Bebop and Rocksteady Discussion Thread

[Mad Dog McMutt]

Originally Posted by ToTheNines

I was thinking about this and it’s kind of surprising that you don’t see more casuals disliking Bebop and Rocksteady. If only for their overuse.

For example, I’m a casual Pokemon fan and I buckled down and watched every Indigo league/Orange Island episode a couple years ago. It was a pretty tough grind, and I blame most of that on the fact that EVERY damn episode had to have Jesse and James up to the same stupid bullshid.

They’re fun characters, especially with Meowth in the mix, but god damn the writers really spammed the hell out of them.

I also watched the first generation of Pokemon for the first time in a long time a couple of years ago when I bought the dvds. I enjoyed it quite a bit actually. Maybe I am just blinded by nostalgia. I am what the Pokemon community considers a genwunner (which is derogatory) because I only care about the first generation. It saves me money though, by not having to buy a new Pokemongame every 2 years.

[ZariusTwo]

Originally Posted by Mad Dog McMutt

I also watched the first generation of Pokemon for the first time in a long time a couple of years ago when I bought the dvds. I enjoyed it quite a bit actually. Maybe I am just blinded by nostalgia. I am what the Pokemon community considers a genwunner (which is derogatory) because I only care about the first generation. It saves me money though, by not having to buy a new Pokemongame every 2 years.

I get that feeling. I'm a gen one guy and didn't bother with the show on a regular basis after the second movie, tried Johto and it wasn't different enough, plus they kept the same cast. It's a bit like how the first five seasons of Power Rangers kept using leftovers from the MMPR era.

Not to mention Ash kept losing his major tournaments. Looking back, the second movie pretty much ended his story for me, You master all those legendary birds and save the world, and you're somehow not recognised as a master by that point?

[ToTheNines]

Originally Posted by Mad Dog McMutt

I also watched the first generation of Pokemon for the first time in a long time a couple of years ago when I bought the dvds. I enjoyed it quite a bit actually. Maybe I am just blinded by nostalgia. I am what the Pokemon community considers a genwunner (which is derogatory) because I only care about the first generation. It saves me money though, by not having to buy a new Pokemongame every 2 years.

Yeah, I'm also more or less a genwunner. I like all generations due to playing Go for years, but as far as the anime/cards/games, I don't branch out from Kanto too much.

The anime though... oof!

There were moments that were really awesome, but pretty much only because I was seeing stuff I hadn't seen in almost 25 years and it really took me back. Catching the few episodes I missed was interesting, especially the banned episodes. A couple of which I had to watch the Japanese versions, which was fun too.

But overall, it was a frustrating show to watch. Ash is an absolutely awful trainer lol. He just wins all his badges on wild technicalities. Even some of the good ones like the Volcano badge and the Thunder badge have stupid rules like 1v1. I feel like Squirtle would have whooped Blaine's Magmar pretty easily.

So then of course he doesn't even win the Indigo League, which felt like such a flat, anti-climactic ending. Then of course he goes on the win the Orange League tournament but it felt way too easy. There was zero tension and it just felt like Drake threw the match since he was just kissing Ash's ass the whole time.

Then there's the repetition. Team Rocket every single episode, Brock being problematically horny every single episode, etc.

I dunno, it's always been on my list of childhood shows to revisit and now I can say I did. The first 15 episodes were pretty great, Snow Way Out still rules, and a couple other strong ones are there. Like Zarius, I tapped out at the second movie. I can't fathom anyone watching the additional 900 or whatever episodes haha!

[CyberCubed]

I've seen all 1,200 episodes and all 23 movies, and the 50+ specials or so that went along with it. Ash does start off as a poor trainer with a lucky streak, that's the whole point of the first season. He does get somewhat better into Johto but then becomes a legitimately good trainer (for the animes standards), by the time you get into Hoenn and Sinnoh. Then by the XY anime Ash is basically a veteran trainer, then Sun/Moon basically changes his design but keeps his competence to reflect the more cartoony aspect of that season, and then Journeys was his final arc.

But yeah, Team Rocket stays for the entire 26 year run of the show, and it's just something you have to deal with. They do stop appearing in every episode by the BW anime, but they're always around every season.

Brock runs his course and they get rid of him again after DP for good (besides brief cameo returns), and of course the writers admitted they ran out of stuff to do with Misty by Johto. You could tell they just had her hold Togepi in most episodes and barely get a role unless the episode focused on water pokemon. It also didn't help that Takeshi Shudo, the original director, infamously hated shipping and basically killed Misty's crush on Ash and put his foot down on it ever happening lol.

[neatoman]

Can I ask, what would be funnier?

