Power Points of the episode:
I really like Ash's alola team. They really are essentially the pokemon version of their respective animals. I loved how Lycanroc chaces Litten around. Good slapstick.
If there's one thing I really dont like that Pokemon does, it's that it introduces plot points in the episode in which they're the most relevant. It's a bit weird to explain. Why wasn't Lycanroc's issue with getting its mane dirty introduced a bit earlier. Like in a random filler episode. It seems like such meaningless thing to just throw into such a plot heavy episode. I've noticed that pokemon always does this sort of thing too. -_- At least sun and moon brings it back up sometimes.
Cosmog is such a troll; landing them on top of Pinsers like that. Lols were had.
Gladion, how have you not figured out that Ash is the main character yet? XD in all seriousness though, I actually am curious myself as to why Solgaleo and Lunala choose ash to take care of Cosmog. I get the feeling this question is never gonna be answered though so I'm just gonna have to take that answer I gave above as gospel. -_-
Detective Rotom: KILL IT WITH FIRE! Seriously, it wasted like 30 seconds. I've never wanted to strangle something so badly.
I don't know why Type: Null / Silvally's animation for Swords Dance bothered me so much but it really freakin urks me. -_- When they showed it the second time, I kinda just hated everything and wasn't really sure why.
The battle itself was very eh. One of my thoughts about ash as the battle was going on was, "Why aren't you using any strategy in this battle? You said you wanted Gladion to understand the kind of person you are through the battle so why are you not taking this a bit more seriously?" -_-
I'm not gonna lie, I gave a few more claps to the story when I thought about this episode a bit more. They needed to show that Lycanroc still needed some growing, how Strong Type: Null / Sylvally was, and tell the story all in one. Having that interuption with Lycanroc's mane was probably the best was of getting all those points done easily cause lets face it. If the battle hadn't been stopped, Lycanroc probably would've been smacked down with Gladion looking particularly unimpressed and annoyed with ash for wasting 10 seconds of his life
. I don't think it landed a solid hit once that entire battle.
I have many more things to say but I'll just leave it at that for now. Don't wanna spend all day on this. Overall, the episode ranges from pretty good to "Freakin Rotom Dex -_-"