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Best and worst episodes of the series

Rock Captain 99

Following the dreams!!
Which episodes are considered as best episodes and which are worsts! Name the title of the best and worst episodes of pokemon of all time. You can name the episodes region wise also. Short description as to why you love or hate the episode can also be given.

According to me, one of the worst episode in the history of pokemon was A DOUBLE DILLEMA! Simply pathetic episode. Specially when people can't differ between actual humans and pokemon disguised as humans. Hate it!

There are many episodes which i like. I love all the episodes featuring a team change of main casts. Plus episodes involving a good battle, either gym or league or any other tournaments. One of my favourite episode was the episode in which ash battled Conway in sinnoh league. Plus the recent Team Flare arc was amazing too.
 

Golden_Latias

#SlayQueenSlay
I second "A Double Dilemma," but moreso because it felt way too mean-spirited toward Ash, almost like this episode was partially designed to torture him. Like... he is basically snubbed and discredited by the townspeople despite having four badges at that point, forced to battle to the point of exhaustion for both him and his Pokemon, loses to May in a rigged battle, gets burned by Torchic, and all these stupid townspeople basically **** on him from start to finish in their blind fanboyism for Norman and his family. And when Ash defeats Team Rocket and returns the stolen money to these idiots? Pikachu gets all the credit instead.
And yeah, the citizens of North Petalburg have to be some of stupidest COTD in the entire history of the show. Like seriously, if they so obsessed with Norman, they should have been able to see right through Team Rocket's lame disguises. They're probably some of my most hated characters, too.

And I'll name one of my favorites, as well. "Tears for Fears" from DP. I think that episode is very underrated in how emotional it is, in just how it shows the stark contrast between Chimchar's life with Paul and Ash, and I admit even I nearly teared up when Chimchar started crying after losing to Piplup. That scene really shows how much Paul damaged Chimchar's psyche, if it starts crying because it's not used to others being nice to it. And it had some good character development for Chimchar, to boot.
 
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mehmeh1

Not thinking twice!
best: probably dp 188 (Battling a Thaw in Relations!), the only thing that would've made it better would've been had it been the finals and had paul gotten more retribution. "Creating an Even More Perfect Union!" and "Uncrushing Defeat" were also pretty good.
worst: a tie between bw 001 (In the Shadow of Zekrom) and bw 002 (Enter Iris and Axew), because they cemented how bad the reset was for ash and were the defining moments of dumping most of his development (at least as a trainer) from gens 1-4
 
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satopi

Life doesn’t end, …it changes.
There's so many best episodes to name. One of my favorite episodes were when Serena was alone by herself with only Fenekkin (not really a whole episode (I wish) but those were one of my favorite scenes.) It felt really relatable where Serena wasn't accustomed to living outside, was spooked by almost everything that popped up when it was getting dark, and she was so relieved to find a Pokémon Center. She was so brave to go out on a whim to find someone she admired for helping her a long time ago.

I did really like the episode where Golden_Latias pointed out, I was so invested in the Chimchar storyline. Another favorite of mine was when Caterpie was captured and how the group reacted to him. I felt so bad for him when Misty kept telling Ash to keep that thing away from her and how downright disgusted she was of Caterpie, all because he was a Bug type Pokémon and the worst part was how sad he felt even when he was trying to get close to her. I liked how Ash and Pikachu kept comforting him and defending him.

I don't know what's worse. The episode where Bonnie was a leader of that kiddie group of nobodys or that episode of that Kangaskun kid. The sight of Nene appearing and that episode where Clemont found a match was terrible too. I also didn't particularly care for the episodes where Casey appeared. There's only so much Electrabuzz fanatic theme song singing I can take.
 

wobbanut

Team Awesome
My favorites are Sweet Baby James (season 9), A Better Pill to Swallow (season 4), and Tricks of the Trades (season 3). They're all Team Rocket-heavy episodes, but of course I greatly enjoy the trio. Most of my all-time favorite episodes ones that heavily feature Team Rocket, especially when it's in a good light. Of course, it helps that TOTT features the debut of my favorite pokemon Wobbuffet.

My least favorite, no contest, is Same Old Song and Dance (season 5). The music in the episode, apart from Team Rocket's song motto, is horrendous, the singer is monotone, and the adult men fans drooling over a young girl is more than a little disturbing.
 

