"A Poached Ego" and "Tree's a Crowd" Review Thread

[Jedah And Sonans]

Originally posted by TRF-Chan
[B] I want to see the episode in English, Japanese, French, German, Rusian, Chinese, and every other conceivable language to compare and contrast. *Is possessed by the manic force of love for this episode*

Yeah, I say this for every episode, even the ones not easily available in Japanese, but you really do need to see this one in it's original format. Not for any visual edits (there are none besides he obvious eyecatches removal and intro/outro change), but for the sounds. The music in the last two scenes with TR in totally _makes_ this episode, and they just trashed them both.

(Of course, the scene that still keeps this episode being short of best ever, is still present in either (the one where Ryou walks out of the forest, into Satoshi-tachi, and gets stomped flat in about 5 frames).

Hey, is Dogasu going to do an episode comparison for this one on his website? I'm pretty sure his choice of language will be more civil than what I'd use...

[Trainer Lisa]

"A Poached Ego" - I loved this episode! The first part with Brock and Nurse Joy, and then Officer Jenny was hilarious! LOL!! ^_^ And I really loved how much Jessie and James cared for the caged Ekans and Koffing. They were so determined to get them out. And it was so cool when they did! But, it was so sad when they had to say goodbye to Arbok and Weezing. The song that was playing ("Tears Of Life" from Pokemon The First Movie) just made it even more sad. And that was good, cause I love all the emotional episodes. Oh yeah, and that Cacnea was so cute! And I loved the part at the end when James was holding it and it's thorns hurt him. That was funny! Overall, this episode gets a teary-eyed 10 out of 10.

Originally posted by Kauri
Well, speaking as someone who has better things to do than wank over every inconsistency between the dub and original, I rather liked the poacher episode. Even if there were changes made, that didn't make it any less touching to people who might not have seen the original version. Some of us are, yanno, happy with what we get.

Originally posted by Kauri
( ... okay, so that's only because it takes the aforementioned 'some of us' a week to download one single episode thanks to dial-up connections, but STILL )

I agree. I mean, the only episode I have in Japanese is "In The Knicker Of Time" (with no subtitles), and I downloaded it from Kazaa Lite. I had a hard time finding it though.

"Tree's A Crowd" - I loved May and Max's fighting! That was hilarious! And it's just like how my brother and I fight. Although, of course I'm 7 years older than May and my brother's older than Max. Anyway, I liked it when Meowth translated what the Treecko were saying. It made it easier for me to understand what was going on. And I think it was cool how Ash's Treecko was the only one that wanted to protect the tree. It knew that it was dying, but it still wanted to stay with it until it died because that's where it was born. I loved the part when Ash and Pikachu went up in the tree to wait for Treecko. And later, I liked how they helped put leaves around it. That was cool. But, it was weird when the tree broke in half and they showed that flashback. Although, I really loved the part when Ash was gonna tie it back together, and they noticed the new tree! Of course, the best part of this episode was Ash's battle with Treecko! And I liked what Brock said that disadvantages alone don't decide a battle. That was cool! Well, anyway, I didn't get to see the ending of this episode (thanks to stupid WHCP/WB30), but it was still good. And I'm glad I got to see Ash catch another Pokemon in the Hoenn region. Overall, even though I didn't see the ending, this episode gets an 8 out of 10.

[Dogasu]

"A Poached Ego!" really wasn't too bad. There were problems with the voice acting and music, as expected, but overall it didn't fare as badly as I had predicted.

Does anyone know what was said in the Japanese version when dub Ryo makes his fake death threat ("You fools! This wouldn't have happened if you'd handed over your pokemon nicely. But now it's too late for that. So, I'm going to take those pokemon and destroy you!")? I didn't hear the word korosu or any of its variants in the original version, so I don't know if he really did threaten their lives in the Japanese version. If someone could verify that for me, I'd be most appreciative

[Murgatroyd]

"If you'd handed over the pokemon nicely, it wouldn't have to end like this. But it's too late now. I'll flatten you and take the pokemon."

Not a death threat; just a threat of extreme violence.

(If you're wondering, the exact verb used was tatakinomesu, defined in my various dictionaries as "knock sb down [out]", "floor sb with a blow", "lay low", "lay out", and similar expressions.)

[GeneralStar]

I already posted my rambling review of A Poached Ego over on Serebii, so I won't bother doing so again here (plus I'm too lazy at the moment to bother with cutting and pasting). To make it short~

1. Overall I thought the episode was good, even though...
2. ...I was extremely disappointed with the music changes and some of the voice dubbing (Weezing, James). I was kind of expecting this, though.
3. I LOVE Cacnea's dub voice. To my surprise, I think they did a really great job with it, and it sounds very fitting to me.

Was it just me, or is Weezing's voice waaay different?

Seriously... in fact, I think that was honestly one of the things that annoyed me most about this episode. It actually almost sounded like the same guy to me, just like they forgot to add the echoing kind-of effect to his voice or something. Whatever.

... just once, I'd like to see a Fearow who's trainer is, without question, good. It seems like every time a Spearow/Fearow shows up, it has an antagonistic role. Dear writers: pick on a different Pokemon, plzkthx ;_; *hugs poor Fearow*

There was one time that a "nice" Fearow was shown with a "good" trainer, in the episode with the hot air balloon-race I believe (the name of which escapes me at the moment).

