Why didn't Best Wishes use Hilda?

[CyberCubed]

Not necessarily. Dawn typically used small and cute pokemon and had no interest in making them evolve. If Iris kept her personality from BW in DP I would imagine she would go for a different team. Of course, if they gave her Dawn's personality then this point becomes moot.

All the girls generally have in evolved and cute pokemon for most of their run.

As for Iris I think the writers gave up on her after she got her Dragonite. Besides meeting Claire she largely got stuck in the background for most of BW until she left.

 

[pokemon fan 132]

Hilda looking back wasn't the only female protagonist from games which writters passed on in being used in anime in any shape or form. There is also Kris, Rosa and never regretted Leaf.

However in Hilda specific case main reason why writers didn't used her probably comes from fact of wanting to do some sort of reset, new start for pokemon series. Mirroring OS(namely Kanto style)in some ways suc as female gym leader joining Ash again. Ash catching more pokemon than usual aong with his characterization being dumbed down abit. Acting more clueless and immature which clashed with his previous growth.
Etc.

Which was mainly consequence of BW games going nthrough big revamp. Cutting ties with padst generations and pokemon from previous sagas for firtst time in history. Getting rid of contests and promoting mantra of new start, "fresh beginning" they seemed to be intended in going for.

With writers wanting to mirror games message as much as possible reducing continuity and links to history, previous characters and experiences Ash went through and got molded as person to minimum. In having only one character posessing pokemon starters, getting rid of Brock after what 12 years?
Not having presence of any older pokemon in first half of UNova accompanied with writing style which lagely differed from what people used to see in Sinnoh. Although arguably i appreciated lively, more energetic chemistry in main group, higher sense of unpredictability writers went with by breaking several patterns(such as Ash catching dark type, Team Rocket being organized, agile villains, main girl getting fully evolved pokemon right of the bat etc).

However to be perfectly honest if production team really aimed to go back to roots they could simply in that case reuse original trio which would be most appropriate candidates for it and make more sense. Something most fans which missed OS writing style in reality asked for, to see good friends which know themselves for long gathering together and building on friendship experiencing close bond, joking, clash and friendship they shared.

I don't think iris' pokemon would have been any better. Dawn's team consisted of almost all unvolved pokemon other than Manoswine. Iris would have had the same type of team back in DP.

Comparing Iris to Dawn is like comparing apples with peers to be honest. They are girls with largely different personalities, different careers and motives they pursue. There is nothing to indicate how Iris would had same pokemon team if she was in Sinnoh.

All the girls generally have in evolved and cute pokemon for most of their run.

Not quite. Iris had 50/50 ratio with evilved and unevolved cute pokemon(i just dont see Excadrill and Dragonite as small, fluffy pokemon. With Misty aside from Goldeen, Corsola and Togepi i would have hard time calling Staryu, Psyduck, Poliwhirl, even Horsea that much cute at all.

Looking back its kinda true how out of all main girls Dawn had most unevolved and cute, plushy pokemon which went better in correlation with advertizing. Since small, unevolved pokemon for some reason are usually most popular among small kids being impelled to buy such products.

As for Iris I think the writers gave up on her after she got her Dragonite. Besides meeting Claire she largely got stuck in the background for most of BW until she left.

Not really. There was rather big role focused on Iris and Dragonite in growing more accustomized to each other during events of Junior Cup.

There were episodes focused on Iris gradually earning Dragonite thrust such as in battling legendary Kami trio, like when blocking Thundurus attack herself to prevent her pokemon from getting hit.

Afterwards there were several episodes focused on Iris past, return to dragon village meeting up with her childhood friend Shannon, reviving bad experiences at Opelucid city. Showing Iris was treated as outcast which couldn't fit in within norms imposed by society leading to rematch against Drayden.

Iris played role in stopping Colress and Ghetsis in fighting Team Plasma and their attempts to revive Reshiram and controll pokemon through their own machine. Fought Ash Charizard.

Entered Marine Cup, There were episodes dealing with her pokemon like Emolga switching sides joining Team Rocket briefly and notorious ones such as Axew being lost.
While being present generally in most episodes interacting with Ash, Cilan and others.

So im not sure how was Iris background fodder after getting Dragonite?

 

[BlueDragonfangirl]

I always thought it was due to the age.

