August 16th: SM86 - I Choose Here! The Pokémon Steam Paradise!!

[Master Pikachu 11]

It's hard to really care about the Ride Pokemon, at the end of the day they belong to Lusamine not the twerps. It's not like we'll see them battle outside of UG stuff, nor should they.... cause Soph and Mallow need some wins all to themselves and their own Pokemon.

And creating an unbreakable bond between somebody and their Ride Pokemon wouldn't really be fair either, Mallow and Lana should catch their second Pokemon not be gifted one. And this is coming from somebody whose wanted a Flygon on the cast since the Jirachi movie....
Hanging around Garchomp should really make Ash think about his Gible too....

Charizard belongs to Kiawe

 

[ash&charizardfan]

It would be interesting if the whole reason why they chose Garchomp to be Ash's ride pokemon is if they were testing the waters to see how people react to the idea of Ash having a Garchomp and if they see that it goes over well then maybe in gen 8 to promote the D&P remakes they will bring back Ash's Gible and fully evolve it.

I just hope when they make D&P remakes they bring back dawn for a larger cameo, its been long time since the best pokegirl was last seen in the anime.

As for gible that could be the case maybe it would be this times cynaquil. Pretty sure people would love the idea of ash with garchomp.

 

[ChampioN-Trainer-BriaN]

Ground type Garchomp & Flygon swimming??? Poke-writers have totally ignored pokemons & their habitats.

 

[Kawaii Emolga]

Ground type Garchomp & Flygon swimming??? Poke-writers have totally ignored pokemons & their habitats.

Garchomp is a land shark pokémon and can learn surf. About flygon i don't know

 

[Zoruagible]

It would be interesting if the whole reason why they chose Garchomp to be Ash's ride pokemon is if they were testing the waters to see how people react to the idea of Ash having a Garchomp and if they see that it goes over well then maybe in gen 8 to promote the D&P remakes they will bring back Ash's Gible and fully evolve it.

That is what I'm hoping, Garchomp certainly suits him when you look at the two together.
Gible could pull a Phanpy/Aipom and request to go to gen 8 with him, or Ash just calls him in to do the Sinnoh BF after gen 8's League(Pls writers, Ash needs another win badly). Either way it would be perfect, Gible's one of the few Pokemon I'd argue needs a evolution. Right next to Totodile at the top

In fact Garchomp is the only way I'd accept Dawn not getting a cameo or appearance.

Charizard belongs to Kiawe

Obviously. But I still care for Charizard as much as I do the others. It doesn't do much apart from take Kiawe home, and his presence doesn't help the Charizard fatigue some fans such as myself are feeling after XY

 

[Leonhart]

I like the spa concept even if the idea of Satoshi and his friends needing a day off sounds flimsy, but the Rocket-dan's involvement seems contrived to me. It's just not very interesting at this point.

 

[DatsRight]

Obviously. But I still care for Charizard as much as I do the others. It doesn't do much apart from take Kiawe home, and his presence doesn't help the Charizard fatigue some fans such as myself are feeling after XY

I always thought it was a shame Kiawe's Charizard never got proper characterisation or chances to interact with the others, this could be the ideal opportunity to start changing that and even give it a big moment of involvement (though against TR I doubt it will get to do much extravagant).

TR possibly managing to get the main lot of Pokemon might be a time to shine for the Ride Pokemon.

I hope TR at least try to fight this time round, even just remember they have Z Rings now, but I can see it being another bland thrashing. They only seem to be allowed to put up a fight if it's Ash on his own.

 

[lemoncatpower]

Ground type Garchomp & Flygon swimming??? Poke-writers have totally ignored pokemons & their habitats.

I'm enjoying it because it goes to show they can still go into habitats that might not be healthy for them to exactly live in, and that it's more that ground types are weak to water type attack moves and not allergic to water.

Although it could just be since theyre part dragon it cancels it out its weakness to water so they can act like any other pokemon without a weakness to water.

 

[Mega Altaria]

Dragon-type Pokémon are quite hardy so we can see Garchomp and Flygon swimming in the pool. I like Garchomp and Flygon just as much so I hope it’ll end up in a tie.

 

[TheWanderingMist]

Ground type Garchomp & Flygon swimming??? Poke-writers have totally ignored pokemons & their habitats.

Neither of them is weak to Water-type attacks thanks to their shared Dragon typing, so a spa shouldn't really be any different.

 

[Jangobadass]

Hopefully this could be like BW95 where it's a standard issue filler, and then at the last minute evil rears its ugly head (with creepy glowing eyes! )

And heck, this already looks better than BW95 in general!

 

[DatsRight]

Hopefully this could be like BW95 where it's a standard issue filler, and then at the last minute evil rears its ugly head (with creepy glowing eyes! )

And heck, this already looks better than BW95 in general!

Maybe, but my bigger concern with this one is that while BW95 was at least a less formulaic filler with TR's role actually being the big twist at the end, this one it seems either way the TRio will be doing their usual run, unless the other TR squad interrupts it.

It's hard to really care about the Ride Pokemon, at the end of the day they belong to Lusamine not the twerps. It's not like we'll see them battle outside of UG stuff, nor should they.... cause Soph and Mallow need some wins all to themselves and their own Pokemon.

