day 215 ash gets back to viridian city/leaves for cerulean to drop off horsea {ep61} day 227 ash gets to cerulean {still ep61}
Travel time between the cites and screen dissolve transitions give Ash some much needed downtime before the last leg of his journey and Misty's sisters time to set the water ballet up. They then force Misty to star in it providing more Misy fanservice and Ash/Misty moments. How did she learn to hold her breath for such a long time underwater? Everyone else has oxygen masks. ep 62 is a funny filler where jigglypuff gets into a bitch-slapping contest with some clefairy FROM SPAAACCCEE 11!!1! (2013) Also the dub interjects that its been a year since Ash was last in Viridian, not as bad as that 2 months line in ep9 at least.
day 240 viridian city visit #3/gets badge {ep63} day 242 ash's mom gets a mr.mime {ep64} day 243 ash visits pr.oak {ep65}
Hurry Ash! If you hurry you might get to meet Giovan— nope too late, Gary beat you to it (why does Gary need an eleventh badge?) Anyway solid set of eps. all around and gives the audience a time limit till the league cometh and neatly welds the first movie into canon, the rest of them only get circumstantial ties.
It's nice to see TR being genuinely threatening every once in a while, and its funny that the one time they succeed in catching a Pokémon, Togepi, Giovanni doesn't want it. Gary is one lucky SOB that Mewtwo didn't just straight up murder him. The one time Jessie, James, and Meowth seriously thought about quitting the organization, instead of just splitting the team up Giovanni was the one who accidentally renewed their confidence. Ther's irony in there somewhere.
When they get back to Pallet after helping out at circus and getting Ash's mom a clown-butler Gary shows up at his grandfather's lab. At this juncture, two things are revealed: One, Gary's Krabby is fucking huge compared to Ash's (Wonder how big the Kingler would be) Two, that Gary has caught way more Pokémon than Ash but hasn't seen nearly as many different species, and since this was back in Gen 1 I think Gary tried to unsuccessfully clear out Mt. Moon's zubat population.
days 245-261 ash sets out to train for the indigo league and also goes to Hollywood {ep69+70}
ep 66 is a stupid training montage with a single funny gag, 67 is an even dumber montage ep. with a plot about surfing, and in 68 they visit a green house... WHY??! 69+70 are awesome though, Psyduck becomes the star of a movie and we get Meowth's back story and TR being the best friends you could ask for if you weren't named Ash Ketchum. Speaking of movies, well you all know what's next.
day 270 Mewtwo has an ephiphany about life/Ash starts on the path to become the Pokémessiah {m1}
What can I really say about Mewtwo Strikes Back, we all know the plot inside and out, genetic experiment has an existential crisis and gets pissed, the plot is resolved through a heroic sacrifice and Swiss-Army Tears so something else. Excusing Charizard as an anomaly, all Pokémon just kind of do what Ash tells them. It's more noticeable in the wild ones where as long as they're not being actively malicious towards him in particular, they'll be like “sure brah, we'll instantly trust your word and ask you to help with our problems even though we're wary/scared/distrustful towards other humans.” So I guess he is a master of Pokémon at least in spirit... or his charisma score is just super high.
Random trivia again, this movie is the only Pokémon film to be entirely hand drawn, some asshat decided the huge giant doors should be overlaid with CG though so only the theatrical version counts.
(2013) I claim no part in this joke, as I'm copying it from That Dude in the Suede's review of the 1st movie on That Guy With The Glasses "You know how Mewtwo's big evil plan was to psychicly control the weather so as to kill all humans and non-wild Pokémon? Man, Rayquaza really sucked at his job before he existed."
Next Time.... "Yo Misty! I Did... I Didn't Win. (cue Rocky music) or "You coulda been a contender, except for you know the plot and everything, better luck never I mean next time" Eps 71-82
