BW 031 "Rival Battle! Vanipeti, Dokkora Compete in a Battle!!" Review Thread

[Musashi]

BW 034 "Rival Battle! Vanipeti, Dokkora Compete in a Battle!!"
After ruining their lunch, Satoshi and Iris set out to find more food. On the way, they run into Satoshi's rival, Shooty once again! Can Satoshi finally defeat him?

[Tsutarja]

So, it was a tie.

I was all like WTF when I saw little Shooty and Adeku. o_o

[Yoshi-san]

OMG ADEKU ADEKU AND ADEKU!!

AND BABBY SHUUTI

[Ampharos King]

BIG SPOILERS!!!

For the purpose of explaining a lot of things happening at once, I summarized what was in this episode.

Cilan was angry that Ash and Iris were playing on the vines as he was cooking their lunch. When Cilan discovered leaves in the stew, he accidentally tips it over in his rage. Cilan becomes even more enraged, but Iris casually dismisses his anger by giving the group apples. Ash and Iris decide to have a race for the small tree situated next to the giant tree in the forest. Iris maintains a steady lead, but Ash is persistent as ever despite falling off the vine.

Meanwhile, Trip’s Vanillish freezes a wild Palpitoad. Trip decides to catch it. Just as Ash was falling down a cliff, Trip’s Poke Ball accidentally hits Ash. Palpitoad soon flees afterwards after seeing Ash go excited over it. Ash apologizes to Trip for stopping his capture. Iris comes to help Ash, but soon sees Trip’s Vanillite. Iris is AFRAID OF ICE-TYPE POKEMON. Iris explicitly mentions that she hates Ice-type pokemon because those pokemon are powerful against Dragon-types. Trip overhears this conversation as soon as he decides to leave. Trip is impressed that Iris raises Dragon-types, and decides to take a photo of her Axew on his camera. Trip then asks if Iris has any other Dragon-types other than Axew, and Ash tells Trip that Iris wants to be a Dragon Master.

Trip then offers Iris to battle her, but Ash wants Trip to battle him instead. Trip would rather fight the budding Dragon Master than Iris, but Iris is embarrassed since most of her pokemon are not Dragon-types. Trip is disappointed and he soon leaves despite Ash’s protest to battle the rival. In an attempt to stop him, Iris begins to taunt the rival for being “such a child.” Trip warns Ash of what would happen if they fought again, but Ash promises that he and his pokemon improved from last time. Trip reluctantly accepted the challenge.

Meanwhile, Cilan is seen making a cake out of berries as Dwebble and Pansage were disappointed that they could not search for Ash and Iris.
The battle starts. Trip sends out Servine, and Ash sends out Snivy. Trip is disappointed that Ash’s Snivy had not yet evolved, and he had high hopes that she would after their battle last time. Trip then asks Ash if he is truly serious about being a Pokemon Master. Their argument begins to tire out Axew, who is yawning and waiting for a battle to start. Servine starts it off with Leaf Tornado, but Snivy counters with Leaf Storm. Leaf Tornado overpowered it. Servine then went for Cut, but Snivy dodged and used Attract (again). Servine countered Attract with Leaf Tornado, stopping Attract. Servine had leveled up from the last time and is now able to stop Attract without dodging it. Servine goes for Cut, while Snivy uses Leaf Blade in return. Snivy was easily overpowered and lost. Trip returns Servine.

Trip reveals that he wanted to battle the Champion of the Unova League, but Ash had no knowledge who the Champion is. Iris is angry and tells Ash that the Champion is a person named Alder. Ash becomes excited to meet him. Trip wants to defeat Alder.

There is a flashback with Trip (as a child) watching Alder and his Bouffalant defeating another trainer’s Herdier. Trip is excited and begins to pet Bouffalant. Alder gives Trip some Pokemon Food, and asks Trip if he loves Pokemon. Trip promises Alder that he will become the Champion soon day. In return, Alder promises to battle Trip if he becomes a powerful trainer. Trip reveals that he must win the Unova League to go to the Champion League. Only then is he eligible to battle Alder.

Trip sends out Timburr as the second pokemon. Ash then sends out Oshawott. Oshawott is initially nervous, but Ash calms him down and assures that they will succeed. Oshawott uses Aqua Jet. Timburr goes for Bulk Up, but Oshawott failed to control Aqua Jet. Oshawott goes for a second Aqua Jet and loses even more control this time. Trip takes a photo of Oshawott as he lands an Aqua Jet on the ground. Ash asks Trip why he wanted to take a photo of the attack. Trip shows Ash that Oshawott’s eyes are closed as it uses Aqua Jet. [Trip is helping Ash here?]

Ash tells Oshawott to do his best with Aqua Jet, and the battle resumes. Oshawott attacks with Shell Blade. Oshawott then goes for Water Gun, and Timburr deflects it. Oshawott uses another attack and manages to defeat the Timburr. [Oshawott’s battle record is amazing.] Right now Ash and Trip have one win and one loss each. These are indeed 3 1-on-1 battles.

