Does the Paul rivalry send a wrong message to kids?

[Navin]

Paul definitely changed at the end, and the show portrayed Ash's training style as superior to Paul's.

And Ash never actually treated his Pokemon like Paul did.

The show portrayed it that Paul's style will have a higher floor and generally be more consistent (as in Paul would almost never lose to weaker trainers, whereas Ash might some bad losses here and there). However, Ash's style will ultimately have a higher peak (Ash can believe in and motivate Sceptile and Pikachu to beat Darkrai and Latios for example). It's funny because Paul and Tobias are pretty much how gamers would be in the anime - catching only powerful Pokemon and legendaries, and fully evolving them, and using complex strategies.

 

[LilyTwo]

My opinion is that yes, it is a dangerous and wrong thing to try and teach to kids. It really did come across to me as "abuse is okay if it gives you results".

My main problem with the whole mess is, that Paul is almost never called out for his attitude (which doesn't limit itself to Pokemon, mind you: remember how he demoralized Maylene?) And whenever he is, the one repriminding him is made to look like a fool (Ash, Dawn) or is outright ignored (Zoey). The public doesn't boo him when he simply rage quit on Ash at the Tag Team Tournament, and instead he gets a new fanboy in the form of Barry. When Reggie hears what happened to Maylene, he simply shrugs it off as Paul being Paul. And I honestly find it really hard to believe that, having been a trainer for as long as Ash, he has NEVER mistreated one of his Pokemon like he did with Chimchar (honestly, I think it was all part of the whitewashing that Paul progressively received).

It does not help that Paul's change of heart came across to me as sudden and nonsensical. I think that Paul's in-character reaction to winning 6-2 against Ash at Lake Acuity would not be to start respecting him, but to say something along the lines of: "Pathetic. Clearly, your victory against Brandon was nothing but a fluke."

Now, if Paul had been portrayed more like, say, A.J. for the 6th episode of the anime - someone who trained his Pokemon hard but clearly cared about them as "people" and held himself to the same standards as them (whereas Paul hypocritically blames his Pokemon for losing all the while saying that, when a Pokemon loses, it's the trainer's fault), I would not be so cynical about this rivalry.

 

[XY Rules]

Did he? I mean, I loved the rivalry, I really did; but even I found his development at the end to be forced. (But I do alternate between the sub and dub though, so it's possible that I may have missed a few lines that indicated him changing towards the end.)

He definitely did, I only watched the dub and even I noticed that. I think a lot of people think his development was about him becoming friendlier which it really wasn’t. Keep in mind character development isn’t about a character changing (change is just one possible end result of development). Character development is about coming to terms with something/reaching a resolve and reaffirming that resolve. Paul remained as Paul until the very end, who he was never changed. But he began to respect the mentality of others as the series went on. It’s why LilyTwo’s suggestion of having Paul call Ash’s in against Brandon a fluke wouldn’t have made any coherent sense. Paul had been developing his respect for Ash each time they met and he saw the results. It might’ve not been enough to beat Paul himself for a while, but it got him to the league. At which point, Paul was clearly shown to have become genuinely interested in battling Ash and why he egged Infernape on during those final moments.

And I hate Paul, but development is development. As a writer myself I take these kinds of things very seriously.

 

[LilyTwo]

I'm sorry, but I didn't notice any change in Paul until his forced development at the end of the Lake Acuity battle, and I didn't see him develop any respect for Ash until the very end. There was no development until that last minute shoe-horn. That's my opinion, and I'm sticking to it. I've stuck to it ever since DP ended, and nothing will change my mind.

I don't see Paul as an example of good writing at all. He's just a Gary Stu.

 

[XY Rules]

I'm sorry, but I didn't notice any change in Paul until his forced development at the end of the Lake Acuity battle, and I didn't see him develop any respect for Ash until the very end. There was no development until that last minute shoe-horn. That's my opinion, and I'm sticking to it. I've stuck to it ever since DP ended, and nothing will change my mind.

I don't see Paul as an example of good writing at all. He's just a Gary Stu.

I literally just said change=/character development...His development was shown throughout the series as he learned more about Ash and why he watched a lot of his battles. If you can’t notice development, that’s fine, that’s your problem. But you don’t have any right to call anything good or bad writing if you can’t see it when it happens. And something like development isn’t subjective. Well-executed development is subjective but what’s there is there. You can’t argue against that without sounding vastly uninformed which you really do...