Rock Captain 99

Following the dreams!!
Yeah.. kangaskun kid was boring af too! I remember one episode featuring pidgey in which that pidgey was trying to fly higher and higher. That episode was boring too.
 

Thumbs2

Well-Known Member
Least favorite: Sticking with who you know. (DP)

Favorite: Dressed for Jess success (Also DP)
 

SinnohEevee

Well-Known Member
1000+ episodes is a lot to choose from, and a lot to remember.

Worst episode: Maybe Ash vs Cameron. I don't think I need to say much about this, but it did cement how bad BW and BW Ash were.

Best: I don't have one on the top of my head.
 

Lord Trollbias

Y'all Salty Bishes
Go West Young Meowth is not the best episode but its a severely underrated one on here.
 

Golden_Latias

#SlayQueenSlay
Yeah.. kangaskun kid was boring af too! I remember one episode featuring pidgey in which that pidgey was trying to fly higher and higher. That episode was boring too.
I actually thought that one was a surprisingly emotional episode, with Orville's determination to achieve such an impossible dream and nearly dying in the process to achieve it. And seeing Meowth's more sympathetic side is always good. That carrier Pidgey one from earlier in the Johto saga (I think it was called "Carrying On") was far more boring and derivative than this one, though certainly not one I'd call one of the worst episodes of the anime.

Actually, I felt a lot of the Johto League Champions fillers that padded out Ecruteak to Olivine in particular were very dull and forgettable. I can only think of a few I truly enjoyed, like "The Poke-Spokesman," which at least had an interesting enough concept to be memorable, or "The Wayward Wobbuffet," which is an incredibly fun episode and some rare Wobbuffet focus.

Sorry for not really posting episodes I do like. It's just a lot of them tend to be the obvious major battles with the occasional emotional episode every now and then, and there are so many episodes that not all of them stand out.
 

DatsRight

Well-Known Member
Least Favourite Episodes:

I'm generally not a big fan of episodes where the COTD is a jerk that becomes the designated hero simply because TR attacked them (especially in cases said jerk bullied TR FIRST and often did the same to the twerps despite the latter being mandated to rescue them after all they put them through). 'Lights Camera Quackion', 'Hail to the Chef', 'The Bamboozling Forest' and 'For The Love of Meowth' are all examples of this. It's bad when I actually wanted these characters to get a comeuppance more than TR.

'A Double Dilemma' didn't bug me QUITE as much, since they at least didn't sweep this fact under the rug afterwards. Ash saved them, but the characters are quite obviously still jerks so he decided to just be the better man about it. That gave him an admirable tint.

I'm also not big of the 'Something eventful is built up the whole episode and then TR interrupts it' formula. There's too many instances to really count, but XYZ got particularly annoying with it with cases like 'Battling at Full Volume', 'Keeper for the Keeps' and 'Electrifying Rage'. It works occasionally but copping out EVERY TIME the twerps do something different is like giving your audience a middle finger, especially since it's always substituted with the most generic TR curb stomp possible.

Favourite episodes:

Almost any rare time TR put up a good fight that isn't negated in any way, as in we get a full challenging face off that the twerps are made to fight off on their own. 'The Stolen Stones', 'Do I Hear A Ralts', 'A Frenzied Factory Fiasco' and the Nimbasa subway two parter are defining examples. 'Factory Fiasco' gets special points for being the one time Meowth fought Pikachu, and actually got in some damage.

Some of TR's limelight episodes are also particularly sweet. 'Ignorance Is Blissey' has always been a favourite of mine (which is saying something since I've only ever seen the dub version). TR taking the fall for Blissey in the most hammy blundering way possible was both hilarious and adorable. Inkay and James' bond in 'Facing the Grand Design' was also heartwarming.

I'm actually coming to be a big fan of some of the twerps' solo episodes in SM as well. 'Crowning Moment of Truth', 'A Guardian Rematch', 'Family Determination', and 'Mounting An Electrifying Charge' (TR was in the latter but they didn't interfere). After the listed cop out excess pulled off in previous series, it's very cathartic to see stories where the twerps prove they're charismatic enough to hold an episode and accomplish something on their own besides 'beating TR effortlessly'.
 
