BettyNewbie

Yeah, not to mention they actually DID prove to be threats a few times during those sagas.


Also agreed there. And even if they WERE to be retained, it's not like they needed to keep their Rocket memberships. Just have them quit Team Rocket and try to pursue Ash and Co. while acting as mercenaries for the current regional villain teams. Or just go with suspiciously similar substitutes as well, even giving them reasons for going after Pikachu that directly tied in to the villains' goals (Team Magma and Team Aqua, for example, could express interest in Pikachu for the fact that it possessed genomes allowing it to bond with the orbs used to summon Groudon/Kyogre, which actually could neatly foreshadow the climax where Pikachu was possessed by the Red Orb).


Yeah, no kidding. Overall it was a horrible matchup. May, of all people, should not be afraid of Pokémon, considering she literally grew up with them due to her dad being a gym leader. And I've seen mentor-relationships that were a lot more plausibly done, to be honest, at least enough to avoid making them looking bad for no real reason.


Yeah. I watched Pokémon since I was in elementary school, and while I did look up to Ash, I must admit I don't EVER recall inserting myself into him, and there were actually a few instances where I ultimately agreed with Misty in her criticisms. Besides, I guess it rubs me off the wrong way since with Beauty and the Beast when someone gets no criticism whatsoever, not even when it's necessary (I can understand it if people dislike unfair criticism, where there's no merit to criticizing other than for the sake of criticism to demonize someone, but when it's an actual flaw that needs to be pointed out, I think it does require stating).


Yeah, no kidding. I don't have any problem with Generation 4 myself, but I do think that if you're going to make a movie actually honoring an anniversary for a long-standing franchise, you might as well, you know, actually make it relevant to the actual plot and not include stuff that isn't even related to the anniversary directly. I'd cry foul if they used Generation III, V, VI, or even VII Pokémon as marketing. I'd tolerate Gen II being marketed since, well, Ho-Oh did debut in the first episode and clearly wasn't Gen I.


Quite frankly, all I can say is I'm not feeling optimistic about this upcoming movie. They still haven't even teased Gen 8 yet (and believe me, if they were going to do Generation 8, they would have started hinting at it by now, like how Metroid Prime 4 got teased at this year's E3). If Movie 21 ends up being a massive bomb, that only reinforces my view that M20 being released on the anime's anniversary is the only reason why it succeeded.


Yeah, agreed, and it also doesn't help that I'm not even that fond of SM as it is anyways, and Misty and Brock's return is the only reason I have even a slight interest in it right now. That and maybe Lillie. They've pretty much rushed through Alola right now, got past the climax (honestly, I haven't seen a region go by THIS quickly since Kanto), and since they didn't even HINT at a Gen 8 right now, I'd even wager that Alola might end next year. I just hope the writers bring Misty and Brock into Alola before they inevitably stop with Alola. At least with the CBS app, I can rewatch episodes of various shows I watched that I either missed or otherwise missed some sound on thanks to my sound system going mute at the worst possible moments that forces me to "reset" by turning the TV on and off.

Yeah, and that Earthquake early into BW's run didn't help either.

Honestly, if they're going to keep them, whether as villains or comic relief, they should have done it like how they handled Oolong back when he's a villain. Namely, actually REDEEM them beforehand so that they can be comic relief WITHOUT needing to be the villains. Or, they can at least make them far more threatening and a menace while still keeping their humor. That way, they can remain joke villains and yet most importantly still actually BE villains. The Red Ribbon Army made a far better Team Rocket than they did, heck, General Blue made a better joke villain than Team Rocket, since he was both humorous AND a genuine threat. It's as if the writers don't even know how to actually balance those two aspects and go for extremes even if they betray the entire point of being a villain. Heck, forget Dragon Ball or Mario or anything like that, even Gaston from the 1991 Disney Beauty and the Beast film comes across as a far better joke villain than Team Rocket does, and I thought he was a poorly written villain thanks to the Gaston Reprise having him loudly declaring key details of his plan in such a stupid and reckless manner that should have gotten him arrested or at least talked out of the plan by the villagers at least. Team Rocket right now is one of two main antagonists that are quite frankly written in an exceptionally embarrassing manner that is really unbefitting of villains, the only other being the Galactic Empire in Star Wars: Rebels, which has the main protagonists outwitting and defeating the Empire in a similarly embarrassingly easy light multiple times, to such an extent that, were that show reality, the Empire would have collapsed LONG before they even developed the Death Star and used it on Alderaan.