... er, did the "Who's that Pokémon?" on the second episode say Girafarig has a 'tale' that bites? Eheh. (... or was that just the snow on my TV making 'tail' look misspelled? :E)

Yeah, I noticed that too. I was actually trying to figure out if maybe they'd done it on purpose and meant "tale", but if so that was pretty stupid.

[InfiniteBlue]

Yesh, Weezing sounded like an elderly version of James to me. *laughs at such a thought* Anyone, I was lucky enough to download the Japanese version of the 6th episode before watching the dub (this really is a big deal for me since I'm mostly a Poke-dubbie, and aspiring Poke-hybrid).

The dub wasn't that bad, but....if you thought the mood of the fight scene was captured badly in the dub, I would've loved to see your reaction if you head James utter, "You big...bully!" before collapsing. That just made the whole end of the scene take a dive, in my opinion.

I'd say something about the Treecko eppy, but I neither have the Japanese version downloaded, nor did I remember that they air more Pokemon at 11:30 AM from now on. ¬¬

[Blackjack Gabbiani]

copy-pasted from Serebii...

Huh. I only noticed *ONE TIME* the music seemed inappropiate, and that was at the end when they had the Happy Walking Music. But then Cacnea showed up, and the music suddenly fit.

I love Rico's voice. Who was it? He sounded like Eric Stewart at times, and other times far from it.

Speaking of Stewart--one of the gayest James lines ever:

Jesse: I know how to deal with men like that!
James: Tell me. *PLEASE!*

*snerk*

Throughout the entire episode, I wanted to say "Hey Rico! Two words--'Dark Ball'!" (and then I remember Jesse wore a golden mask in one ep...*cough* But that's an image best left untouched.)

Why hasn't anyone but Brock figured out how to tell Jenny apart? It's easy! EAAASY! And I always laugh when someone finds out about the Jennies and Joys. Shouldn't that be common knowledge?

[Druddigon]

A Poached Ego!

Wasn't a terribly interesting episode to be honest. I felt bad for May at the beginning of the episode, she was so much more tired than the boys and I almost forgot that all Nurse Joy are related. Though it's kinda weird when you think about, Nurse Joy's family must breed like rats. I loved how Max and May interacted with Brock and were so surprised by his behavior for the first time. What was with Brock and Max referring to Hoenn as a country? God, the Ekans were so ugly. Haven't seen one of those in a long time. This is probably the first and last time I actually saw Arbok and Weezing showing some remnants of a thing called a personality. Never cared for TR's OS Pokemon so I wasn't bothered by their releases, this was my first time seeing this episode ever as well. Liked seeing Cacnea for the first time, it always had a somewhat more amusing personality to me than any OS Pokemon owned by TR and it was fresh. Thought it was weird Meowth wasn't bothered by the electric shock by the cage during the second confrontation but the first time he was fried like a chicken. What in the hell was up with the poacher seemingly evolving his Pupitar on a dime? Now that was some forced crap right there. Though it was nice seeing Tyranitar I guess. I actually liked it when Jessie thought to have Wobbuffett counter Hyper Beam back at Tyranitar, shame she was used as a joke. TR all using Fury Swipes on Tyranitar was kinda heartwarming however. It's amazing how quickly Ash and Jenny ex-sponged the poacher compared to TR who got eaten alive. Decent episode I guess.

Tree's a Crowd

Max: I said we should have taken a right in that fork in the road but you insisted on going the other way and now we're lost!
May: But this path looked prettier and and it has all those awesome flowers! There's nothing more dreamy than strolling through lovely flowers~

God, what a vomit-inducing dialogue exchange. I think that just shows right there the writers may have been figuring out May's character, I'm so glad to know in the long run the writers don't make May out to a bland, girly-girl, princessy, air-head. Not to mention she's usually the burden to the group and tires out quickly and her Torchic has been portrayed as useless 100% of the time. Can't wait to see her drop this demeanor, I don't even know when she does. I presume sometime around Wurmple's capture which I'm really looking forward to. Also getting a bit tired of May and Max/Ash's little spats, they're entertaining in moderation but they're happening way too often for my liking. I'm just so glad that May isn't going to be made out to be "Typical girly girl, doing typical girly things."

When you want to catch a Pokemon you should weaken them in battle first so they have no defense when using your Pokeball, is that what you taught me the other day, Ash Ketchum? Pokemon Master, huh?!
Okay, that made me laugh. :P May has a fast learning curve, I must admit.

Anyway this was a decent capture episode, Treecko's capture, one of the best Pokemon in the whole show. I always liked the way he kept a twig in his mouth as a sigh of his badassery. I liked getting a mention of Misty. I liked seeing Ash toss a Pokeball at the Treecko without weakening it despite criticizing May for doing the same thing not to long ago. Way to be a good role-model, guess he got caught up in the excitement of it all. The whole tree plot was not very engrossing at all for me, though I did like the explanation of why Grass-types don't take much punishment from Electricity and I also liked Cacnea's debut to Ash. Shame it didn't do more aside from pop the balloon and fire a Pin Missile at Treecko though.