We Have the Sea and We Have Valleys! Pokémon Evolution Training!! (1049)

[AuraChannelerChris]

But there was nothing natural about Goomy's absurdly fast evolutions and the fact it evolved through its own Rain Dance.

 

[Blue Saturday]

Sorry, but this is still low percentage of spotlights among all the SM episodes aired so far, nothing in the same scale like Hikari, in which the producers/writers should put more efforts.

It’s almost as if you’re watching a completely different series with a different writing style and formula, right than DP, right?

I don’t quite understand PokeAni fandom series elitism, wouldn’t it be better to simply treat S&M as it’s own by its own style and merits rather than the criticism boiling down to, “IT’S NOT LIKE DAWN!” or “It’s not cool! Like XY!”

 

[Sham]

But there was nothing natural about Goomy's absurdly fast evolutions and the fact it evolved through its own Rain Dance.

In the anime’s defense rain dance causes actual overworld precipitation like in the games. Rain dance in the anime can be used outside of a battle unlike the games where it could be raining in battle but the overworld could be sunny.

 

[AuraChannelerChris]

In the anime’s defense rain dance causes actual overworld precipitation like in the games. Rain dance in the anime can be used outside of a battle unlike the games where it could be raining in battle but the overworld could be sunny.

Stop trying to make the anime make sense!

 

[AznKei]

It’s almost as if you’re watching a completely different series with a different writing style and formula, right than DP, right?

I don’t quite understand PokeAni fandom series elitism, wouldn’t it be better to simply treat S&M as it’s own by its own style and merits rather than the criticism boiling down to, “IT’S NOT LIKE DAWN!” or “It’s not cool! Like XY!”

Unfortunately, I'm none of those fandom series elitism crowd you mentioned. I'm more from a community where the fans work on their creativities and I can see some of them doing better jobs than the anime producers/writers.

 

[dman_dustin]

It’s almost as if you’re watching a completely different series with a different writing style and formula, right than DP, right?

I don’t quite understand PokeAni fandom series elitism, wouldn’t it be better to simply treat S&M as it’s own by its own style and merits rather than the criticism boiling down to, “IT’S NOT LIKE DAWN!” or “It’s not cool! Like XY!”

I can only partially agree to this.

At some point you just can't tell if people are having a genuine opinion, or they're just salty because they're being completely biased and aren't willing to give things a chance. It's understandable to compare especially within the same series, but I've always found it unfavorable to have a completely biased/spoiled mindset. Something is going to disappoint you, in some way, trying to act like it won't doesn't make sense to me, and harshly criticizing something for it as per usual doesn't make sense to me.

Sun and Moon isn't like other series, it tried to do something new, and in some aspects it failed but there are positives about this show.

The one thing this series does well, is that despite having all of these characters, we still get to see the group's Pokemon very frequently, there are episodes though that do annoy me, but take any other series (especially Black and White), and you were always left wondering "Will we ever see this Pokemon or that Pokemon?"

Unfortunately though it does seem to come at a cost of actually developing the characters. I mean the only thing Mallow ever got was just Bounsweet and Steenee evolution, while any other development was wasted. Surien had some development, and then the just shoved Eevee onto her because....why not? (probably to make room for Brionne I guess and of course the whole Primarina implication) Sophocles and Kiawe do get something every once in a while, Sophocles at least got an evolution, Kiawe has to rely solely on what's given to him. Lillie had mostly personal development but not much int he way of Pokemon but we do have some implication that Lillie might have something by the end.

And Ash, the only major focus in general is just Pikachu and him, with the occasional focus being on his other Pokemon, only some of them weren't exactly positive because it seems generally speaking they don't care about Ash's team, it's gotten to the point I honestly don't know what the hell they are doing. It's like they don't know what do with Ash so they are doing everything "mostly wrong" with Ash. And its not like we have a whole lot of time to warrant fooling around. It's like they don't know how to progress his story. I mean it seemed promising at first but then they started cutting out challenges and Z-crystals for Ash (Torracat still doesn't have its own Z-crystal, and I don't think its even used a Z-move outside of MAYBE the normal type Z-move but so has everyone else).