No kidding. I'm almost tempted to say they're the worst parents ever, but on the other hand, I can name parents in the series who were far worse, like Brock and Misty's parents (the latter isn't stated in-series per se, but it's made clear in that novelization that Misty's parents ditched Cerulean Gym like Brock's parents did, and one of the production staff apparently confirmed that bit at least was indeed canon to the series. And don't get me started on Brock's parents, who literally ditched their kids to fend for themselves, and constantly screwed up the gym and even after "getting back" for their families STILL screwed up ultimately.), or even James' parents (blue bloods or not, they have REAL character problems if they thought the best fiancée for their son was dominatrix sadist and a likely psychopath.). And yeah, no kidding about how they failed to elaborate on May's hatred of Pokémon. This isn't merely something like Misty's fear of bugs where such probably didn't need much of an explanation (though that being said, I do kinda wish they explained that one), and was useful for gags, this was plot-relevant and something that would require an explanation. Probably the closest they got to even beginning to explain it is after Max unknowingly humiliated her by revealing that she got conked on the head by Caroline trying to catch Pokémon at the beach, and even there... yeah, I fail to see how that really was much of an explanation. Embarassing story, sure, but not enough to have hatred of Pokémon over unless you were mentally unstable to begin with.


Yeah, and I suspect the only reason Movie 20 did nearly as well as it did was because it aired during the 20th anniversary of the anime/movies. Had they not aired it then, I'm pretty sure it would have flopped even more than Movie 19.


...

I'll try to discuss some things with my parents first. Don't get me wrong, I do want to watch the Misty and Brock return episodes, and I'm even willing to use Disney and make them an exception if I must, but I don't want to end up getting an app solely for those two episodes and leave it unable to be used otherwise.

Agreed to an extent. After all, I've seen guys who are flamboyant despite obviously being masculine, like Gaston from Beauty and the Beast. That guy hammed it up quite a bit. Besides, the term "Real Men Wear Pink".


Yeah, no kidding. If only Takeshi Shudo used logic rather than favoritism and kept Misty on, we wouldn't BE in this situation. Honestly, they even ruined Cyrus by turning him into yet another megalomaniacal psychopath with no justification for his actions (at least in the game, he had a pretty crappy childhood as an excuse for his actions that made him a bit tragic even if still evil).

It also doesn't help that thanks to that decision, Jessie James and Meowth got downright shafted as characters as well, turning them into complete jokes who don't even DESERVE being called villains or antagonists, or especially threats. Say what you will about their Original Series selves, at least there, they had their moments of actually being genuine threats. Now... well, if they do anything wrong it's due to stupidity rather than actually being a threat. Even in Best Wishes, the closest they've EVER gotten to getting back to being threatening, they screwed up by having them beat Ash's Pikachu (I've said it before, I'll say it again: I would have settled on them beating one of Ash's rookie Pokémon especially considering how their first loss against Ash since developing their obsession with Pikachu was against a barely-alive Caterpie that Ash just caught. THAT would have settled the threat level for me, not them beating Pikachu, that just made an already painful start in Unova even worse.). Even Bowser when he got villain decay down hard never was as badly done as Team Rocket right now.


