Let me try this again. Sorry about putting next episode's post in here.
I obviously didn't like much of this plot for me to misremember it so badly...about the only thing I do remember is Professor Rowan's reaction to the "good" research Ash and the group do: he grades them by the rule, and takes off pts for them breaking the rules. Rowan, I think, is the first professor that really made an sort of impression on me, b/c he's so blunt, and critical of reckless behavior. He's the type of character Ash is not, and I do not get the sense Ash respects him overly so. I remember the first episode where Ash met Rowan, where Rowan told Ash he had quite a reputation, only for Ash to show that his great reputation was based on qualities that Rowan does not value: Ash running off to find Dawn as soon as he hears Pikachu's with her, rather than waiting for Dawn to check in with him later and establish some type of meeting place. Real people are like that, as well, mind you. When they hear someone is great, they assume that person is great by their standards, and if that person does not exactly follow those standards, then the they reason that the "great" person is really not that great at all. But I think what's really neat about this type of situation is that what if Ash had accepted the offer to be a frontier brain, become one, and then had the right to judge who should succeed or not. I get the feeling his standards would be different from the normal gym leader or many of the respected individuals in the pokemon world. Although, I suppose the gym leaders Ash has traveled with have that type of power, too, and they make similar decisions and judgments that Rowan does; but they do decide to travel with Ash after all. Ash judges himself by such different standards than many gym leader....I think, in Sinnoh, he bonds with the last gym leader to a degree, and also one of the members of the elite 4. Those two, though, were pretty off the wall themselves...Well, all of this to say is I think it's funny to see Ash have to be scolded by Rowan and shown no respect, though I'm not sure Ash is that much below Rowan, to be honest, in terms of Pokemon trainer skill and bonding with pokemon. Angie disregards the rules b/c she's not that responsible, having not started her trainer journey; Ash disregards the rules b/c he doesn't see the need for formality, since the important thing is the relationship with the pokemon, not some socially accepted rule from the professor. Keeping this episode in mind, I think it's interesting the friendship he forms with one of the members of the elite 4. The other 3, he "respects," but I don't think he would train the way they do or really take their advice to heart (similar to Rowan's). This member he does, so I want to watch a little more closely what the philosophy of that elite 4 member is, especially compared to the other 3.