Ash's personal Z-crystal with Pikachu seems to be going nowhere and it annoys me how they turned into a plot convenience as opposed to going anywhere promising with it.

So while I agree S&M should be treated as its own series, even trying to think of it in that mindset, I'm left wondering, what the hell are they doing? It seemed like in other series, they knew what they were doing. Sun and Moon seems like they have a lot of ideas, but not a whole lot of understanding how use those ideas, so we get a chaotic mess of whatever the hell we're getting.

Especially this episode, which seemed to be more about Sophocles than Lana and yet both their Pokemon evolved, and Charjabug's training or development was more prominent, it actually seemed to like actual development. And then we have the idea of "having certain characters return, they announce basically they are not ever returning to the show, because they want to explore the world.....apparently" Primarina and Popplio just play around, Lana is told to focus on the ocean as a way to train Popplio, she goes and trains offscreen comes back and they say goodbye to characters with the event of Popplio evolving as a sign of growth that seems oddly placed as if nothing prior to this episode mattered AS much as Lana training Popplio at night, like Lana REALLY had to train Popplio before never (within the context of the show airing) seeing the person she admired the most.

I'm honestly disappointed that Brionne didn't show up very much in this episode, I understand it, but given how more Sophocles centric this was, actually giving him some kind of rival of sorts, it feels like they suddenly realized "OH NO, we want Vikavolt and Brionne, but our scheduling won't allow for two different episodes; Lana is more important than Sophocles, so let's just give Sophocles more development while Lana can get her own focal episode later, which will work with our scheduling" and then produced this episode.

A lot of ideas, but doesn't seem like they know how to structure them properly. And I even wonder, would it even make any sense? If you wrote for many series of Ash who was travelling with companions, would it suddenly make sense that you suddenly don't know what to do with the plot/story so if it happens......it happens.

I mean is it REALLY that different to have Ash and company ACTUALLY going from city to city, town to town trying to reach Ash's next badge or Ash's companions next focal episodes, then staying PUT but also leading up to those "focal" episodes. In other words to make it more clearer: Is it THAT different for a character to actually travel large intentional (scheduling purposes) distances to reach his/her next destination in comparison to "Well the location I need is a couple miles from here, and I could do it, but I want to train and focus on other things, then I'll get around to going and doing it then."

I personally don't see HOW its THAT different, that it has to appear like they don't know what they are doing, considering walking from location to location, doesn't sound like its much of a general difference to warrant absolute chaos by just staying in the same location. I mean I do get the concept of potential "stir crazy" of just staying in one place for a long time doing nothing. But don't you technically have the same level of freedom to write whatever you want regardless of the character stays in ONE location as opposed to many "intentionally non canon" locations.

For example: Is an episode about Ash travelling with his friends and running into a Sick Ponyta that needs to be nursed back to health by taking it to a new city for the Pokemon center really all that different than Ash and Company are out enjoying the weather of the same location they've been at for quite a few days and they stumble upon a sick Mudbray and want to take it to the Pokemon center but are attacked by Team Skull.

Would the former really provide MORE story structure because they are traveling than the latter which is just staying in the same place.

I mean to give some leeway I can understand it would be difficult to put ideas together because of the differences. Like you can argue that Team Evil Bad Jerks show up a few episodes after Badge Number 5, and Ash get Pokemon L abducted. As opposed to a random time, Ash and company happen to run into bad evil team and Ash gets Pokemon R abducted.

I get that the earlier structures provided SOLID anchors to weave a story, even though at times, it seemed like it took TOO long, but I would think that you'd still be able to create your own story anchors that you can work off with (Such as Z-crystals or Pokemon evolutions or grand trial). So I'm not sure why they don't seem to know what they are doing despite them having ideas of what they would've liked to have done, such as Lillie's story in the past or the Ultra Beasts.

