Pokemon Sun and Moon Anime Discussion

[Rhaynebow]

Hm..it makes me wonder how the ratings for SM are in Japan. Over here, if you look past the critics hating the show for its art style, people who judge the tone of the show say that SM is copying Yokai Watch’s slice of life tone, which is why they took the Pokémon School concept, and ran with it going so far as introducing a never used idea of Ash and the others having a home base.

While a 10 year old going to school is honestly a lot more believable than a 10 year old traveling an archipelago, slice of life is pretty much the opposite of adventure and the Pokémon Anime was ABOUT the adventure. Having the characters travel to new places, meeting new people for brief moments before each going their own way.

Seeing Ash running late for school, watching Detective shows with Rotom and doing laundry may be something new, but I wouldn’t say that it’s exciting. What, now his Mom doesn’t have to ask if he’s changing his underwear? Is that we gain? It keeps giving me Steven Universe vibes where we have to watch every episode with the hope that maybe Ash’s Island Challenge will be addressed this episode. The games treat the Island Challenge like a right of passage, but here, it’s like a tourist trap; collect all of the stamps from the character stations and you get a prize. Of course Ash isn’t treating it with a sense of excitement. His focus this season seems to be him being the very best STUDENT like no one ever was.


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[Light Lucario]

Hm..it makes me wonder how the ratings for SM are in Japan. Over here, if you look past the critics hating the show for its art style, people who judge the tone of the show say that SM is copying Yokai Watch’s slice of life tone, which is why they took the Pokémon School concept, and ran with it going so far as introducing a never used idea of Ash and the others having a home base.

While a 10 year old going to school is honestly a lot more believable than a 10 year old traveling an archipelago, slice of life is pretty much the opposite of adventure and the Pokémon Anime was ABOUT the adventure. Having the characters travel to new places, meeting new people for brief moments before each going their own way.

I've seen the comparison with Yokai Watch before, but I don't know how accurate that claim is. I couldn't sit through one episode of Yokai Watch and the humor felt much more immature, although the later could easily be due to the dub rather than the show itself. SM has more over the top humor and expressions, but it never made me think of Yokai Watch, aside from Rotom Dex. It is still weird to see Ash stay in primarily one place and I do understand why it would bother other people more. Going on an adventure has been a core aspect of the anime and for the franchise itself. Characters always go on a journey and the games have made a big deal about a Pokemon journey basically being a way for children to grow in particular.

Despite the lack of a traditional adventure format, SM still feels like a Pokemon series. The focus is still on the trainers and their Pokemon. Even with my complaints about the lack of focus and Trials in mind, it doesn't feel like they're wasting time exactly. There aren't a lot of filler episodes in the series. Most episodes tend to focus on Ash, his Pokemon and/or his friends to some significant degree.

Seeing Ash running late for school, watching Detective shows with Rotom and doing laundry may be something new, but I wouldn’t say that it’s exciting. What, now his Mom doesn’t have to ask if he’s changing his underwear? Is that we gain? It keeps giving me Steven Universe vibes where we have to watch every episode with the hope that maybe Ash’s Island Challenge will be addressed this episode. The games treat the Island Challenge like a right of passage, but here, it’s like a tourist trap; collect all of the stamps from the character stations and you get a prize. Of course Ash isn’t treating it with a sense of excitement. His focus this season seems to be him being the very best STUDENT like no one ever was.


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At least Steven Universe started out a more light hearted series that used its slice of life episodes to build to its storyline. The same doesn't really work too well with Pokemon. I disagree that Ash's focus in this series is to be the best student. I don't think that neither the school or the Island Challenge could be his main goal of the series. The Trials are considered a rite of passage in the game, but they're ignored too often to be Ash's goal in the show. One would think that means that Ash's goal is to graduate, but I don't think that's the case either. The Pokemon School is primarily used for the background or as a lead way for other events to happen, such as the whole Kanto field trip. Ash goes to school now, but we don't really see what he's learning or how it offers him more than if he was traveling around the region like he normally does. It isn't treated much better than the Island Challenge in terms of Ash's motivation. It just has the main advantage of being the main setting for the series, so it's going to show up/be mentioned a lot more frequently.

