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** Perhaps he meant that the eight Gym Leaders *together* are stronger than Ruby and Sapphire. Ruby and Sapphire could likely 2v2 any pair of Leaders and win, but 2v8, they would certainly be the weaker group.
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* Toward the end of the RS saga, it's stated (by Juan IIRC) that the Hoenn Gym Leaders are stronger than Ruby and Sapphire. How does that make sense? Sapphire defeated most of them, and in a flashback from before the saga even started, Norman (said by many to be the strongest Leader) states that Ruby had surpassed him.
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* Toward the end of the RS saga, it's stated (by Juan IIRC) that the Hoenn Gym Leaders are stronger than Ruby and Sapphire. How does that make sense? Sapphire defeated most of them, and in a flashback from before dating back to the saga even started, beginning of the saga, Norman (said by many to be the strongest Leader) states that Ruby had surpassed him.
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* Toward the end of the RS saga, it's stated (by Juan IIRC) that the Hoenn Gym Leaders are stronger than Ruby and Sapphire. How does that make sense? Sapphire defeated most of them, and in a flashback from before the saga even started, Norman (said by many to be the strongest Leader) states that Ruby had surpassed him.
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Changed line(s) 143 (click to see context) from:
*** Were the personalities of all the rivals in Special really more interesting and varied? Wally lost his ambition for becoming the Champion and proving himself. Instead, he only wanted to catch a Pokémon and become a trainer so that he would have friends. Even when he helped Norman with Rayquaza, he did so for the sake of helping him. The aspect of wanting to prove himself was never brought up. Meanwhile, Silver... What ''was'' his personality in the manga? I honestly couldn't tell. He was as one-track minded as his game self (replace "being the strongest" with "bringing Mask of Ice down"), but unlike his game self, his characterization gave off very little personality. And he lost his character development from the games. Even leaving aside later games that expanded on his character and motivations, Silver displayed clear character arc in GSC. He was a guy who was obsessed with becoming strong and viewed affection as a sign of weakness, so he treated Pokémon as tools. Until he ran into Lance, who curbstomped him and called him out for his methods. Meeting a trainer who cared about Pokémon yet was so much stronger than made him realize that true strength isn't about an abusive jerk and crushing everyone else, prompting him to start changing his ways. On the other hand, what development did manga!Silver get between his debut and the end of the GSC saga? There was a brief scene with Lance criticizing Silver for his treatment of his Pokémon, but [[BigLippedAlligatorMoment nothing came out of it,]] and it felt extraneous, as manga!Silver had never displayed his "Pokémon are tools" view from the games.
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*** Were the personalities of all the rivals in Special really more interesting and varied? Wally lost his ambition for becoming the Champion and proving himself. Instead, he only wanted to catch a Pokémon and become a trainer so that he would have friends. Even when he helped Norman with Rayquaza, he did so for the sake of helping him. The aspect of wanting to prove himself was never brought up. Meanwhile, Silver... What ''was'' his personality in the manga? I honestly couldn't tell. He was as one-track minded as his game self (replace "being the strongest" with "bringing Mask of Ice down"), but unlike his game self, his characterization gave off very little personality. And he lost his character development from the games. Even leaving aside later games that expanded on his character and motivations, Silver displayed a clear character arc in GSC. He was a guy who was obsessed with becoming strong and viewed affection as a sign of weakness, so he treated Pokémon as tools. Until he ran into Lance, who curbstomped him and called him out for his methods. Meeting a trainer who cared about Pokémon yet was so much stronger than him made him realize that true strength isn't about an abusive jerk and crushing everyone else, prompting him to start changing his ways. On the other hand, what development did manga!Silver get between his debut and the end of the GSC saga? There was a brief scene with Lance criticizing Silver for his treatment of his Pokémon, but [[BigLippedAlligatorMoment nothing came out of it,]] it, and it the scene felt extraneous, extraneous,]] as manga!Silver had never displayed his "Pokémon are tools" view from the games.
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Changed line(s) 143 (click to see context) from:
*** Were the personalities of all the rivals in Special really more interesting and varied? Wally lost his ambition for becoming the Champion and proving himself. Instead, he only wanted to catch a Pokémon and become a trainer so that he would have friends. Even when he helped Norman with Rayquaza, he did so for the sake of helping him, not because he wanted to prove himself. Meanwhile, Silver... What ''was'' his personality in the manga? I couldn't tell. He was as one-track minded as his game self (replace "becoming the strongest" with "defeating Mask of Ice"), but unlike his game self, his characterization gave off very little personality. And he lost his character development from the games. Even leaving aside later games that expanded on his character and motivations, Silver displayed clear character development in GSC. He was a guy who was obsessed with becoming strong and viewed affection as a sign of weakness, so he treated Pokémon as tools. Until he ran into Lance, who curbstomped him and called him out for his methods. Meeting a trainer who cared about Pokémon yet was so much stronger than made him realize that true strength isn't about an abusive jerk and crushing everyone else, prompting him to start changing his ways. On the other hand, what development did manga!Silver get between his debut and the end of the GSC saga? There was a brief scene with Lance criticizing Silver for his treatment of his Pokémon, but [[BigLippedAlligatorMoment nothing came out of it,]] and it felt extraneous, as manga!Silver had never displayed his "Pokémon are tools" view from the games.
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*** Were the personalities of all the rivals in Special really more interesting and varied? Wally lost his ambition for becoming the Champion and proving himself. Instead, he only wanted to catch a Pokémon and become a trainer so that he would have friends. Even when he helped Norman with Rayquaza, he did so for the sake of helping him, not because he wanted him. The aspect of wanting to prove himself.himself was never brought up. Meanwhile, Silver... What ''was'' his personality in the manga? I honestly couldn't tell. He was as one-track minded as his game self (replace "becoming "being the strongest" with "defeating "bringing Mask of Ice"), Ice down"), but unlike his game self, his characterization gave off very little personality. And he lost his character development from the games. Even leaving aside later games that expanded on his character and motivations, Silver displayed clear character development arc in GSC. He was a guy who was obsessed with becoming strong and viewed affection as a sign of weakness, so he treated Pokémon as tools. Until he ran into Lance, who curbstomped him and called him out for his methods. Meeting a trainer who cared about Pokémon yet was so much stronger than made him realize that true strength isn't about an abusive jerk and crushing everyone else, prompting him to start changing his ways. On the other hand, what development did manga!Silver get between his debut and the end of the GSC saga? There was a brief scene with Lance criticizing Silver for his treatment of his Pokémon, but [[BigLippedAlligatorMoment nothing came out of it,]] and it felt extraneous, as manga!Silver had never displayed his "Pokémon are tools" view from the games.
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*** Were the personalities of all the rivals in Special really more interesting and varied? Wally lost his ambition for becoming the Champion and proving himself. Instead, he only wanted to catch a Pokémon and become a trainer so that he would have friends. Even when he helped Norman with Rayquaza, he did so for the sake of helping him, not because he wanted to prove himself. Meanwhile, Silver... What ''was'' his personality in the manga? I couldn't tell. He was as one-track minded as his game self (replace "becoming the strongest" with "defeating Mask of Ice"), but unlike his game self, his characterization gave off very little personality. And he lost his character development from the games. Even leaving aside later games that expanded on his character and motivations, Silver displayed clear character development in GSC. He was a guy who was obsessed with becoming strong and viewed affection as a sign of weakness, so he treated Pokémon as tools. Until he ran into Lance, who curbstomped him and called him out for his methods. Meeting a trainer who cared about Pokémon yet was so much stronger than made him realize that true strength isn't about an abusive jerk and crushing everyone else, prompting him to start changing his ways. On the other hand, what development did manga!Silver get between his debut and the end of the GSC saga? There was a brief scene with Lance criticizing Silver for his treatment of his Pokémon, but [[BigLippedAlligatorMoment nothing came out of it,]] and it felt extraneous, as manga!Silver had never displayed his "Pokémon are tools" view from the games.
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*** While they do have personalities, they aren't exactly the most interesting and, more importantly, varied personalities. As most of the game character arcs have have a simple end goal (get stronger, get nicer, etc.) while PokeSpe tries to keep their characters personalities and fates more open ended cause they return often in future arcs.
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** He didn't. Steam from Poli with the electricity from Pika created the thundercloud that Saur lured Charizard into.
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* Stuff he does in a Tough Contest will be written off as part of the performance, ergo fake, ergo not especially frightening to anyone. Plenty of actors play villainous or violent roles on stage or on TV, but that woud hardly be a reason to fear them in real life.
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* Stuff he does in a Tough Contest will be written off as part of the performance, ergo fake, ergo not especially frightening to anyone. Plenty of actors play villainous or violent roles on stage or on TV, but that woud hardly be a reason to fear them in real life.
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* If Ruby doesn't want people to see him when he's in his "serious battler mode" for fear of making others scared of him, how come he has no reservation about showing his "tough" side during Tough contests?
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* In the GSC saga we first see Jasmine in Ecruteak City. There's an abrupt earthquake and the ground opens under her feet, causing her to fall down a fissure. Then the next time we see her, she's at the Tin Tower. Um, what?
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*** "not even the rivals and pseudo-rivals are given much personality to begin with in the games" < Um, what? Rivals tend to have some of the most defined personalities in the games. Blue is an arrogant jackass who loves to brag about his superiority, Silver is a jerk who (initially) sees Pokémon as nothing but tools and hates weakness, Wally is a sickly boy who wants to prove himself, and so on.
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*** Not really. Outside of player characters, characters in the games have their own personalities. And even counting only player characters, their actions contradict their manga personalities, such as Ruby being interested in collecting contest ribbons instead of gym badges.
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*** Blue is the color officially attributed to Pokémon Crystal, just like red is to Pokémon Red, blue to Pokémon Blue, and so on. So Crystal's eyes ''do'' match her name.
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*** Blue is the color officially attributed to Pokémon Crystal, just like red is to Pokémon Red, blue to Pokémon Blue, and so on. It's also common for artists in general to color glass and crystal objects blue. So yes, Crystal's eyes ''do'' match her name.
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*** Blue is the color officially attributed to Pokémon Crystal, just like red is to Pokémon Red, blue to Pokémon Blue, and so on. So Crystal's eyes ''do'' match her name.
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* I can hardly forgive Ruby, but how did Sapphire not recognize Ruby from the past? He even wore that same weird cap!
** It's likely that there are a number of other trainers with caps of similar nature who passed through Littleroot during her years as Birch's assistant. The identifying feature are the scars above his left eye, as he revealed near the end of the RS arc.
*** You also forget, watching your (admittedly, very new) friend get slashed across the face is a pretty traumatic experience. Combined with the fact that it happened about half their lifetimes ago, it's possible that they only remember the basic event, forgetting the finer details. To them, it's probably like "I remember really liking this person, but I don't really remember much about it". It's the same way in that you might remember hanging out with a person at summer camp without remembering names or faces.
** It's likely that there are a number of other trainers with caps of similar nature who passed through Littleroot during her years as Birch's assistant. The identifying feature are the scars above his left eye, as he revealed near the end of the RS arc.
*** You also forget, watching your (admittedly, very new) friend get slashed across the face is a pretty traumatic experience. Combined with the fact that it happened about half their lifetimes ago, it's possible that they only remember the basic event, forgetting the finer details. To them, it's probably like "I remember really liking this person, but I don't really remember much about it". It's the same way in that you might remember hanging out with a person at summer camp without remembering names or faces.
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moved from main pokemon headscratchers page. Also providing answers.
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* How is Red's victory in the Pokemon League legal? He had three Pokemon out at the same time, and all of them contribuited to the victory.
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* How is Red's victory in the Pokemon League legal? He had three Pokemon out at the same time, and all of them contribuited contributed to the victory.
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** Perhaps she was more focused on supporting Team Magma, who helped her try to revive the volcano that was killed. That's one way spite Team Aqua.
* During the Ruby/Sapphire arc, Hoenn was in mortal danger because of Kyogre and Groudon's fighting. Why, then, did Norman make Wally fight his way up 50 or so crumbling floors, which could not have taken a small amount of time, so he could help summon Rayquaza? Why not just fly him up there, as Norman was pretty clearly able to do so with that Flygon he had? I know, RuleOfCool and all, but it just seems like it was a big waste of time.
** The point was not to get to the top of the tower directly, as it would be a big waste of time. Norman was intent on ''training'' Wally instead, and a do-or-die scenario was the best he could do given the circumstances. If Wally couldn't rise to the challenge, he couldn't succeed as a trainer, end of story, and Norman has been shown to be the TrainingFromHell kind of guy.
