Favorite main female companion

The only ones that should not return is Iris, Serena and Lillie.

Misty, May and Dawn are the best no matter some say. None of these three deserve to go into the dumps. To say that they do is untruthful.

Pinkie-Dawn said:

Easy, that would be Dawn.

Also, where are Mallow and Lana on this poll?

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Mallow and Lana aren't "main" females.

weedle_mchairybug said:

Yeah, it's stupid and a cheap attempt at ratings (not that it matters now, since it seems audiences in Japan have wised up to this going by how the ratings are hitting rock bottom right now, and AG actually came close to losing a huge amount of ratings and outright bombing, meaning even back then, they probably thought AG was stupid, and overall got even WORSE ratings than Johto, both on the American side and even the Japanese side of things.). I didn't like it when Heroes and West Wing pulled that kind of crap, or Supergirl, or any other franchises pulling that exact crap, do you REALLY think I'd even tolerate Pokémon doing that, ESPECIALLY given its status as a kids show? And quite frankly, I also didn't like how she outright hated Pokémon in the beginning. Well, May, if you hated Pokémon, why are you even GOING on a Pokémon Journey in the first place? Seems to downright disrespect the profession.

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What made May's Pokémon hatred even more stupid was the fact that she was the daughter of a Gym Leader. She should've logically grown up surrounded by Pokémon and Pokémon battling, so it made no sense for her to ever hate Pokémon.

Of course, it was never more than an excuse for her to go into contests and become a beauty queen instead of a battler, anyways. :rolleyes2:

weedle_mchairybug said:

And yeah, I hear ya. What's worse with Misty's situation is that, thanks to the writers apparently listening to the various vocal complaints about Togepi not doing anything at all, they started fresh and barring Pikachu had entirely new Pokémon, and more than that, managed to easily kick Gym Leader butt despite being outright rookies, thus making the Hoenn Gym Leaders at least as much of a bunch of butt monkeys as Team Rocket, which likewise causes the implication that Misty's basically going to get slaughtered by the gym challengers. Probably the only ones that did well are Roxanne due to fighting Pikachu and Brawley, probably the only Hoenn Gym Leader to actually BEAT Ash (I'm not counting Norman, since I suspect they only had him win against Ash because they wanted an excuse to have Ash go to the gym after that since, technically, he's not the actual first Gym Leader).

Heck, probably the only thing that makes it even worse is their keeping Brock on, especially when he if anything has far MORE of a reason to take over the gym than Misty does, considering his family was so grossly incompetent at maintaining the gym that even Misty's Sisters look like professionals by comparison. Honestly, if I wanted to see a series for shameless fanservice and ditzy girls played humorously, I would have gone for Love Hina or even Battle Vixens, NOT go for Pokémon.

And despite all the petitions and even our warning the writers about the consequences, they outright ignored us. And they didn't even bother to allow Misty and Brock into the 20th anniversary movie, probably the ONE time having them appear DEFINITELY would have been justified. They couldn't even get Misty into that Pokémon World Conference due to skipping it altogether, despite such a thing actually BEING in the games. All we ask right now is to give Misty actual closure for her goal.

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Yeah, it's pretty obvious that Misty's goal wasn't to sit inside a gym all day and be a punching bag for rookies. If being a Gym Leader was all she wanted to be, then she would've never left Cerulean to travel in the first place. It's far more likely that E4 level was what she aspired to, especially considering her idolization of Lorelei.

weedle_mchairybug said:

Maybe if May, Dawn, heck, even Serena were Coordinators/Performers in the games, I'd be a bit more forgiving. Heck, even having Contests/Performances be actual goals for the games directly tied to the story and leading to a happy ending and being an actual career choice in the game would have made them a bit more tolerable. As it is, though, most of us fans, either male in my case, or especially female, would literally not be able to follow them especially if we are to play the games, since we can't do contests beyond as a side quest in the games, leaving gyms the only true option to beating the game.