Yeah, agreed, on both fronts. And it also doesn't help that it also makes Norman and Caroline look bad (I'm sorry, but I fail to see why a dad would just let his only remaining son join someone who he doesn't even know all that well before he's even old enough. At least with May, she has the fact that she was old enough to go on a Pokémon journey as an excuse for why he'd let her do that, even though quite frankly she shouldn't have even bothered going into that profession, wanting to travel or not, if she disliked or hated Pokémon. Like my grandpa said, if you're going to enter a job and do it for a long time, you might as well make sure you do something you actually enjoy.).


Yeah, and going by how things are going right now, they may have just drained the well there. In fact, I'm pretty sure the only Event Pokémon they've got right now is Zeraora. Unless they tease Generation 8 in this movie, they're pretty much dead right now, especially when Alola's probably going to end by this time next year.


Hmm, well, if I have to pay for it, then probably no deal on getting it, since I'm boycotting Disney right now for some stupidity done this year (I'd elaborate on what exactly it is they did, but that would run the risk of delving into politics and violating my promise, so I'm not going to elaborate. I WILL tell you this much, though: They're pursuing decisions that are more likely to alienate their viewers and any possible money they could get, and definitely betrays the family friendly image of Disney, as well as delving into subject matter that's completely irrelevant to the actual medium at hand in the case of ESPN. Let's leave it at that.).

Oh I heard. I haven't watched the 8th Episode yet, but according to my younger sister who read some reviews, it seems that it's pretty big on Reylo...

Okay, so I was on the money there. Okay.


Yeah, no kidding. I realize that contests do come across at times as girly, but for goodness sakes, couldn't they have clearly masculine characters participate simply because they find the concept fascinating? Besides, being a girly girl doesn't mean they shouldn't participate in ordinarily masculine activities if they like a good scrap. Just look at Dead or Alive, both males and females fight, and several of the females were actually very feminine in nature (especially Kasumi, Hitomi, Leifang, Kokoro, Tina, and the like, oh, and especially Honoka, arguably the girliest of the female characters, and she really does get excited at the mere idea of a good old scrap, hence why she trains in secret). Plus, in Still Standing, there's a guy who technically does girly things yet it actually was meant to be an expression of his more masculine side in a rather unorthodox manner (for example, he often collects Victoria's Secret magazines, causing people to assume he's into women's clothing when in reality, he's actually more into the actual women in them than what clothing they were wearing). And quite frankly, after hearing how Harley was depicted, all I can say is, he's pretty much the Pokémon version of General Blue if James wasn't that already.


See above.


Yeah, not to mention that Misty if anything was actually making quite a bit of strides in her goal compared to Ash and Brock, and considering what Hoenn is like, keeping her would have been the more logical choice rather than Team Rocket, giving her PLENTY to do.


Yeah, no kidding about that. Heck, I could have come up with a good character arc for AG regarding Misty (or heck, any series after that).


Me too. And what's worse is that unlike the other characters save for maybe Max (which even then was only because of the writers' asinine insistence on keeping Ash 10 years old, meaning Ash CAN'T fulfill that promise to Max. And quite frankly, as much as I tolerate Max more than I can May, I fail to see why they even needed him on the cast anyways since he's underage.), Misty's goal was essentially stolen from her, neither allowing her to pursue her dream nor was she even allowed to at least change her goal of her own free will with little if any outside influence. Instead, her sisters pretty much forced her to put her goal on the backburner for an indefinite amount of time. At least the other cast members did one or the other, sometimes even both, and in Tracey's case arguably succeeded in his goal of meeting Professor Oak when he left. Let's hope her impending return for Alola, assuming they do it right, actually ALLOWS her to pursue her goal again instead of being forced to run the gym yet again thanks to her sisters.