*** WhatTheHellHero! TrainingFromHell is bad and all, but to stake the entire world on that? That's a bit too far, and Norman should've known that. If the entire world was in danger and you only had so much time before everything went ka-boom, would you rather risk your butt climbing up 50 floors and waste a whole lot of time or even lose all the time you had, or fly up there in a fraction of the time and save the effort and the world?
*** Something along the lines of "that storm's too powerful, so we can't fly to Rayquaza, and I can't do it alone without a child's help, so I need to make you and your Pokémon strong enough to get up to the top." Makes sense if you think about it that way.
*** True; the fact that a sickly boy like Wally would've never had the physical stamina to make it if it wasn't for having to fight through all those floors is legitimate. Of course, Ruby would've probably had to do the same thing, so it's kinda unjustified. Nevertheless, not counting the fact that Rayquaza is summoned, it's all for naught in Wally's case, as he ends up presumably dead, Grovyle gets stolen by Guile, [[DeusExMachina Celebi]] teleports Ruru back to Ruby, and [[OriginalGeneration Emerald]] shows up to overwrite Wally's existence in the end, a la [[WhatHappenedToTheMouse the GS Ball.]]
*** This may be a bit late, but the whole story is out. Wally is needed because the final roadblocks to Rayquaza shut out pokemon and adults. The first roadblock is a beam that repels pokemon so you can simply smuggle them in their pokeballs. However, the second roadblock is a tunnel that is so small that even Wally could barely squeeze through with his small size. Said tunnel must be pulled open at all times by a strong enough individual via heavy chains. This combination forces only small children to get to Rayquaza. Even Norman said that this was why he couldn't do this by himself when he first found it. Also, Wally is still alive and personally gave Ruru back to Ruby as of Emerald arc.
* During the Ruby/Sapphire arc, Hoenn was in mortal danger because of Kyogre and Groudon's fighting. Why, then, did Norman make Wally fight his way up 50 or so crumbling floors, which could not have taken a small amount of time, so he could help summon Rayquaza? Why not just fly him up there, as Norman was pretty clearly able to do so with that Flygon he had? I know, RuleOfCool and all, but it just seems like it was a big waste of time.
** The point was not to get to the top of the tower directly, as it would be a big waste of time. Norman was intent on ''training'' Wally instead, and a do-or-die scenario was the best he could do given the circumstances. If Wally couldn't rise to the challenge, he couldn't succeed as a trainer, end of story, and Norman has been shown to be the TrainingFromHell kind of guy.
*** WhatTheHellHero! TrainingFromHell is bad and all, but to stake the entire world on that? That's a bit too far, and Norman should've known that. If the entire world was in danger and you only had so much time before everything went ka-boom, would you rather risk your butt climbing up 50 floors and waste a whole lot of time or even lose all the time you had, or fly up there in a fraction of the time and save the effort and the world?
*** Something along the lines of "that storm's too powerful, so we can't fly to Rayquaza, and I can't do it alone without a child's help, so I need to make you and your Pokémon strong enough to get up to the top." Makes sense if you think about it that way.
*** True; the fact that a sickly boy like Wally would've never had the physical stamina to make it if it wasn't for having to fight through all those floors is legitimate. Of course, Ruby would've probably had to do the same thing, so it's kinda unjustified. Nevertheless, not counting the fact that Rayquaza is summoned, it's all for naught in Wally's case, as he ends up presumably dead, Grovyle gets stolen by Guile, [[DeusExMachina Celebi]] teleports Ruru back to Ruby, and [[OriginalGeneration Emerald]] shows up to overwrite Wally's existence in the end, a la [[WhatHappenedToTheMouse the GS Ball.]]
*** This may be a bit late, but the whole story is out. Wally is needed because the final roadblocks to Rayquaza shut out pokemon and adults. The first roadblock is a beam that repels pokemon so you can simply smuggle them in their pokeballs. However, the second roadblock is a tunnel that is so small that even Wally could barely squeeze through with his small size. Said tunnel must be pulled open at all times by a strong enough individual via heavy chains. This combination forces only small children to get to Rayquaza. Even Norman said that this was why he couldn't do this by himself when he first found it. Also, Wally is still alive and personally gave Ruru back to Ruby as of Emerald arc.
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** Actually, the original artist got sick and it affected her hand, meaning - at the time, if the above Troper's saying that she now does doujins online is correct - she couldn't continue PokeSpe. From GSC onwards, a different artist has done the art.
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** Actually, the original artist got sick and it affected her hand, meaning - at the time, if the above Troper's saying that she now does doujins online is correct - she couldn't continue PokeSpe.[=PokeSpe=]. From GSC onwards, a different artist has done the art.
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** Okay, Sho4's chapter 10 included a colored shot of Black and White, and their hair is indeed a very, ''very'' dark shade of brown, darker than Blue or Sapphire's.
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** Okay, Sho4's [=Sho4's=] chapter 10 included a colored shot of Black and White, and their hair is indeed a very, ''very'' dark shade of brown, darker than Blue or Sapphire's.
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Changed line(s) 215,216 (click to see context) from:
* The timeline after the [=ORAS=] arc. It was said that the arc for [=HGSS=] takes place before the Diamond and Pearl arc. Okay, that makes sense given how there's some in-game implication that is the case. But [=ORAS=] is stretching it. How exactly could Fairy-types and Mega Evolution have not come up in the Diamond, Pearl, Platinum, Black, White, Black2 and White2 stories? Further confusing things is how it's implied X & Y also take place at the same time as [=ORAS=], said implication being Blue was in Kalos while [=ORAS=] was going on. So, again, how did stuff like the Fairy-types and Mega Evolution never come up in-universe during the Gen 4 and Gen 5 storylines?
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** By the sounds of it, Kusaka was sad to see Mato go and had to put Special on hiatus until Yamamoto came along. Mato ended up getting a new artist job while she recovered, presumably it being much less taxing on her than a regular on-going manga (and as ''Manga/{{Bakuman}}'' clearly shows, being a manga artist is anything ''but'' a walk in the park).
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** By the sounds of it, Kusaka was sad to see Mato go and had to put Special on hiatus until Yamamoto came along. Mato ended up getting a new artist job while she recovered, presumably it being much less taxing on her than a regular on-going manga (and as ''Manga/{{Bakuman}}'' clearly shows, being a manga artist is anything ''but'' a walk in the park).
park). Additionally, Kusaka has only 2 followings on Twittter, Yamamoto and Mato.
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* How is Red's victory in the Pokemon League legal? He had three Pokemon out at the same time, and all of them contribuited to the victory.
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[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/x11.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:What!?]]
[[caption-width-right:350:What!?]]
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*** After receiving the direct explosion and falling off, Sird's Persian and Starmie disappeared.
*** After getting knocked out Lt. Surge's Voltorbs and Magnemites disappeared.
*** After being frozen, Red's other pokemon that received the combined Ice, Fighting, and Ghost attack miraculously disappeared.
*** After the dex holders got turned to stone, Pika, Chuchu, and Mewtwo disappeared on the scene.
*** Pika and Chuchu weren't hit by the attack, and they turn up in Emerald's Chapter. Mewtwo [[spoiler: immediately started chasing Sird as she tried to flee the scene]].
*** After getting knocked out Lt. Surge's Voltorbs and Magnemites disappeared.
*** After being frozen, Red's other pokemon that received the combined Ice, Fighting, and Ghost attack miraculously disappeared.
*** After the dex holders got turned to stone, Pika, Chuchu, and Mewtwo disappeared on the scene.
*** Pika and Chuchu weren't hit by the attack, and they turn up in Emerald's Chapter. Mewtwo [[spoiler: immediately started chasing Sird as she tried to flee the scene]].
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*** They might be skin tight, so at the most only his fingers are getting the hell shocked out of them, but the rest of his hand is protected. That theory may not have a lot of credibility in real life, but hey, [[MST3KMantra this is Pokemon.]]
*** Well think back to the Yellow chapter. Super Nerd made an insulated body suit that went over his skin from a piece of Red's glove. It was clear and we needed an establishing panel to know he was wearing it. And in RGB the entire room that Red was battling Lt. Surge in was being electrified, and despite the fingerless gloves and short sleeves, Surge wasn't being hurt. So maybe the gloves aren't actually fingerless at all, maybe the fingers are just clear. It makes some sense that Lt. Surge just stylized his insulation gear to match a look that was comfortable to him. And yeah, it's never been said that this is the case, but it was never said that it wasn't.
*** It is now confirmed that the gloves have an invisible layer over where the fingers go, thus making sure his fingers are indeed protected.
*** Well think back to the Yellow chapter. Super Nerd made an insulated body suit that went over his skin from a piece of Red's glove. It was clear and we needed an establishing panel to know he was wearing it. And in RGB the entire room that Red was battling Lt. Surge in was being electrified, and despite the fingerless gloves and short sleeves, Surge wasn't being hurt. So maybe the gloves aren't actually fingerless at all, maybe the fingers are just clear. It makes some sense that Lt. Surge just stylized his insulation gear to match a look that was comfortable to him. And yeah, it's never been said that this is the case, but it was never said that it wasn't.
*** It is now confirmed that the gloves have an invisible layer over where the fingers go, thus making sure his fingers are indeed protected.
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** The idea of Pokemon liking battling isn't very far out there. PEOPLE enjoy fighting, this is why we have boxing, martial arts competitions, fencing, paintball, laser tag, the Society for Creative Anachronism. People talk about animal violence in Pokemon but the Pokemon have an ability that is most common to humans. The ability to find sport in fighting. Pokemon battles are more like karate matches than say, dog fights. Further more, partnership is a recurring theme in ''Manga/PokemonSpecial'', in that the trainer and Pokemon are equals, and in all canons there's some form of cross species culture. The games put you more in control, [[RuleOfFun because it's arguably easier for the player]].
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** The idea of Pokemon liking battling isn't very far out there. PEOPLE enjoy fighting, this is why we have boxing, martial arts competitions, fencing, paintball, laser tag, the Society for Creative Anachronism. People talk about animal violence in Pokemon but the Pokemon have an ability that is most common to humans. The ability to find sport in fighting. Pokemon battles are more like karate matches than say, dog fights. Further more, partnership is a recurring theme in ''Manga/PokemonSpecial'', ''Pokemon Adventures'', in that the trainer and Pokemon are equals, and in all canons there's some form of cross species culture. The games put you more in control, [[RuleOfFun because it's arguably easier for the player]].
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* White and Black have blue and brown eyes, like their game counterparts. There goes over ten years of tradition, and for a reboot of sorts. Black would have had the same black style that all Pokemon characters have, or have been like other black eyed characters. White.. Could have had a [[{{Naruto}} Hyuuga approach]].
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* White and Black have blue and brown eyes, like their game counterparts. There goes over ten years of tradition, and for a reboot of sorts. Black would have had the same black style that all Pokemon characters have, or have been like other black eyed characters. White.. Could have had a [[{{Naruto}} [[Manga/{{Naruto}} Hyuuga approach]].
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** In-universe, fairy types were mis-typed the same way steel-types were. Also, while Blue was in Kalos during ORAS, the XY chapter does not take place during the same time; Steven's flashback shows Blue and Diantha together at the Tower of Mastery, and Diantha is shown as a little girl.
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* The timeline after the [=ORAS=] arc. It was said that the arc for [=HGSS=] takes place before the Diamond and Pearl arc. Okay, that makes sense given how there's some in-game implication that is the case. But [=ORAS=] is stretching it. How exactly could Fairy-types and Mega Evolution have not come up in the Diamond, Pearl, Platinum, Black, White, Black2 and White2 stories? Further confusing things is how it's implied X & Y also take place at the same time as [=ORAS=], said implication being Blue was in Kalos while [=ORAS=] was going on. So, again, how did stuff like the Fairy-types and Mega Evolution never come up in-universe during the Gen 4 and Gen 5 storylines?
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** The idea of Pokemon liking battling isn't very far out there. PEOPLE enjoy fighting, this is why we have boxing, martial arts competitions, fencing, paintball, laser tag, the Society for Creative Anachronism. People talk about animal violence in Pokemon but the Pokemon have an ability that is most common to humans. The ability to find sport in fighting. Pokemon battles are more like karate matches than say, dog fights. Further more, partnership is a recurring theme in PokemonSpecial, in that the trainer and Pokemon are equals, and in all canons there's some form of cross species culture. The games put you more in control, [[RuleOfFun because it's arguably easier for the player]].
