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Why is Dawn known for having no character development?

Sham

The Guardian of Ruin and Birth
I’ve seen several people say that Dawn had the best goal arc but barely changed as a character at the end of the series and I just don’t see how. She started out as an entitled girl who thought she could win Contests if just entered and “tried her best”. Her mother being a top a coordinator didn’t help with her ego much either. We’ve seen several episodes in the series where she cried over a lost of got nervous about the thought of losing. This is contrasted multiple times at the end where she stood her ground despite almost losing to Ursula with Encore and stayed determined and when she humbly excepted her lost at the GF and claimed “she did everything she could”. Dawn’s entire arc was about instead of complaining, push through your difficulties and ultimately excepting failure as a natural process of your goal. Not to mention minor stuff like no longer caring about her appearance or being dirty.
 

Kyloreywalk

Active Member
I don't know where you got this from. She's known for getting a lot of development, but her personality doesn't change too much over the course of the series, so I guess that's what people are talking about.

If you watch DP1 and DP191 back to back, her personality/character feels nearly identical in both episodes. Without the context of what she did in Contests, she does feel rather similar as a person throughout her series. But when you look at her arc, as you said, she gets alot of development. But it's true her personality doesn't change too much.
 

Sham

The Guardian of Ruin and Birth
I don't know where you got this from. She's known for getting a lot of development, but her personality doesn't change too much over the course of the series, so I guess that's what people are talking about.

If you watch DP1 and DP191 back to back, her personality/character feels nearly identical in both episodes. Without the context of what she did in Contests, she does feel rather similar as a person throughout her series. But when you look at her arc, as you said, she gets alot of development. But it's true her personality doesn't change too much.
Because that isn't real life? Nobody has a complete 100 percent change in personality unless something drastic or dramatic happens to them. Most people retain a core personality but have different traits at the end of a series. To have a character completely different at the end of a series without good cause it lazy writing and low hanging fruit.
 
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Kyloreywalk

Active Member
Because that isn't real life? Nobody has a complete 100 percent change in personality unless something drastic or dramatic happens to them. Most people retain a core personality but have different traits at he end of each series. To have a character completely different at the end of the series without good cause it lazy writing and low hanging fruit.

Sure, but a lot of the other main girls have personality changes by the end of their series. Misty at the end of Johto isn't the same short-tempered girl she is at the beginning of Kanto. May loses the silly/ditzy aspect of her personality and becomes more mature and self-sufficient. Lillie gets over her fear of pokemon and at the end of SM is ready to go on an adventure to find her father. Even Serena gets independent enough to want to break away from Ash or stay at home with her mother and not go on a journey like she was at the beginning of the series. I guess Iris doesn't change much either.
 

Bortgreen

Captain Pikachu is EPIC
Sure, but a lot of the other main girls have personality changes by the end of their series. Misty at the end of Johto isn't the same short-tempered girl she is at the beginning of Kanto. May loses the silly/ditzy aspect of her personality and becomes more mature and self-sufficient. Lillie gets over her fear of pokemon and at the end of SM is ready to go on an adventure to find her father. Even Serena gets independent enough to want to break away from Ash or stay at home with her mother and not go on a journey like she was at the beginning of the series. I guess Iris doesn't change much either.
But this is character development too
 

Kyloreywalk

Active Member
But this is character development too

yeah, I mean I like Dawn too, but I can see what people mean when they say her character doesn’t feel that majorly different by the end of her saga as the beginning. Some other female leads just have more noticeable personality changes over their series. Iris is probably the only other one whose personality remained pretty much the same from her first to last episode.
 

Leonhart

Imagineer
I personally felt that she had the most development apart from perhaps Haruka. Hikari started off confident when she left Futaba Town because she already had a goal in mind, but reality struck when she began losing in the appeals round of two Contests in a row. She had to figure out a way to improve her appeals, which she did eventually after getting several episodes that showed her working with her Pokemon to improve her skills as a Coordinator, including the Mikuri Cup arc. I don't know what more development she could've received.
 

Kuzehiko

That moment I found a lifetime treasure
Dawn started out very overconfident and somewhat cocky due to her mother being a top coordinator. She probably thought she'd have it easy since her mother taught her about Pokemon contests before starting her journey, and at the beginning she never realized skills is something you get through hard training and so did she. She became more humble and stopped being overconfident not only due to her losing streak but also by overcoming Mamoswine disobeying her, her fear for Plusle and Minun, etc. She often used to argue with Ash but she also learned to teamwork with him and they developed a very strong bond one another. That also counts as character development imo. Her personality did change although she does retain some of the personality she still had in early DP such as being extremely positive all the time aka "No need to worry" or her liking for fashion stuff. She became depressed, she cried. I do not get how people fails to see her personality change by the end of DP. Dawn simply has one of the strongest character development and a very consistent one.
 

SerenaRulez

Well-Known Member
I thought Dawn was liked for the most part?? I don't think I've ever seen anyone complain that she didn't get enough development, in fact I think it's the opposite because I've seen alot of folks say that she had too much screentime and that she was a co-star on the same level as Ash during Diamond and Pearl.
 

BabaVanga

Well-Known Member
Dawn having consistent personality was one of DP's strongest points. There's no need for 180° change just for the sake of it. The flaws she had at the beginning of the series were gone by the end of it, the rest is her core personality that makes Dawn, Dawn. That's why she had one of the best developments in the show because the writers didn't try to fix what wasn't broken in the first place.
 