Sophocles and Mallow (and most of the not-Kiawe companions for that matter) are in that same awkward limbo as Serena was in XY, where they never really get any big battles or wins, but to try and hide it, they technically never lose any either and always get stuck against even worse battlers like Team Rocket to try and hide their lack of experience. Sophocles isn't too bad because he and his Pokemon gets loads of non-battle limelight, he doesn't need wins for his quota (though I would like his team to gain a full moveset), but Mallow I'm really expecting to beat up Meowth again this episode because it's pretty much all she's got this whole series.

Still betting they'll also battle Ash by the end of this series and suddenly be his equal.

 

[AuraChannelerChris]

Kiawe's Charizard must've really needed that massage. It looks worn out.

Mostly because that Charizard is actually very old.

It would be interesting if the whole reason why they chose Garchomp to be Ash's ride pokemon is if they were testing the waters to see how people react to the idea of Ash having a Garchomp and if they see that it goes over well then maybe in gen 8 to promote the D&P remakes they will bring back Ash's Gible and fully evolve it.

If that was a real reason, people would be up in an uproar anyway as there are more deserving Pokemon Ash could own as well. The guy has incredible chemistry with a lot.

 

[Zoruagible]

If that was a real reason, people would be up in an uproar anyway as there are more deserving Pokemon Ash could own as well. The guy has incredible chemistry with a lot.

Actually, Garchomp's one of the Pokemon I think most Ash fans would be happy to see him with.

 

[DatsRight]

The problem is that so far his Ride Garchomp hasn't got to demonstrate much of a personality, or even much of a moveset, let alone have Ash train it. This is it's first real moment of spotlight.

What happened to Lana's Lapras come to think about it?

 

[mehmeh1]

Maybe, but my bigger concern with this one is that while BW95 was at least a less formulaic filler with TR's role actually being the big twist at the end, this one it seems either way the TRio will be doing their usual run, unless the other TR squad interrupts it.



Sophocles and Mallow (and most of the not-Kiawe companions for that matter) are in that same awkward limbo as Serena was in XY, where they never really get any big battles or wins, but to try and hide it, they technically never lose any either and always get stuck against even worse battlers like Team Rocket to try and hide their lack of experience. Sophocles isn't too bad because he and his Pokemon gets loads of non-battle limelight, he doesn't need wins for his quota (though I would like his team to gain a full moveset), but Mallow I'm really expecting to beat up Meowth again this episode because it's pretty much all she's got this whole series.

Still betting they'll also battle Ash by the end of this series and suddenly be his equal.

at least soph and serena had 1 real loss (soph during the battle royale, serena during the summer camp arc), mallow though? Unless they're planning the ultimate joke (like, having her get to the alola league finals by beating a bunch of meowth/persian-only trainers and ending up getting thrashed by ash or something), it's just lame

 

[Gamzee Makara]

Please stop begging for training montages and "earned" victories.

If you win, you win. DP and Paul are irrelevant to whether victories are "earned".

 

[Dragalge]

at least soph and serena had 1 real loss (soph during the battle royale, serena during the summer camp arc), mallow though? Unless they're planning the ultimate joke (like, having her get to the alola league finals by beating a bunch of meowth/persian-only trainers and ending up getting thrashed by ash or something), it's just lame

I don’t count that as a loss considering we never saw Charjabug with the swirly eyes I think. Same with Fenniken.

Anyways yeah I’m not expecting much from this episode but it’s nice seeing a bit more of Ash & Mallow interacting again after a long while. And poor Charizard lol

 

[DatsRight]

Please stop begging for training montages and "earned" victories.

If you win, you win. DP and Paul are irrelevant to whether victories are "earned".

I don't mind battle records so long as the characters are doing SOMETHING to make them feel integral and make them feel developed. Team Rocket face-offs have always been the ultimate 'get out of jail free' card for that, especially since they're seldom relevant to the character in question and are often insanely easy to defeat. Commanding two attacks is not a gratifying form of character agency, nor should it count as heavy battle experience like it apparently did for Serena, no matter how many times it was done over.

If a character can't develop from or make entertaining use of battles, just don't make them do battles all the time. I don't care how many times you can pit them against jobbers like Team Rocket just so they look like a winner, it's superficial. I mean Ash is a battler that sucks at baseball, should we make him do baseball all the time (but never finish a match so he doesn't look bad)?

EDIT: Cut down comment, because it turned into another bloated, completely off topic rant. Sorry.

 

[Gamzee Makara]

Why must Mallow be a montage-then-battler? Is there a quota that needs filling of montage-then-battlers every season? Is she not allowed to pursue her culinary inclinations for some arbitrary reason? Where did TV Tokyo say that Tsareena had to evolve after training?

I, for one am enjoying the mere concept of Pokémon characters not using Pokémon constantly to further their goals(And having non-Pokémon-centric ones) and solve problems. It breaks the constraints of the rinse and repeat battle/contest/Showcasefests with Non-Ash characters.

Anyway...

I love hot springs IRL, but not hot spring episodes...they're kinda skeevy in an "only in Asia is this legal" kinda way....