Bebop and Rocksteady being killed in their first battle without doing much?

Or

Bebop and Rocksteady dying of some unstable mutation thing like Senator Kelly in the first X-Men movie?

[ToTheNines]

Originally Posted by CyberCubed

I've seen all 1,200 episodes and all 23 movies, and the 50+ specials or so that went along with it.

[neatoman]

Oh god, yeah. Yeah, I can imagine anyone bearing to watch all of the Pokémon anime.

I was like 4 when the anime started in Japan, here it started when I was 8, and I stopped somewhere in the Gen3 episodes because I got sick of how the main character never really progressed. He just kept doing the same badge collecting thing and never won the championship, the Gen3 episodes even had the gaul to not just let him continue training his previous Pokémon and gain an obvious advantage, which became a trend as I know and I presume was only done because GF/Nintendo wanted new Pokémon to get promoted. The little turd did eventually reach his goal in 2023, when was already 30. It literally took them from the time I hadn't really started elementary school yet until the year I earned my master's degree, how absurd is that?

[CyberCubed]

You expected him to win a league when he was a rookie? Ash's progression in the anime is actually very realistic, the only issue is it took 26 years (in real life) from 1997-2023 so of course most of the original fanbase outgrew the show, and then the kids who came in watching around the mid-2000's grew out of the target audience as well. That was basically the main issue, Ash became a different character for different kids depending on what demographic or which gen of Pokemon was your first.

But if you view it from an in-universe perspective, he got progressively higher in rank in each league he did until he eventually won. The only issue is as said, Ash started over with a new team every generation, so his previous Pokemon only came back every so often, while he used new captures (for each gen of games they were for) as it went on.

Besides that he did plenty of world saving in the show and of course each of the 23 movies were basically a villain or world-ending plotline, so he did plenty of "saving the day" moments outside the usual 8 Gym and league trek the series was based on.

[neatoman]

Hey, guess what? When I played Pokémon Red back as a kid, I managed to defeat the Elite Four after getting all eight badges. And you know what else? So did every other kid I knew. Which makes Ash a worse trainer than the average 6-10 year old gamer.

[ZariusTwo]

Originally Posted by CyberCubed

It also didn't help that Takeshi Shudo, the original director, infamously hated shipping and basically killed Misty's crush on Ash and put his foot down on it ever happening lol.

Yeah, but there were still plenty of 'writer revolts' where that was concerned and her absence actually made their relationship more interesting and mean more whenever she came back for guest spots, especially once they ditched Togepei.

Kind of wish the second episode of the final "To Be A Master" series for Ash had been the ending of the whole show because Misty and Ash finally reunite and walk off into the sunset together. Outside of some flirting, it wasn't outright romantic, but it's as close as we'd ever gotten to a resolution and a win.

[ZariusTwo]

Originally Posted by neatoman

Bebop and Rocksteady dying of some unstable mutation thing like Senator Kelly in the first X-Men movie?

MutAIDtion.

[TylerD]

Originally Posted by ToTheNines

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/i...A-kS7u_nA&s=10

My reaction when I get back to work after a week off

[CyberCubed]

Originally Posted by neatoman

Hey, guess what? When I played Pokémon Red back as a kid, I managed to defeat the Elite Four after getting all eight badges. And you know what else? So did every other kid I knew. Which makes Ash a worse trainer than the average 6-10 year old gamer.

That's an absolutely terrible comparison. Of course in the games you're going to beat the game, that's what its intended for. The anime treats Pokemon as if its real-life in-universe, same reason Pokemon aren't stored on "PC's" in the anime and you need to actually feed the pokemon food as if they're animals. Any beginning trainer is not going to win their first league, or even their second, or third.

Especially when you realize the trainers all start as 10 year olds. Most Elite 4 and Champions are 20-30+ year olds in canon, it makes no sense for a kid to beat people double their age. That's like a 5th grader in real life knowing more than 30+ year old with a college degree and job experience.

[Mad Dog McMutt]

I'm such a dork that like 6 years ago I bought Red when I already had Blue just to get all 150 pokemon without cheating (with some help from Pokemon Stadium). I can now be considered a Pokemon master.

[ToTheNines]

[Mad Dog McMutt]

That guy is pretty good at coming close to the actual voices of the characters.

[TylerD]

Originally Posted by ToTheNines

Stupid me didn’t read what it was about. Thought he was gonna do bebop lmao

[CyberCubed]

This thread needs to be locked.

[neatoman]

Originally Posted by CyberCubed

This thread needs to be locked.

Aw, but I was just about to ask how many people I would need to invite to a whole roasted Bebop feast.

[ToTheNines]