Side note, Gary Stu is a fanfiction term, not one actual writers use...

 

[Epicocity]

I literally just said change=/character development...His development was shown throughout the series as he learned more about Ash and why he watched a lot of his battles. If you can’t notice development, that’s fine, that’s your problem. But you don’t have any right to call anything good or bad writing if you can’t see it when it happens. And something like development isn’t subjective. Well-executed development is subjective but what’s there is there. You can’t argue against that without sounding vastly uninformed which you really do...

Side note, Gary Stu is a fanfiction term, not one actual writers use...

No, Gary Stus can be used for regular fictional characters as well; it's just that the term originated with fanfiction.

Would Paul be considered one? Not by a long shot. While he does beat Ash, it also consistently shows his weaknesses. He loses to Cynthia, he loses to Brandon and he's not glorified by any trainer for his work in the Tag Battle. Furthermore, there's not a single character that actually actively respects him except for, at best, Reggie, and then Barry, who has never met the guy, until his personality starts to subtly change. Paul is never glorified in-universe, and while I can admit the shift to "it's just a different training style" is a bit jarring, one can see that it is only Chimchar who has a hard time with Paul's methods given how the others behaved and the fact that Paul outright did pointless things like getting Torterra groomed.

Anyway, if I've lost the point, Paul wouldn't even touch Gary Stu realm.

 

[Xenon Blue]

I mean Paul didn't really "change", but is that really a problem? If he suddenly changed his ways and admitted his "mistake" he made to Chimchar, that just puts him out of character and would feel much more forced than what we got in the end. He already paid for his sin in the most crushing way. And no, his sin isn't "not giving all Pokemon a chance and putting them through rigorous training". There's honestly nothing wrong with that. The problem is when he started forcing results out of Chimchar, believing he saw something in him, instead of looking at the results objectively and concluding Chimchar obviously cannot handle Paul's training method. He was initially extremely stubborn about his training method, so the fact that he admitted Ash's training method is also valid alongside his usual method is already a step in the right direction. He still believes in his method and possibly still thinks it is the most superior, but by the end he isn't overly caught up with it and certainly won't make the same mistake with Chimchar in that he won't force compatibility.

 

[LilyTwo]

I genuinely can't understand people who think Paul is a well-written character in any way. It's like they come from another planet.
I honestly didn't see any development in Paul except a forced one after the infamous Lake Acuity battle. I still don't see anything likeable or respectable in Paul, and I still think he should have gotten a harsher punishment for his attitude.

And I still think this joke of a rivalry sends the wrong message to kids.

 

[Thumbs2]

His punishment was losing to the pokemon he abandoned. This is pokemon, not even main antagonists get punished.

 

[MattySadler]

How would it send the wrong message?

The whole point of the rivalry was:

- Abuse is bad.
- Power of friendship and love wins over power of cruelty and abuse.

Ash wins and even Paul begins to change slightly and to treat his Pokemon better.

This. If anything it sends out the right message, because the "good" way prevails over the "bad" way in the end.

 

[Johtohfiller]

The "Paul just has a different style" stuff was an asspull plain and simple. Don't expect me to believe that his methods are legit when you consistently portray him as a dick and said methods contradict the "friendship between humans and Pokemon is important" theme that the whole franchise preaches at every turn. DP is my overall favorite but I consider this its one glaring flaw.

Exactly. It shows that affection and love prevail in the end.

Though I also think it would have been interesting if Ash managed to beat Paul a couple of times before the League as well. The writers could have used it as a way to have Paul begin doubting his own training style, and have him change even earlier than he did in DP. I feel like it would have intensified the rivalry as well rather than turning the rivalry into one-sided curb stomping that it was in DP.

This would have been great.

 

[Halolady]

The "Paul just has a different style" stuff was an asspull plain and simple. Don't expect me to believe that his methods are legit when you consistently portray him as a dick and said methods contradict the "friendship between humans and Pokemon is important" theme that the whole franchise preaches at every turn. DP is my overall favorite but I consider this its one glaring flaw.

Well, in defense of the rivalry, I've never really thought that the writers were going to take the standard "friendship rules! Power drools!" route that they always took in the past for this rivalry. Idk, I just couldn't see that as a fitting conclusion I guess. The moment they set up Paul to be this huge threat to stand in Ash's way throughout the region in DP3, as opposed to a one-time pushover as is the case with Damian, I had a feeling they were going to do something different for this particular "friendship vs. power" plotline. So I wouldn't say that it was an "asspull" to enforce that "different training method" message in the end per-se...seeing as how it was more likely to have been somewhat planned as the conclusion from the get-go. Of course, whether or not you actually approve of that conclusion is an entirely different facet of the argument itself.

