Thread: Why did the writers end the original series with a terrible filler episode?

Originally Posted by The Fighting Misty

Perhaps it would have been better if we had more episodes with Ash by himself at the end of Johto. If they cut out some of the filler from the middle of Johto, they would have had extra time for the end.

I'm not sure about that. While I like Ash, I don't think he could carry more than a couple of episodes at best on his own. There wouldn't be a need for more than one transition episode to Hoenn. Anything more than that would be pushing it and Ask sticking around Pallet Town for more than one episode doesn't really appeal to me either.

Originally Posted by The Fighting Misty

Except "Hoenn Alone" is the real last episode of both Johto and the original series. Its episode 276.

That's why I said the ep has no real reason to exist. They should have used, "Gotta Catch Ya Later" as the series finale, not some random one-off filler nonsense afterward.

Technically yes, but when you think about OS finale most people associate it with "Gotta Catch YA Later" since this was episode which finished journey of original trio having them split up. This was episode where Gary was wrapped up, and moment when Ash was prepared and set up for his Hoenn journey. Just like it was case with last episode of AG or DP.

GLC in every possible sense was episode which wrapped up journey and OS as whole, and while "Hoenn Alone"was last episode it served more as transition between Johto and Hoenn than saga finale in reality.

Needless to say im not sure why you keep on insisting how this was filler when in reality it wasn't setting up plot of Pikachu becoming ill depowering him like we have chance to see at start of every new region for one or another reason.

I really didn't find it pointless at all, in fact I thought it set the stage for AG quite well. We saw for the first time in ages how helpless Ash was without his friends and Pokemon watching his back so it got me wondering how he was going to handle Hoenn on his own like that. I never have thought of it as a filler whatsoever.

Simple. This was the only 4Kids series ending. The AG and DP ones were better... (just a joke, no rage wars please...)

As for the episode itself, I don't consider it filler. It is a transition episode, lots of them happen at the begginings and ends of sagas.

I don't understand why Brock and Misty left the previous episode...why not just make that the finale instead of having one afterwards?

I'm also guessing they wanted to have the series end the way they started - with Satoshi and Pikachu by themselves. Gives the series a nice sense of symmetry.

I find this thread quite petty. Instead of complaining that ""Gotta Catch Ya Later" was followed by a less important episode, why not complain that the AG and DP finales were each followed by a one-week break? Any episode is better than nothing. Well, there were previews of the next series in each of those two breaks, but we could have easily done without those.

Originally Posted by Silktree

I find this thread quite petty. Instead of complaining that ""Gotta Catch Ya Later" was followed by a less important episode, why not complain that the AG and DP finales were each followed by a one-week break? Any episode is better than nothing. Well, there were previews of the next series in each of those two breaks, but we could have easily done without those.

Because it also gave Misty one less episode. For Brock it didn't matter because he stays for two more generations.

Why didn't May leave in AG190 instead of AG191? Same for Dawn? They had them depart in their last episodes than one before.

Originally Posted by The Fighting Misty

Because it also gave Misty one less episode. For Brock it didn't matter because he stays for two more generations.

Why didn't May leave in AG190 instead of AG191? Same for Dawn? They had them depart in their last episodes than one before.

You're looking at the situation in the wrong way. May and Dawn were also "cheated" out of one more episode each since their series could have been extended had it not been for those breaks I mentioned. "Gotta Catch Ya Later" had aired two weeks before the AG series started, but AG192 and DP191 were no different in that regard.

Originally Posted by Silktree

Originally Posted by The Fighting Misty

Because it also gave Misty one less episode. For Brock it didn't matter because he stays for two more generations.

Why didn't May leave in AG190 instead of AG191? Same for Dawn? They had them depart in their last episodes than one before.

You're looking at the situation in the wrong way. May and Dawn were also "cheated" out of one more episode each since their series could have been extended had it not been for those breaks I mentioned. "Gotta Catch Ya Later" had aired two weeks before the AG series started, but AG192 and DP191 were no different in that regard.

That's because the first 3 DP episodes aired together on the same day, it was really skipping a DP week. There were a lot of breaks around that time toon, hence why Dawn only had 189 episodes without those clip shows.

Originally Posted by The Fighting Misty

That's because the first 3 DP episodes aired together on the same day, it was really skipping a DP week. There were a lot of breaks around that time toon, hence why Dawn only had 189 episodes without those clip shows.

There was also a one-week break in October and another one in November. With that in mind, I wouldn't necessarily say that the break in September was warranted by the triple airing, but I don't recall the exact circumstances of each break.

Either way, they could have extended the AG series by at least one episode (there didn't have to be a triple airing, and even AG had a clip show back in 2005), and they could have definitely extended the DP series (which had fewer episodes than AG did despite lasting two more months). So why complain about the original series ending with a transition episode? The real finale was "Gotta Catch Ya Later", and the Hoso episodes continued the older characters' stories.

Mainly my complaints were that the final episode was terrible. I would have rathered seen something with Ash's older pokemon at Oaks.

Originally Posted by The Fighting Misty

I would have rathered seen something with Ash's older pokemon at Oaks.

Again, I feel that this complaint is far more applicable to the later series. Ash had just used all of his Pokémon in the Johto League (with the exception of Kingler, which had been used in the Whirl Cup), so I don't think that that we needed to see them at Oak's Laboratory just yet. We ended up getting that episode just two months after the end of the series.

@Silktree, the reason why AG has one more episode than DP despite lasting two months less are apart of possible baseball games that delayed episodes with no warning, was because that until 2004, TV Tokyo doesn't air the past movie around the movie release in the standard Pokemon timeslot. The movie takes 2 episodes each year, one for air and one for Naruto. Also, take note that Naruto didn't existed in OS and I think that the series had other timeslot in AG until around 2005.

Originally Posted by fer92

@Silktree, the reason why AG has one more episode than DP despite lasting two months less are apart of possible baseball games that delayed episodes with no warning, was because that until 2004, TV Tokyo doesn't air the past movie around the movie release in the standard Pokemon timeslot. The movie takes 2 episodes each year, one for air and one for Naruto. Also, take note that Naruto didn't existed in OS and I think that the series had other timeslot in AG until around 2005.

I know that there was a reason for it. The fact remains that the TV Tokyo's priorities made the writers' jobs easier. To think that they also had the Hoso episodes on their plates back in early AG...