The fact that I genuinely don't know what Ash's goal is for his Alola journey is both extremely weird and confusing. It can't be the Trials or the Pokemon School because of how they're handled, so it seems to be focused more on the light-hearted adventures with Ash and his new friends. If I didn't enjoy most of the episodes, that would bother me more than it does. It is a fun series and I do like most of the main cast, but this has been a problem for me for quite awhile.

 

[Rhaynebow]

Get ready for the next arc folks, cause I sure ain’t lol

I’m personally probably gonna sign off on watching the anime until the next region at this point. I held out til the end of the Lusamine arc, but I just don’t think I can last another arc of the characters never seeing the rest of the Alolan cities and tripping into Island Challenges when they remember that exists, now in addition to catching the Ultra Beasts. Plus, we JUST had an arc with Ash paling around with a cute baby-god, granted Poipole isn’t a god, but it’s another ‘one of a kind’ Pokémon that humans wouldn’t have on their shoulder.

It looks like a neat arc, but I’m not interested. Have fun guys!


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[Dudley]

Wait, they’re no longer doing challenges, and he’s not traveling the other islands?
I don’t mind Ash going to school and having a home base, but he should still be exploring all of Alola to capture and battle Pokemon and their trainers and do their equivalent of Gym battles. I mean it’s not like he has to travel far.


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[CyberCubed]

Mallow/Lillie must be the main ship of SM, this isn't the first time they've been holding hands and this is on the promotional poster now.

 

[Rhaynebow]

Wait, they’re no longer doing challenges, and he’s not traveling the other islands?
I don’t mind Ash going to school and having a home base, but he should still be exploring all of Alola to capture and battle Pokemon and their trainers and do their equivalent of Gym battles. I mean it’s not like he has to travel far.


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I mean, I’m positive the show is still doing the challenges, but it’s pretty well established that it’s not crucial as Ash has not technically completed some of them. I think the show treats Ash’s Island Challenge as him beating the Kahunas and getting the Z crystals for the Pokémon he has. With his still quite empty team, Ash only has to get flying, fire, dark and ghost type Z crystals and that’s IF his Rowlet and Litten evolve (and a CoroCoro scan confirmed one of these guys will be). But since Z crystals in this show are treated with a little bit more sacredness, I doubt Ash will have a fire crystal if Kiawe has one. If Kiawe gets a ghost one for his Marowak, take that away from Ash too and moreorless confirm that his Rowlet will not be evolving.

As for traveling, I still have no idea why this show insists on not showing the rest of Alola. They showed a small pinch of Paniola Town where Kiawe lives, but other than that, Hau’oli is the only place we’ve seen. They can afford class trips to whole different region, but not a trip to Malie City?


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[Light Lucario]

Wait, they’re no longer doing challenges, and he’s not traveling the other islands?
I don’t mind Ash going to school and having a home base, but he should still be exploring all of Alola to capture and battle Pokemon and their trainers and do their equivalent of Gym battles. I mean it’s not like he has to travel far.


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Well the show has been basically treating the Island Challenge as an afterthought. Despite being the Alola version of the Gym badge quest, Ash's motivation for doing the Trials comes and goes at the drop of a hat. The Trials will rarely come up, he doesn't do as much training or battling with his team compared to some other series and he'll only want to do the Trials to get new Z-Crystals in order to do more Z-Moves. He doesn't even have to do all eight Trials. They've skipped over other Trials for some of his friends, which helps to give the other characters more focus, but it does make it more confusing on what Ash needs to do to complete his Island Challenge.

The lack of traveling around Alola is kind of weird when that is a pretty key aspect of not just the anime, but the franchise in general. Practically everything in the franchise revolves around the characters going on a journey of some kind. They haven't been interested in exploring much of Alola, which is a shame considering it is so nice in the games and they could afford to go to different islands. While I enjoy SM, the lack of a clear sense of focus or purpose behind Ash's Alola journey is arguably the biggest problem I have with the series. It seems like they just want Ash and his friends to have light hearted adventures in Alola, which are usually pretty entertaining, but it does make it more confusing as to why he has to be at the school instead of traveling around or how this provides any kind of progression for his goal. He still wants to become a Pokemon Master and has mentioned that during this series a few times, so it's not like he's taking a break from his goal while being in Alola.

