Right now while I'm going through my tapes again like I do every year, I can't help thinking back to this episode and how it really made the gym battles in the series much more interesting and exciting. Up until this point, with the exception of "Electric Shock Showdown" and "The Ninja Poke-Showdown", the gym battles really... stunk. I mean, really, they weren't that great at all during the first season. I've been watching some of them the past couple of days, and I shake my head at how bad some of them were. Compared to the exciting gym battles of later years- "From Ghost to Ghost", the Clair ones, "Who's Flying Now", the official Norman one, etc.- the first season just was lackluster in its gym battles. Ash got almost all his first season gym badges WAY too easily. At least nowadays he truly earns the badges/symbols/ribbon he earns, by hard work, strategy, learning, and improvising. Gym battles and Frontier battles are much more exciting nowadays. Of course the first two Orange Island gym battles weren't that great either, but they started being pretty consistently good with "Misty Meets Her Match".
At least this episode, though, really started to show how great they can be. I may not like how Charizard acts like a jerk in the two episodes, but the matches are still amazing to watch. I'd rather watch this gym a hundred times than his battle against Sabrina, one of the cheapest wins ever.
Sorry I had to rant a bit there, I just felt like letting off some steam. At least I'm coming to his battle against Koga tomorrow.