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PokeAni Missed Opportunities

matt0044

Well-Known Member
Whether it be concepts from past sagas that were never fully developed or game elements that could've been interesting to see animated, the Pokemon Anime has a lot of moments where there could've been something great but it seems like the plans fell through or they never thought of it to begin with.

I'll start by pondering this: what if N had be in Trip's place as Ash's main rival right out the gate?

The more I think about it, the more it become apparent that this was the biggest missed opportunity in the Anime ever.

For one thing, N could easily be the antagonistic rival to Ash like Paul was but in a different way considering how he’s a Trainer who’s been around. He’d meet Ash like Trip would’ve at the Juniper Laboratory to get a starter and commence his cover as a Pokémon Trainer for Team Plasma's ultimate endgame.

However, when Pikachu returns to Ash and gets all chummy with the humans, N would be intrigued by this apparent bond and accept a challenge to battle Ash. Perhaps he later sees Zekrom's second appearance too.

Pikachu would lose and prompt N to tell off Ash for how he let his friend battle without realizing that he wasn’t feeling well. And that's just episode one.

Even if Team Plasma still had limited appearances, N would still be an effective rival on par with Paul if they played their cards right. Maybe they'd team up when Team Rocket butts in and find they have more in common than they'd like to admit.

That's it for me. I'm sure you guys have a lot of other thoughts on this.
 

Red and Blue

Well-Known Member
AZ and the eternal Floette should have been in the main series. I have no idea why the writers didn't include them
 

Pokegirl Fan~

Liko>>>>>Ash
N and the Team Plasma plot in general. I think even if those episodes weren't banned they probably still would have used Generic villain team Team plasma instead of the plot twist/manipulative Team Plasma.
 

Ash-Pikachu

Well-Known Member
Should've brought the Pokémon World Tournament from the B&W2 (Post-League). It would've been appropriate to bring back Charizard (for ratings) as well as other previous pokemon as well which is a win-win. I'm sure the Plasma arc was good, but N and Charizard's return didn't pique my interest and entice me enough to continue watching after the travesty that was Unova. This likely would've convinced me otherwise.
 

matt0044

Well-Known Member
N and the Team Plasma plot in general. I think even if those episodes weren't banned they probably still would have used Generic villain team Team plasma instead of the plot twist/manipulative Team Plasma.

Honestly, I feel like there should've been more to Team Plasma. Have them appear as far back as Accumula where they're not really in the shadows so much as actively in the field giving speeches about "the tyranny of Trainers." Hell, they could've been part of Tepig's debut where they protest over the Battle Club. Maybe have them come into conflict with Team Rocket in the Dreamyard.

With Cheren, I'd say he'd be a good straight man for Bianca's antics.
 

RedJirachi

Veteran member
N and the Team Plasma plot in general. I think even if those episodes weren't banned they probably still would have used Generic villain team Team plasma instead of the plot twist/manipulative Team Plasma.

I don't even buy that as an excuse for what we got.
 

Navin

MALDREAD
* Kanto: Mostly forgivable since the show was just getting a foothold.
* OI: Should have just been Ash and Misty (even though their ship was the subplot)
* Johto: More Misty focus. Gary should have appeared more often.
* Hoenn: Better Magma/Aqua plot. ME Special Act III showed how to handle the Groudon v Kyogre v Rayquaza stuff. Ash v Tyson should have been the semifinals.
* Battle Frontier: Misty should have had more episodes. Charizard losing to Dusclops should have been better handled than Ash having a random brainfade.
* Sinnoh: Ash v Tobias should have been a two-parter and Tobias should have had two other Pokemon in Lucario and Zoroark (or another legendary, say Entei?). Ash/Dawn should have been a thing.
* Unova: Ash and Iris should have been rivals. Axew should have evolved. Ash shouldn't have been 'reset.' Should have just copied the game plot to a T. Charizard v Reshiram should have happened. Misty should have appeared in the final episode.
* Kalos: Serena should have been a Pokemon Racer. Serena should have retained her early episode sassiness. Amourshipping should have been much better handled. Clemont should have had a character arc before his gym. Goodra's Vietnam PTSD plot should have been given to Noivern. Much. More. Continuity. May should have appeared due to ORAS promotion. Kalos League should not have been treated as a B-plot.
 

Pokegirl Fan~

Liko>>>>>Ash
* Kalos: Serena should have been a Pokemon Racer. Serena should have retained her early episode sassiness. Amourshipping should have been much better handled. Clemont should have had a character arc before his gym. Goodra's Vietnam PTSD plot should have been given to Noivern. Much. More. Continuity. May should have appeared due to ORAS promotion. Kalos League should not have been treated as a B-plot.
I'd rather Serena was a trainer instead and that Amourshipping shouldn't have existed at all to be honest.
Also I doubt May would have been able to appear due to her VA being sick and how strict they are about changing vas.
 

matt0044

Well-Known Member
I'd rather Serena was a trainer instead and that Amourshipping shouldn't have existed at all to be honest.
Also I doubt May would have been able to appear due to her VA being sick and how strict they are about changing vas.
I do think that Serena being Ash's main rival would've made for an interesting utilization of the female player character. I mean, hey, in Ruby & Sapphire, May was Brendan's rival and, with XY, Serena was Calem's rival. It'd be cool if the adapted that aspect of the games.