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** The idea of Pokemon liking battling isn't very far out there. PEOPLE enjoy fighting, this is why we have boxing, martial arts competitions, fencing, paintball, laser tag, the Society for Creative Anachronism. People talk about animal violence in Pokemon but the Pokemon have an ability that is most common to humans. The ability to find sport in fighting. Pokemon battles are more like karate matches than say, dog fights. Further more, partnership is a recurring theme in PokemonSpecial, ''Manga/PokemonSpecial'', in that the trainer and Pokemon are equals, and in all canons there's some form of cross species culture. The games put you more in control, [[RuleOfFun because it's arguably easier for the player]].
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*** Red and Blue have returned to have major roles in OR/AS. Gold, Silver and Crystal also had a brief cameo talking to Emerald via computer in a recent chapter.
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**** The way I see it, Pokemon view it as a "Two heads are better than one" deal. They're smart and clever, yes, but while they're actually in battle the human can serve as a separate set of eyes to pick up on details they miss or can't determine on their own. Do you think Pearl's pokemon can tell which attack is coming at them just by observing the enemy's posture? While Mewtwo focuses on fighting Deoxys in the actual battle, Red can come up with an overall strategy because he's not taking tentacle-arms to the face. While not technically a battle, Gold's memorization of the obstacle course allowed his Togepi to win the Pokeathlon race even when the little guy was blinded by sand in his eyes. Raikou, Entei, and Suicine wanted to save Ho-oh and Ho-oh was being threatened by a human. Who better to fight by their sides than other humans that have a better understanding of how the Mask of Ice might think? Pokemon ARE smart, but humans bring a different kind of smarts to the table (like Black knowing all the pokemon used by the gym leaders) and the resulting teamwork is greater than the sum of its parts. Besides, if they REALLY didn't like the situation, what stops the pokemon from leaving, or even attacking their own trainer? Remember how Red's Pika kept shocking him in the beginning[[labelnote:*]]Pika changed its mind after Red put himself in harm's way to keep Pika safe[[/labelnote]].
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* Red's Pika defeating Brock's Onix.
** Actually, Onix was in the air at that point of time, and in many Pokemon adaptions, Ground types can't become immune to the effects of electricity if they're not touching the ground.
** Maybe it was dumb luck.
** There's also Pika defeating the Rhydon in Mt. Moon and beating Giovanni's Ground type Pokes with it too.
*** The Rhydon was defeated when the cave ceiling fell, it wasn't technically Pikachu defeating him, but more like winning Red and Misty time to escape.
*** For Giovanni. there is actually a pretty good reason: the electricity had been [[TimTaylorTechnology supercharged]]. Which, in the Special series, pretty much guarantees a win. The bigass explosion that happened afterwards probably did something too.
*** I think the battle ended immediately after the trainer gets knocked out. It happens multiple times.
* Orm's Shuckle and Hoppip disappeared after he fell to his death.
*** After receiving the direct explosion and falling off, Sird's Persian and Starmie disappeared.
*** After getting knocked out Lt. Surge's Voltorbs and Magnemites disappeared.
*** After being frozen, Red's other pokemon that received the combined Ice, Fighting, and Ghost attack miraculously disappeared.
*** After the dex holders got turned to stone, Pika, Chuchu, and Mewtwo disappeared on the scene.
**** Pika and Chuchu weren't hit by the attack, and they turn up in Emerald's Chapter. Mewtwo [[spoiler: immediately started chasing Sird as she tried to flee the scene]].
* Blue reveals to Red during the Indigo Plateau section that throughout Kanto history, only people from Pallet Town have made it through the Championships.
** Exact wording is that he said that only Pallet natives actually ''became'' Kanto champions. That League happened to be the ninth, and the league takes place every three years, so over a period of 27 years, there have only been nine champions, less if someone won more than once. Little less eyebrow-raising, and it is heavily implied later on that the main reason Blue (girl) was kidnapped was because she ''was'' from Pallet.
* And also Red's FingerlessGloves. They're supposed to be insulated and protects Red from electricity, unfortunately being fingerless should defeat such purpose.
*** They might be skin tight, so at the most only his fingers are getting the hell shocked out of them, but the rest of his hand is protected. That theory may not have a lot of credibility in real life, but hey, [[MST3KMantra this is Pokemon.]]
**** Well think back to the Yellow chapter. Super Nerd made an insulated body suit that went over his skin from a piece of Red's glove. It was clear and we needed an establishing panel to know he was wearing it. And in RGB the entire room that Red was battling Lt. Surge in was being electrified, and despite the fingerless gloves and short sleeves, Surge wasn't being hurt. So maybe the gloves aren't actually fingerless at all, maybe the fingers are just clear. It makes some sense that Lt. Surge just stylized his insulation gear to match a look that was comfortable to him. And yeah, it's never been said that this is the case, but it was never said that it wasn't.
***** It is now confirmed that the gloves have an invisible layer over where the fingers go, thus making sure his fingers are indeed protected.
* The names. Is it supposed to be a coincidence that a lot of 'chosen' kids just happen to have absurd names with a color or gem theme?
** Yeah, but it's a whole lot more obvious to us English-speakers, as names such as "Reddo" and "Gurin" probably don't stick out as much among names such as "Kasumi" and "Takeshi".
*** Sure they do. Just because they're pronounced with a "Japanese accent" (i.e. transliterated to Japanese phenoms) doesn't make it any less weird that the kid down the block is named Daiyamondo.
*** There's other people in the original Japanese with weird/Western names too. It's just that they're less likely to spot the otherwise obvious ThemeNaming.
** To be fair Red, Blue, Crystal, Ruby and Pearl are all normal names, albeit Ruby and Pearl are girl's names and a Blue is a boy's name that normally drops the e anyway, and while much rarer, this troper has met a couple girls named Green. I used to have the fan theory that "Green" was the girl's last name, since Green is a common last name. Of course that was before I was aware of the name switch. On the other hand, everyone I've ever talked to, regardless of gender would LOVE to be named [[AwesomeMcCoolname Gold, Silver or Platinum]].
*** Also bare in mind that Ruby and Sapphire, whose parents are friends, are hinted to be named after their birthstones.
*** Besides those, Sapphire, Diamond and Emerald are also girl's names, although very rare(except Emerald, which is fairly common)
*** Diamond can be a boy's name as well (i.e. Prince Diamond from Sailor Moon.)
** It's a lot less eyebrow raising considering nearly ''everyone'' worth mentioning has some sort of Theme Naming going on.
* As said on FridgeHorror, is the series currently in an AlternateUniverse? Ruby said they encountered a "time slip" and "arrived in a slightly different future" where presumably everything turned out fine.
** Piggybacking on this, are we to assume there is another "timeline" where Norman, Steven, and Courtney are all still very much dead? Oh, hey, Fridge Depression, haven't seen you in awhile...
** You want Fridge Horror? Ruby and Sapphire were sent to an alternate timeline where everyone lived through the crisis and using legendary Pokemon doesn't automatically kill you, which we can assume is the main canon universe. And in this universe, Ruby and Sapphire are being celebrated for what they've done which is at least a little different from what they did in their own timeline. Oh and everyone has a counterpart in the new/main canon universe... So what happened to the new timeline's original Ruby and Sapphire? And also using legendary Pokemon in the original timeline slowly kills you, remember that's why Steven and Norman died in the first place. And with the Kanto trio using the legendary bird trio and the Johto trio using the legendary beast trio at the end of the GSC Chapter, this also explains why the original Dex Holders didn't show up during a worldly crisis... They died.
*** I regret posting that tidbit on FridgeHorror now. Everything's sounding so fan-wanky now...but just to be sure, was Chuang Yi's translation accurate when Ruby said that they "had arrived in a slightly different future?"
*** Why wouldn't it be? And fan wankery how? I rather enjoy the idea of the existance of this dark alternate world that might come back to haunt Ruby and Sapphire.
*** "Fans make theories on the loose ends of a work that border on the ridiculous." Laconic version of Fan Wank. Just because you enjoy doesn't stop it from being silly and adding nothing of value to any discussion of the series.
*** Hmmm... Maybe actually Ruby and Sapphire doesn't go to an alternate universe, but Celebi reversed everything, including Ruby's supposed death and the other dexholders' too as being theorized.
**** Apparently, this is correct. Except that no dexholders had died [[spoiler:or even been Taken For Granite... yet.]] So, now we're back to "Hax without an EquivalentExchange"... Hm..., maybe we're about to see [[VideoGameRemake just what that trick truly cost]]...
**** Celebi ''did'' pay the price; it used the Red and Blue Orbs to boost its powers, which resulted in the Orbs being shattered.
* Red's lack of family. I originally thought they were offscreen and just never referred to but it seems like he is an orphan with no relatives or family of any sort, biological or not. With whom did he grow up?
** Poliwag.
* In the 2nd volume, Blue asks Red if he knows how many Pokemon there are and he replies with "There are 150!" He says this RIGHT after seeing Mewtwo being created. Mewtwo was being created by Team Rocket and Blaine, so it's safe to assume that no one else in the world knows of its existence besides them and Red, who had no idea what it was. How can people say there are 150 known species of Pokemon when only 149 are known since Mewtwo's secret?! And it can't be Mew, because Blue says Mew's the Phantom 151st Pokemon. IJBM, a lot.
** To be fair, the games also took Mewtwo being the 150th for granted despite it being at most an urban legend to the general populace; [=PokeSpe=]'s case is only slightly worse.
** Mostly it was done to coincide with the games, the general consensus of gamers of the time was that there was only 150, the 151st is meant to match up to the games, where Mew was so secret not even Nintendo knew about it, and the manga is mostly intended for fans of the game. Storywise... Slip of the tongue on Red's part maybe? I mean he does have a hard time keeping things together around Blue in the early chapters.
** To be fair, Blue was from Johto and even had her Snubbull at that point, though it's never shown until Yellow. It's likely that Red was talking about a few Johto species.
*** We don't actually know if Blue had Snubull then. She could have caught it sometime before Yellow. But Blue of all people should have known there were more than the 150 known if she grew up alongside trainers who had a Sneasel and Natu...(and the Sneasel in question was from Viridian in the first place). This troper always thought that #150 was meant to be Ho-oh (since it is acknowledged to exist in RGB)...that or EarlyInstallmentWeirdness (RGB had more than its fair share of it at any rate).
* Did Red's morals change quickly? By the time he met Blue he hated people who stole Pokemon, but wasn't he doing the same in the first chapter with the Rockets?
** When did Red ever steal Pokemon? When he tried to catch Nidorino and Mew, they were wild so free game, and when he was in the lab, he was just looking around. He never had any intention to steal anything ever.
** He picked up all those Pokemon that the rockets dropped, unless they were empty balls.
*** Those were his empty balls he brought to catch Mew with.
* What happened to the originals artist art style between Yellow and Gold-Silver? I heard she was sickly, but how did it turn from such nice artwork to a nice but ''very'' simple style?
** I heard her sickness affected her wrist directly. Apparently she is now better and posts art on her website. No idea if she ever illustrated for another manga, though she does do doujinshi.
** Actually, the original artist got sick and it affected her hand, meaning - at the time, if the above Troper's saying that she now does doujins online is correct - she couldn't continue PokeSpe. From GSC onwards, a different artist has done the art.
* ..What's with Crystal's mom?
** Eh, I've seen weirder.
* Doesn't the Kanto trio seem a bit.. Apathetic? An Arbok is sliced in half, it's insides all over the floor and it presumed dead, yet Red just mutters how Blue is cool.
** It was trying to kill them, they were defending themselves (it's not their fault Koga's Arbok has such a shitty defense), and they had just been chased around by (rotting) zombie Pokemon. Anybody in that situation wouldn't exactly be thinking straight. Though I'd say a less justifiable reason is that it's early in the manga, the world hasn't been well set-up yet and Pokemon are still treated more-or-less like animals.
*** An animal tries to kill me, and someone blows its head off. I wouldn't mutter how awesome that guy is, I'd freak out about the animal being killed in such a manner.
*** So you'd rather be killed? Okay then.
** Turns out the Arbok wasn't dead anyway.
** You're talking about trainers want their Pokemon to be able to do exactly what Blue had done. In that mindset, yeah, it would be justified to think that person was impressive.
* So Giovanni spent the last decade or so creating Team Rocket into order to get the most powerful psychic pokemon (Mewtwo and Deoxys) to track down his long lost son... reasonable. But why didn't he just ask Morty?