LOL Had Iris gotten the same Pokemon she had now back in the D / P and acted the same way she'd have been crushed by D / P Ash.
Only Pokemon that would have given Ash's Pokemon trouble would have been Dragonite, that thing was always a challenge for him though

Weird change of the subject hereXD

 

[OfCorsola]

My say or take on this is I still solely believe that they were just trying to rehash Kanto again. I mean, there were no contests, and if there were I can assure you guys that they would've used Hilda as a coordinator like Dawn and May. That's why since there were no contests, they were like "hey, lets just reboot kanto!"

Now, something that gets me is...there are no contests in Kalos, so why couldn't they just keep Iris and Cilan or just use Viola or someone as a female lead instead of Serena? Wouldn't it be expected for them to use Serena as a coordinator if there were contests?

Anyways, even if they did add Hilda, I would want them to be careful as they characterize her. IMO, Pokespe did an outstanding job portraying Hilda (White) and I would not mind at all if they had done the same for Best Wishes, it would even be more enjoyable if they had Hilbert tag along instead of Cilan.

Maybe if Hilbert and Hilda were used each of them could specialize in types like Brock and Misty. Or, Hilbert could've been Ash's rival, and Hilda could've had her pokespe personality along with Hilbert. Even if it was a rehash, it's better than using Cilan and Iris, they just bored me..

 

[PokemonNation2000]

I always thought it was due to the age.

Seconded: that's what I always thought as well.

 

[OfCorsola]

Seconded: that's what I always thought as well.

But then, what about Serena? That could have been an issue, but they could de-age her.

 

[PokemonNation2000]

But then, what about Serena? That could have been an issue, but they could de-age her.

Hmm...good point! Well, that's out the window now, so I guess your theory makes more sense.

 

[Dragalge]

Serena kinda looks a bit younger than Hilda imo. She looks older than the previous female protagonists but Serena feels more like a 13-14ish year old girl unlike Hilda where she looks like a 16 year old person to me.

Anyway they probably chose Iris over Hilda simply because they didn't want another female protagonist in the group imo. I can't see how Iris was supposed to pay homage to Misty since Misty is a gym leader in both the games and the anime unlike Iris who's just a Dragon Master in training in Best Wishes. Sure they have almost the same personalities but they were different characters overall. The only things BW paid homage to OS was a gym leader (or more if you think Iris was a homage to Misty) traveling with the main character, Ash catching all the starter Pokémon and maybe a couple of other things I might have missed.

 

[PokemonNation2000]

Serena kinda looks a bit younger than Hilda imo. She looks older than the previous female protagonists but Serena feels more like a 13-14ish year old girl unlike Hilda where she looks like a 16 year old person to me.

Anyway they probably chose Iris over Hilda simply because they didn't want another female protagonist in the group imo. I can't see how Iris was supposed to pay homage to Misty since Misty is a gym leader in both the games and the anime unlike Iris who's just a Dragon Master in training in Best Wishes. Sure they have almost the same personalities but they were different characters overall. The only things BW paid homage to OS was a gym leader (or more if you think Iris was a homage to Misty) traveling with the main character, Ash catching all the starter Pokémon and maybe a couple of other things I might have missed.

Yeah, this makes sense to me: well, Ash used to flip his cap in early BW, but stopped soon after he caught Roggenrola like 47 or so episodes into BW, I think... and Cilan kinda reminded me of Brock in some ways back when he was interesting, TR kinda like Kanto TR at the start, but that's about it for the OS homages there.

 

[pokemon fan 132]

Anyway they probably chose Iris over Hilda simply because they didn't want another female protagonist in the group imo. I can't see how Iris was supposed to pay homage to Misty since Misty is a gym leader in both the games and the anime unlike Iris who's just a Dragon Master in training in Best Wishes. Sure they have almost the same personalities but they were different characters overall. The only things BW paid homage to OS was a gym leader (or more if you think Iris was a homage to Misty) traveling with the main character, Ash catching all the starter Pokémon and maybe a couple of other things I might have missed.

I guess reason why people saw Iris as "homage to Misty" was because Misty also wanted/wants to become one type master(water pokemon master), even though she didn't acieved this having to go back to gym and help family out. Because in games threy are both gym leaders and because of certain similarities in personality.

But in all honesty i have hard time seeing Cilan and Iris as "Misty and Brock clones" as some like to call it.

Cilan is more quirky and flambioyant having passion for various hobbies, while Brock was more flirty amd eccentric type of character actiong as more calm and rationale member of group. Not to mention i find he was more prominent in role of mentor, navigator than Cilan in reality who joined Ash to learn something from him for change.