 

[SinnohEevee]

The "Paul just has a different style" stuff was an asspull plain and simple. Don't expect me to believe that his methods are legit when you consistently portray him as a dick and said methods contradict the "friendship between humans and Pokemon is important" theme that the whole franchise preaches at every turn. DP is my overall favorite but I consider this its one glaring flaw.



This would have been great.

Maybe they pulled that up when they saw Paul was popular. I think they initially made Paul as someone who's meant to be hated but didn't expect the fans to like him.

 

[Halolady]

Maybe they pulled that up when they saw Paul was popular. I think they initially made Paul as someone who's meant to be hated but didn't expect the fans to like him.

Really? Because I got the impression that he was pretty hated among fans outside of the bulbagarden and serebii communities. (bulbagardeners and serebii goers being a small part of the whole fanbase and all)

 

[PokemonBattleFanatic-]

I wouldn't call an abuser but rather a trainer that puts his pokemon through rigorous training to get stronger.I'm sure he may have done similar methods to other pokemon in different regions like he did with Chimchar in early DP but mid to late DP there was no indication of him "abusing his pokemon nor did any of his pokemon come off as sad/depressed.The Ash/Paul rivalry shows that there's other trainers out there that have different styles and methods but are just as strong,which can cause clashing and conflict.

Ash's style will ultimately have a higher peak (Ash can believe in and motivate Sceptile and Pikachu to beat Darkrai and Latios for example). It's funny because Paul and Tobias are pretty much how gamers would be in the anime - catching only powerful Pokemon and legendaries, and fully evolving them, and using complex strategies.

I'm pretty sure Paul can do the same thing but chooses not to or did it in previous regions and decided to abandon that aspect.If a current Paul were to focus on power,strategy,and bonding then he'd be way ahead of Ash.

 

[Korrіna]

I would say no it doesn't because the times that he went too far he was portrayed as the bad guy

 

[Leonhart]

I would say no it doesn't because the times that he went too far he was portrayed as the bad guy

Other than his apparent lack of concern for Hikozaru's past emotional trauma and habit of pushing Hikozaru over the edge to master Blaze, I can't think of a time when Shinji went too far. He only showed his uncaring side when Hikozaru was involved, and even then it was to strengthen Hikozaru with tough love.

 

[PokemonBattleFanatic-]

I wonder why nobody comes on here and claims Paul ABUSED his pokemon post Hearthome City Arc (Ursaring) (Electabuzz).

 

[Halolady]

To update a little on the OP, I now think there are two ways to interpret Paul's scenario with Chimchar after rewatching the whole tag battle arc: 1.) Paul being too power-hungry to care about Chimchar's well-being, and 2.) Paul's action-action-logic-logic mindset simply being much too incompatible with Chimchar's more empathetic one for their alliance to work out. The first interpretation didn't come naturally to me at all; I had to step back from the show and piece together certain scenes just to see it. While the second perspective came effortlessly to me while I was watching the episodes before my eyes. (Hence I probably would've went with the second interpretation full-force if it wasn't for some fans pointing out Paul's actions as abuse)

At this point, I think it really does come down to how we subjectively interpret things.

 

[PokemonBattleFanatic-]

Chimchar is like a scrawny kid that tried out for a sports team,the coach (Paul) saw some potential in him and decided that he'd make the final cut.The coach was very stricted on what the players needed to do,he'd make them do workout training in the gym and training drills on the field/court.The scrawny kid had trouble keeping up with the other players on the team (Torterra)(Elekid)(Ursaring)
during the strength conditioning and practice drills,the coach noticed it immediately and decided to work with him personally.

The kid would little by little improve but would still fall behind and make silly mistakes during games,the more he failed the harder the coach pushed him during practice,it eventually lead to the coach finally getting fed up with the kid's incompetence and released him from the team.A coach of a different team(Ash) saw a little bit of talent in him and decided to bring him on the team,the coach was less strict and his training regimen was less intense and rigorous.The kid got along well with the other teammates (Pikachu)(Buizel)(Staraptor) and improved greatly compared to when he was on the other coach's team.