BW101: "Soryu Gym! Iris VS Shaga!!"

I'm amazed that no one's talking about how they decided to just do their own interpretation of Opelucid instead of referencing either of the game versions. I guess for the anime, that just makes sense, though. Anyway, predictable outcomes are predictable. I have no idea what other climax they can give Iris, though, since this one serves that purpose nicely. The only thing I can think of is that perhaps her rivalry with Georgia is not over yet... I'm unsure if we will see Iris become the Gym Leader. If it were up to me, I would've ended Iris here so she can train more diligently under Drayden himself. She has shown the potential, all that's being done is that she needs to develop her battle skills more. That kinda worries me. She's closer to her goal than most of the other companions ever got already, and this still isn't over. (she's not as close as Dawn got, though) We'll see how this plays out.

So long awaited confrontation between student and mentor has finally happened.
It was interesting to get insight in more of Iris backstory finding out how she doesn't have many friends and how she couldn't fit in being treated like outcast, which added nice trait of realism into character making her feel more sympathetic and easier to relate to. This would also explain rather antisocial behavior at start of Unova following Ash around for no reason, along with lack of confidence she seemed to express toward humans at start.

I always appreciate when we get more info about character past and what leaded toward them becoming persons they are today, so that's definitely a plus in my book.

Battle between Drayden and Iris was mediocre. Clash between Excadrill and Haxorous was way too rushed leaving sore taste in mouth,. Although ill admit this, it was nice to see how change of strategy and addition of new attacks like focus blast resolved main problem mole pokemon had during their first battle not having any effective defense against devastating rock smash. Tie also you could say settled score between this two pokemon once and for all being obvious from start how its only matter of time when rematch will ensue. That being said judging from what Haxorous showed first time around and Drayden prestigious role such easy knockout was highly unbelievable.

Battle between Dragonite and Druddigon was better, but still too short for my taste lacking enough details and strategy to make it stand out.

Either way this episode showed how Iris still has lot to learn about dragons and their characteristics on road of becoming dragon master, serving as Drayden test to determine how much she learned and improved after leaving village. Loss also served as lecture and motivation for Iris to grow stronger revealing huge potential lying in her to become full-fledged dragon master one day. Which passed anything but unnoticed, hence explaining Drayden wish that she becomes Opelucid gym leader eventually.

Whether she will accept offer or not remains to be seen, though judging by how uncomfortable she is about that place due to bad experiences from past doesn't add to staying.

Another thing which brings cloud of doubt about Iris future is promotion in BW2 games becoming champion and encounters with Cynthia, making me suspect how she might eventually follow path game counterpart went through ending as apprentice working to become champion. After all there is another highly skilled dragon trainer which holds champion status(Lance).

And we still don't know how Drayden became dragon master and what trials and tests you need to pass to become recognized as such.

But yes unless she stays for one more region which is doubtful, at this point most likely thing to happen with Iris is ending as Drayden apprentice or new Opelucid gym leader succeeding him.

Why does it look like Dragonite can only beat Ice Types at this point? Oh well, I don't care. Drayden winning was great. The battle was boring, however.:yawn: I agree with pokemon fan 132, Haxorus losing so quickly made no sense.

I enjoyed the first half of the episode more than I enjoyed the battle. But the good thing is, finally a Unova gym leader that isn't a complete pushover. Too bad Ash didn't battle him. Oh well, maybe next time.

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Originally Posted by Samurott

I'm amazed that no one's talking about how they decided to just do their own interpretation of Opelucid instead of referencing either of the game versions. I guess for the anime, that just makes sense, though.

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It was obvious that they wouldn't choose one version over the other. It is hardly uncommon for game locations to look generic in the anime.

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I have no idea what other climax they can give Iris, though, since this one serves that purpose nicely.

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A Dragon Master tournament involving Drayden, Clair and Lance.

Aside from the rushed battle, the episode was pretty nice.

Iris becoming a Gym Leader was expected, so I hope Cilan can give her advice about being a gym leader.

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Originally Posted by Ampharos King

As expected, this turned out to be a very short gym battle, but I am still surprised and upset that Excadrill got a f'ing tie against Drayden's Haxorus. With the exception of him learning Focus Blast and being more in synch with Iris, Excadrill did not really improve over the course of this series. Very little has been suggested that Iris's Excadrill is particularly more powerful than any of the other pokemon on the main cast, and Excadrill has lost numerous times as well; most notably against Montgomery's Throh. Excadrill tied against Georgia's Beartic after it lost once, although Beartic's strength was more around Excadrill's level. Excadrill also barely won his battle against Burgundy's Dewott back at the Clubsplosion.