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What makes it even worse is that the show is pretty much the only place where female player characters get any attention, however poor. All of the other animated specials (like Origins, Generations, and the B2W2/ORAS trailers), as well as the various manga, primarily focus on the male PCs, so most of the time, it's either be a contest bimbo on Ash's show or get nothing at all (see Green, Hilda, and Moon). :(

BettyNewbie said:

What made May's Pokémon hatred even more stupid was the fact that she was the daughter of a Gym Leader. She should've logically grown up surrounded by Pokémon and Pokémon battling, so it made no sense for her to ever hate Pokémon.

Of course, it was never more than an excuse for her to go into contests and become a beauty queen instead of a battler, anyways. :rolleyes2:

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Yeah, that and a cheap attempt at character development (Misty had that department down far better, anyways). Probably another reason I don't like May at all involves Manaphy, especially regarding Misty and Togepi. I get that egg gets a lot of bad rap for allegedly "not doing anything" or "ruining Misty" (I personally actually don't mind Misty getting Togepi or their relationship, but nonetheless...), but at least with Misty and Togepi, if Togepi ever found itself in danger, Misty's ALWAYS there to find it or save it. May, on the other hand, when she had that chance to be a similar good mother to Manaphy, she actually let Phantom outright abduct it and stand there like a coward, not making ANY attempt to save what was essentially her child. And then when Ash reveals he survived and essentially went Super Saiyan thanks to the Sea Crown, she STILL doesn't make any attempt to save her kid, just boarding the sub. Seriously... this was meant to be her movie, and because she chose to act like a coward and make zero attempt to save what is essentially her own son, Ash ended up saving the day again?! Granted, I wasn't happy that she got the starring role in that movie (quite frankly, it should have been Misty in that starring role, even if it meant only bringing her back temporarily, considering that's closer to Misty's forte compared to May's), but I could have forgiven that if May at LEAST tried to be a good mother, including actually trying her darned hardest, use everything at her disposal, to outright save Manaphy when he was abducted. The fact that she didn't even do THAT just... ugh.

Yeah, it's pretty obvious that Misty's goal wasn't to sit inside a gym all day and be a punching bag for rookies. If being a Gym Leader was all she wanted to be, then she would've never left Cerulean to travel in the first place. It's far more likely that E4 level was what she aspired to, especially considering her idolization of Lorelei.

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Yeah, and it also doesn't help that thanks to AG, the gym leaders came across as being as big of weaklings as JJM were, which also proceeded to make Misty look bad as well. Say what you will about the Kanto gym leaders during the Indigo League, or even the Johto gym leaders during the Johto saga, at least those guys, Misty's sisters aside, came across as quite badass even IF they ultimately paled in comparison to the Elite 4. What's worse, even the last time we ever actually see her in the flesh had her implying she didn't even WANT to go back to the gym, but then Daisy pretty much threatened to hand out badges if she didn't comply. That's not even remotely a good end for her at all, and I get very irritated when people who are otherwise massive Misty fans imply that Misty got a good end when she became Gym Leader since she's at least "doing something." Is being a punching bag, and her not even liking the experience at all, even WORTH giving her at least some abilities beyond being Ash's support (ignoring of course she did PLENTY of stuff outside of simply being Ash's "girlfriend" anyway.).

What makes it even worse is that the show is pretty much the only place where female player characters get any attention, however poor. All of the other animated specials (like Origins, Generations, and the B2W2/ORAS trailers), as well as the various manga, primarily focus on the male PCs, so most of the time, it's either be a contest bimbo on Ash's show or get nothing at all (see Green, Hilda, and Moon). :(

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There's Pokémon Special, but yeah. I'm not asking that they go the Rey route, I wouldn't want that either. But, for goodness sakes, since it's a franchise dedicated to trainers battling as a key component, couldn't they at LEAST have May, Dawn, and Serena actually TRY to be trainers first and foremost, and maybe do contests/performances as a side hobby? That would better reflect the games, anyways.

To be fair to Leaf, she only appeared in the remake, so it's not like they could bring her in anyways. But yeah, Hilda and Moon definitely got screwed over.

We might want to take it to my VM, though, just in case the mods get irritated by our conversation.

