*nods*
Anybody notice that I never posted in those other two threads? Well, I figured that I'd wait for the Gym battle to finish with before starting my review, so here we go (yes, this is for ALL the episodes pertaining to the battle):
The Gym battle was definitely a fresh attempt, what with Paul going first. I have to say, for all of the insults Paul had for Ash, their battling styles don't seem too different. They both ignore type advantages Pokemon-wise for the most part and go with left-field tactics to win their battles. The difference? Ash went in without preparing the first time. If only Cranidos had come last, then maybe Ash would have won the battle, seeing as Geodude & Onix were/are easy by comparison. But no, he loses, and we're there for another episode...
...Oh, wait, I mean
two episodes. Yes, our interlude and Pokemon evolution in the middle...is it just me, or are they overkilling evolutions a bit? I mean, in a span of a couple weeks, Starly, Bonsly, and Cranidos all evolve. Who's next, Mime Jr.? ...Don't answer that. Anyway..."Wild In The Streets" had a strange feel for me, seeing as Dawn, the girl that has supposedly had less than a MONTH as a trainer, came in as the hero(ine) at one point. The technique was interesting, but I wonder what she used as a target when they were training...and why it wasn't elaborated on until
Ash used it in the next episode. ......Oh, yes, and Team Rocket actually stole something worthwhile for once, and COULD have gotten away with it had they not gotten greedy. Seriously, I bet Giovanni would have LOVED a machine like that.
And then the rematch, and the actual topic of this thread. After Cranidos' incredibly-timed evolution, Ash has more work ahead of him than Paul did. However, I want to take a side bar for a second to cover our other main characters...mainly Dawn's outfit. I mean, I know that Misty & Brock were kind of "coaches" for Ash in the first season, but really, a full-blown cheerleader? We haven't seen something like that since...geez, since Gary was still Ash's big-mouthed rival!! I say that it's a nice bit of nostalgia...but it backfired into a bit of shipping as well...really, a cheerleader!? Shippers will just eat that one up for months to come...Anywho, back to--oh, yeah, and Croagunk. That was, honestly, one of the greatest things I have ever seen in the anime. It just walked off and sent Team Rocket running without anybody noticing it was gone...very nice.
Anyway, the battle itself was a lot better for Ash this time around (see? Told you that the order would have helped him!). This time he was able to knock out two of Roark's Pokemon without losing any...but then came Rampardos, and Aipom and Pikachu (regardless of its strength level, once again...GRR!!!) came down, leaving it to Turtwig to make a faux-Smokescreen to win by surprise. I would have liked it a lot more had the theme song not played in the background >.>...
Yeah, there were some weird dubbing choices, but I'll leave those for later, as my computer has chosen
NOW to start acting up...