Mallow/Lillie must be the main ship of SM, this isn't the first time they've been holding hands and this is on the promotional poster now.

Well I guess that's one way to look at their relationship. It's not the first time I've heard of people pairing them together, but I don't really see it. They had some nice interactions earlier in the series to showcase their friendship, but nothing noteworthy has happened between them in ages. It probably doesn't help that Mallow is one of the more boring characters in the main cast. I also don't see how two girls holding hands while they're scared of Ultra Beasts around them in a promotional poster translates into being the main ship of the series. It is kind of strange that I haven't seen a lot of Ash pairings with the girls of this series though. It's practically a tradition to pair Ash with the new female lead of a new series, but he hasn't really had a lot of noteworthy interactions between any of the female leads and I'm sure a lot of people still favor his pairing with Serena as well.

I mean, I’m positive the show is still doing the challenges, but it’s pretty well established that it’s not crucial as Ash has not technically completed some of them. I think the show treats Ash’s Island Challenge as him beating the Kahunas and getting the Z crystals for the Pokémon he has. With his still quite empty team, Ash only has to get flying, fire, dark and ghost type Z crystals and that’s IF his Rowlet and Litten evolve (and a CoroCoro scan confirmed one of these guys will be). But since Z crystals in this show are treated with a little bit more sacredness, I doubt Ash will have a fire crystal if Kiawe has one. If Kiawe gets a ghost one for his Marowak, take that away from Ash too and moreorless confirm that his Rowlet will not be evolving.

As for traveling, I still have no idea why this show insists on not showing the rest of Alola. They showed a small pinch of Paniola Town where Kiawe lives, but other than that, Hau’oli is the only place we’ve seen. They can afford class trips to whole different region, but not a trip to Malie City?


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I wouldn't be surprised if Rowlet doesn't evolve even if Kiawe doesn't get the Ghost type Z-Crystal for his Marowak. They seem to really like using Rowlet sleeping all the time for comedy relief. It can be funny and cute, but it's also annoying how virtually useless Rowlet can be because of falling asleep all the time. In other series, this would be treated more of a flaw than a cute gag. I still remember how annoyed I was that Rowlet couldn't fly up a small hill to get one low hanging berry for Ash's Trial on Akala Island. That was when the gag really started to bother me.

I still hope that Ash will capture a Dewpider. It would be a unique Water type for his team, he hasn't had a Bug type Pokemon for quite awhile and he could get the Bug type Z-Crystal considering that Lana and her Popplio have the Water type Z-Crystal. The preview does indicate that Ash will capture an Ultra Beast, which would be pretty neat too. He hasn't captured anything new in a long time and that does make his team seem more empty as a result. He as two open slots, but nothing has happened for his team since his Rockruff evolved.

 

[Checkerboard]

Maybe he's not traveling as much because there's no place for him to go anymore? I don't follow the games, but how many regions are left to explore? Could it be they are waiting with the anime for new regions for the games to be created which they could then later visit?

 

[Dudley]

I think avoiding having him explore the various locations or take the challenges seriously is just them really wanting to do something different.
I mean think about it, each region/generation storyline is basically the same and you can expect certain things to happen. After 20 years, they decided to change things up. At least now there won’t be some League to prepare for that Ash will end up losing.


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[Light Lucario]

Maybe he's not traveling as much because there's no place for him to go anymore? I don't follow the games, but how many regions are left to explore? Could it be they are waiting with the anime for new regions for the games to be created which they could then later visit?

I don't think that would be the reason. They don't just wait until a few more regions have been made for Ash to travel through them. They always have him travel through the newest region to promote the newest games. Waiting until a few regions are made before Ash travels through them would be really counterproductive considering that each generation lasts at least three years. They aren't going to have Ash wait that long to travel through another region. Besides that, that wouldn't explain why they aren't exploring Alola in the anime, especially when traveling through it to complete the Island Challenge is a big aspect of the video games.