** Dude, he's the leader of Team Rocket. I can think of a million reasons why Giovanni wouldn't do that.
*** Adding on to that, the book never said that he created Team Rocket to find Silver. In fact it probably existed before Silver was even born considering Giovanni wanted him to be part of it. So a lot of the things Team Rocket did were genuinely evil deeds, finding his son was the secondary objective. And for all we know he may have asked Morty but Silver wasn't just kidnapped, he was taken off the ground by a Ho-oh and taken to the Mask of Ice's hideout, and since Pryce was the Mask of Ice, he probably prepared for Morty anyway.
** Silver was kidnapped by Ho-Oh, Morty's been trying his whole life without success to find Ho-Oh. That might have something to do with it.
* Ruby, who can't be more than six, fights off the Salamence that was attacking him and Sapphire. It wanders off to trash the lab, freeing Rayquaza. Instead of just telling the truth about the incident Norman covers for Ruby, which forces him to postpone his gym leader ambitions and leave his family for years and blaming Ruby for not defeating it fully. Good God, why didn't you just tell the truth? The kid deserves a medal for fighting off a psudolegendary with a Ralts, Skitty and Poochyena.
** Would ''you'' want to risk having your personal life probed for training a child on how to fight with Pokemon at Leader caliber well below the legal training age? Norman didn't feel it was worth the risk to face such a probe, and didn't want to drag the Birches down with him by association.
** Children younger than the age of consent have been seen with Pokemon, but almost purely as pets - while Yellow had a Rattata during the RGB arc (caught for her by Red, and she was nine at this time), she wasn't seen fighting with it until her arc was underway.
** The "legal age" thing seems to be more about being allowed to travel on your own(Or an ExcusePlot for the games) since every character has had pokemon well before getting their starter(Yellow got a Rattata on screen, for example).
*** And again, what would be worse?: "My kid saved his and his friend life because he illegally knows how to fight" or "My kid and his friend are dead".
** Then again, while the games start with you receiving your first pokémon, all protagonists so far have had pokémon well before getting their starter and pokedex.
** Well, Ruby did ruin an experiment that the Association was banking on to eventually ''save the world''. '''Somebody''' was going to have to pay, and Norman figured he could take it rather his five year old son.
*** This. Not only would Ruby have likely faced some serious consequences, but Norman would probably have been in much hotter water than he already was. Consider being a gym leader is a position of great responsibility. What could be worse than letting it be known that you taught a 5 year old that kind of fire power, then let two of them loose (unsupervised, to boot) in an area with that powerful of Pokemon? That's not to say 'letting the experiment escape due to negligence' is much better, but it's not as bad.
**** Raltses, Skitties and Poochyenas aren't particularly powerful, and in game, at least, there are trainer Classes that are FAR younger than the ten years(Ninja Boy, Tuber, School Kids, Poke Kids and Twins) and we have seen many children with pokemon in the manga proper, so it's not conclusive which is the "legal" age to let kids train pokemon(Unlike the anime and games, none of the kids get their starter in a ceremony or anything like that). The "letting the kids in an area with powerful pokemon" doesn't hold much water either, as technically speaking, any low level pokemon can be dangerous to any human, they had incredibly bad luck. If either Ruby or Norman suffered "serious consequences" for Ruby fighting for his life, they could have easily turned it around, at least giving them bad reputation. (And just running away didn't guarantee that the Salamance wouldn't want to go after them)
***** It seems the age limit is only comfirmed in the anime. Gold had ten bazillion Pokémon as a kid, and it's implied he trained them, rather than his mom.
** Age has nothing to do with this issue. Like it was said before, the whole problem was that for all intents and purposes, Ruby '''doomed the world'''.
*** But not on purpose. What were they going to say? "You have to be punished because a Salamence you fought to save your life and your friend's accidentally broke into our lab and freed Rayquaza".
*** If someone accidentally screwed over the world, you think the government's going to care whether or not it was an accident?
**** Real life? No, they won't. Fiction yes, unless it's an explicit crapsack world, which this one is far from being. And it's not like they "doomed" the world, they just screwed a project the government had going on. Furthermore, any good lawyer(Or any people with high charisma) could have turned the case into very bad reputation for the project, as they had imprisoned a one-of-a-kind pokemon(A big no-no in this pokemon world), gave priority to a project that MIGHT be useful instead of the live of two little children, and blamed them for something that could have happened anyway(Any pokemon strong enough could have come rampaging on the lab, which seemed pretty insecure if that was all it needed to set Rayquaza free)
*** The project was explicitly supposed to eventually save the world. Steven made it clear that he and the Association had been expecting for quite some time that someone was out to awaken Kyogre and Groudon for destruction, hence them starting the project and constructing the submarine. I think the government would be pretty pissed if anything happened to it. The actual Ruby/Sapphire arc shows that the crisis could not have been stopped without Rayquaza, and Norman was almost too late in awakening it. If they had it on hand the entire time, a lot of damage could've been avoided. Also, all Norman could figure out from the damage was that Ruby was responsible for the Salamance's wounds, not that it nearly killed his son. (For whatever reason, it doesn't look like Ruby told anybody.) Furthermore, nobody in Pokespe has a problem with capturing legendaries for non-evil purposes. Finally, Salamance is an pseudo-legendary. Not too many things can stand up to one, especially an enraged one.
** The real question here is why anyone had to take a fall at all. If Norman was willing to lie to cover for his son anyway, why not just lie and say that the wild Salamence must have been injured by another wild Pokemon and thus went on a rampage?
*** Norman was able to tell what attacked the Salamance by observing its wounds. I guess by covering up for Ruby, nobody else would bother to do so.
** Maybe Norman didn't want his six year old kid to be chosen as a potential wielder of the orb that would control Raquazya. He might have been afraid that the scientists would try to make Ruby absorb the green orb, because if they want the orb to be of any use, they have to find someone to absorb it. Since you also have to be strong of mind or risk insanity, they probably don’t want to risk any of their own personnel, and there’s no one else who could try. If they found out about Ruby – and were desperate enough – they might actually decide to recruit Ruby for orb-absorption and hold the whole “rampaging salamance broke our lab – your fault” card over their heads – something Norman would probably NOT be willing to risk, no matter how improbable it may be. As a result, he takes on the blame for the attack so that there will be absolutely no reason to look at his six year old kid to potentially save the world and/or be driven crazy trying.
** We should also remember that Ruby and Sapphire were blatantly affected by this event. Ruby received a permanent scar on his head, and Sapphire was severely traumatized. If people were to ask them what had happened and they mention the Salamence incident, word would likely spread to the association, especially with both Birch and Norman being well-renowned as the region's professor and newest gym leader, thus entailing more gossip and exposed publicity. It's most likely that Norman, after inspecting the Salamence, immediately went to check on Ruby and saw his injury. Once he understood what happened (possibly by having Ruby spill the beans), he confronted the association and confessed that he was the one at fault, probably covering it up as a training session gone wrong with Ruby and Sapphire involved somehow. With that, all of the blame was shifted on him, thus giving the association no reason to look into his son or his best friend's daughter.
* So the Black and White arc has begun, and with it, all the UnfortunateImplications of the Pokemon world that people have noticed since the beginning. Although we all know that Geechisu is [[BitchInSheepsClothing not as benevolent as he seems]], and that N was manipulated, the fact of the matter is [[StrawmanHasAPoint they bring up a good point]] about the Pokemon world. A world where Sentient creatures are enslaved and made to battle each-other. There have been various [[{{Handwave}} Handwaves]] about pokemon enjoying battle, and wanting to be caught, etc but that can easily be twisted into HappinessInSlavery, which is a whole new set of UnfortunateImplications. So what I want to know is how the writers are really going to deal with it.
** Well, I can't speak for other canons, but in Pokespe, if you're a Pokemon, yes, you have feelings, personality, etc., but chances are, you're a dumb animal. Only "boss" Pokemon or really well-trained ones are capable of forming battle strategies. And since for the most part Pokemon enjoy battling, well, that's why they need trainers, to help them reach their fullest potential. And thus, the bonding and mutual respect. Not to mention time and time again it's hammered in ''all'' canons that you'd better treat your 'Mons right with love and kindness, or else it ''will'' bite you in the ass somehow.
*** To add to the above point, the three legendary dogs (or whateveryoucallthem) spent a good portion of the GSC chapter searching out for humans worthy to be their trainers to help Ho-Oh. Heck, even the proud Mewtwo co-operated with Red as his trainer to fight against Deoxys and Giovanni in the FRLG chapter. Proves that even very intelligent pokemon acknowledge that they perform better when they have a human trainer.
*** Each justification only creates more unfortunate implications and questions. Just don't think too much about it.
**** Yeah I was thinking the same thing. Even with Trainers treating them nice, with Pokemon supposedly loving battle, etc, it just seems like am excuse. I suppose it's impossible to fully justify the Pokemon World, no matter what they say in-universe. Although I will admit, that if the pokemon are intelligent enough to choose, and this is what they want, then maybe we're looking at it too hard. It's not like the series hasn't been deconstructed to hell and back already.
**** How does this create 'more unfortunate implications and questions'? Pokemon are shown as intelligent and fully able to leave their trainers if they want to (even back in the R/S/E arc) if the trainer's feelings and motivations don't match up with theirs.
** BlueAndOrangeMorality, pokemon don't think like humans do
** The idea of Pokemon liking battling isn't very far out there. PEOPLE enjoy fighting, this is why we have boxing, martial arts competitions, fencing, paintball, laser tag, the Society for Creative Anachronism. People talk about animal violence in Pokemon but the Pokemon have an ability that is most common to humans. The ability to find sport in fighting. Pokemon battles are more like karate matches than say, dog fights. Further more, partnership is a recurring theme in PokemonSpecial, in that the trainer and Pokemon are equals, and in all canons there's some form of cross species culture. The games put you more in control, [[RuleOfFun because it's arguably easier for the player]].
*** Speaking of the games, it’s known that if you’re traded a too-high leveled Pokemon, and you don’t have enough/the right gym badges, the Pokemon won’t listen to you, because it doesn’t respect you. I’ve read a fanfiction that has a historic event about the beginning of Pokemon trainers; at the start, Pokemon would fight to the point of killing each other. The first trainers and a counsel-type gathering of legendaries established the League and put down rules so that Pokemon wouldn’t fight to the death. (As well as the fact that, like humans, they rather enjoy fighting.) The badges were originally created as a token given to those who respect and care for Pokemon, for the world to see.
**** Link, please?
* White and Black have blue and brown eyes, like their game counterparts. There goes over ten years of tradition, and for a reboot of sorts. Black would have had the same black style that all Pokemon characters have, or have been like other black eyed characters. White.. Could have had a [[{{Naruto}} Hyuuga approach]].
** Actually, Pearl broke the tradition first by having orange eyes, a colour that has very little to do with pearls.
*** Pearls come basically in every color of the spectrum. [[http://www.palagems.com/melo_myanmar.htm Orange Pearls]]
**** Yes, but orange pearls are very rare; the average PokéSpe reader would typically associate pearls with a milky white hue. Sapphire has blue eyes, but sapphires come in a variety of different colours (or in some cases can be completely colourless) because the general perception of sapphires is a blue hue, so one would think that Pearl's eyes would be white or even light silver. They probably just wanted to keep close to canon, or they just prefer drawing coloured eyes over black and white ones.
***** In the very particular case of Diamond, Pearl and Platinum, People associate Diamond with clear gems, Pearls with milky white... balls... and Platinum is silver colored. It would be rather boring to have the three main characters of a chapter with the same white eyes, so they did a little research, and there do exist Blue Diamonds and Orange Pearls(orange is a main color of Pearl anyway, his poketch is that color) The only one who keeps the "usual" coloring is Platinum with her goldish silvery eyes.
*** Generally the idea of the characters having the same eye color as they're names is a misconception. Red for example only had red eyes on the cover of volume 6 if I recall. Before that they were brown, and on volume 23 they're magenta. And Yellow had black eyes until her appearance the cover of volume 24, in which they're Green, they have not ONCE been yellow. But this should've been obvious once we got to Crystal, because crystals aren't blue, they're clear. Crystal can't have "crystal colored eyes" because crystal doesn't have a color. While others seem to obey this they jump around and remained inconsistent. Ruby's eyes go back and forth between red and purple for example.
*** No they're brown on volume six too.
** Red has had red eyes ever since Gold. In early drawings, first gen ones, they were brown though. Yellow is an odd case. Certain colors show her with black, and others as a greenish hue of yellow. The closest color to "crystal" is blue, which Kris has.