Why should all of Ash's companions be doing what he does? His companions have the right to choose their own path. If they want to do contests then who are we to judge. Female companions should not be Ash 2.0. They should be original. The first three female companions have proved that.

weedle_mchairybug said:

Yeah, and it also doesn't help that thanks to AG, the gym leaders came across as being as big of weaklings as JJM were, which also proceeded to make Misty look bad as well. Say what you will about the Kanto gym leaders during the Indigo League, or even the Johto gym leaders during the Johto saga, at least those guys, Misty's sisters aside, came across as quite badass even IF they ultimately paled in comparison to the Elite 4. What's worse, even the last time we ever actually see her in the flesh had her implying she didn't even WANT to go back to the gym, but then Daisy pretty much threatened to hand out badges if she didn't comply. That's not even remotely a good end for her at all, and I get very irritated when people who are otherwise massive Misty fans imply that Misty got a good end when she became Gym Leader since she's at least "doing something." Is being a punching bag, and her not even liking the experience at all, even WORTH giving her at least some abilities beyond being Ash's support (ignoring of course she did PLENTY of stuff outside of simply being Ash's "girlfriend" anyway.).

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I totally agree with this. Misty didn't want to be stuck in some gym as a punching bag, and I never liked how the show used the gym to force Misty out of the cast instead of just having her go off to travel on her own.

That's probably the thing that bothers me the most about Misty's exit compared to any of the other companions. She's the only one who didn't leave on her own free will and was literally kicked out of the show. Talk about a lack of respect for her character. :rolleyes2:

Alexander18 said:

Why should all of Ash's companions be doing what he does? His companions have the right to choose their own path. If they want to do contests then who are we to judge. Female companions should not be Ash 2.0. They should be original. The first three female companions have proved that.

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It's one thing for an individual girl to shun battles and become a beauty queen, but it's another for almost *all* of them to go down that route. That smacks of sexism.

Misty was a battler, but she was far from being an "Ash 2.0." Her goal was still very different from his, and the other girls could've also been given roles that were different from his, but still involved battling rather than playing dress-up.

BettyNewbie said:

It's one thing for an individual girl to shun battles and become a beauty queen, but it's another for almost *all* of them to go down that route. That smacks of sexism.

Misty was a battler, but she was far from being an "Ash 2.0." Her goal was still very different from his, and the other girls could've also been given roles that were different from his, but still involved battling rather than playing dress-up.

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I don't see any sexism in that. I think people just say that because they are salty that there hasn't been a battler since Misty.

The are plenty female battlers even if they not the companion. I think they want the female companions to show case the features that also appear in the games such as contests.

I don't see a problem to be honest but to each his own. I just hope gen 8 finally gives us a good female companion. Had not got one since Dawn but that is my opinion.

Alexander18 said:

Why should all of Ash's companions be doing what he does? His companions have the right to choose their own path. If they want to do contests then who are we to judge. Female companions should not be Ash 2.0. They should be original. The first three female companions have proved that.

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You mean the first two companions because Dawn is a May 2.0 but with more character development than her.

Apparently, this person's been banned now, but I still want to address this:

I don't see any sexism in that. I think people just say that because they are salty that there hasn't been a battler since Misty.

The are plenty female battlers even if they not the companion. I think they want the female companions to show case the features that also appear in the games such as contests.

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It should be very obvious that the show used contests as a "girl ghetto" alternative to badges. They put more focus on fashion and beauty over battling (thus, sending home the message that girls exist to look pretty), and they're treated as "equivalent" to the gym quest while in reality being far more trivial and less important. In the games, contests are little more than a frivolous sidequest that's 100% optional and will never lead to an end credit screen like beating the Champion.

Yes, there have been male coordinators on the show, but they were all secondary characters, they were all overtly effeminate, and they were still outnumbered by female coordinators. It's plainly obvious that contests are considered a traditionally female domain, and it *is* sexist to constantly see female characters on the show being reduced to a lesser occupation that revolves entirely around beauty and places less importance on traits like strength and intelligence.

