-Today starts off with Dento rushing into the subway...for the stamp rally! And Iris calls him a kid again. Hey, at least he's not sperging about trains this time!
-Then Ash gets interested once Dento mentions that the prize for getting all the stamps is battling the Subway Masters.
-...and Ash and Iris end up leaving to explore the city on their own, disappointing Dento.
-Looks like the first stop for Ash & Iris is the sports stadiums! And...apparently there's one Gurrdurr-themed football team & one Darmitanian-themed team. Iris seems to be a fan of the Gurrdurr team!
-Meanwhile, Dento's collecting stamps and being dramatic. Same ol' same ol'.
-Back with Ash/Iris...it looks like Iris' team won! Who knew she was such a sports fan?
-And now they're playing tennis. Ash seems to be slightly better at it than Iris!
-Now it's time for a musical! It's...not very musical.
-Oshawott bursts out of its ball and is absolutely ENTHRALLED with the musical, but Ash has to ruin its fun by trying to drag it off the stage...until Gothitelle decides to bring both of them onstage!
-Then Ash, Oshawott, and Pikachu get a sudden costume change. How? Where did the clothes come from? Why am I even attempting to make sense of this?!
-I must say, Oshawott looks rather dapper with that mustache.
-Oh hey, they're finally getting around to the ferris wheel. Iris runs ahead of Ash, and while Ash tries to find out where she went...Pikachu notices an Axew. With a pink ribbon on its tail. Then Iris returns with ice cream and goes OMG A GIRL AXEW SO CUUUUUUTE...shortly before realizing that this Axew isn't all that happy.
-...okay, I get the recycling symbol on the bins behind Iris, but what's with the pink bulb/flame symbol?
-Back with Dento...he's collecting more stamps, when suddenly a girl with glasses asks him something about...yuen. Whatever that is. I'm guessing it's a place?
-Back with Iris/Ash...they're at this "yuen" place(which appears to be a subway station)! How convenient!
-GirlAxew seems to see its trainer in the crowd boarding the train, so it follows.
-Back with Dento, he's getting really excited about how he's totally going to get to battle the Subway Masters. Then he sees the girl from before, who still seems lost. And her name is apparently Ellie.
-Ellie gives him a sob story about something or other, and Dento decides to show off his Metro Sommelier stuff to help her! Because it apparently requires specialized knowledge to figure out how subway maps work?
-Back with Ash/Iris, GirlAxew reunites with its trainer...except the girl it saw wasn't its trainer. Oops.
-Back to Dento! They're about to set off, but the girl notices a train passing by...with her Axew on it!
-Back to Ash/Iris! GirlAxew gets String Shotted by the stranger's Swadloon, and Emolga gets pissed off enough by that to shock everyone in the car!
-After the train stops, they all have to give an awkward apology to the conductor. And then they sit and eat sandwiches while wondering what to do next. Then Iris gets the idea to do...something...with the stamp card and having GirlAxew put its pawprint on it, then Iris herself drawing a ferris wheel on it and yeah I don't get it. :|
-AND THEY JUST MISSED DENTO AND ELLIE!
-At least Dento/Ellie notice the stamp card that got all marked up. Oh, is that yuen thing the ferris wheel?
-...and then Dento freaks out because the train they just jumped on won't take them where they need to go! That's what he gets for being the type of Metro Sommelier that spergs out over trains instead of one that spergs out over transit routes.
-Back with Ash/Iris...they're back at the fairground, and trying to cheer up GirlAxew.
-Dento, meanwhile, realizes a way to get to the fairground. Hopefully he gets there before Iris and Ash wander off again.
-Ash and Iris are still waiting...when a train conductor suddenly comes looking for them. Hmm.
-They get whisked away to another station...where Ellie is! And this reuniting was orchestrated by...Dento, since he dragged the Subway Masters into helping him out. It also seems that Ellie got to see the awesome central room where they oversee everything.
-Aaaaand Dento had forgotten all about the stamp rally. And he's AAAAAAAAAAAing about it pretty well, since he only missed ONE stamp(which happens to be the Axew stamp!). Oh, and the rally ends just as he panics about finding it.
-...you know, Dento can get a bit
too excited about things sometimes, but it's still a d
ick move for Ash and Iris do to a chuckle/sigh at his disappointment over failing the stamp rally!
-It turns out that the ONLY stamp Ellie got was the Axew stamp. It turns out that while she was looking for her Axew, one of the train conductors mistook her and pointed her to the Axew stamp.
-Dento's uneasy about accepting the stamp, but the subway twins are
so goddamned SMILEY more than happy to accept this since Dento really only missed that stamp because he was too busy helping people out. And...wait, there's barely any time left in the episode. I have the feeling this battle won't be as great as it should be...
-Note: The subway masters still look like muppets to me. Especially when we're getting a side view of them talking like this.
-Of course the battle field is pretty much a subway car.
-Tepig and Pansage versus...Chandelure and Eelectross. Yeah, this is gonna be a curbstomp battle.
-Things aren't going well...but Dento suddenly has his "heh" face on. Oh dear.
-It's tasting time! (it's also recycling a previous "it's tasting time!" animation time)
-Oh, it's also SPECIAL SUBWAY TIME!
-And the theme music kicked in! Maybe it's not so hopeless after all?
-...except for the part where the twins quickly wreck the plan Dento came up with.
-And Iris(and Ash and Dento and Ellie) finally gets to ride the ferris wheel.
Overall, this episode was okay, but I definitely feel like the SUBWAY BOSS BATTLE was overhyped. It got, what, four minutes of screentime? I get that they already got several episodes to themselves, but it still felt like a waste to have the battle be that short. :/ At least we discovered that Iris actually likes things that have nothing to do with dragons and/or cute Pokemon? (the football thing honestly surprised me!)
EDIT: Wait, apparently the girl's name is Elina? Well, I was close enough.