I think avoiding having him explore the various locations or take the challenges seriously is just them really wanting to do something different.
I mean think about it, each region/generation storyline is basically the same and you can expect certain things to happen. After 20 years, they decided to change things up. At least now there won’t be some League to prepare for that Ash will end up losing.

Each series does tend to provide some new ideas or storylines for the other characters though. The anime, like the franchise itself, is repetitive, but I think that there are some pretty key differences with each series to where they aren't just basically the same thing. You can expect certain things to happen, but it's not like every series is the exact same. This is a bit more drastic change, especially with the character design that people got really annoyed over, but I don't think that this is the first time in twenty years that they decided to change things up. They change things up with every series.

There probably will be an Alola League though. In the games, you go through the Pokemon League to become the first Champion of Alola. Plus, Professor Kukui mentioned that he really wants to bring the Pokemon League to Alola right before Ash and his friends left Kanto. I don't know how they'll incorporate the Alola League, especially when the Island Challenge itself hasn't been focused on that much and Ash doesn't even have a full team at this point of the series, but they'll probably find some way to include the Alola League now that they brought it up in the series.

 

[PF9]

I think the Kanto episodes have been the highlight of the Sun and Moon series. As a Pokeshipper, I really loved seeing Misty again.

 

[CyberCubed]

Oddly enough I feel Misty works better with SM Ash because he's somewhat kid-ish again like he was in Kanto. I always thought AG Ash and Misty's interactions were rather bland, because they were both matured in that series so they didn't act the same. Probably didn't help matters Misty and Ash didn't even interact all that much in her cameos.

SM Ash and Misty acted more like their Kanto selves, so their dynamic was much funner again. I guess it goes to prove Misty's character works better in comical seasons, outside of them not so much.

 

[Radical]

So enjoyed the great Kanto episodes, cool to see Misty/Brock return as much as I enjoy the classic Pokemon when it first came when it got really popular, hehehe.

Cool seeing Lusamine appear in the anime, both Lusamine, Professor Burnet, and Wicke were great interesting new female characters, loved Lusamine, has a sweet character design and her psychopathic villainous role in the Pokemon Sun and Moon videogame was awesome.

Faba, my favorite great new ruthless villain, I knew he was evil when he first showed up from his slimey hostile behavior.Loved it when he got defeated, hehehe.

Nebby was cute/awesome after Meloetta/Squishy, has a sweet design.

Lillie's major focus/character development along with getting over her fear and touch/love Pokemon was amazing, still my favorite awesome female companion.Glazio the best brother on protecting Lillie, Glazio still reminds me of Alain(my favorite new character), his Silvadi is so awesome/strong.

Uturoid was an awesome interesting deadly jellyfish-like Ultra Beast, has a cool design.

Both Solgaleo/Lunala are cool/interesting and the Altar of the Sunne is pretty interesting.

Jangmo-o, Hakamo-o, and Kommo-o are awesome new Dragon Pokemon.

Cool seeing the Kapu-Pokemon, love Kapu-Tetefu, its so cute.

Loved the great Lusamine arc, I'll enjoy the next great arc.

 

[PF9]

I'd like the series to explore Human/Pokemon relations more

 

[Rhaynebow]

Bumping the thread here because after all of these years, Pokémon’s got a banned episode!

https://gamerant.com/pokemon-sun-moon-anime-episode-ban/

Somewhat understandable although it sucks that after the Jynx fiasco, Japan would maybe know NOT to put black makeup on a white face. Let’s just hope Ash doesn’t go back and catch one of the Passimian.


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[Light Lucario]

I heard about the episode being skipped, but I wasn't sure if that confirmed if it was banned. While I didn't think of blackface when I first saw images of Ash dressing up as a Passimian, I can see why it could be potentially problematic. Plus, the whole Jynx situation is the second most well known controversy within the series. The Porygon episode would be the most well known and biggest controversy for the series. Since both of those controversies still affect the anime to this day, especially the Porygon event, I can't really blame TPCI for wanting to avoid another potential problem.