As I've said before in the thread, I'm not asking that every girl be a tomboy. I'm simply asking that girls on this show not be objects and actually show brains and ambition. That's my problem with May, Dawn, and Serena. They existed to be objects, pretty little girls who never threatened or otherwise challenged Ash and happily stuck to their "place" as coordinators/performers.

You have a point regarding Coordinators.

Except for maybe Zoey, Ash himself was the most conventionally "masculine" character we ever saw participate in a Contest.

BettyNewbie said:

Apparently, this person's been banned now, but I still want to address this:



It should be very obvious that the show used contests as a "girl ghetto" alternative to badges. They put more focus on fashion and beauty over battling (thus, sending home the message that girls exist to look pretty), and they're treated as "equivalent" to the gym quest while in reality being far more trivial and less important. In the games, contests are little more than a frivolous sidequest that's 100% optional and will never lead to an end credit screen like beating the Champion.

Yes, there have been male coordinators on the show, but they were all secondary characters, they were all overtly effeminate, and they were still outnumbered by female coordinators. It's plainly obvious that contests are considered a traditionally female domain, and it *is* sexist to constantly see female characters on the show being reduced to a lesser occupation that revolves entirely around beauty and places less importance on traits like strength and intelligence.

As I've said before in the thread, I'm not asking that every girl be a tomboy. I'm simply asking that girls on this show not be objects and actually show brains and ambition. That's my problem with May, Dawn, and Serena. They existed to be objects, pretty little girls who never threatened or otherwise challenged Ash and happily stuck to their "place" as coordinators/performers.

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Fully agreed there. If the games DID portray them as being an equivalent to Gym Battles, right down to actually unlocking the ending if you beat something akin to the Elite 4, that's ONE thing, and I could at least tolerate it. But that's not what it did. You could skip it without it even impacting the story at all. At most, the only relevancy Contests have is evolving your Feebas into a Milotic simply to get its Pokedex entry (which is a notorious pain in the butt to do since you need to find the specific nature of Feebas you need), and even there, Contests don't even play a direct role in the evolution. You could just feed them a whole lot of the relevant berries and, voila, you got yourself a Milotic.

And quite frankly, having them focus solely on beauty doesn't work well at all in showing the girls' strengths and intelligence as you pointed out. Even though I'm personally not particularly fond of the Disney Princess franchise as a whole for similar reasons as to what you yourself stated regarding May, Dawn, and Serena, at least the individual members of the franchise had various traits beyond simply being beautiful that made them endearing to various people, including intellect, perserverence even when the odds look bleak, bravery, innocence, and in some cases like Ariel being a genuine badass who kicked butt and took names (and BTW, other than Belle and Merida, a lot of the girls were very feminine in that franchise, yet they still managed to be endearing to a whole LOT of people, not just girls). And let's not forget about Dead or Alive. Even the girls there ultimately showed traits beyond merely looking beautiful (and believe me, considering how famous, or rather, infamous the series is regarding how the girls looked, that's saying a lot), especially intellect regarding strategy and battle, and ambition/perserverence. Even Honoka, arguably the girliest of the DOA females, at least had her just enjoying watching or even participating in fights as a key personality trait for her beyond simply being girly. And the girls there also embraced their femininity as well. If even Team Ninja could get it right, why can't the Pok?mon anime creators regarding the girls after Misty?

And yeah, agreed there, it's hard for us guys to even get involved in contests when they literally just aren't our thing. The only consistently present male coordinator who is even remotely masculine is that Salaryman guy, and even there, considering he randomly changes appearance, it's not even clear if he's the same guy every time. I'm not counting Ash since he only did a one-off contest with May as their "farewell." And another thing that annoyed me with all the girls after Misty is that many of them joined up with Ash when they could easily just travel by themselves. Misty at least had something of an excuse, as did Iris. Probably the closest any of the girls have besides those two that actually HAS a somewhat valid reason for traveling with Ash is Serena.

weedle_mchairybug said:

I'm not counting Ash since he only did a one-off contest with May as their "farewell."

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Ash also took part in two contests in Sinnoh: the Jubilife Contest, and the Wallace Cup.

Rad Dudesman said:

Ash also took part in two contests in Sinnoh: the Jubilife Contest, and the Wallace Cup.