Meanwhile, Haxorus had been established as Drayden's most powerful and signature pokemon in the anime, had enough durability to resist Excadrill's Drill Run attack during their first battle (which is ironically the attack that Excadrill used to win here), and completely annihilated Excadrill with just one attack. Haxorus was the type of opponent that one could not have defeated with just power alone, and realistically it would have taken more than one of Iris's pokemon to win against it. It was a shame that Haxorus had been taken down so easily here by a pokemon that barely improved in this series. I felt that Haxorus should have overpowered Excadrill at the end, but once again Iris seems to get the glory treatment here.

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BW isn't nearly as long as DP, Iris doesn't get as many battles as others, not to mention she has a Dento to compete with for screentime, unlike Takeshi. The thing about BW is most of the training clearly happens off-screen, it's not like DP which devoted many episodes to Pokemon training regularly. We see small scenes of Satoshi and Iris training before episodes or at the end of episodes, that's all we need to see. We, as the viewers, can early surmise that it happens off-screen because the episode canon says that Satoshi has trained hard. At the end of the Don Battle Tournament Iris is all like, "These are the fruit of my training!" and Satoshi is all like in various episodes "All our hard training has paid off!", even Homika says "Wow, your Pokemon must all be in mad good shape!". The writers are telling us it happens off-screen.


Ononokusu is not Gaburias, Shaga is not Shirona. He is defeatable. Doryuuzu and Ononokusu tied, Doryuuzu didn't win. Iris certainly wasn't glorified since this whole episode was about teaching her a lesson and seeing the relationship she's built with her Pokemon, specifically Kairyu and Doryuuzu. The battle was rushed very very true, but overall Shaga won since Crimgan completely sponged Kairyu's Ice Beam for some reason.(Powered up Mold Breaker, maybe?) Since Shaga won this time, I could easily see Iris returning in the filler saga and facing off against Shaga and winning. Shaga got serious when Kairyu came out and really kicked into full gear and won with ease.



This episode told us Iris isn't ready to be a Gym Leader, that's probably gonna be her main focus goal during the filler arc. with becoming a Dragon Master being the second banana goal. Which is weird since she wants to be a Dragon Master not a Gym Leader, hopefully Kibago evolves, battles more, and gets more focus after this experience with Shaga. They can toss a marketable Dragon like Fukamaru or a 6th Gen Dragon her way in his place.

So Does Iris becoming a Gym Leader or She considering herself to be a Gym Leader ?
Is She going to be in the Filler saga ?
Is the filler Saga going to take Place in Unova ?
Does Ash really going to leave Unova without achieving anything ?
Those are the question this episode has created !!!!

I'm just glad she lost

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Originally Posted by jman21

I'm just glad she lost

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Not a fan of Iris, eh? I actually don't blame you, but do you have a reason why you're glad she lost?

Was it just me, or did she get a new, slightly less annoying voice actor?

What was she crying about when she was younger?

That she can't make friend easily and the lost of that battle

I think it's putting it lightly when I say that Iris's development has divided people. That said...


...I think you gotta be pretty cold-hearted to not feel something when watching Iris's childhood this ep.

But onto the quality of said episode, I thought it was a solid episode that did a decent job of showing Iris's character, and not going overboard.

I loved the Oran & Pecha berries on a stick that were so "Natsukashii" to her.
Great episode.

Just watched the battle between Iris and Drayden and I must say that I liked it. Not because Iris lost mind you, I mean I’ve never been an Iris mascot but I’m just saying that it was a good battle. Yes, it was rushed like most BW battles but still it was something to watch.

Of course round 1 was the long awaited match or should I say rematch that was based on Excadrill’s relationship with Iris. The reason I liked this one was because you get to see how much stronger these two had become. Even though it blocked Excadrill’s attacks, seeing Haxorus being pushed back for that Metal Claw for example was a surprise and shows the improvement that Excadrill and Iris developed since their first match.

Not so fond of it ending in a tie but oh well. Like most people in BW, I really wanted to see more of Haxorus’ attacks but like Head Charge being the only move we see from Alder’s signature Pokemon it’s easy to expect the same from Drayden’s.

Round 2, the reason I liked it was because of the realism like Dragonite taking damage from Dragon Claw. That Dragon Tail was badass though wish it was that powerful in the games. Being held in midair after that failed Dragon Rush will be one of the highlights of that battle for me.

Overall, the battle should have been longer but it was one of my favorites in BW.