As far as Iris go aside from being cynical liking to tease Ash and fearing particular type she is nothing like Misty is in personality aspect. Misty is more sarcastic, brash and romantic, while Iris tends to be wild,unthrusty and instinctive being connected with nature. Even dragon master goal doesn't draw much similarity with Misty's given how aside from name they follow largely different structure through which they can be achieved requiring different tasks to be passed.


That aside another difference between them was that Iris was handled better when it comes to treatment of pokemon,better established goal and being given rival with more focus being directed toward development of her story.
Though i find Misty left bigger impact on this show in sense of helping Ash grow foirward, playing m ore of role of classic heroine paving way fior future giurls.contributing in several areas having qualities and good sides just like anyone else.
And in terms of emotional growth Misty gave us more depth in personal issues and problems than it was case with Iris imo.

Either way my point is that while there were some similarities its very wrong and degrading actually to Iris and Cilan characters to call them Misty and Brock "copies".

 

[PokemonNation2000]

I guess reason why people saw Iris as "homage to Misty" was because Misty also wanted/wants to become one type master(water pokemon master), even though she didn't acieved this having to go back to gym and help family out. Because in games threy are both gym leaders and because of certain similarities in personality.

But in all honesty i have hard time seeing Cilan and Iris as "Misty and Brock clones" as some like to call it.

Cilan is more quirky and flambioyant having passion for various hobbies, while Brock was more flirty amd eccentric type of character actiong as more calm and rationale member of group. Not to mention i find he was more prominent in role of mentor, navigator than Cilan in reality who joined Ash to learn something from him for change.

As far as Iris go aside from being cynical liking to tease Ash and fearing particular type she is nothing like Misty is in personality aspect. Misty is more sarcastic, brash and romantic, while Iris tends to be wild,unthrusty and instinctive being connected with nature. Even dragon master goal doesn't draw much similarity with Misty's given how aside from name they follow largely different structure through which they can be achieved requiring different tasks to be passed.


That aside another difference between them was that Iris was handled better when it comes to treatment of pokemon,better established goal and being given rival with more focus being directed toward development of her story.
Though i find Misty left bigger impact on this show in sense of helping Ash grow foirward, playing m ore of role of classic heroine paving way fior future giurls.contributing in several areas having qualities and good sides just like anyone else.
And in terms of emotional growth Misty gave us more depth in personal issues and problems than it was case with Iris imo.

Either way my point is that while there were some similarities its very wrong and degrading actually to Iris and Cilan characters to call them Misty and Brock "copies".

All too true, man: all too true.

 

[MidnightMelody]

I wonder if the tossback to OS worked. I know myself I hated BW and I know others were not big fans at least on here and Tumblr/Twitter but I wonder what Japan thought of it.

 

[PokemonNation2000]

I wonder if the tossback to OS worked. I know myself I hated BW and I know others were not big fans at least on here and Tumblr/Twitter but I wonder what Japan thought of it.

I think they pretty much share your opinion: well, I'm just going off of Dogasu's thoughts on it, though.

I'm one of the few who did like the homages to the OS, though, so it worked to some extent for me.

 

[fawfulmark2]

Hilda looking back wasn't the only female protagonist from games which writters passed on in being used in anime in any shape or form. There is also Kris, Rosa and never regretted Leaf.

that's the thing though: Kris/Marina at least got to be in the Raikou special with Ethan/Jimmy, and Rosa the trailer for B/W 2. Leaf is admittedly an anomaly though as she has appeared in no other form of animated media along with Hilda(not even in Origins).

 

[MidnightMelody]

that's the thing though: Kris/Marina at least got to be in the Raikou special with Ethan/Jimmy, and Rosa the trailer for B/W 2. Leaf is admittedly an anomaly though as she has appeared in no other form of animated media along with Hilda(not even in Origins).

It can be argued that Leaf is Serena and they fused the two into one. Like how she has connections to Ash (Red) from years prior and the hat style

 

[OfCorsola]

It can be argued that Leaf is Serena and they fused the two into one. Like how she has connections to Ash (Red) from years prior and the hat style

I like that theory, it is interesting.
But yeah, we should have all the game players that hasn't been in the anime at least make a cameo or have an episode.
Like Brendan, he was cameoed in the first part of two hoenn movies.

 

[Sprinter1988]

I think it was a combination of things.

The most obvious, as already pointed out, is that they intended to mirror the Original series - Iris = Misty, Cilan = Brock.

However, I think that Ash's regression also played a part.