Yeah, and what's truly sad is that that's been the case since Generation III. While Event Pokémon evidently were in the movies before Jirachi Wishmaker, at least the first five movies when unveiling those Pokémon were actually treated as stars in their own right and given impressive storylines without even needing to convince people to buy them, instead of being overglorified commercials for them that you get them just for paying a movie ticket or going to your nearest Toys-R-Us if they announce a distribution (I remember being disappointed when I just got Darkrai in Diamond and Pearl despite thinking I'd be able to visit New Moon Island thanks to Bulbapedia). In fact, the event Pokémon in question didn't even need to be distributed in the movies, having their own separate events for getting them via Celebi, Mew, and even the Lati@s via that e-reader Eon Ticket. Also led to a massive waste in creating new areas like Navel Rock, Birth Island, Faraway Island, New Moon Island, Seabreak Path/Flower Paradise, Hall of Origin, Liberty Garden, or, heck, even Shinjoh Ruins, many of which went unused outside of datamining because they opted to just DLC them. There were ways to put those locations to good use without needing the movies.

EDIT: BTW, I stumbled while on bulbapedia (that reminds me, when is their lockdown regarding USUM-related stuff going to end?) that DisneyNOW is apparently showing episodes of Pokémon. If that requires a subscription, I don't plan on doing that, but if I can watch for free, I probably won't even need to wait for Pokémon TV to upload the episodes to watch Misty and Brock's reunion with Ash in Alola. You know anything about it? Those episodes are the only exception to the current boycott against Disney (not counting stuff that, while being distributed by Disney, is technically created prior to Disney taking control such as any Legends continuity stuff relating to Star Wars).

Hey, I'm not going to lie, I got a little overwhelmed trying to read over and come up with replies to both of those very long DMs tonight. I'll try to reply to at least one tonight and get to the other one tomorrow before work if I can.

Yeah, sorry, ended up being out of town and not online much except via mobile. Should have some time tonight though.

Yeah, in part that's because they ship Hilda with N xD

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgQXjyfxATk

That was a brainfart xD I meant to say Rosa xD

Aww, there's people who like you Hilda :) xD

To be fair, and correct me if I'm mistaken, because I may be mixing up Adventures with Special, but May, or rather, Sapphire DID get the badge-collecting quest while Brendan/Ruby got the contests. But yeah, I see your point (besides, I'm not fond of musicals right now, especially after a combination of both Return to the Sea and that stupid Sock Party ad on Kids WB. Word to the wise, Ash shouldn't pursue a singing career).


Fine by me. If they aren't going to bother making the female lead actually useful in advertising the main story of the games (ie, actually do things important to the games' plotline and endgame), they shouldn't bother including the female lead in the first place.


Sure, will keep that in mind. May also get Puzzle League on the Wii while I'm at it (one of the few games where Misty's actually playable). Besides, I'm pretty sure I won't miss much regarding USUM, especially when any Mythical Pokémon they have won't have any DLC stories since they screwed that bit up with Generation IV regarding Darkrai, Shaymin, and Arceus, and to a lesser extent Dialga, Palkia, and Giratina (they had full fledged story arcs you could get after meeting certain event requirements, with the latter three even having them violating the whole no-eggs Legendary thing by getting them as newly hatched baby mons, but instead, we just got direct ownership of them via download rather than visiting and actually encountering them and then capturing them. Such a shame, especially considering that I actually like exploration of new places).

Try making one for the girls xD.

"And meanwhile, some of us exist to be turned into companions for said eternal 10-year-old," May says, glancing at Dawn and Serena.

"At least you three are treated as canon. I was dummied out of the original and only appeared in the remakes," 'Leaf' says.

Kris scoffs. "At least you appeared in a pair. I only appeared in a third version and was replaced by this somewhat similar girl whose clothing bares an odd resemblance to Mario..." Kris says.

xD

Yeah, lucky for Gold, Ash kept his original clothes xD. And for Brendan, Ash's Advance era clothing differed greatly from his (and remake Red's). Lucas-Nate are borderline. While Calem and 'Sun' are way more obvious.