I'm just not sure what's going to happen, and I would like to see SOMETHING.

 

[Sceptile Leaf Blade]

Unfortunately, I'm none of those fandom series elitism crowd you mentioned. I'm more from a community where the fans work on their creativities and I can see some of them doing better jobs than the anime producers/writers.

Comparing fanfiction to the official writing isn't a fair comparison. Fanfiction writers are not bound by story lengths, deadlines, and so on. The anime has to make the story about the region and it has to last three years. They have to appeal to a wide audience, keep things a family show, show off all the new pokémon, produce a new episode every week of exactly this length (constraining pacing within an episode), make sure the story can also be animated, and so on. Of course there are going to be fanfiction stories that appeal more to your individual needs and desires. That's barely even an argument against the anime.

 

[Agstrek]

Why are you just looking at this one episode and not the series as a whole?

• SM005: First focus episode where Ashimari managed to make a good balloon to save the ride Pokemon, history with Suiren is fleshed out.
• SM016: Balloons are strong enough at this point they accidentally carry her and Mukuroh away, revealed to know Bubblebeam.
• SM033: She and Suiren had their fishing battle for the Waterium-Z (she also learned Aqua Jet and got over her cowardice while KO’ing Totem Yowashi)
• SM040: Struggled with and perfected Super Aqua Tornado. The PokeProblem literally has her dress up as an Oysamari.
• SM043: Training battle against Kasumi, Kasumi was super caught off-guard by her balloons that we now know her balloons are strong enough to catch attacks.
• SM099: Learned Surf to protect and fight with Nagisa.

This is just a shortlist of major "benchmarks" in her growth but she's accumulated more than enough experience in her craft that an evolution feels natural by this point, battles really shouldn't be used as the only medal of deciding if a Pokemon can evolve when the character's goal doesn't have much to do with battling nor narratively do they matter much for their dreams. We've also gotten a fair amount of hints that this was going to happen eventually, Ashimari being female, her "singing," her dressing up as Oysamari in the Z-Move episode. Needless to say we saw Suiren training for her Z-Move and balloons many, many, many times. It makes 100% sense she would evolve while making a balloon after being inspired by Ashirene's Oceanic Operetta.

There's SM 94 as well where Ashimari's bubbles carried both Suiren and Acerola.

 

[Leonhart]

Ashimari's evolution towards the end took me by surprise since I was only expecting to see Maamane's Denjimushi evolve, but Suiren's Ashimari was overdue for a change. Even though I don't like Oshamari much, I can cope since we now have a Kuwagannon in the cast, which I've longed for.

 

[DatsRight]

Watching the episode (can't find subs for some reason however) I have to say that, yes, this episode should have been split into two. And expectedly it was Lana's plot that suffered the most. All the Poni episodes so far seem to have one the girls cast aside despite having a potential plot underway, like even the writers just don't think they're interesting enough to hold an episode anymore (which is annoying since the very first episode in Poni in the AF arc shown Lillie in top form).

Sophocles plot, though compressed, expectedly had more going for it, way more fun bits of personality and interactions (I only really remember Eevee making the Lana plot fun). Ash and Kiawe losing track of things by battling themselves, Charjabug trying to imitate Togedemaru's 'night light' role, Togedemaru literally stealing Charjabug's thunder, with Pikachu having to keep her occupied when Charjabug tries to do things solo, her riding on Vikavolt after he evolves (I hope their chemistry isn't diluted by the latter evolving). The rivals returning was a fun extra, always kinda felt sorry for the shiny Charjabug with his jerkass trainer (though at least the latter gets the worst of it this time round).

