Thread: Do all these gimmicky stunts that Best Wishes! keeps pulling seem desperate to you?

Originally Posted by Hidden Mew

Originally Posted by ObjectionMan

That's not desperation, that's marketing, something the anime's always done. N is currently the most popular human character in the entire Pokemon franchise, who many wanted to see in the anime for a long time, so of course they're going to advertise his presence.

They've never really gone so far as to change the title of the series twice for marketing before. While I agree that it makes sense marketing wise to capitalize on N's popularity by making a big deal about his appearance, it still comes off a gimmicky stunt to get ratings. It doesn't really come off as desperation, but just another attempt to give the anime more attention by hyping up a new change, instead of actually fixing more of the mistakes in this series.

So in other words...

The writers were just so desperate that as a last resort they finally decided to bring in N to the series. N, the most popular human character in the whole franchise. N, who had been ignored by the anime ever since the TP vs TR two-parter was indefinitely postphoned. N, who's appearance alone was half the cause of the hype of the B2W2 game promo anime. N, who looks definitely promising enough to attract the eyes of all pokemon fans and hopefully raise the ratings.


Okay. Gimmicky stunt defined.

But they're doing well... yet. (Episode N isn't over, so I can't say). Though, they did a good job in hyping people to nearly forget the damage done in Season Two. Yeah, I admit I was one of the hyped people as well. But bringing in a popular character to the show is one thing. Messing up the show is another thing. You can't cancel out the massive damage done to the show with N's appearance (and Charizard).

The damage needs to be dealt with properly with better writing - creative ideas and consistent plots that hold the episodes together. Simply tossing in everyone's favorite character isn't the solution. Yeah, it's working for N since the writers seem to be caring about him a lot. But look how Cynthia and Dawn were sacrificed. All the hype, and all the advertisements - all just to end in making people disappointed.


EDIT:

Again, the writers aren't in complete control over all of these, you should KNOW that. And seriously, Dogasu, why are you fantasizing that the writers think their work is as bad as you and other fans here think it is? Just to validate all your bashing of BW? Hate to break this to you, but the writers and the other members of the staff don't give a crap about whether or not you keep watching. You, me, and all other Poke-geeks here aren't the intended audience. BW is doing perfectly fine with it's intended audience (KIDS, most of whom haven't watched the anime from the beginning) so there's no reason these gimmicks would mean anything other than merchandizing.

@ObjectionMan;

I don't want to sound offending or anything... but while I do understand that the writers don't have any obligation to care about the older fans, (the people who have loyally watched the series since Ash received Pikachu on Day 1), I don't really think they're doing fine with their intended audience - the KIDS. IF what they're doing now is what they thought was right for the KIDS, then I'm afraid they are rather underestimating the KIDS IQ. Children may be young - but they aren't stupid. If you watched at least the League, then you'd know what I'm talking about. Like people mentioned above, Trip got build up over the arc to appear as a powerful threat - only to be finished off on round 1. Then there was stupid Cameron who suddenly appeared with an overpowered Hydreigon. And there's Virgil, who was introduced for marketing reasons for Eevees, who posed as yet another threat as a rival for Ash - but never even got to battle Ash. Not even once. Just look at all the inconsistency for one League, and that's not even a third of the damage done.

Do you think kids won't notice that? Do you think it's alright to feed kids inconsistent, poorly developed, poorly planned-out plots, just because "they're young so it's okay - they won't even know anyways"? The answer's no because like I said, kids aren't stupid. They know what they're watching, and they know if something's not right.

So what you're saying is a show that is intended for kids should stay bad and not try at all because it's target audience doesn't care about quality.

Originally Posted by Pokemon Y

So what you're saying is a show that is intended for kids should stay bad and not try at all because it's target audience doesn't care about quality.

No. It's a show intended for kids and it needs good writing precisely because of that reason. It needs to improve, not get any worse, because children are watching it.