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Okay, I stand corrected then. Still, it wasn't something he generally had much interest in.

Its true that contests are primarily a Female thing(heck the Kalos showcases are exclusively Female...) but the fact they're predominantly Female doesn't make them(May, Dawn and Serena) any less important to the Anime. The games center around the Gym/League arc that Ash takes the lead in doing as the Male protagonist so they give the Female lead the leftovers or all the new side challenges and oddities the newer generation games now have. What they ought to do is give a Female lead the same interests that Ash has in challenging the Gym's and corresponding League, thereby giving him a Female traveling companion who is also his regional rival.

Instead of doing the performer arc that was a neutered form of Pokemon Contests(basically performing without any battling), Serena would have been better served to have adopted the Gym arc like Ash. Not only would it finally give us a strong Female protagonist(Misty was decent, with Iris slightly better in that she actually defeated Ash to win a Tournament. But neither of them did Gym's. Rather they were Gym Leaders instead). With Serena on the Gym arc, it would have been interesting to see how she handled having a crush on Ash while pursuing her dream of winning the Kalos League(hence having to balance love and rivalry, not to mention fighting Ash for Pokemon to catch).

Had they gone that route, Serena would have been the Trainer Ash faced in the Kalos League Finals and Ash would have won like we all wanted him to(with Serena indifferent as she wins either way(namely she wins the Kalos League or her crush does)). Not saying they did anything wrong with Serena in XY(I'm perfectly fine with the Performer Arc... just wish it didn't take her 60 freaking Episodes to finally have her debut).

I should probably clarify that I'm a she and not a he. My avatar is Lance because I'm a huge fan of him. :P

weedle_mchairybug said:

Fully agreed there. If the games DID portray them as being an equivalent to Gym Battles, right down to actually unlocking the ending if you beat something akin to the Elite 4, that's ONE thing, and I could at least tolerate it. But that's not what it did. You could skip it without it even impacting the story at all. At most, the only relevancy Contests have is evolving your Feebas into a Milotic simply to get its Pokedex entry (which is a notorious pain in the butt to do since you need to find the specific nature of Feebas you need), and even there, Contests don't even play a direct role in the evolution. You could just feed them a whole lot of the relevant berries and, voila, you got yourself a Milotic.

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And, Contests are only relevant to Feebas' evolution in Gens 3/4 and ORAS. In all of the other games released since Gen 5, it evolves by being traded with the Prism Scale instead. And, why, because those games don't have Contests (and thus no way to increase its Beauty stat), so GF needed to create a new way for Feebas to evolve.

What does that say about Contests' importance to the franchise when GF was so easily able to dump them after Gen 4? And, seeing as none of the post-Gen 4 games have had Contests besides the remakes of games that originally had Contests (ORAS), it doesn't look like GF has any intention of ever bringing them back.

weedle_mchairybug said:

And quite frankly, having them focus solely on beauty doesn't work well at all in showing the girls' strengths and intelligence as you pointed out. Even though I'm personally not particularly fond of the Disney Princess franchise as a whole for similar reasons as to what you yourself stated regarding May, Dawn, and Serena, at least the individual members of the franchise had various traits beyond simply being beautiful that made them endearing to various people, including intellect, perserverence even when the odds look bleak, bravery, innocence, and in some cases like Ariel being a genuine badass who kicked butt and took names (and BTW, other than Belle and Merida, a lot of the girls were very feminine in that franchise, yet they still managed to be endearing to a whole LOT of people, not just girls). And let's not forget about Dead or Alive. Even the girls there ultimately showed traits beyond merely looking beautiful (and believe me, considering how famous, or rather, infamous the series is regarding how the girls looked, that's saying a lot), especially intellect regarding strategy and battle, and ambition/perserverence. Even Honoka, arguably the girliest of the DOA females, at least had her just enjoying watching or even participating in fights as a key personality trait for her beyond simply being girly. And the girls there also embraced their femininity as well. If even Team Ninja could get it right, why can't the Pok?mon anime creators regarding the girls after Misty?