*** You can't be close to a color if it has no color. The "closest color" to crystal is white, in that there would be no color. And Yellow's eyes aren't a greenish yellow, on both versions of the cover they're just green. And again, Red's eyes were purple on volume 23, even more so on the Japanese cover. They're on Bulbapedia if you want to see for yourself. The fact of the matter is that the idea that the Pokedex Holders have eye colors to match their names is mostly fanon.
** Well I don't think that Kusaka was going for the colors of the actual jewels but more of the color of the box art. Lets take diamond for example. Diamond (the game's) box art was dark or navy blue and so was Dia (the character's) eyes. I think of the dexholders more as personifications of the games than an actual manga about the games. That's why Yellow and Emerald exist.
* What happened to Red and the Kanto trio after the Emerald saga? Did they all just disappear? Because I think after that, it just skips right on to D/P/Pl and Bl/Wh.
** Since the D/P/Pl and B/W arcs are set in different regions than Hoenn, Johto and Kanto it's safe to assume they all just went back to their normal lives after being saved by Emerald and co.. Green went back to being a Gym Leader, Blue went back to her parents, Red went back to [[MysteriousPast whatever the hell he was doing before the whole adventure began...]]
*** Besides, the Kanto/Johto trio didn't appear at all in the RS chapter.
** Darn. I wanted to see Red again.
*** You might in HGSS. Keep your fingers crossed.
*** Nope. Only Green is shown through flashback.
*** And Blue too. But just one panel in a flashback.
*** Red appears, but in a brief cameo through a flashback.
* Team Galactic tells Berlitz's Dad that they've kidnapped her (They haven't), and offer the fact that they [[spoiler: killed her bodyguards]] as proof. He calls her bodyguards and gets no response... and gives in immediately. Why, exactly, did he not try calling his daughter to see if ''she'' was okay? And even if he was too distraught to think of it, why did Team Galactic use a plan with such an obvious hole in it?
** Then again, this is the same guy who decided to break into the room where Platinum was sleeping just so he could gloat and explain Team Galactic's secret plan, so he's probably not the sharpest knife in the drawer anyway.
** Platinum didn't carry a phone around with her, so her dad couldn't call her directly. Of course, point is still valid as how would Team Galactic know that?
*** Actually, she brought a Pokegear with her at the start of the arc (as seen in the Vs. Bidoof chapter) and she's presumably still carrying it now, considering how her mother managed to contact her at the end of the DP arc.
*** No, Platinum was using the phone in her hotel room when calling her butler. She was also the one making the call to her mother, not the other way around, and she could've made it anywhere following the events at Spear Pillar.
*** [[spoiler: As it turns out, the constant brainwashing from different people screwed around with his head to the point he was fighting it, which is probably why he warned Platinum.]]
* How do they chose their characterizations? A lot of them are a far stretch from their game personalities, it's almost InNameOnly for several people. Do they just look at the designs for an hour then make a random plot that vaguely follows the games?
** Kusaka makes the personality fit his own tweaked plot, design and canon game personality damned. It helps that not even the rivals and pseudo-rivals are given much personality to begin with in the games, and he wants each character to be unique so we don't go hollering about Replacement Scrappies.
** But how does he chose the personalities? They seem almost random few relate to the games.
** Hardly anyone has personality in the games so he just does whatever he thinks would be fun and different.
* This has to do with coloring. Why do Black and White have dark tones in the uncolored manga? Their hair isn't too dark, it's barely darker then Blue's or Sapphire's, but they have the same shade as the raven haired protagonists.
** Sapphire's hair isn't that dark (more like a light tannish-gray) and Blue's hair has actually gotten lighter over the years. That said, yes, it is a bit strange why their hair isn't toned, Black's at least. Maybe it would've clashed with their hats?
*** What's with Sapphire's hair anyway? It's.. Gray in a lot of artwork.
*** Yamamoto is ''really'' inconsistent when it comes to coloring, with Crystal suffering the most from it. Her hair and jacket change colors in ever colored shot she's in.
** Kris doesn't even look like she has blue hair in Pokespe. She looks like she has ''black'' hair with blueish hints.
** Like it was said before, changes in ''every'' color shot. As of the HGSS arc, it's straight up dark blue.
** Okay, Sho4's chapter 10 included a colored shot of Black and White, and their hair is indeed a very, ''very'' dark shade of brown, darker than Blue or Sapphire's.
* What's with the ArtisticAge of the series? Until remakes or reappearances in the games, a lot of characters look the same age despite years passing. It's especially bad with the Pokedex gang.
** Not really. The only (main) characters who have been around long enough to have noticeable aging are the Kanto and the Johto Dex Holders, and looking over their character bio pages at serebii tells me that they had been aging, little by little over the years. Up till the third gen arcs, they all got taller, their faces lost a little baby fat, and the girls got filled out a bit more (even Yellow's got a bit of a chest in FLRG). The main problem is that with Mato's artwork in the RGB arc to the Yellow arc; she ''did'' draw them looker older when she drew normally, but half her artwork was in chibi-style so you couldn't tell anyways. As for the other recurring characters like the Kanto Gym Leaders, they were all at the age where a few years really doesn't make a difference anymore in your appearance.
* What's Yellow's eye color? They look like Green-Yellow eyes, Bulbapedia describes her with brown eyes, and fanon has her with either green or gold.
** Volume 24 is the only colored shot of her with colored eyes. And ''boy'' is it a ''really'' ambiguous shade that's hard to identify. I'd go with greenish-yellow like you. Not everything in bulbapedia is correct, though it does strive to be. Wally is identified as a main character when the official Japanese Pokespe site, netkun, doesn't.
* I'm having trouble figuring out Ruby's scar when his hat is off.. What's it supposed to look like?
** Two large gashes on the upper-right-side of his forehead. His hair hasn't grown back where he was slashed at.
* Is Platinum's dad really an OverprotectiveDad? Bodyguards seems a bit much, however you can't blame him for being freaked out at the thought of letting his sheltered ten year old daughter travel a region.
** Yes, he's a minor example, but considering that it's generally acceptable for kids to go out on their own in the world of Pokemon...
* So...exactly how much power does White have as a "representative" of the BW agency? I'd figure her job is to simply advertise the business, find jobs, and oversee the Pokemon actors on set (a plenty big responsibility already as it sounds)...but White also looks over the finances, can take on a huge debt in the company name, and can hire people on the spot. Not to mention her efficiency in supervising the Pokemon Musical and the respect she gets from her co-workers makes me think it's not her first time being put in charge of a major project. Can't blame me for thinking she actually owns the business with all that she does.
** Okay, according to Viz's translation, she is the president and manager. She has absolute power.
* Ruby mentions during the RS chapter that he's been sleeping in hotels throughout his journey. How does he pay for them?
** Prize money for winning a contest?
** Viz translated the line differently, saying that a city boy like him should only sleep in hotels. Besides, that was day 1 or 2 of his journey. He didn't even sleep yet.
* Bear with me here, during the Platinum Arc the title character battles through the Frontier. When she faces Hall Matron Argenta, it's Froslass against Dragonite. Dragonite uses Steel Wing, and Argenta exclaims it is a super effective attack from a dragon to an ice type... but Froslass is also a ghost type, which resists steel, making the attack neutral...
** Ghost does not resist steel; steel performs neutral damage against ghosts, so yes, Steel Wing is indeed super-effective against Froslass.
* Is it just this troper, or is it a ''really'' lucky coincidence that the unofficial name Blue gave Silver (she only called him so because of his eyes) just so happens to be his real name? Silver didn't have his name-embroidered hankerchief back then when he was two.
** Yeah, he ''did'' have his handkerchief when he was two; it was the only thing that he had that connected him to his past after he was kidnapped. The flashback shows Blue looking at it; she decided to call him Silver because that was what was written on the handkerchief ''and'' that it matched his eyes.
* If White's the same age as Black then she's 14. How is a 14 year old the manager ''and president'' of an actual agency? Doesn't Unova have any child labor laws?
** Like the ''rest'' of the Poke-world actually cares how old you are regardless of your occupation. In that case, Professor Oak should've been arrested ages ago for hiring children to go out into the world to gather information on dangerous creatures. Hell, Platinum accepted pretty fast that her "professional bodyguards" were the same age as her. It's kinda normal here; as long as you're good at it, no questions asked.
** This manga treats the FreeRangeChildren deal that the games put out in a more extreme manner. I simply assumed that legally, or socially, children are allowed to venture off and do adult things at a young age in this universe (or country)
** The games already had preteens as Gym Leaders, and Amanita maintains the Unova storage system. Age is never an issue in any of the Pokémon worlds.
* Why did everyone guess Yellow was a girl just because she has a ponytail? We see a lot of male characters with long hair.
** I think it may have something to do with her hair length (It's longer than Blue's and Platinum's) and she probably just has a girlish face and personality to begin with (crying over her Ratatta evolving because it wasn't cute? Ruby is the only other character who might do that but even he doesn't cry...). Also, no other character goes through so much trouble to keep their hair hidden (remember her reluctance to take of her hat in GSC?) But to be fair...Gold did mistake Bugsy for a girl...
*** Actually, Yellow never said anything about crying because "her Raticate wasn't cute." None of the translations from Chuang-Yi or Dragon Guard say this (not too sure on Viz though). She was scared that her Ratty wasn't the same Pokemon that she knew anymore, since she never knew the concept of evolution before then. This reaction still reinforces your point though; for instance, a young boy seeing his Pokemon evolve into a stronger-looking one would probably say "That was cool!" or something, but a young pacifistic girl like Yellow would probably do the same thing she did: cry. For her, it was probably like losing a best friend, or seeing that friend change into something unfamiliar or more threatening. So yeah, that was most likely the dead giveaway (for Green(male)) that she was indeed female, and not just because of the hair.
* I'm sorry if this is a stupid question, but can someone please explain the AnachronicOrder nature of Pokemon Special release? For all I know now the manga is running on three simultaneous arcs, the Platinum arc (which is not finished by a long shot), HGSS arc (nowhere to be found anywhere), and BW arc (which in itself really anachronic and barely coherent). I bet this has something to do with the weird release platform they have originally in Japan whether some chapters are released in magazines and some in tankobon volume but can someone please confirm how this works?
** Don't worry, it's not a stupid question; even people who know the situation find it confusing. I wrote an explanation for this awhile back. [[http://theviolenttomboy.tumblr.com/post/15911164787/pokemon-special-has-the-craziest-manga-release-schedule Here]] it is, I hope it helps.
* How could a 5 year old Black read such lengthy, and probably word heavy, books?
** I've seen a few first graders read Harry Potter. Also, in the original Japanese, Black is a terrible speller, at least.
* How is that Yellow didn't know about Pokémon evolution? She being able to read Pokemon's minds and being so close to them, should know the essentials.
** She only really hung around the only two Pokemon she's ever had, and both were apparently content with just watching her fish, nap, and draw all day before she went on her journey. Neither probably ever thought about evolution.
* What are they gonna do with Black and White 2? New characters, or stuff Black and White into new outfits?
** We'll just have to wait and see. Nothing else we can do about it.
** Well, they did just shove Crystal into a new outfit in the [=HGSS=] arc, so that's not totally out of the question for Black and White.
*** New characters it is.
* If the mangaka decides to bring the player characters of Black/White 2 to the manga, how they will be named?
** Wait and see. How should we know?
** Their names are Rakutsu (corruption of Black 2) and Faitsu (corruption of White 2). ''No'' idea how this is going to work in English. However, evidence points to this not being their real names.
*** Their English names are Lack-Two and Whi-Two, though those might not be their real names.
*** No, they aren't. Those are how their Japanese names are supposed to spelled.
* Why are shirts with circular cleavage-cutouts, and black undershirts/markings so popular? Both Blue and Crys have them, from unrelated sources, no less.
** ...Because that's how they're designed in the games.
* This may be a stupid question, but it never hurts to ask. From what I hear, the manga's original artist, Mato, got sick and was replaced by Yamamoto in the beginning of the GSC arc. She's gotten better, but how come Kusaka didn't hire her back? Was she not interested in drawing the manga anymore? Did she and Kusaka end things on bitter terms? Did personal issues stop her from going back to it? Is the aftermath of her illness more serious than expected? Does Kusaka not want to disappont Yamamoto? Did Kusaka want to give Mato a chance at living a good life?
** By the sounds of it, Kusaka was sad to see Mato go and had to put Special on hiatus until Yamamoto came along. Mato ended up getting a new artist job while she recovered, presumably it being much less taxing on her than a regular on-going manga (and as ''Manga/{{Bakuman}}'' clearly shows, being a manga artist is anything ''but'' a walk in the park).