With May and Dawn, they were beginners with Ash being the seasoned trainer. It was Ash who taught them the basics, from catching pokemon to battling with them (to the point that he actually felt partially responsible when they May (and to a lesser extent Dawn) failed to do well in her first contest, shouldering some of the blame himself for not teaching her enough). This sort of thing worked with May and Dawn but with Ash's regression at the start of Best Wishes, they could not have him doing this with a new trainer. With Ash regressing, the story called for Ash to be accompanied by a trainer with some experiance under their belt, not a newbie.

Next comes the simple question of "What would Hilda have done?" - Contests were pretty much out as they were not in the games and they had done this angle twice already. We know from Brock, Tracey, and Cilan that gimmicky goals such as breeding, watching and evaluating don't really go anywhere, so those were out too. The only other major options that they could really have done anything with were made her a type specialist, which is what they ultimately did with Iris (sort of), or have her challenge the Gyms. Again Ash's regression got in the way of that. Personally I think that at the end of the DP series, Ash was in a good place to take on a proper protege, teaching them the ins and the outs of gym battles. Ash, being the more experianced trainer, would have faced tougher challenges where as Hilda, the newbie, would have faced weaker opponents. For example at the Striaton Gym Ash could have faced Simisage, Simipour and Simisear, whereas Hilda would have faced their pre-evolved forms. Then at the next gym Ash could have faced Watchog, Stoutland and Cinccino whereas Hilda faced Watchog and Herdier - and so on in that way for all other gyms.
However Ash's regression got in the way of that, and let's face it, seeing Ash battle a gym and then seeing Hilda battle that gym with the Leader using the exact same pokemon could have gotten rather repetative.

So in the end they went for Iris and her goal of becoming a master of the dragon type, despite not knowing how best to show the progression of such a character and giving her two pokemon not of that type, or even close to that type.

 

[chalkus]

I guess reason why people saw Iris as "homage to Misty" was because Misty also wanted/wants to become one type master(water pokemon master), even though she didn't acieved this having to go back to gym and help family out. Because in games threy are both gym leaders and because of certain similarities in personality.

But in all honesty i have hard time seeing Cilan and Iris as "Misty and Brock clones" as some like to call it.

Cilan is more quirky and flambioyant having passion for various hobbies, while Brock was more flirty amd eccentric type of character actiong as more calm and rationale member of group. Not to mention i find he was more prominent in role of mentor, navigator than Cilan in reality who joined Ash to learn something from him for change.

As far as Iris go aside from being cynical liking to tease Ash and fearing particular type she is nothing like Misty is in personality aspect. Misty is more sarcastic, brash and romantic, while Iris tends to be wild,unthrusty and instinctive being connected with nature. Even dragon master goal doesn't draw much similarity with Misty's given how aside from name they follow largely different structure through which they can be achieved requiring different tasks to be passed.


That aside another difference between them was that Iris was handled better when it comes to treatment of pokemon,better established goal and being given rival with more focus being directed toward development of her story.
Though i find Misty left bigger impact on this show in sense of helping Ash grow foirward, playing m ore of role of classic heroine paving way fior future giurls.contributing in several areas having qualities and good sides just like anyone else.
And in terms of emotional growth Misty gave us more depth in personal issues and problems than it was case with Iris imo.

Either way my point is that while there were some similarities its very wrong and degrading actually to Iris and Cilan characters to call them Misty and Brock "copies".

I think Cilan was a straight up Brock clone. They just replaced Brock's quirkiness around women with Cilan's quirkiness with food. Other than that they were pretty much the same.

Iris and Misty is a different situation. While they were both born from the same mold I think there is enough of a difference between the two to make them different characters. I especially found Iris to be much funnier, more sarcastic ( that episode with Professor Juniper's father was priceless) and more likable than Misty. She also did not have to resort to violence or fan service to get her point across like Misty did.

 

[CyberCubed]

I wonder if the tossback to OS worked. I know myself I hated BW and I know others were not big fans at least on here and Tumblr/Twitter but I wonder what Japan thought of it.

Funny thing is I don't think many OS fans cared for BW. Some liked it of course, but from what I've seen a lot didn't care for it.

 

[Pokemaniac24]

Funny thing is I don't think many OS fans cared for BW. Some liked it of course, but from what I've seen a lot didn't care for it.

I loved Best Wishes badge quest and a few of the episodes after that (Tempest and many of the Episode N episodes, for example) and I am a huge fan of the OS. I think there are probably quite a few OS (well, actually more Kanto in particular) fans that enjoyed BW (the badge quest) anyway because it had similar pacing to Kanto, the focus was more on adventure and comedy than battles outside of the occasional tournament arc, and the group interaction was the closest we got to the original trio of Ash, Misty, and Brock.