The third pokemon being sent out is Tepig. Trip sends out Vanillite. The BW theme song plays. Iris is afraid of Vanillite again. Ash asks why Trip decided to send out an Ice-type, but Trip felt that if he went for a disadvantage, he could become stonger. Tepig uses Flame Charge while Vanillite uses Ice Beam. Vanillite then goes for another Ice-type attack. Tepig’s Ember shook Vanillite off and caused no damage whatsoever. Vanillite then goes for Ice Shard. Tepig uses Flame Charge yet again while Vanillite counters with Blizzard. As the attacks clash, both Tepig and Vanillite are exhausted. Both pokemon faint at the same time. The match is a draw. Tepig is disappointed that he failed to please Ash by winning, but Ash is satisfied with the draw.

Ash tells Pikachu that they are glad with the success with the battle. Iris tells Ash that now he has to get Oshawott to use Aqua Jet again. Ash promises to meet up with the Unova League Champion Alder too. The battle between Ash and Trip is a draw. As soon as the episode is “supposed” to end, Ash and Iris are hungry and rush back to Cilan. Cilan and his pokemon are tired of waiting for Ash and Iris to come back for food.

[Masurao]

Lol, Iris is afraid of Ice types. Just wow.

The match overall was a tie. Thanks god.

[pokemon_master2]

So Shooti is Adeku's son?

[Yoshi-san]

So Shooti is Adeku's son?

No. He just wants to battle Adeku.

[Musashi]

Man, does Tomioka always deliver or what? As great as it was that the battle was a tie, I loved the much needed backstory on Shootie. Not to mention introducing Adeku and the Champion League! Yes!

[TeddiUrsa]

Hm, pretty good episode. Tomioka strikes again!
Shooti background, Iris gets a lecture from Shooti, Champion cameo, 4 (!) new Pokémon...can't wait to rewatch this in non laggy way.
Timburr was all kinds of awesome btw ^^

[Ashfangirl22]

Some good

Negaishippy moments here sounds like *awe* LOL Poor Dento getting left behind like thatXD

I'm freakin glad its a tie this time instead of Trip always beating him, don't think they did this with Ash/Paul. Also yah, good to see some info on Trip finally!

[sunyshore]

amazing.

[WatcherMark]

Nice to see Alder show up, I was beginning to think he might not appear during Unova.

Of course, Ash is now all "Screw Cynthia, that's the Champion I want to battle!".

[dman_dustin]

Pretty much a copy paste post from my serebii forum post, with one slight difference:

This episode had its faults (primarily Snivy vs Servine) but I guess most of it was okay. I mean I don't know why but I think the battle portion was just crap. I mean as hilarious as it was I think they focused on lunch too much. The battle was really horribly rushed, not the best written battle in terms of quality written battles, but I love how it ended in a draw.

Snivy vs Servine- A big cop out if I ever saw one. One hit and Snivy's down, they really want to show Servine as his big bad didn't they? And Trip, SHUT THE **** UP about Snivy still being unevolved. If she doesn't evolve even once I'm fully blaming you, and yes I realize your a fictional character but that's not going to stop me from printing your face and putting it on a punching bag, and beating your picture until it's unrecognisable. This is the second time you mentioned how unevolved Ash's Snivy is, honestly just SHUT UP.

Flashback- As cool as it was to see Alder and his Bouffalant, Trip you're not supposed to make revelations only to the audience. But I still wonder why they didn't show his Volcorona, I thought that was Alder's main Pokemon.

Timburr vs Oshawott- LMAO. Oshawott you are the absolute greatest Pokemon that Ash has ever had. Man that confidence when you shell bladed Timburr for the win, and knew you knocked it out was pure awesome. Please evolve all the way, and redeem the main water types for Ash that didn't evolve.

And LOL at Trip explaining to Ash why Oshawott keeps failing Aqua Jet. Seems rather contradictory.

Tepig vs Vanillite- A slight cop out only because Vanillite's ice attacks were beating fire attacks or tying as well as the battle being rushed as hell. But a tie making the battle a draw was acceptable, though I really wanted Tepig to win, but then I realize Oshawott given its record probably needed the win more than Tepig. Next battle Tepig is in, better be a win. And LOOK Tepig was upset with the loss/tie like usual. I guess that Druddigon loss was an animation fluke then.

LOL, when the narrator was doing his end of episode spiel, I was like "Wait, what about Cilan?" LOL best ending of an episode, since Ash, Dawn, and Brock forgot Gliscor in the episode where Dawn's Pachirisu got sick. Just LOL.

[Eitarou]

A tied battle? An interesting backstory? Finally! Trip is interesting.

And Iris is afraid of Ice Types for that stupid reason? Now who's the kid?

[sunyshore]

But I still wonder why they didn't show his Volcorona, I thought that was Alder's main Pokemon.

they wouldn't show his main pokemon in his first appearance, it was only a flashback anyway... volcarona will be some big finale for him i think :D