* Red's battle with Giovanni at the gym (way back in RGB). Giovanni was the only one with his Pokeballs on the ground. Red tried to attack but Giovanni was able to counter attack. He said the 3 seconds it took for Red to attack was more than enough time for him to grab a Pokemon on the floor and counter.. However, few pages later, he says it will take him 6 seconds to grab a pokeball from the floor. What? Didn't he just contradict himself to what he said earlier (less then 3 seconds to take a pokeball from the floor and attack vs him saying it takes 6 seconds to grab a pokeball)?
** Distance. It's going to take longer to grab what's ten feet away from you as opposed to five.
* Ok, I have read the entire manga up till the HGSS ending (all online mind you) and I have been wondering one thing. Where did Ruby, Sapphire, Emerald, Diamond, Pearl and Platinum get their respective titles like Calmer or Empathizer? Did I just miss it?
** They've never been given titles in the manga proper. They came from the special Pokemon the Comic magazine, which featured bios of them.
----
** Actually, Onix was in the air at that point of time, and in many Pokemon adaptions, Ground types can't become immune to the effects of electricity if they're not touching the ground.
** Maybe it was dumb luck.
** There's also Pika defeating the Rhydon in Mt. Moon and beating Giovanni's Ground type Pokes with it too.
*** The Rhydon was defeated when the cave ceiling fell, it wasn't technically Pikachu defeating him, but more like winning Red and Misty time to escape.
*** For Giovanni. there is actually a pretty good reason: the electricity had been [[TimTaylorTechnology supercharged]]. Which, in the Special series, pretty much guarantees a win. The bigass explosion that happened afterwards probably did something too.
*** I think the battle ended immediately after the trainer gets knocked out. It happens multiple times.
* Orm's Shuckle and Hoppip disappeared after he fell to his death.
*** After receiving the direct explosion and falling off, Sird's Persian and Starmie disappeared.
*** After getting knocked out Lt. Surge's Voltorbs and Magnemites disappeared.
*** After being frozen, Red's other pokemon that received the combined Ice, Fighting, and Ghost attack miraculously disappeared.
*** After the dex holders got turned to stone, Pika, Chuchu, and Mewtwo disappeared on the scene.
**** Pika and Chuchu weren't hit by the attack, and they turn up in Emerald's Chapter. Mewtwo [[spoiler: immediately started chasing Sird as she tried to flee the scene]].
* Blue reveals to Red during the Indigo Plateau section that throughout Kanto history, only people from Pallet Town have made it through the Championships.
** Exact wording is that he said that only Pallet natives actually ''became'' Kanto champions. That League happened to be the ninth, and the league takes place every three years, so over a period of 27 years, there have only been nine champions, less if someone won more than once. Little less eyebrow-raising, and it is heavily implied later on that the main reason Blue (girl) was kidnapped was because she ''was'' from Pallet.
* And also Red's FingerlessGloves. They're supposed to be insulated and protects Red from electricity, unfortunately being fingerless should defeat such purpose.
*** They might be skin tight, so at the most only his fingers are getting the hell shocked out of them, but the rest of his hand is protected. That theory may not have a lot of credibility in real life, but hey, [[MST3KMantra this is Pokemon.]]
**** Well think back to the Yellow chapter. Super Nerd made an insulated body suit that went over his skin from a piece of Red's glove. It was clear and we needed an establishing panel to know he was wearing it. And in RGB the entire room that Red was battling Lt. Surge in was being electrified, and despite the fingerless gloves and short sleeves, Surge wasn't being hurt. So maybe the gloves aren't actually fingerless at all, maybe the fingers are just clear. It makes some sense that Lt. Surge just stylized his insulation gear to match a look that was comfortable to him. And yeah, it's never been said that this is the case, but it was never said that it wasn't.
***** It is now confirmed that the gloves have an invisible layer over where the fingers go, thus making sure his fingers are indeed protected.
* The names. Is it supposed to be a coincidence that a lot of 'chosen' kids just happen to have absurd names with a color or gem theme?
** Yeah, but it's a whole lot more obvious to us English-speakers, as names such as "Reddo" and "Gurin" probably don't stick out as much among names such as "Kasumi" and "Takeshi".
*** Sure they do. Just because they're pronounced with a "Japanese accent" (i.e. transliterated to Japanese phenoms) doesn't make it any less weird that the kid down the block is named Daiyamondo.
*** There's other people in the original Japanese with weird/Western names too. It's just that they're less likely to spot the otherwise obvious ThemeNaming.
** To be fair Red, Blue, Crystal, Ruby and Pearl are all normal names, albeit Ruby and Pearl are girl's names and a Blue is a boy's name that normally drops the e anyway, and while much rarer, this troper has met a couple girls named Green. I used to have the fan theory that "Green" was the girl's last name, since Green is a common last name. Of course that was before I was aware of the name switch. On the other hand, everyone I've ever talked to, regardless of gender would LOVE to be named [[AwesomeMcCoolname Gold, Silver or Platinum]].
*** Also bare in mind that Ruby and Sapphire, whose parents are friends, are hinted to be named after their birthstones.
*** Besides those, Sapphire, Diamond and Emerald are also girl's names, although very rare(except Emerald, which is fairly common)
*** Diamond can be a boy's name as well (i.e. Prince Diamond from Sailor Moon.)
** It's a lot less eyebrow raising considering nearly ''everyone'' worth mentioning has some sort of Theme Naming going on.
* As said on FridgeHorror, is the series currently in an AlternateUniverse? Ruby said they encountered a "time slip" and "arrived in a slightly different future" where presumably everything turned out fine.
** Piggybacking on this, are we to assume there is another "timeline" where Norman, Steven, and Courtney are all still very much dead? Oh, hey, Fridge Depression, haven't seen you in awhile...
** You want Fridge Horror? Ruby and Sapphire were sent to an alternate timeline where everyone lived through the crisis and using legendary Pokemon doesn't automatically kill you, which we can assume is the main canon universe. And in this universe, Ruby and Sapphire are being celebrated for what they've done which is at least a little different from what they did in their own timeline. Oh and everyone has a counterpart in the new/main canon universe... So what happened to the new timeline's original Ruby and Sapphire? And also using legendary Pokemon in the original timeline slowly kills you, remember that's why Steven and Norman died in the first place. And with the Kanto trio using the legendary bird trio and the Johto trio using the legendary beast trio at the end of the GSC Chapter, this also explains why the original Dex Holders didn't show up during a worldly crisis... They died.
*** I regret posting that tidbit on FridgeHorror now. Everything's sounding so fan-wanky now...but just to be sure, was Chuang Yi's translation accurate when Ruby said that they "had arrived in a slightly different future?"
*** Why wouldn't it be? And fan wankery how? I rather enjoy the idea of the existance of this dark alternate world that might come back to haunt Ruby and Sapphire.
*** "Fans make theories on the loose ends of a work that border on the ridiculous." Laconic version of Fan Wank. Just because you enjoy doesn't stop it from being silly and adding nothing of value to any discussion of the series.
*** Hmmm... Maybe actually Ruby and Sapphire doesn't go to an alternate universe, but Celebi reversed everything, including Ruby's supposed death and the other dexholders' too as being theorized.
**** Apparently, this is correct. Except that no dexholders had died [[spoiler:or even been Taken For Granite... yet.]] So, now we're back to "Hax without an EquivalentExchange"... Hm..., maybe we're about to see [[VideoGameRemake just what that trick truly cost]]...
**** Celebi ''did'' pay the price; it used the Red and Blue Orbs to boost its powers, which resulted in the Orbs being shattered.
* Red's lack of family. I originally thought they were offscreen and just never referred to but it seems like he is an orphan with no relatives or family of any sort, biological or not. With whom did he grow up?
** Poliwag.
* In the 2nd volume, Blue asks Red if he knows how many Pokemon there are and he replies with "There are 150!" He says this RIGHT after seeing Mewtwo being created. Mewtwo was being created by Team Rocket and Blaine, so it's safe to assume that no one else in the world knows of its existence besides them and Red, who had no idea what it was. How can people say there are 150 known species of Pokemon when only 149 are known since Mewtwo's secret?! And it can't be Mew, because Blue says Mew's the Phantom 151st Pokemon. IJBM, a lot.
** To be fair, the games also took Mewtwo being the 150th for granted despite it being at most an urban legend to the general populace; [=PokeSpe=]'s case is only slightly worse.
** Mostly it was done to coincide with the games, the general consensus of gamers of the time was that there was only 150, the 151st is meant to match up to the games, where Mew was so secret not even Nintendo knew about it, and the manga is mostly intended for fans of the game. Storywise... Slip of the tongue on Red's part maybe? I mean he does have a hard time keeping things together around Blue in the early chapters.
** To be fair, Blue was from Johto and even had her Snubbull at that point, though it's never shown until Yellow. It's likely that Red was talking about a few Johto species.
*** We don't actually know if Blue had Snubull then. She could have caught it sometime before Yellow. But Blue of all people should have known there were more than the 150 known if she grew up alongside trainers who had a Sneasel and Natu...(and the Sneasel in question was from Viridian in the first place). This troper always thought that #150 was meant to be Ho-oh (since it is acknowledged to exist in RGB)...that or EarlyInstallmentWeirdness (RGB had more than its fair share of it at any rate).
* Did Red's morals change quickly? By the time he met Blue he hated people who stole Pokemon, but wasn't he doing the same in the first chapter with the Rockets?
** When did Red ever steal Pokemon? When he tried to catch Nidorino and Mew, they were wild so free game, and when he was in the lab, he was just looking around. He never had any intention to steal anything ever.
** He picked up all those Pokemon that the rockets dropped, unless they were empty balls.
*** Those were his empty balls he brought to catch Mew with.
* What happened to the originals artist art style between Yellow and Gold-Silver? I heard she was sickly, but how did it turn from such nice artwork to a nice but ''very'' simple style?
** I heard her sickness affected her wrist directly. Apparently she is now better and posts art on her website. No idea if she ever illustrated for another manga, though she does do doujinshi.
** Actually, the original artist got sick and it affected her hand, meaning - at the time, if the above Troper's saying that she now does doujins online is correct - she couldn't continue PokeSpe. From GSC onwards, a different artist has done the art.
* ..What's with Crystal's mom?
** Eh, I've seen weirder.
* Doesn't the Kanto trio seem a bit.. Apathetic? An Arbok is sliced in half, it's insides all over the floor and it presumed dead, yet Red just mutters how Blue is cool.
** It was trying to kill them, they were defending themselves (it's not their fault Koga's Arbok has such a shitty defense), and they had just been chased around by (rotting) zombie Pokemon. Anybody in that situation wouldn't exactly be thinking straight. Though I'd say a less justifiable reason is that it's early in the manga, the world hasn't been well set-up yet and Pokemon are still treated more-or-less like animals.
*** An animal tries to kill me, and someone blows its head off. I wouldn't mutter how awesome that guy is, I'd freak out about the animal being killed in such a manner.
*** So you'd rather be killed? Okay then.
** Turns out the Arbok wasn't dead anyway.
** You're talking about trainers want their Pokemon to be able to do exactly what Blue had done. In that mindset, yeah, it would be justified to think that person was impressive.
* So Giovanni spent the last decade or so creating Team Rocket into order to get the most powerful psychic pokemon (Mewtwo and Deoxys) to track down his long lost son... reasonable. But why didn't he just ask Morty?
** Dude, he's the leader of Team Rocket. I can think of a million reasons why Giovanni wouldn't do that.
*** Adding on to that, the book never said that he created Team Rocket to find Silver. In fact it probably existed before Silver was even born considering Giovanni wanted him to be part of it. So a lot of the things Team Rocket did were genuinely evil deeds, finding his son was the secondary objective. And for all we know he may have asked Morty but Silver wasn't just kidnapped, he was taken off the ground by a Ho-oh and taken to the Mask of Ice's hideout, and since Pryce was the Mask of Ice, he probably prepared for Morty anyway.
** Silver was kidnapped by Ho-Oh, Morty's been trying his whole life without success to find Ho-Oh. That might have something to do with it.
* Ruby, who can't be more than six, fights off the Salamence that was attacking him and Sapphire. It wanders off to trash the lab, freeing Rayquaza. Instead of just telling the truth about the incident Norman covers for Ruby, which forces him to postpone his gym leader ambitions and leave his family for years and blaming Ruby for not defeating it fully. Good God, why didn't you just tell the truth? The kid deserves a medal for fighting off a psudolegendary with a Ralts, Skitty and Poochyena.