Marketing is important. Advertisements are also important. Hyping is needed, but the writers must not forget that children can tell whether the show was horribly written or not. What they have to do is acknowledge the damage they had caused to the show, and make it up for it with better writing - not just cover it up with hypes because the audience are children. It's as if the writers are underestimating children - that kids won't care about quality and just watch the show without any complaints. But in reality, kids do care about quality. They do care about well-written plots. The show isn't for toddlers who can barely comprehend a few words - it's for children who can understand what the show wants to tell them, what messages the writers want to deliver with Ash and his journey. Children can understand that much, and it's clear that they can see if the show was written poorly.

The Kanto festival and the return of Charizard and Mewtwo is very strange because there's no Kanto remake coming and these pokemon advertise nothing of the current gen.

Even when FR/LG came out the writers barely advertised Kanto. They just gave May a Bulbasaur and then placed the BF in Kanto but barely referenced anything of it.

I wouldn't be surprised if the Kanto Pokémon focus in because in a way, Pokémon moving to the 3DS with XY is the end of an era. Pokémon has used 2D sprites since Red and Green and now they're moving in the 3D realm. So it's kind of like a send off to the older days in a way. Hence Mewtwo and Charizard, two iconic Pokémon of the first series.

Originally Posted by Joshawott

I wouldn't be surprised if the Kanto Pokémon focus in because in a way, Pokémon moving to the 3DS with XY is the end of an era. Pokémon has used 2D sprites since Red and Green and now they're moving in the 3D realm. So it's kind of like a send off to the older days in a way. Hence Mewtwo and Charizard, two iconic Pokémon of the first series.

But we're not seeing all of Ash's older pokemon, at least not yet.

Originally Posted by The Fighting Misty

But we're not seeing all of Ash's older pokemon, at least not yet.

Just the important ones.

Originally Posted by Haruhi.

Originally Posted by The Fighting Misty

But we're not seeing all of Ash's older pokemon, at least not yet.

Just the important ones.

So nobody other than Charizard? Are Ash's older Pokemon going to get used at all this arc?

Personally, I'm mixed on the matter of pre-Gen V Pokemon having any sort of focus in Best Wishes at all. For the negative, it's mostly because this is a gimmick (adapting a trait straight from the sequel games, that is) that ended up contradicting one of the main things about the region that was established in the first episode of Best Wishes. Professor Juniper outright tells Ash that there are no non-Gen V Pokemon that live in the Unova region. As in the WHOLE region. Never mind that even in the original BW games, East Unova had pre-Gen V Pokemon and that easily could have been mentioned as an exception to the rule this early on. But it was only until Black2/White2 coming out where there were pre-Gen V Pokemon from the start of the game that the anime suddenly decided to drop this "no non-Unova Pokemon in Unova" rule and start pouring in all sorts of species out of nowhere with no real explanation, including certain entire islands being notorious for being filled with a certain Gen I Pokemon we've seen entirely too much of in the show before.

That said, I'm not personally against non-Unova Pokemon appearing in Best Wishes (though obvious shoe-ins out of nowhere like Mewtwo and Charizard do bug me and just scream desperation); it's just that this highlights the poor planning despite having the information needed to handle matters like these (and it's been said that BW2 were planned even before they finished BW), where the staff flippantly breaks their own rule just for the sake of marketing even though this technically never should have been a rule to begin with. Consequently, it makes Professor Juniper in the anime look like she doesn't know what the hell she's talking about and this inconsistency is completely ignored.

In a way I see the refusal to evolve Ash's Oshawott (or Ash's Snivy for that matter... or at least giving Snivy some new moves dear god) just another marketing gimmick, since it seems rather apparent they're trying to make Oshawott the next Piplup (to what degree of success I don't know, but it was obvious Dawn's return was mostly just for the sake of having Piplup and Oshawott interact needlessly), even though they've never given a valid reason for Oshawott to not evolve (nor Snivy), unlike the existing reasons of Bulbasaur deliberately not wanting to evolve and Squirtle being part of a squad where it being a Wartortle or Blastoise would be incredibly out of place. Hell, they even bothered to establish Piplup's lack of desire to evolve. We've got no such reason nor justification for Oshawott or Snivy; we're just supposed to accept that because they're cuter and more marketable in their base forms, obviously they should stay that way forever.