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TheWanderingMist

Paladin of the Snow Queen
Least favorite episodes: I'm betting anyone can guess mine.

Favorite: Well, we've got "I Choose You" and "Pokemon Emergency", but since those set up the basics of the story, I'm excluding them. EP28 of SM of course. I generally like the League ending battles (even Unova's up to a point), though my favorite League episode is "Fourth Round Rumble", because it subverts the rival aspect of Ash and Gary, even if it wasn't originally planned to do so. Oh, and also the "Bonnie commands Squishy to kill a man" episode of the TF climax.
 

Golden_Latias

#SlayQueenSlay
This is probably just me, but I actually tend to enjoy separation episodes. Namely separation episodes involving the main cast alone and not necessarily "x character gets lost" or whatever, and especially if Team Rocket is involved. I mostly enjoy these episodes because they allow for characters who often rarely get to interact to have to work together to achieve something and develop some chemistry together, and they're some of the rare moments where Team Rocket is shown some degree of kindness. Namely I'm thinking of episodes like "Bound for Trouble" or "Forest Grumps," although SM has an example of a separation episode without Team Rocket being involved in the actual separation that's done well in "They Might Not Be Giants."
 

Pokegirl Fan~

Liko>>>>>Ash
The best imo are: most of the Battle Frontier arc, The Wallace Cup arc, the Iris and Dawn separated from the rest of the group/Onix filler, and most of the Aether Foundation arc. Most of the episodes here were enjoyable and interesting.

The worst imo are: most of Johto and the standard fillers up until the end of XYZ that started from that series, some of May's contest episodes, most of XY/Z especially any episodes where Ash or someone else upstaged Serena in her own focus episodes and the Korrina arc, and pretty much any episode where team rocket unnecessarily interrupts a battle or whatever. I found most of these either really boring or just frustrating to watch.
 
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Captain Jigglypuff

Leader of Jigglypuff Army
My list for the best are Bye Bye Butterfree for its plot and how well written it was and that 4Kids didn’t mess it up, Who Gets to Keep Togepi?, Pikachu’s Goodbye for how emotional it can get, Go West Young Meowth for giving us Meowth’s backstory, Holy Matrimony for explaining James’ past and why he ran away and joined Team Rocket, and the two Silver League Conference episodes where Ash and Gary had their big showdown because Ash finally got to defeat Gary and earned his respect.

The worst are The Kangaskhan Kid for several plot holes, the Unova League episode where Cameron defeated Ash only because Riolu evolved and suddenly gained Super Saiyan levels of power for no real reason at all, the episode from Hoenn where all they did was talk about movies they had seen and was pure filler fluff, the Ping Pong episode where Ambipom left because it is another filler fluff episode, and of course A Maractus Musical which was not only pure filler fluff but also had a really stupid way of having Ash and his friends get involved even though the problem literally had nothing to do with them.
 

oshawott7

cat burgler
My favorite episodes are the ones focusing on Ash's travelling companions, rivals and Team Rocket and giving them development. I especially love all the episodes with Drew (obv, he's my fave character), namely Spontaneous Combusken, Channeling the Battle Zone and the Unbeatable Lightness of Seeing.

I also like emotional episodes if they're well done, too bad most of them are not. Some I like are: Bye Bye Butterfree, Pikachu's Goodbye, A Poached Ego, Sweet Baby James, Charizard's Burning Ambition.

As for worst...the Kangaskhan Kid, Take the Lombre Home and Judgement Day. There's probably more that I can't think of.
 
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PokemonBattleFanatic-

Well-Known Member
Best Pokemon Episodes
  • When Pokemon Worlds Collide
  • Different Strokes For Different Blokes
  • Shapes of Things to Come
  • Top-Down Training
  • Tag We're It
  • Glory Blaze
  • Smells Like Team Spirit
  • Riding the Winds of Change
  • Chim-Charred
  • Aiding the Enemy
  • Pursuing a Lofty Goal
  • A Pyramiding Rage
  • Pedal to the Mettle
  • Evolving Strategies
  • Casting a Paul on Barry
  • Familiarity Breeds Strategy
  • A Real Rival Rouser
  • Battling a Thaw in Relations



Worst Pokemon Episode
  • Lost at the League
 
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