** Would ''you'' want to risk having your personal life probed for training a child on how to fight with Pokemon at Leader caliber well below the legal training age? Norman didn't feel it was worth the risk to face such a probe, and didn't want to drag the Birches down with him by association.
** Children younger than the age of consent have been seen with Pokemon, but almost purely as pets - while Yellow had a Rattata during the RGB arc (caught for her by Red, and she was nine at this time), she wasn't seen fighting with it until her arc was underway.
** The "legal age" thing seems to be more about being allowed to travel on your own(Or an ExcusePlot for the games) since every character has had pokemon well before getting their starter(Yellow got a Rattata on screen, for example).
*** And again, what would be worse?: "My kid saved his and his friend life because he illegally knows how to fight" or "My kid and his friend are dead".
** Then again, while the games start with you receiving your first pokémon, all protagonists so far have had pokémon well before getting their starter and pokedex.
** Well, Ruby did ruin an experiment that the Association was banking on to eventually ''save the world''. '''Somebody''' was going to have to pay, and Norman figured he could take it rather his five year old son.
*** This. Not only would Ruby have likely faced some serious consequences, but Norman would probably have been in much hotter water than he already was. Consider being a gym leader is a position of great responsibility. What could be worse than letting it be known that you taught a 5 year old that kind of fire power, then let two of them loose (unsupervised, to boot) in an area with that powerful of Pokemon? That's not to say 'letting the experiment escape due to negligence' is much better, but it's not as bad.
**** Raltses, Skitties and Poochyenas aren't particularly powerful, and in game, at least, there are trainer Classes that are FAR younger than the ten years(Ninja Boy, Tuber, School Kids, Poke Kids and Twins) and we have seen many children with pokemon in the manga proper, so it's not conclusive which is the "legal" age to let kids train pokemon(Unlike the anime and games, none of the kids get their starter in a ceremony or anything like that). The "letting the kids in an area with powerful pokemon" doesn't hold much water either, as technically speaking, any low level pokemon can be dangerous to any human, they had incredibly bad luck. If either Ruby or Norman suffered "serious consequences" for Ruby fighting for his life, they could have easily turned it around, at least giving them bad reputation. (And just running away didn't guarantee that the Salamance wouldn't want to go after them)
***** It seems the age limit is only comfirmed in the anime. Gold had ten bazillion Pokémon as a kid, and it's implied he trained them, rather than his mom.
** Age has nothing to do with this issue. Like it was said before, the whole problem was that for all intents and purposes, Ruby '''doomed the world'''.
*** But not on purpose. What were they going to say? "You have to be punished because a Salamence you fought to save your life and your friend's accidentally broke into our lab and freed Rayquaza".
*** If someone accidentally screwed over the world, you think the government's going to care whether or not it was an accident?
**** Real life? No, they won't. Fiction yes, unless it's an explicit crapsack world, which this one is far from being. And it's not like they "doomed" the world, they just screwed a project the government had going on. Furthermore, any good lawyer(Or any people with high charisma) could have turned the case into very bad reputation for the project, as they had imprisoned a one-of-a-kind pokemon(A big no-no in this pokemon world), gave priority to a project that MIGHT be useful instead of the live of two little children, and blamed them for something that could have happened anyway(Any pokemon strong enough could have come rampaging on the lab, which seemed pretty insecure if that was all it needed to set Rayquaza free)
*** The project was explicitly supposed to eventually save the world. Steven made it clear that he and the Association had been expecting for quite some time that someone was out to awaken Kyogre and Groudon for destruction, hence them starting the project and constructing the submarine. I think the government would be pretty pissed if anything happened to it. The actual Ruby/Sapphire arc shows that the crisis could not have been stopped without Rayquaza, and Norman was almost too late in awakening it. If they had it on hand the entire time, a lot of damage could've been avoided. Also, all Norman could figure out from the damage was that Ruby was responsible for the Salamance's wounds, not that it nearly killed his son. (For whatever reason, it doesn't look like Ruby told anybody.) Furthermore, nobody in Pokespe has a problem with capturing legendaries for non-evil purposes. Finally, Salamance is an pseudo-legendary. Not too many things can stand up to one, especially an enraged one.
** The real question here is why anyone had to take a fall at all. If Norman was willing to lie to cover for his son anyway, why not just lie and say that the wild Salamence must have been injured by another wild Pokemon and thus went on a rampage?
*** Norman was able to tell what attacked the Salamance by observing its wounds. I guess by covering up for Ruby, nobody else would bother to do so.
** Maybe Norman didn't want his six year old kid to be chosen as a potential wielder of the orb that would control Raquazya. He might have been afraid that the scientists would try to make Ruby absorb the green orb, because if they want the orb to be of any use, they have to find someone to absorb it. Since you also have to be strong of mind or risk insanity, they probably don’t want to risk any of their own personnel, and there’s no one else who could try. If they found out about Ruby – and were desperate enough – they might actually decide to recruit Ruby for orb-absorption and hold the whole “rampaging salamance broke our lab – your fault” card over their heads – something Norman would probably NOT be willing to risk, no matter how improbable it may be. As a result, he takes on the blame for the attack so that there will be absolutely no reason to look at his six year old kid to potentially save the world and/or be driven crazy trying.
** We should also remember that Ruby and Sapphire were blatantly affected by this event. Ruby received a permanent scar on his head, and Sapphire was severely traumatized. If people were to ask them what had happened and they mention the Salamence incident, word would likely spread to the association, especially with both Birch and Norman being well-renowned as the region's professor and newest gym leader, thus entailing more gossip and exposed publicity. It's most likely that Norman, after inspecting the Salamence, immediately went to check on Ruby and saw his injury. Once he understood what happened (possibly by having Ruby spill the beans), he confronted the association and confessed that he was the one at fault, probably covering it up as a training session gone wrong with Ruby and Sapphire involved somehow. With that, all of the blame was shifted on him, thus giving the association no reason to look into his son or his best friend's daughter.
* So the Black and White arc has begun, and with it, all the UnfortunateImplications of the Pokemon world that people have noticed since the beginning. Although we all know that Geechisu is [[BitchInSheepsClothing not as benevolent as he seems]], and that N was manipulated, the fact of the matter is [[StrawmanHasAPoint they bring up a good point]] about the Pokemon world. A world where Sentient creatures are enslaved and made to battle each-other. There have been various [[{{Handwave}} Handwaves]] about pokemon enjoying battle, and wanting to be caught, etc but that can easily be twisted into HappinessInSlavery, which is a whole new set of UnfortunateImplications. So what I want to know is how the writers are really going to deal with it.
** Well, I can't speak for other canons, but in Pokespe, if you're a Pokemon, yes, you have feelings, personality, etc., but chances are, you're a dumb animal. Only "boss" Pokemon or really well-trained ones are capable of forming battle strategies. And since for the most part Pokemon enjoy battling, well, that's why they need trainers, to help them reach their fullest potential. And thus, the bonding and mutual respect. Not to mention time and time again it's hammered in ''all'' canons that you'd better treat your 'Mons right with love and kindness, or else it ''will'' bite you in the ass somehow.
*** To add to the above point, the three legendary dogs (or whateveryoucallthem) spent a good portion of the GSC chapter searching out for humans worthy to be their trainers to help Ho-Oh. Heck, even the proud Mewtwo co-operated with Red as his trainer to fight against Deoxys and Giovanni in the FRLG chapter. Proves that even very intelligent pokemon acknowledge that they perform better when they have a human trainer.
*** Each justification only creates more unfortunate implications and questions. Just don't think too much about it.
**** Yeah I was thinking the same thing. Even with Trainers treating them nice, with Pokemon supposedly loving battle, etc, it just seems like am excuse. I suppose it's impossible to fully justify the Pokemon World, no matter what they say in-universe. Although I will admit, that if the pokemon are intelligent enough to choose, and this is what they want, then maybe we're looking at it too hard. It's not like the series hasn't been deconstructed to hell and back already.
**** How does this create 'more unfortunate implications and questions'? Pokemon are shown as intelligent and fully able to leave their trainers if they want to (even back in the R/S/E arc) if the trainer's feelings and motivations don't match up with theirs.
** BlueAndOrangeMorality, pokemon don't think like humans do
** The idea of Pokemon liking battling isn't very far out there. PEOPLE enjoy fighting, this is why we have boxing, martial arts competitions, fencing, paintball, laser tag, the Society for Creative Anachronism. People talk about animal violence in Pokemon but the Pokemon have an ability that is most common to humans. The ability to find sport in fighting. Pokemon battles are more like karate matches than say, dog fights. Further more, partnership is a recurring theme in PokemonSpecial, in that the trainer and Pokemon are equals, and in all canons there's some form of cross species culture. The games put you more in control, [[RuleOfFun because it's arguably easier for the player]].
*** Speaking of the games, it’s known that if you’re traded a too-high leveled Pokemon, and you don’t have enough/the right gym badges, the Pokemon won’t listen to you, because it doesn’t respect you. I’ve read a fanfiction that has a historic event about the beginning of Pokemon trainers; at the start, Pokemon would fight to the point of killing each other. The first trainers and a counsel-type gathering of legendaries established the League and put down rules so that Pokemon wouldn’t fight to the death. (As well as the fact that, like humans, they rather enjoy fighting.) The badges were originally created as a token given to those who respect and care for Pokemon, for the world to see.
**** Link, please?
* White and Black have blue and brown eyes, like their game counterparts. There goes over ten years of tradition, and for a reboot of sorts. Black would have had the same black style that all Pokemon characters have, or have been like other black eyed characters. White.. Could have had a [[{{Naruto}} Hyuuga approach]].
** Actually, Pearl broke the tradition first by having orange eyes, a colour that has very little to do with pearls.
*** Pearls come basically in every color of the spectrum. [[http://www.palagems.com/melo_myanmar.htm Orange Pearls]]
**** Yes, but orange pearls are very rare; the average PokéSpe reader would typically associate pearls with a milky white hue. Sapphire has blue eyes, but sapphires come in a variety of different colours (or in some cases can be completely colourless) because the general perception of sapphires is a blue hue, so one would think that Pearl's eyes would be white or even light silver. They probably just wanted to keep close to canon, or they just prefer drawing coloured eyes over black and white ones.
***** In the very particular case of Diamond, Pearl and Platinum, People associate Diamond with clear gems, Pearls with milky white... balls... and Platinum is silver colored. It would be rather boring to have the three main characters of a chapter with the same white eyes, so they did a little research, and there do exist Blue Diamonds and Orange Pearls(orange is a main color of Pearl anyway, his poketch is that color) The only one who keeps the "usual" coloring is Platinum with her goldish silvery eyes.
*** Generally the idea of the characters having the same eye color as they're names is a misconception. Red for example only had red eyes on the cover of volume 6 if I recall. Before that they were brown, and on volume 23 they're magenta. And Yellow had black eyes until her appearance the cover of volume 24, in which they're Green, they have not ONCE been yellow. But this should've been obvious once we got to Crystal, because crystals aren't blue, they're clear. Crystal can't have "crystal colored eyes" because crystal doesn't have a color. While others seem to obey this they jump around and remained inconsistent. Ruby's eyes go back and forth between red and purple for example.
*** No they're brown on volume six too.
** Red has had red eyes ever since Gold. In early drawings, first gen ones, they were brown though. Yellow is an odd case. Certain colors show her with black, and others as a greenish hue of yellow. The closest color to "crystal" is blue, which Kris has.
*** You can't be close to a color if it has no color. The "closest color" to crystal is white, in that there would be no color. And Yellow's eyes aren't a greenish yellow, on both versions of the cover they're just green. And again, Red's eyes were purple on volume 23, even more so on the Japanese cover. They're on Bulbapedia if you want to see for yourself. The fact of the matter is that the idea that the Pokedex Holders have eye colors to match their names is mostly fanon.
** Well I don't think that Kusaka was going for the colors of the actual jewels but more of the color of the box art. Lets take diamond for example. Diamond (the game's) box art was dark or navy blue and so was Dia (the character's) eyes. I think of the dexholders more as personifications of the games than an actual manga about the games. That's why Yellow and Emerald exist.
* What happened to Red and the Kanto trio after the Emerald saga? Did they all just disappear? Because I think after that, it just skips right on to D/P/Pl and Bl/Wh.
** Since the D/P/Pl and B/W arcs are set in different regions than Hoenn, Johto and Kanto it's safe to assume they all just went back to their normal lives after being saved by Emerald and co.. Green went back to being a Gym Leader, Blue went back to her parents, Red went back to [[MysteriousPast whatever the hell he was doing before the whole adventure began...]]