I guess one could argue it's just a "small detail" from the first episode about the aforementioned contradiction to their own canon, along the lines of Ash's magically shape-shifting badge case, but regardless these are things that just bug me. When actual story details get thrown out just for the sake of a short-term marketing gimmick that more often than not fails to hook me, then I get annoyed.

Originally Posted by The Fighting Misty

Originally Posted by Joshawott

I wouldn't be surprised if the Kanto Pokémon focus in because in a way, Pokémon moving to the 3DS with XY is the end of an era. Pokémon has used 2D sprites since Red and Green and now they're moving in the 3D realm. So it's kind of like a send off to the older days in a way. Hence Mewtwo and Charizard, two iconic Pokémon of the first series.

But we're not seeing all of Ash's older pokemon, at least not yet.

Nothing ever says all of Ash's Pokémon have to reappear. But it wouldn't surprise me if towards the end of the series, he takes his usual trip back to Pallet Town anyway.

Since there is no reason to stay in Unova after the N arc, I would love to see Ash simply re-enter the Indigo league tournament. Since he has all the badges already they can probably allow him to re-enter the league.

Ash has lost all 4 tournaments in BW, and did HORRIBLY at the Unova league. I get the feeling the writers want Ash to win SOMETHING in BW, and the only thing I can think of would be re-entering the Indigo league with all his older pokemon.

Originally Posted by The Fighting Misty

Since there is no reason to stay in Unova after the N arc, I would love to see Ash simply re-enter the Indigo league tournament. Since he has all the badges already they can probably allow him to re-enter the league.

Ash has lost all 4 tournaments in BW, and did HORRIBLY at the Unova league. I get the feeling the writers want Ash to win SOMETHING in BW, and the only thing I can think of would be re-entering the Indigo league with all his older pokemon.

True and maybe if we are lucky, he'll fight that trainer with the Darkrai again (except that sinnoh). Just a thought.

Take this with a credibility of 50% but I think that the reason why Dawn was promoted like she is going to be in the main cast is that the writers want to bring back Dawn into the main cast. When the cameo started the audience know that Contests aren't in the games confirming that Dawn isn't only making a cameo.

Why the writers could want a return to happen? Because 1) Piplup and 2) she is a stereotype for girl and 3) Contest were popular for girls. More than Dragon Master thing.

This is because I found funny that many people are thinking that Contest can return and Cilan will take part in it.

@The Fighting Misty, thanks for mentioning Ash winning the League in Indigo. Although I expect that Episode N is ending on 18th april like everyone else, but...

I remember that the only game character (usable in the anime) that hasn't appeared yet are 3 of the four Elite 4 members. And Caitlin hasn't interacted with Ash with it's really weird.

It's possible that the "N's Climax" is like the Dragonspiral Tower arc in the games, N claims Ash the winner and not Virgil (Virgil* will appear in a proper time) and Ash defeats the (temporarily "weak") Elite 4 (mainly because Reshiram defeated them before).

Remember that Ash this time will use his past reserves. And this promotes the BW games. It's true that the CoroCoro magazine said conclusion but if isn't like the first time that a magazine can lie to us.

Season 2 and Season 2: Episode N makes sense as sub-sagas because they are promoting Black 2 and White 2 and the filler saga.

Scott, you can be surprisingly partially right.

Dawn was only promoted because of Piplup. Her BW cameo is probably her final appearance in the anime, just like Misty's was back in mid-AG and May's was the Wallace Cup.

Other than a possible final episode type of deal, it's likely that the 3 will never get a full real appearance again.

The thread's here to discuss the the stunts from the OP, and whether or not they're signs of desperation, not about Dawn coming back for the next saga or Ash challenging the Indigo League. If you want to discuss what Ash will do in the final stretch of BW, or what will happen in XY, we have threads for that.

What'll happen after Episode N, and before X and Y?
How will Pokemon X & Y impact the Anime?