I never really understood the ICYniverse, I found it complicated things. Still, I found this episode to be…well…honestly, not as good as everyone is saying it is but that’s mostly because killing one-time characters nowadays feels emotionally-manipulative. At least with Stoutland we had time to get to know them before they died. Versus Mallow’s Mom who felt like a poor attempt to get audiences to give a crap about Mallow while also giving her a shoulder pet.
Haruto’s story is unique in that he’s the kid this time, so I’ll give Pokémon props for having the guts to have the ghost be a child. But my feelings are still similar to my feelings to the story with Mallow’s Mom; it all just felt like a cheap way to tug the heartstrings, get his parents to say some mushy sentimental stuff about their kid loving the sky and getting his hat back. Please cry and crown this episode as the best one ever even though it was mostly Ash being a huge menace to Pokémon minding their business.
I liked the theory that Haruto was Ash’s Dad visiting from the past because it at least would have made Ash just missing his old man at the end feel better. Ash’s hat gets swiped by Mankey, he’s trying to get it back, meets his young Dad where he tells him how important his hat his. They give up and let Mankey keep it, Kid Dad goes back to the past, Ash meets up with his Mom, just misses his Dad, but surprise, his Dad bought him a new cap.
I mean, I would find that better than Ash having a comedic chase with a Mankey to get a hat back…that’s revealed to have belonged to a dead child and his parents are still clearly hurt by his passing.
Only thing that shocked me was Ash letting Haruto feel Pikachu. Even in the AU, it was mad weird seeing Ash be so physical with a human, even if he was a ghost.