*** Besides, the Kanto/Johto trio didn't appear at all in the RS chapter.
** Darn. I wanted to see Red again.
*** You might in HGSS. Keep your fingers crossed.
*** Nope. Only Green is shown through flashback.
*** And Blue too. But just one panel in a flashback.
*** Red appears, but in a brief cameo through a flashback.
* Team Galactic tells Berlitz's Dad that they've kidnapped her (They haven't), and offer the fact that they [[spoiler: killed her bodyguards]] as proof. He calls her bodyguards and gets no response... and gives in immediately. Why, exactly, did he not try calling his daughter to see if ''she'' was okay? And even if he was too distraught to think of it, why did Team Galactic use a plan with such an obvious hole in it?
** Then again, this is the same guy who decided to break into the room where Platinum was sleeping just so he could gloat and explain Team Galactic's secret plan, so he's probably not the sharpest knife in the drawer anyway.
** Platinum didn't carry a phone around with her, so her dad couldn't call her directly. Of course, point is still valid as how would Team Galactic know that?
*** Actually, she brought a Pokegear with her at the start of the arc (as seen in the Vs. Bidoof chapter) and she's presumably still carrying it now, considering how her mother managed to contact her at the end of the DP arc.
*** No, Platinum was using the phone in her hotel room when calling her butler. She was also the one making the call to her mother, not the other way around, and she could've made it anywhere following the events at Spear Pillar.
*** [[spoiler: As it turns out, the constant brainwashing from different people screwed around with his head to the point he was fighting it, which is probably why he warned Platinum.]]
* How do they chose their characterizations? A lot of them are a far stretch from their game personalities, it's almost InNameOnly for several people. Do they just look at the designs for an hour then make a random plot that vaguely follows the games?
** Kusaka makes the personality fit his own tweaked plot, design and canon game personality damned. It helps that not even the rivals and pseudo-rivals are given much personality to begin with in the games, and he wants each character to be unique so we don't go hollering about Replacement Scrappies.
** But how does he chose the personalities? They seem almost random few relate to the games.
** Hardly anyone has personality in the games so he just does whatever he thinks would be fun and different.
* This has to do with coloring. Why do Black and White have dark tones in the uncolored manga? Their hair isn't too dark, it's barely darker then Blue's or Sapphire's, but they have the same shade as the raven haired protagonists.
** Sapphire's hair isn't that dark (more like a light tannish-gray) and Blue's hair has actually gotten lighter over the years. That said, yes, it is a bit strange why their hair isn't toned, Black's at least. Maybe it would've clashed with their hats?
*** What's with Sapphire's hair anyway? It's.. Gray in a lot of artwork.
*** Yamamoto is ''really'' inconsistent when it comes to coloring, with Crystal suffering the most from it. Her hair and jacket change colors in ever colored shot she's in.
** Kris doesn't even look like she has blue hair in Pokespe. She looks like she has ''black'' hair with blueish hints.
** Like it was said before, changes in ''every'' color shot. As of the HGSS arc, it's straight up dark blue.
** Okay, Sho4's chapter 10 included a colored shot of Black and White, and their hair is indeed a very, ''very'' dark shade of brown, darker than Blue or Sapphire's.
* What's with the ArtisticAge of the series? Until remakes or reappearances in the games, a lot of characters look the same age despite years passing. It's especially bad with the Pokedex gang.
** Not really. The only (main) characters who have been around long enough to have noticeable aging are the Kanto and the Johto Dex Holders, and looking over their character bio pages at serebii tells me that they had been aging, little by little over the years. Up till the third gen arcs, they all got taller, their faces lost a little baby fat, and the girls got filled out a bit more (even Yellow's got a bit of a chest in FLRG). The main problem is that with Mato's artwork in the RGB arc to the Yellow arc; she ''did'' draw them looker older when she drew normally, but half her artwork was in chibi-style so you couldn't tell anyways. As for the other recurring characters like the Kanto Gym Leaders, they were all at the age where a few years really doesn't make a difference anymore in your appearance.
* What's Yellow's eye color? They look like Green-Yellow eyes, Bulbapedia describes her with brown eyes, and fanon has her with either green or gold.
** Volume 24 is the only colored shot of her with colored eyes. And ''boy'' is it a ''really'' ambiguous shade that's hard to identify. I'd go with greenish-yellow like you. Not everything in bulbapedia is correct, though it does strive to be. Wally is identified as a main character when the official Japanese Pokespe site, netkun, doesn't.
* I'm having trouble figuring out Ruby's scar when his hat is off.. What's it supposed to look like?
** Two large gashes on the upper-right-side of his forehead. His hair hasn't grown back where he was slashed at.
* Is Platinum's dad really an OverprotectiveDad? Bodyguards seems a bit much, however you can't blame him for being freaked out at the thought of letting his sheltered ten year old daughter travel a region.
** Yes, he's a minor example, but considering that it's generally acceptable for kids to go out on their own in the world of Pokemon...
* So...exactly how much power does White have as a "representative" of the BW agency? I'd figure her job is to simply advertise the business, find jobs, and oversee the Pokemon actors on set (a plenty big responsibility already as it sounds)...but White also looks over the finances, can take on a huge debt in the company name, and can hire people on the spot. Not to mention her efficiency in supervising the Pokemon Musical and the respect she gets from her co-workers makes me think it's not her first time being put in charge of a major project. Can't blame me for thinking she actually owns the business with all that she does.
** Okay, according to Viz's translation, she is the president and manager. She has absolute power.
* Ruby mentions during the RS chapter that he's been sleeping in hotels throughout his journey. How does he pay for them?
** Prize money for winning a contest?
** Viz translated the line differently, saying that a city boy like him should only sleep in hotels. Besides, that was day 1 or 2 of his journey. He didn't even sleep yet.
* Bear with me here, during the Platinum Arc the title character battles through the Frontier. When she faces Hall Matron Argenta, it's Froslass against Dragonite. Dragonite uses Steel Wing, and Argenta exclaims it is a super effective attack from a dragon to an ice type... but Froslass is also a ghost type, which resists steel, making the attack neutral...
** Ghost does not resist steel; steel performs neutral damage against ghosts, so yes, Steel Wing is indeed super-effective against Froslass.
* Is it just this troper, or is it a ''really'' lucky coincidence that the unofficial name Blue gave Silver (she only called him so because of his eyes) just so happens to be his real name? Silver didn't have his name-embroidered hankerchief back then when he was two.
** Yeah, he ''did'' have his handkerchief when he was two; it was the only thing that he had that connected him to his past after he was kidnapped. The flashback shows Blue looking at it; she decided to call him Silver because that was what was written on the handkerchief ''and'' that it matched his eyes.
* If White's the same age as Black then she's 14. How is a 14 year old the manager ''and president'' of an actual agency? Doesn't Unova have any child labor laws?
** Like the ''rest'' of the Poke-world actually cares how old you are regardless of your occupation. In that case, Professor Oak should've been arrested ages ago for hiring children to go out into the world to gather information on dangerous creatures. Hell, Platinum accepted pretty fast that her "professional bodyguards" were the same age as her. It's kinda normal here; as long as you're good at it, no questions asked.
** This manga treats the FreeRangeChildren deal that the games put out in a more extreme manner. I simply assumed that legally, or socially, children are allowed to venture off and do adult things at a young age in this universe (or country)
** The games already had preteens as Gym Leaders, and Amanita maintains the Unova storage system. Age is never an issue in any of the Pokémon worlds.
* Why did everyone guess Yellow was a girl just because she has a ponytail? We see a lot of male characters with long hair.
** I think it may have something to do with her hair length (It's longer than Blue's and Platinum's) and she probably just has a girlish face and personality to begin with (crying over her Ratatta evolving because it wasn't cute? Ruby is the only other character who might do that but even he doesn't cry...). Also, no other character goes through so much trouble to keep their hair hidden (remember her reluctance to take of her hat in GSC?) But to be fair...Gold did mistake Bugsy for a girl...
*** Actually, Yellow never said anything about crying because "her Raticate wasn't cute." None of the translations from Chuang-Yi or Dragon Guard say this (not too sure on Viz though). She was scared that her Ratty wasn't the same Pokemon that she knew anymore, since she never knew the concept of evolution before then. This reaction still reinforces your point though; for instance, a young boy seeing his Pokemon evolve into a stronger-looking one would probably say "That was cool!" or something, but a young pacifistic girl like Yellow would probably do the same thing she did: cry. For her, it was probably like losing a best friend, or seeing that friend change into something unfamiliar or more threatening. So yeah, that was most likely the dead giveaway (for Green(male)) that she was indeed female, and not just because of the hair.
* I'm sorry if this is a stupid question, but can someone please explain the AnachronicOrder nature of Pokemon Special release? For all I know now the manga is running on three simultaneous arcs, the Platinum arc (which is not finished by a long shot), HGSS arc (nowhere to be found anywhere), and BW arc (which in itself really anachronic and barely coherent). I bet this has something to do with the weird release platform they have originally in Japan whether some chapters are released in magazines and some in tankobon volume but can someone please confirm how this works?
** Don't worry, it's not a stupid question; even people who know the situation find it confusing. I wrote an explanation for this awhile back. [[http://theviolenttomboy.tumblr.com/post/15911164787/pokemon-special-has-the-craziest-manga-release-schedule Here]] it is, I hope it helps.
* How could a 5 year old Black read such lengthy, and probably word heavy, books?
** I've seen a few first graders read Harry Potter. Also, in the original Japanese, Black is a terrible speller, at least.
* How is that Yellow didn't know about Pokémon evolution? She being able to read Pokemon's minds and being so close to them, should know the essentials.
** She only really hung around the only two Pokemon she's ever had, and both were apparently content with just watching her fish, nap, and draw all day before she went on her journey. Neither probably ever thought about evolution.
* What are they gonna do with Black and White 2? New characters, or stuff Black and White into new outfits?
** We'll just have to wait and see. Nothing else we can do about it.
** Well, they did just shove Crystal into a new outfit in the [=HGSS=] arc, so that's not totally out of the question for Black and White.
*** New characters it is.
* If the mangaka decides to bring the player characters of Black/White 2 to the manga, how they will be named?
** Wait and see. How should we know?
** Their names are Rakutsu (corruption of Black 2) and Faitsu (corruption of White 2). ''No'' idea how this is going to work in English. However, evidence points to this not being their real names.
*** Their English names are Lack-Two and Whi-Two, though those might not be their real names.
*** No, they aren't. Those are how their Japanese names are supposed to spelled.
* Why are shirts with circular cleavage-cutouts, and black undershirts/markings so popular? Both Blue and Crys have them, from unrelated sources, no less.
** ...Because that's how they're designed in the games.
* This may be a stupid question, but it never hurts to ask. From what I hear, the manga's original artist, Mato, got sick and was replaced by Yamamoto in the beginning of the GSC arc. She's gotten better, but how come Kusaka didn't hire her back? Was she not interested in drawing the manga anymore? Did she and Kusaka end things on bitter terms? Did personal issues stop her from going back to it? Is the aftermath of her illness more serious than expected? Does Kusaka not want to disappont Yamamoto? Did Kusaka want to give Mato a chance at living a good life?
** By the sounds of it, Kusaka was sad to see Mato go and had to put Special on hiatus until Yamamoto came along. Mato ended up getting a new artist job while she recovered, presumably it being much less taxing on her than a regular on-going manga (and as ''Manga/{{Bakuman}}'' clearly shows, being a manga artist is anything ''but'' a walk in the park).
* Red's battle with Giovanni at the gym (way back in RGB). Giovanni was the only one with his Pokeballs on the ground. Red tried to attack but Giovanni was able to counter attack. He said the 3 seconds it took for Red to attack was more than enough time for him to grab a Pokemon on the floor and counter.. However, few pages later, he says it will take him 6 seconds to grab a pokeball from the floor. What? Didn't he just contradict himself to what he said earlier (less then 3 seconds to take a pokeball from the floor and attack vs him saying it takes 6 seconds to grab a pokeball)?
** Distance. It's going to take longer to grab what's ten feet away from you as opposed to five.
* Ok, I have read the entire manga up till the HGSS ending (all online mind you) and I have been wondering one thing. Where did Ruby, Sapphire, Emerald, Diamond, Pearl and Platinum get their respective titles like Calmer or Empathizer? Did I just miss it?
** They've never been given titles in the manga proper. They came from the special Pokemon the Comic magazine, which featured bios of them.
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