Lana's was......a thing I guess. The girls' stuff just seems to be fluff or exposition this arc. I don't mind things being gentler and more introspective, but it often feels like it's still doing that in a more half assed way than the boys, like it's more because they don't really know how to make their characters shine. They're almost the sitcom housewives, while the boys are the wacky husbands. The latter are supposed to do all the wacky antics and lesson learning while the housewives are just meant to be the inactive straight men. It doesn't really work when they're meant to be protagonists as well. I feel like I see extra little depths from Sophocles and his Pokemon every limelight episode they get, while Lana and Popplio are....largely the same level of personality they were at the start of the series. I don't mind Popplio's evolution being down to bubble blowing or whatever, it's a talent it has and it beats a DEM evolution against Team Rocket or something that doesn't feel earned at all, but you could at least kinda try to give some sort of personality and interest to it.

 

[AuraGuardian448]

Given the increased companion capacity this generation series and the theme of unity in Alola, i'm completely fine with a double evolution happening in the same episode. A separate episode would have had to cram some padding and filler in there just for the sake of having one's Pokemon evolve in another episode, and ultimately these side characters don't really deserve that special treatment (outside Lana and Lillie anyway). I think the Kalos series also did this once? I more often remember evolution episodes being stacked, but I think there was at least one episode with a double evolution.

Evolution was good of course, but we have already started to see better evolution animations since last gen's series (may'be even in BW). It's the standard, or it's suppose to be, so there's no reason to praise it as if its something new and innovative. Hopefully, they just keep up this animation quality via evolutions. Secondly, there was never any rules or logic stating that Pokemon who evolve naturally always need to battle or need battling experience prior. Pokemon evolve for differing reasons; we've literally seen this like one-hundred times already. And logically, Popplio and Charjabug have had a decent amount of battling experience, in addition to everything else they've been through, to justify their evolution.

One thing i'm highly upset at, though, is Lana's "master" (I forget her name) giving away her Primarina z-crystal (not familiar with correct term) to Lana. That was BS at its finest. There's several cons with that, but the only one I feel like addressing is it being given to her before she even has a Primarina itself. The character doesn't even know if Lana will attain one. Sigh, I digress.

Wouldn't be the first time, the writers often rush through the middle stages of Pokemon, usually keeping them in their base stage and then final stage for most of their run. Probably the only exceptions were Grovyle/Combusken and Grotle.

Actually, and Frogadier, Bayleef, Pignite (who was great), and Braxien...

 

[lolipiece]

One thing i'm highly upset at, though, is Lana's "master" (I forget her name) giving away her Primarina z-crystal (not familiar with correct term) to Lana. That was BS at its finest. There's several cons with that, but the only one I feel like addressing is it being given to her before she even has a Primarina itself. The character doesn't even know if Lana will attain one. Sigh, I digress.

Why is that a problem? Lana's never expressed disinterest in evolving Brionne all the way, nor has Brionne indicated it didn't want to evolve.

Lana's even shown interest in Primarina multiple times.

And Popplio evolved because of the training it received in this episode, which means it'll probably end up evolving through future training/whatever battles it participates in. Think of it as a future investment.

 

[Sceptile Leaf Blade]

I don't like it either. I think Z-Crystals should be earned through some kind of trial or selfless act to help others, and this was neither, Lana just trained her Popplio to become better with balloons. That earned her the evolution, but I don't think that's sufficient for the Primarina Z to feel earned. I guess Kanoa and Ida also didn't earn it though, they just found it somewhere in the sea.

I know that the games hand out Z-Crystals everywhere without anything, but I don't like it there either.

 

[AuraGuardian448]

Why is that a problem? Lana's never expressed disinterest in evolving Brionne all the way, nor has Brionne indicated it didn't want to evolve. Lana's even shown interest in Primarina multiple times.

And Popplio evolved because of the training it received in this episode, which means it'll probably end up evolving through future training/whatever battles it participates in. Think of it as a future investment.