That's hilarious xD

Poor 'Sun'... :P

Yeah, no kidding. They could have at least made them of equal standing to Ash, but no... they get filler stuff from the games.

I'm sorry, but Misty and to a lesser extent Iris at least have goals that theoretically COULD require you to beat the league with a type-exclusive team. May, Dawn and Serena don't. Let's hope that Lillie at least can pursue gyms knowing Ash won't need to challenge the ones in Kanto and Johto again. The closest Serena's got to a true game mechanic goal is those stupid Pokémon Musicals from Black and White, and even THAT's grossly outdated.

BTW, I know I said I'd hold off on getting any Pokémon games until I'm sure they don't screw up with Misty's return in some way, but I'm going to be making an exception with Pokémon Snap, and any other Pokémon stuff for the Wii console, and that's only because the Wii Shop Channel is going to be closing down soon, so I figured I might as well get those games and others while I still have that ability.

I should have some free time tomorrow and tuesday, so I'll try to reply then.

True... xD

Btw, I found this :3

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/436356651369616947/

Yeah, still getting used to this whole thing of only working at the hospital, plus they swapped my days back around again. It got me back on the schedule I wanted, but meant I went longer without a day off with the way the schedule weeks line up.

EDIT: Well, not entirely the schedule I wanted. I'm still on the overnight shift on weekends, and I'd rather be back on days, but oh well.

Thanks. Also, turns out there isn't a gold venom snake nameplate distribution thing (I suspected that might be a possibility, but I didn't find out until yesterday), so I might be able to watch those episodes on some other channel if they are found.


Yeah, good point (though I think they definitely screwed up there overall, mostly because Contests were a side quest in the game, not an actual goal. I mean, couldn't they at LEAST try to make her do something that, if it doesn't even match up with the ending of the game to the letter, then at least in spirit by having her be a type trainer?). Well, since Ash won't need to worry about redoing Kanto, I'm pretty sure she can do badges certainly.

And yeah, let's see how they handle Aya/Janine.

Man, this stinks, as I really wanted to watch Misty return. And now I can't do it because of some stupid copyright thing that the site is technically immune to (I mean, the CBS app has a similar problem, yet even that at least allows you to watch the entire current season rather than restricts you from watching only a few episodes of that season)? I just checked Netflix, and while they DO have streamings of the episodes, including 42, they're the Japanese episodes, not the English ones (I like Mayumi Iizuka's voice acting of Misty, and in fact, her Kasumi special narration of the Pallet Party Panic was pretty much one of the few things I made the effort to watch in Japanese, only other being the Ragnarok Core Record for MMZ4's radio dramas, but it really doesn't do well to watch the raw when you can't even understand what they're saying). Looks like I can't watch until Easter, since that's most likely when they're even going to allow those episodes to be viewable.


Probably is, but then again, they'd need to worry about making a new engine anyways, and since they're literally breezing right through Alola right now (I haven't seen a region go this fast since Kanto), they'd need to kill the time (especially when they haven't formally announced or even teased Generation 8, and believe me, if they were going to tease Generation 8, they probably would have done it by now, especially considering the likes of Destiny Deoxys where they outright hinted at Generation 4 with Munchlax, and that was before AG was even halfway through.).

And yeah, your proposition definitely sounds interesting as well, never did a female badge collector in Ash's group before (we COULD have gotten it with May, but she went for contests instead), and that definitely would spice things up a bit, and since Ash has already done Kanto and possibly even Johto if we revisit that, they don't need to worry about her upstaging Ash in the gyms. Of course, that's assuming the writers even are smart enough to realize the inherent potential regarding that plot. And it definitely would be interesting to see who would become Gym Leader of Fuschia City if Koga becomes an Elite 4 member, since Koga technically has two relatives. And since USUM, the whole Rainbow Rocket thing aside, doesn't seem to have anything akin to a Battle Frontier, I'm doubtful that Ash will just do the activity that USUM had.