena loses, and Palermo tells that audiences want more unique combinations (forcing Serena to have a full team).
3. Building off #2, Serena uses only 2 Pokemon at a time while Shauna successfully completes a routine with 4 Pokemon. Serena loses, and Palermo tells her audiences are more impressed by technically difficult routines.

They could have also done more with the Freestyle faceoffs in the Master Class, making that part of regular Showcases as well. That way Serena could have lost if a rival outperformed her in that round, like using her own Pokemon's moves as part of their routine.

 

[Leonhart]

In hindsight, Shota would've been my choice for Satoshi's main Kalos rival instead of Alain taking that role in XY&Z. Shota should've shown up at the beginning of the saga however, so that his growth would've seemed much more organic than it ended up being.

 

[Kintaro]

I never do understand why the writers introduce some rivals so late. Barry didn't get introduced until 100 eps into DP. Shota came more than halfway into XY. Hau is introduced in only 1 episode later in SM before the league.

 

[AuraChannelerChris]

After DP, they've been in a steady slope going into a hole.

Unova - Lots of promising rivals that were ultimately just...dropped for no reason. That only left the wackos and perfect human Virgil, leaving no tension whatsoever.
Kalos - Kind of all over the place since everyone worshiped and looked up to Ash, whereas this wasn't present with previous rivals. Serena's "rivals" were more friends than anything.
Alola - Ha ha.

 

[Kintaro]

With XY I think they were trying to mirror AG for awhile with Ash having no real rival (yes there was Tierno/Trevor, but c'mon, most people barely count them), but then we got Shota halfway into the series, and then Alain was sort of retconned into a rival for the end of the saga. I don't think Alain was originally intended to be in the league, but the writers figured they had to have someone for Ash to lose to and didn't want to create yet another new random character like Tobias.

 

[Epicocity]

With XY I think they were trying to mirror AG for awhile with Ash having no real rival (yes there was Tierno/Trevor, but c'mon, most people barely count them), but then we got Shota halfway into the series, and then Alain was sort of retconned into a rival for the end of the saga. I don't think Alain was originally intended to be in the league, but the writers figured they had to have someone for Ash to lose to and didn't want to create yet another new random character like Tobias.

Not true. Yajima is on record saying that Alain was always envisioned to be Ash's final opponent at the League, and they just wanted to build him as a character before then.

 

[Kintaro]

I guess I forgot that, but that's interesting to know.

On a side note, I'd rather Ash have no rival for a region at all than put up with a forced/bad one like Trip. BW probably would get less hate if Stephen was his only rival till the league. Although Cameron would still be hated later.

 

[Jeal]

Honestly, the rivalries we've got in the bast few years are so are somewhat a product of Pokemon franchise's emphasis on friendly competition rather than jerk or cocky rivalries.

The anime has a good deal of terrible rivalries. Let's start with Trip.

Putting aside Trip trying to ride off of Paul's success, Trip had the trappings of a good rival and then promptly threw them all out. He doesn't have much of a unique history other than an admiration of Alder. There was also some underlying level of classism with Trip and how he believes Ash to be some kind of hillbilly with his "the boonies" remarks. Thematically, this would have led to a good clash of themes and characters. These remarks don't even go anywhere to make this rivalry more thematically appropriate. They didn't even do the simplest thing of have Trip's pokemon fight elegantly or, I don't know, have him get along with Cilan over Iris and Ash better than anyone else.

They're rivals. Let their themes clash.

I just watched a few episodes of BW, but every time Trip appeared, the interaction between him and Ash was bland. Trip did not care about Ash, and Ash would talk to him like he was a friend, and Trip was indifferent. There was no tension.

In hindsight, Shota would've been my choice for Satoshi's main Kalos rival instead of Alain taking that role in XY&Z. Shota should've shown up at the beginning of the saga however, so that his growth would've seemed much more organic than it ended up being.

Shota was the main rival. Alain was just a guy that Ash battled.