They could have edited Ash's face paint so it wouldn't be similar to black face, but it might not have been worthwhile to do that for what is basically a filler episode. They had to do some major edits for Lenora's design back in BW because of how her original outfit could also make people think of the mammy racist imagery, but those episodes were more of a necessity. Skipping Gym battle episodes definitely would leave fans even more confused than when Ash suddenly got thirty Tauros. Since I'm sure that TPCI is more aware of what happens during a series' future episodes than 4Kids were, I don't think that they'd ban this episode if they knew Ash would go back to catch one of the Passimian. It's still too bad to skip/ban another episode, but it is pretty understandable all things considered.

 

[jaylop97]

It's been a long time since the English dub has skipped an episode without it being skipped in Japan as well. I also agree with this being an understandable case over the episode being avoided by TPCI, they usually have a good reasoning behind cases like these and in more recent years they usually would change some situations by changing some lines or editing like in Black in White. In this case it didn't seem like either were going to fully save the episode from potential controversy.

 

[CyberCubed]

Well it is just a filler ep, but it's too bad for people who like Passimian as a pokemon because it's it's debut episode. Either way, you guys know where you can watch the Japanese episode like most do these days anyway.

I still remember to this day back in 2005 when KidsWB initially skipped over May's last Hoenn Contest because her opponent used a Jynx, even though Jynx's face was already purple by then. They aired it after the Hoenn GF aired in the U.S., confusing dub watchers, lol. Although it was obviously just a KidsWB thing, the episode is in the right order on the DVDs or episode lists. I remember I ranted like crazy back in 2005 because I thought they were skipping an important Contest episode, too bad the girls don't have huge quests anymore these days in general.

 

[TeridaxXD001]

Bumping the thread here because after all of these years, Pokémon’s got a banned episode!

Pokemon Sun and Moon English Dub Anime Episode Banned

Somewhat understandable although it sucks that after the Jynx fiasco, Japan would maybe know NOT to put black makeup on a white face. Let’s just hope Ash doesn’t go back and catch one of the Passimian.


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That's supposed to resemble blacface? Even remotely? I haven't watched a single episode of Sun and Moon and I'm still furious about this. I thought they were beyond banning entire episodes, but I guess I'm an idiot for thinking that.

Oh, and not that it'll make any difference to TCPi, but it looks like there's more backlash over it being skipped than the "offending" imagery.

 

[Light Lucario]

That's supposed to resemble blacface? Even remotely? I haven't watched a single episode of Sun and Moon and I'm still furious about this. I thought they were beyond banning entire episodes, but I guess I'm an idiot for thinking that.

I'm not sure why you're so upset about it when you don't even watch the series. This isn't even entirely unheard for with the TPCI dub. They didn't include a couple of episodes from the Orange Islands arc in a DVD re-release primarily because Jynx's original design is featured there. They might not be banned officially, but they do want to avoid them since they skip the episodes on the Pokemon website too.

While I don't think Ash's face painted with black paint would be seen as problematic as Jynx's original design, I can still see why they'd prefer to skip it completely. It could still cause some controversy and they would want to avoid it, especially when the second biggest controversy associated with the anime is Jynx's original design. It might be being overly cautious, but considering the history of blackface in the U.S. and racial relations in the country in general, I can understand why they decided to do it.

Oh, and not that it'll make any difference to TCPi, but it looks like there's more backlash over it being skipped than the "offending" imagery.

It's probably one of those situations where they could have received backlash regardless of what they did. However, the backlash among fans online complaining about their decision is probably just a loud minority compared to what could have happened if someone saw the episode and compared it to blackface. That's exactly what happened with Jynx's original design too.

To be honest, I just don't see the need to get so upset over them skipping the episode. If it was an episode was something important happened and we would have another case of Ash randomly having new Pokemon like with those thirty Tauros back in the original series, that might be a different story. But from based on everything I've heard and read about the episode, it's just a typical kind of meet the new Pokemon of the week kind of filler episode. It could still be a decent fun episode, but it's not something that I'd be upset about not being able to see in English if it doesn't really add much beyond showcasing a new Pokemon, especially when that can be done in other episodes too.