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Fully agree. {:3} Nothing about femininity is incompatible with strength and intelligence, and May/Dawn/Serena being girlier than Misty wouldn't have been a problem if there were more to them than just being fanservicey beauty queens and "waifus." Just look at what Dawn and Serena themselves do when they're actual player characters -- take down the Evil Team and become Champion, all while still wearing a miniskirt/dress.

In a lot of ways, what happened with May is far worse than Dawn/Serena, as May's original design was hardly girly, and early artwork of her mostly portrayed her as a strong, heroic character. Combine that with the fact that May was the first female protagonist to debut in a generation (Kris came first, but she was a mid-generation addition), and that the games went out of their way to portray the male PC as an ignorant sexist when you played as May, and it's evident that GF wanted May to be seen as a strong role model for girls.

Then the show gave May an oversized chest and turned her into an annoying bimbo who preferred contests to battling, and the rest was history. GF already started to subtly redesign game!May to look girlier (and more in line with her anime counterpart) in Emerald by putting her in a minidress, and they went full-blown with it in ORAS by giving her an extremely frilly (and skinny) new look and having her prance around in a pink tutu when doing Contests.

weedle_mchairybug said:

And another thing that annoyed me with all the girls after Misty is that many of them joined up with Ash when they could easily just travel by themselves. Misty at least had something of an excuse, as did Iris. Probably the closest any of the girls have besides those two for traveling with Ash is Serena.

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And, Serena's reason revolved entirely around a crush (which was clearly done for marketing/fanservice purposes, like loads of other things in the XY arc), which doesn't exactly reflect well on her. Misty may have had a crush on Ash, but there was still more to her character. She still had her own backstory and goal that existed separately from Ash's.

CodeHelmet said:

What they ought to do is give a Female lead the same interests that Ash has in challenging the Gym's and corresponding League, thereby giving him a Female traveling companion who is also his regional rival.

Instead of doing the performer arc that was a neutered form of Pokemon Contests(basically performing without any battling), Serena would have been better served to have adopted the Gym arc like Ash. Not only would it finally give us a strong Female protagonist(Misty was decent, with Iris slightly better in that she actually defeated Ash to win a Tournament. But neither of them did Gym's. Rather they were Gym Leaders instead). With Serena on the Gym arc, it would have been interesting to see how she handled having a crush on Ash while pursuing her dream of winning the Kalos League(hence having to balance love and rivalry, not to mention fighting Ash for Pokemon to catch).

Had they gone that route, Serena would have been the Trainer Ash faced in the Kalos League Finals and Ash would have won like we all wanted him to(with Serena indifferent as she wins either way(namely she wins the Kalos League or her crush does)). Not saying they did anything wrong with Serena in XY(I'm perfectly fine with the Performer Arc... just wish it didn't take her 60 freaking Episodes to finally have her debut).

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I love this idea. The Kalos games don't even have Contests, so it didn't even make sense from a marketing perspective to create a form of pseudo-Contests and make Serena another performer/beauty queen. Serena is a rival when you don't play has her, so why not give her a role that actually reflected the one she had in the games? It would've made for far more interesting storytelling, too.

You're taking things way too seriously guys... Remember, this is a simple poll thread. Also, this is the anime, which means it's different than the Pokemon games, so please don't compare it. One last thing, I don't want to see any post again regarding May's chest or something like this please.

Does Lillie represent the entirety of the SM female supporting cast? There are three of them to be fair XD

I'd Argue Mao and Suiren over her any day... tho Lillie has the most character development over the three of them so far.

yo i voted misty

CidHazard said:

Does Lillie represent the entirety of the SM female supporting cast? There are three of them to be fair XD

I'd Argue Mao and Suiren over her any day... tho Lillie has the most character development over the three of them so far.

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Ah, translation on who Mao and Suiren are?

CidHazard said:

Does Lillie represent the entirety of the SM female supporting cast? There are three of them to be fair XD

I'd Argue Mao and Suiren over her any day... tho Lillie has the most character development over the three of them so far.

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No, Lillie is just Lillie.

Mallow and Lana are more like supporting characters. Only Lillie is really a "main" character.