Because she was given it with an insufficiently unjustified reason, sameway i'm sure you'd complain if Ash was given something equally significant or better just out of thin air. Lana expressing "interest" and not expressing "disinterest" as well as Brionne not indicating that it doesn't want to evolve aren't at all valid reasons for being handed over the z crystal. Imagine me using this same "interest" logic in any other situation.

Master shows up to conveniently hand over a z crystal for a future event, one which we don't even know will happen but because of poor writing, is near blatantly foreshadowed to actually become a reality. Then when Brionne evolves, it will immediately have access to and be able to use the z crystal that was given to Lana out of the blue. This is not ok.

 

[Twilight-Kun]

Because she was given it with an insufficiently unjustified reason, sameway i'm sure you'd complain if Ash was given something equally significant or better just out of thin air. Lana expressing "interest" and not expressing "disinterest" as well as Brionne not indicating that it doesn't want to evolve aren't at all valid reasons for being handed over the z crystal. Imagine me using this same "interest" logic in any other situation.

Master shows up to conveniently hand over a z crystal for a future event, one which we don't even know will happen but because of poor writing, is near blatantly foreshadowed to actually become a reality. Then when Brionne evolves, it will immediately have access to and be able to use the z crystal that was given to Lana out of the blue. This is not ok.

At least Lana saw how to perform the Z-move, unlike Kiawe, who immediately knew how to pull off the Fly-Z pose with zero fanfare or foreshadowing, despite the anime showing that practicing the pose is important because it doesn't work right if the pose is off

As seen with Rowlet and Lycanroc when they couldn't pull off the Grass or Rock Z-moves the first time around

 

[Lightning Bolt]

At least Lana saw how to perform the Z-move, unlike Kiawe, who immediately knew how to pull off the Fly-Z pose with zero fanfare or foreshadowing, despite the anime showing that practicing the pose is important because it doesn't work right if the pose is off

As seen with Rowlet and Lycanroc when they couldn't pull off the Grass or Rock Z-moves the first time around

Kiawe it's supposed to be a Z Move specialist so that's ok for me. It's said in the very early episodes that he respect all the Z Crystals so it would be a plot hole if he didn't knew the Flyinium Z pose.

 

[lolipiece]

He also recognized the Z-Crystal. It's entirely possible he's seen the move at least once.

Because she was given it with an insufficiently unjustified reason

OK. Whatever you say.

, sameway i'm sure you'd complain if Ash was given something equally significant or better just out of thin air.

Well, Lana isn't the main protagonist/trial kid, so I'm not gonna hold her to the same standards I have with Ash.

Lana expressing "interest" and not expressing "disinterest" as well as Brionne not indicating that it doesn't want to evolve aren't at all valid reasons for being handed over the z crystal. Imagine me using this same "interest" logic in any other situation.

Don't see how that works, but whatever floats your boat, I guess.

 

[andrewscott48209]

Concerning Lana getting a Primarina Z crystal without a trial; in the game, doesn't professor Kukui give the player character the z crystal for the starter he/she had chosen? Also, in the games, doesn't the player character pick up z crystals without going through a trial? For example, if I'm not mistaken, you can find a Flynium Z crystal in a pedestal in ten carat hill.

 

[Twilight-Kun]

Lana did less than Lillie in terms of getting a Z-Crystal; whereas Lillie actually helped pokémon understand the literal basics of working as a team, all Lana did was grind offscreen until she could make a bigger bubble, and was thus rewarded for it

So yes, Ash is the player doing meaningless tasks to earn his crystals, Lillie is the player finding them out in the wild, and Lana is being given them with zero fanfare or explanation

 

[Sceptile Leaf Blade]

Concerning Lana getting a Primarina Z crystal without a trial; in the game, doesn't professor Kukui give the player character the z crystal for the starter he/she had chosen? Also, in the games, doesn't the player character pick up z crystals without going through a trial? For example, if I'm not mistaken, you can find a Flynium Z crystal in a pedestal in ten carat hill.

The games botching that doesn't make it any better, it just means they were both disappointing on this front.