 

[Kintaro]

In terms of Ash, his best rivals were probably DP > XY > OS (only because Gary barely appeared, if he appeared and battled Ash more this would be higher) > SM (only because of Gladion) > BW (Stephen was good, I guess?)

You know looking back at the 22 year history of the anime, it is kinda sad Ash's rivals are so lackluster throughout practically the entire series when you stop to think about it.

 

[Dream Lad]

In terms of Ash, his best rivals were probably DP > XY > OS (only because Gary barely appeared, if he appeared and battled Ash more this would be higher) > SM (only because of Gladion) > BW (Stephen was good, I guess?)

You know looking back at the 22 year history of the anime, it is kinda sad Ash's rivals are so lackluster throughout practically the entire series when you stop to think about it.

Ash and Gary was a rivalry of competition and ambition. Childhood friends turned rivals trying to outdo each other. Gary was always one step ahead (except for the blip at the Indigo Plateau), but Ash surpassed him at the Johto League. Obviously Ash/Gary could have been done way better, but the concept behind it was good. AG Ash was more about improving himself, so he didn't need a rivalry (and it helped set up the main rivalry in DP). DP Ash and Paul was a rivalry of philosophy. Both had equal achievements and experience and came to accept the merits of each other's training after their numerous face-offs. If Ash's story had ended in DP as everything was set up to be, then the two major rivalry concepts would have been fulfilled.

BW's rivalries were all over the place; Ash himself was 'reset', so it was puzzling to know what the writers were thinking at the time.

XY had two rivalry concepts that were not bad. Ash being a mentor-rival to Sawyer could have been compelling, but they introduced Sawyer way too late, and had most of his development off-screen. Alain was a mutual respect rivalry between two great trainers; not the most compelling, but it made for a nice full battle. Gladion has a similar rivalry with Ash.

The only big rivalry ideas left are:

1. Rivalry with a female character
2. Rivalry with an actual villain
3. Rivalry with a family member, viz Ash's father

Hopefully Galar will have something unique.

 

[U.N. Owen]

I just watched a few episodes of BW, but every time Trip appeared, the interaction between him and Ash was bland. Trip did not care about Ash, and Ash would talk to him like he was a friend, and Trip was indifferent. There was no tension.

Which is sad because the trappings were there for a great rivalry. You get to have this classist snob vs. this hillbilly. If they had put any more effort into this rivalry, it would have fit with the duality theme of the BW games and been a memorable rivalry.

 

[Kintaro]

I prefer Ash having no rivals like AG then put up with forced/bad ones like Trip in BW.

 

[AuraChannelerChris]

XY Ash didn't have any rivalries.

...He had admirers.

EVERYWHERE.

 

[Thumbs2]

The pre-DP rivals were great. Even the minor ones. BW's where it went sour.
I love Stephan and Bianca, and I'm actually fine with Cameron, it's just Trip that gets me. We got interesting bits with him, like the one where he figured out why Oshawott couldn't use aqua jet. But most of the time, he was just bland. And Serperior going from a regular Pokemon to the Flash bugged me a lot. Burgundy and Georgia could have been more developed, but were super entertaining to make up for it.

XY had a different isssue in that it's rivals were all but irrelivant until Sawyer came along. Trevor barely existed, and Tierno and Shauna were mostly run-of-the mill, with Tierno never even getting a good battle in. Alain was fine, Sawyer should have been introduced earlier. The Serena rivals are pretty forgettable and don't really push her.

SM's weird. Gladion's less of a rival and more of a guy Ash battles sometimes. The other alleged rivals only appeared once or twice before the league. Honestly, the only real rival in the series is Horacio. And I actually like that guy. Hope he appears again.

 

[Kintaro]

Tierno/Trevor were really only in the anime because the writers wanted Shauna for Serena’s rival but couldn’t ignore the other two. It’s obvious the writers had no plans for them, but Tierno still had some good battles and his dancing gimmick was decently amusing.