Dear Ash: Explain why Pikachu is yelling at you.
Ash spends all night preparing for his gym battle with Elesa. Ash has taken a lot of time figuring out how to deal with her Zebstrika, who defeated all of Bianca's three Pokémon by herself in the previous episode. Will Ash's deep strategy work against her?
This episode contains examples of the following tropes:
- Achievements in Ignorance: See Took a Level in Dumbass below.Elesa: If I may, you didn't by chance bring just Palpitoad, did you?Ash: Hehehehehe.Elesa: Ooh...I’ll ignore that.
- The Cameo: Professor Juniper, only to give Ash his Pokémon.
- Denser and Wackier: Most Gym battles are played relatively straight as important fights, but this one operates heavily on gags and Rule of Funny, shown most clearly when Ash is able to run all the way back to the Pokémon Center just to retrieve a second Pokémon.
- Dumbass No More: Ash. After losing two Pokémon, it took Pikachu to Thunderbolt him out of whatever he was in and yelled at Ash to use him.
- Even the Girls Want Her: All of the girls in the audience watching the battle, fawning over Elesa. Also, an attempt to use attract between females, which failed.Iris: How many times will take for Ash to learn that Attract doesn't work between girls?
- Face Fault: Ash after walking away to the draw bridge, only to find out that the bridge is closed when informed by Elesa.
- Forgot About His Powers: Ash claims he has no Pokémon with an advantage over Emolga, apparently forgetting about his Rock-type Roggenrola.
- Idiot Houdini: In spite of Ash's Cameron level blunders throughout the episode, he still won the gym battle.
- Pintsized Powerhouse: Elesa's Tynamo. It might be tiny, but its rapid speed and fast tackle spamming threw off Pikachu.
- Plot Armor: How Ash managed to dodge a disqualification... twice. First, Ash runs to a Pokemon center during a battle, which is very time-consuming that even the referee would have disqualified him if he didn't choose his Pokemon that instant. Second, like above, he took so long to try figuring out his next Pokemon when Snivy was defeated, only for Pikachu to step in and tell him to select him.
- Took a Level in Dumbass: Ash. This is considered to be one of the worst, if not the worst, performance Ash has done in a gym battle, especially at this point of his journey and his 5th region. Ash may be concerned of Zebstrika sweeping Ash's team, but even that doesn't excuse Ash's blunders here. Let's see:
- After Palpitoad fainted by Emolga, Ash relied so much on Palpitoad that he didn't even consider bringing two more Pokémon, despite knowing the rules beforehand. He was very lucky to call an audible to collect another Pokémon. Elesa decides to... ignore that.
- Ash calls on Snivy to give him the advantage over Emolga, forgetting the fact that Emolga's Flying type actually gives Snivy the disadvantage.
- Instead of Ash using a different move after Elesa used Attract (likely to test trainers on gender identity), he "countered" with Attract, much to a stalemate. Not only did he forgot about his own Pokemon's gender, but also Emolga's.
- Ash forgot that Emolga is also flying type. Plus his stupidity on using grass-type moves while Emolga uses flying moves. Needless to say, Snivy fainted. What makes this even worse is that Iris has an Emolga so he should have known better. Ash could have picked Roggenrola during his audible, but... apparently, Roggenrola was not in his team at the time, so either that or he forgot that he had it.
- ...Even after Snivy fainted, Ash STILL had no third Pokémon (not even Roggenrola), until Pikachu steps in.
- Wipe the Floor with You: All of Elesa's three Pokémon, slamming themselves into a wall.
- You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!: The reactions of Elesa, Cilan, Iris, Axew, and Pikachu after Ash's blunders in this battle.
