Finals IV: Partner (1221)

[Blue Saturday]

The ending didn't have as much gravity and applause as Alola's making me think they'll probably tie it all together with Go's ending in Project Mew somehow.

 

[AJ97]

My favorite part of the battle was the Iron Tail and Air Slash clash between Charizard and Pikachu.

Was amazing to see the little mouse run across those beams and then get into an aerial battle with a Flying Dragon.

 

[masdog]

Initial reaction: OOOOMMMMGGGGG!

 

[WhiteBlair]

There is also a nice touch right before Pikachu's last move. The characters who appeared have either all accomplished goals and/or overcame fears to conclude their arc.

Here are the OGs: Misty and Brock who were always pictured as fearing Gyarados and be a Doctor, having now achieved dreams to watch Ash claim his.

 

[Shneak]

I kind of wish there was a surprise cameo of Geeta and Clavell watching from a box and talking about how they need to recruit Ash.

 

[AJ97]

There is also a nice touch right before Pikachu's last move. The characters who appeared have either all accomplished goals and/or overcame fears to conclude their arc.

Here are the OGs: Misty and Brock who were always pictured as fearing Gyarados and be a Doctor, having now achieved dreams to watch Ash claim his.

Misty's dreams is a little more than just getting over Gyarados xD...
She wants to be the strongest Water Pokemon Trainer. So probably something like potentially being an Elite four member?

 

[Sham]

So, now that it's been discussed how un arbitrary all of this in a way, a shinning light on this situation is that there is a good chance he could be leaving and there is the whole title defense aspect of the PWC. Sure they could find other things to do with him in a forced way but it's now or never. The only way they can make up for all of this or provide a compensate for whoever was turned off from the PWC execution.

 

[Sonic Boom]

Misty in her FRLG getup, or something close to it? No cameos up to now without a real seiyuu reason we're aware of to prevent it? Not being paired up with any previous character, including Brock who just gets to combo with Cilan and Alexa on a whim?

Can I have hopium.

 

[UltimateNinja]

Dephender woke up and decided to be savage today.

I mean he's right?

Ash's winning streak and him suddenly being capable to defeat champions with Pokemon born a couple months ago who can also defeat/be on par with champion tier Pokemon just like that?

Journeys felt like bad fanfiction for a reason. It's ridicilious for him who is, based on what the story told us, still ten to improve so much over the span of a couple months to suddenly become world champion.

Either its shitty writing or Kukui mixed something into his coconut-pineapple juice last season.

 

[Sham]

So are Cilan, Alexa and Brock in Unova, Kalos or Sinnoh because?

 

[SerGoldenhandtheJust]

So we can get G-Max Rillaboom

And now G-Max Cinderace

But I STILL CANT GET TO SEE MY BOY G-MAX?!

God Damn this show HATES me!



Oh yeah... Congratulations Ash!!!

Orrrr we could have Best boy Goh debut G max Inteleon so hype for that!!

 

[BlueDragonfangirl]

I don't think the Project Mew team had an opportunity to watch the match.

They we’re last seen walking to their destination for project Mew, dam it I wanted him to watch and say I’m proud of you with tears in his eyes.

 

[Mr.Munchlax]

I just saw Rose & Oleana's cameo in the episode, & I also that noticed that Todd makes a cameo along with them!!

 

[Almighty Zard]

Journeys felt like bad fanfiction for a reason. It's ridicilious for him who is, based on what the story told us, still ten to improve so much over the span of a couple months to suddenly become world champion.

So I must ask If he was using his reserves would you still feel he didn't have the right to fight the caliber of people he did?

What's done is done at this point, maybe they shouldn't have had him win the alola league, because to me that was opening pandora's box.

 

[BlobbiBoi]

It's ridicilious for him who is, based on what the story told us, still ten to improve so much over the span of a couple months to suddenly become world champion.

I genuinely don't know how anyone expected these to not be issues in a series where the main character quite literally cannot advance at a consistent pace and keep his 'power level' and yet somehow absolutely advances at the same time to meet the plot in other series.

He's stopped world-ending plots and fought legendaries and gotten mixed up in so much **** and people have been begging for battles like these for years - were they just meant to never deliver?

Ultimately I guess my question is; how long was Ash realistically expected to continue to somehow never get closer to any of his goals?

 

[Raikaria]

Well; Ash is now the best trainer in the world.

I assume this is the end for Ash; and we'll be swapping either to a new protag or Goh; depending on how Project Mew goes. Ash has acheived his goal. There is nowhere for his story to go from here. And it'll be really hard to belive anyone in Paldea could challenge him considering we didn't see a single Paldean trainer in the *World* Coronation Series.

 

[Sham]

So I must ask If he was using his reserves would you still feel he didn't have the right to fight the caliber of people he did?

What's done is done at this point, maybe they shouldn't have had him win the alola league, because to me that was opening pandora's box.

Yes, if not at least use his Alola team which is the team that got him to "Champion tier" in the first place. This conversation has been dragged out forever but people aren't that keen of Ash using new(ish) Pokemon and yet somehow they're able to defeat opponents that he was never implied to be on their level before this series. It comes off as very hand wavy and messy just because they've decided he should stop becoming a loser out of the blue this series and use this as a make up.

It's so weird because I've always somewhat coped with that episode that in a way it was just a one time thing and he defeated an old companion but who would've thought it was establishing the narrative that somehow Ash is Champion tier.

And it made absolutely no sense and they haven't helped established this anymore than they did since then. We aren't privy to any new training tactics, what's he been doing differently than the last series, why is this team somehow more powerful or anything else showing progress that Ash has used his past experiences to improve this team to that level. Nothing

 

[Yuugis Black Magician]

Damn, I cried a lot. What an episode. Of course they used Mezase Pokemon Master as an insert song.

The Lizardon cuts were so good, too.

 

[Mythical-Moonlight]

Orrrr we could have Best boy Goh debut G max Inteleon so hype for that!!

It's nice to dream but Goh is nowhere near Galar rn

 

[SerGoldenhandtheJust]

While I do agree that Ash's jump to World Champion level can be a bit sudden, I see that more of a flaw with how the previous series showed the gaps as well, like that Flint episode

Ash needed to level up to their scale someday, and what better way to start then after he finally becomes champion of Alola
Skill wise, his growth has been pretty realistic. Top 16 - Orange island winner - Top 8 - Battle Frontier winner - Top 4 - Hitting a slump and Top 8 - Top 2 - Champion - World Champion

The ISSUE is with the fact it's a new team. Even that could have been avoided if we saw more organic interactions of the new team earlier in the series and more training segments and a mention how Ash is training harder than ever

So to summarise, Ash's skill as a trainer being world champion level makes sense, his new mons being as strong less so. But also, even if the execution was wonky, the decision to have Ash finally ascend to this status in this series was absolutely the right one. It was ABOUT time and remember,

It would ALWAYS felt uncanny to see Ash become this strong and defeat everyone simply because the rest of the series did a poor job by constantly showing him as handicapped and not as strong, with some ridiculous gaps such as again, the Flint episode
So the execution may be botched, but I'm glad we finally are at this stage. It's about time Ash's journey let him more upwards and he won