Hell, Hilda should've been used as Ash's main Unova rival rather than Trip (if not N) since if they weren't going to use the female PC as a companion, they might as well have utilized her in other ways. Maybe reflect American archetypes with the tomboyish brunette and whatnot.

I get that it's a Shonen-esque series where male rivals are always the ones to look out for while female rivals are often seen as either eye-candy or just joke characters like Bianca but it would've been a true first for the series. To give credit where credit was due, Best Wishes had been willing to try shaking up conventions however poorly they were executed and a female rival for Ash to TAKE SERIOUSLY would've at least been interesting.

Better to use a character they already had designed for them than create some OC from the ground up (Paul made sense since Barry wouldn't have been the serious rival they were hoping to go for in DP).

Didn't Buneary get a VA change after the previous one past on?
 
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Pokegirl Fan~

Liko>>>>>Ash
I do think that Serena being Ash's main rival would've made for an interesting utilization of the female player character. I mean, hey, in Ruby & Sapphire, May was Brendan's rival and, with XY, Serena was Calem's rival. It'd be cool if the adapted that aspect of the games.

Didn't Buneary get a VA change after the previous one past on?

Say what you will about Alain beating Ash but at least our hero was defeated by a character who was established WAY before the league began.

No matter how much it's justified, Ash's League rivals are always just plot devices roped into the story in order to prevent him from even reaching the Elite Four and despite there being good battles, there's an underlying cheapness in terms of storytelling.

What I would like to see done is an rival who starts out losing to Ash only to beat him in the league. Maybe a meek little kid like Wally if they adapted him into AG. Hell, Trip could've been that easily if they weren't trying to create the poor man's Paul.

I wouldn't have objected for Serena to be Ash's main rival if they made her competent enough and not a punching bag like most of the rivals were in XYZ.

Apparently they rarely change vas unless one dies, or so I've heard.
 

Luthor

Well-Known Member
One huge missed opportunity was Ash's Tauros. With 30 Tauros it was the perfect opportunity to show off trading but they never went with that. So Ash had 30 of one pokemon but did nothing with them and the one Ash did use never really got to have much personality. Ash's entire team in that first region wasn't really that impressive overall but this would have allowed him to have an interesting league team so he seemed a stronger trainer.
 

Satoshi & Touko

Peanuts aren't just a nut.
I'd rather Serena was a trainer instead and that Amourshipping shouldn't have existed at all to be honest.
Also I doubt May would have been able to appear due to her VA being sick and how strict they are about changing vas.

If Serena was a battler, I would've liked Amourshipping a lot more considering what I think Ash would be interested in a girl.
Though it would come with the price of Serena not doing something that suits her character, so it's a double-edged sword.
 
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matt0044

Well-Known Member
Say what you will about Alain beating Ash but at least our hero was defeated by a character who was established WAY before the league began.

No matter how much it's justified, Ash's League rivals are always just plot devices roped into the story in order to prevent him from even reaching the Elite Four and despite there being good battles, there's an underlying cheapness in terms of storytelling.

What I would like to see done is an rival who starts out losing to Ash only to beat him in the league. Maybe a meek little kid like Wally if they adapted him into AG. Hell, Trip could've been that easily if they weren't trying to create the poor man's Paul.
 

matt0044

Well-Known Member

Xenon Blue

No Hard Feelings
The biggest missed opportunity is they took a gamble by continuing Ash's story beyond OS instead of starting with another protagonist. In hindsight, this was a huge mistake IMO. It's not like Detective Conan where the characters define what the series is, so this whole "Ash is not aging" nonsense shouldn't have been a problem in the first place. If you can't age a character because it needs to represent the viewers, then scrap it and start over. Changing now after 20 years is way too late and will take a much greater effort than ending it after OS. Of course this whole show is just a 25 minute commercial, but that doesn't mean that you can just dismiss what this show can do in terms of plot. You lose very little by changing early on and possibly gain more flexibility and marketing opportunities, but this much into Ash's adventure it's probably not worth changing.
 

Navin

MALDREAD
I mentioned this a long time ago, but a missed opportunity was not having Ash accept the Frontier Brain position from Scott.

That could have allowed the anime to have a timeskip of a few years, and DP could have had an older, more experienced Ash who ultimately defeats his toughest rival at the league, wins the league, and completes the Champion League (that was hinted throughout DP). Or have a new 10-year-old protagonist while Ash is an ex-Frontier Brain who is a recurring character and preparing to challenge the E4 (maybe he is the one who defeats new protagonist at the league).
 

matt0044

Well-Known Member
Speaking of the Battle Frontier, how come they didn't have the Battle Frontier take place on the Sevii Islands? I mean, seven facilities, seven islands. It practically wrote itself and they wanted to advertised FRLG's latest features.
 

Pokegirl Fan~

Liko>>>>>Ash
I mentioned this a long time ago, but a missed opportunity was not having Ash accept the Frontier Brain position from Scott.

That could have allowed the anime to have a timeskip of a few years, and DP could have had an older, more experienced Ash who ultimately defeats his toughest rival at the league, wins the league, and completes the Champion League (that was hinted throughout DP). Or have a new 10-year-old protagonist while Ash is an ex-Frontier Brain who is a recurring character and preparing to challenge the E4 (maybe he is the one who defeats new protagonist at the league).

Dawn should have been the main character, since she pretty much was one, if Ash accepted the frontier brain position.
 
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