Kuzehiko

That moment I found a lifetime treasure
I thought Dawn was liked for the most part?? I don't think I've ever seen anyone complain that she didn't get enough development, in fact I think it's the opposite because I've seen alot of folks say that she had too much screentime and that she was a co-star on the same level as Ash during Diamond and Pearl.
Trust me, over the years there have been many people on the fandom who have claimed that Dawn's a very stale character given how her personality 'remains' the same by the end of DP which is hilarious since she did actually change a lot.
 

game3524

Well-Known Member
Dawn gets more goal development, then personal growth and that is two different things. As a person, she is pretty static (which doesn't make her a bad character. For example, Ash for the most part outside of Kanto/OI is a static character.). Anyway, Dawn's appeal as a character was never her personal development IMO. It was the fact that she was really active on the cast (it is the same reason why I like Iris more then others).
 

Kyloreywalk

Active Member
Dawn gets more goal development, then personal growth and that is two different things. As a person, she is pretty static (which doesn't make her a bad character. For example, Ash for the most part outside of Kanto/OI is a static character.). Anyway, Dawn's appeal as a character was never her personal development IMO. It was the fact that she was really active on the cast (it is the same reason why I like Iris more then others).

I didn’t watch all of BW, was Iris really that more active than most girls? I watched the Don battle tournaments and some of her focus eps, but outside of them she didn’t really seem to be treated any differently than most supporting female leads. I’m not even sure I can say she was more active than Misty or May, as even if Misty didn’t get much goal focus she had a dynamic impact on the group at least in the early seasons.
 

Leonhart

Imagineer
BabaVanga said:
Dawn having consistent personality was one of DP's strongest points. There's no need for 180° change just for the sake of it. The flaws she had at the beginning of the series were gone by the end of it, the rest is her core personality that makes Dawn, Dawn. That's why she had one of the best developments in the show because the writers didn't try to fix what wasn't broken in the first place.

My only complaint regarding the handling of Hikari was that the writers could've maybe paced her development differently. They gave her most of her development in the middle section of DP, which made the last year or so of the saga devoid of much Hikari development other than a few episodes here and there where she invented new appeals.
 

game3524

Well-Known Member
I didn’t watch all of BW, was Iris really that more active than most girls? I watched the Don battle tournaments and some of her focus eps, but outside of them she didn’t really seem to be treated any differently than most supporting female leads. I’m not even sure I can say she was more active than Misty or May, as even if Misty didn’t get much goal focus she had a dynamic impact on the group at least in the early seasons.

Iris did battle quite a lot during her time on the show compared to most of the Pokegirls, that is what I mean't by being more active.

It is strange how progressive they were with Dawn and Iris when it came to battling and then seeing such a regression with Serena and then Lillie. I hope Koharu gets a taste of blood and starts to low key enjoy battling. It would actually be pretty humorous given her character is a bit of a stick in the mud.
 

Kyloreywalk

Active Member
Iris did battle quite a lot during her time on the show compared to most of the Pokegirls, that is what I mean't by being more active.

It is strange how progressive they were with Dawn and Iris when it came to battling and then seeing such a regression with Serena and then Lillie. I hope Koharu gets a taste of blood and starts to low key enjoy battling. It would actually be pretty humorous given her character is a bit of a stick in the mud.

Interesting to hear, from what I saw of BW it seemed like Cilan did a lot more battling in the average filler ep than Iris. I know she has the Don battle tournaments but everyone competed in those.

As for Serena/Lillie they basically followed May’s path where they either had no interest in Pokémon, were scared of Pokémon, or just didn’t know how to battle at first. I recall years ago before all the new girls existed that people had similar problems with May that it took her so long to get into battling and over 50 episodes into AG just to win her first Contests. She was also a lot more passive and hung to the sidelines similarly to Serena and the others when they weren’t getting much focus. I’d arguably say that May was the least active female lead of the series at least prior to Serena mainly due to her not being very active in your average AG filler. Everything about Dawn seemed to be a course correction of that. I honestly can’t even recall May getting any major battles outside of Contests, or ever competing in a tournament. She was generally treated the same way Serena was most of the time.
 

Pokegirl Fan~

Liko>>>>>Ash
Interesting to hear, from what I saw of BW it seemed like Cilan did a lot more battling in the average filler ep than Iris. I know she has the Don battle tournaments but everyone competed in those.

As for Serena/Lillie they basically followed May’s path where they either had no interest in Pokémon, were scared of Pokémon, or just didn’t know how to battle at first. I recall years ago before all the new girls existed that people had similar problems with May that it took her so long to get into battling and over 50 episodes into AG just to win her first Contests. She was also a lot more passive and hung to the sidelines similarly to Serena and the others when they weren’t getting much focus. I’d arguably say that May was the least active female lead of the series at least prior to Serena mainly due to her not being very active in your average AG filler. Everything about Dawn seemed to be a course correction of that. I honestly can’t even recall May getting any major battles outside of Contests, or ever competing in a tournament. She was generally treated the same way Serena was most of the time.
A tournament or two definitely would have helped May, probably some more battles in fillers/pseudo-fillers as well (as long as they didn't involve Team Rocket).
 

Kyloreywalk

Active Member
A tournament or two definitely would have helped May, probably some more battles in fillers/pseudo-fillers as well (as long as they didn't involve Team Rocket).

Hoenn in general lacked a mini-tournament, like the Don battle tournaments, DP's tag battle arc, or even something like the Whirl Cup. It would have been nice somewhere in the middle of the saga to have a tournament arc like the other sagas had, Brock could have entered too and battled. I always loved the mini-tournament arcs every saga has, but Hoenn oddly didn't have one.
 
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