I would advise you to actually look at all evolutions that have happened on the main cast throughout the entire history of the anime (from 1st generation to now), and even remotely try to justify how Steenee even remotely has the least deserved evolution ever, when Steenee has been around since at least around 60 episodes (I don't know if would be exactly 64 or less or maybe 65), but yeah Steenee has been on the cast for over a year in over 60 episodes.
60 episodes is a good average before an evolution. And at least Steenee has actually done things during that tenure of 60 episodes, unlike other Pokemon.
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Am I the only one confused by the summary that says Ash, Lillie, and Sophocles are the only ones affected, while I do get Lillie (and separately I could get Sophocles), I don't necessarily understand the trio pairing of Ash, Lillie and Sophocles (unless the summary wasn't complete).
And further more, I feel as if Sophocles being shrunk would be disadvantageous unless there's some small important plot detail that only a scientific/inventor type shrunk down can resolve the issues, which would make everything make sense if I believed that's where the episode would go.