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  • Accidental Aesop:
    • Ash's Memetic Loser reputation drives home the point that winning tournaments are actually very difficult. Many popular athletes and teams in real life have even worse records than Ash, going their entire careers without seeing a single trophy or medal.
    • The fact that Ash ultimately manages to officially become the strongest champion in the world at the end of the series despite his many league losses can give a good Aesop about the value of never giving up in the face of adversity.
  • Accidental Innuendo:
    • In "Ditto's Mysterious Mansion", Team Rocket take Duplica's Ditto and say that they'll "have some fun [with it] before we hand it over to the boss!" Ditto is notorious for being able to breed with any Pokémon that can lay eggs. Then again, this episode was released before breeding became a mechanic.
    • In the original series episode, "It's Mr. Mime Time", there's a scene where Brock grabs Ash, asks him to "help" him, and then caps it off with Ash screaming when the screen cuts away.
    • In the Johto Journeys, the episode with the Ursaring explains near the end that the reason they've been aggressively attacking the characters is that it is their mating season and are trying to scare off anyone who gets in the way. Cue a pan up to the forest, where Ursaring are shooting Hyper Beams into the sky. Note that Hyper Beam from these Ursaring are massive beams of white shooting into the sky.
    • In the second episode of Diamond and Pearl ("Two Degrees of Separation"), Brock says "These two men are gonna do it with or without a beautiful woman at their side!" with Ash's approval.
    • In "Ancient Family Matters!" Byron responds to his son Roark about how he loves how a hole was dug. It's easy to take out of context.
      Roark: Somebody dug this hole!
      Byron: I don't believe it! [long pause] I love this hole! [In response, everyone else facefaults]
    • In the second episode of Black and White ("Enter Iris and Axew"), there's the line "You can't find anything this jiggly in Unova!" that reads like an advertisement about the bounciness of Unova's women. This was also a TPCI English Dub dialogue change.
    • Serena wearing Ash's clothes. Where Serena's clothes went is never shown, leading it to either be a case of Dressed in Layers, or she changed into them while in Ash's tent.
    • A subtle Running Gag is how they make it look like small Pokemon are looking up a girls's skirt in certain angles. This is most infamous with Dawn's miniskirt, Serena to a smaller extent, and Lillie.
    • Episode 8 of Sun & Moon anime ("Lillie's Egg-xhilirating Challenge") has Ash asking Lillie if she wants to do some "practicing". He's talking about touching Pokémon, but Lillie's tone of voice and the look on her face afterwards make it look like she thought Ash was suggesting something completely different.
      Ash: Hey, Lillie!
      Lillie: Hm?
      Ash: How about doing some practicing?
      Lillie: Do you mean what I think you mean?
      Ash: Yeah! Let's practice touching Pokémon!
      Lillie: (mouth wide open) Uh....
  • Adaptation Displacement: If you ask anyone who isn't a fan of the games (or at least Nintendo-savvy to a minimal extent) what they know about Pokémon, they will very likely answer with anime-exclusive information (i.e. the protagonist's name being "Ash", Trainers being 10 years old, Pikachu being the "star" Pokémon, Team Rocket consisting of Jessie, James and Meowth, "Aim for the Horn", the Pokémon Theme or Pokérap, Pokémon Speak, etc.). Many Pokémon GO players brought in via the Newbie Boom are mostly familiar with the anime, and often use its storyline and depictions of Lugia and Team Rocket in fan concepts and parodies. The presence of Recursive Adaptations (including an animefied version of the original Kanto games) doesn't help; almost every game released nowadays uses Ikue Ohtani's voice clips for Pikachu rather than the original sound clips. The game protagonists' popularity also depends on whether they appear in the anime or not.
  • Alas, Poor Scrappy:
    • Though disliked by her fans due to the perception of ruining Misty's character, Togepi's farewell to Misty was still rather depressing and heartwarming to them.
    • Kenny's send-off also made some people who were less than impressed with his antagonism sympathetic toward him.
    • Despite the poor reception of Ash's rivalry with Trip, most fans were disappointed by his Anti-Climax Boss battle with Ash in the first round of the Unova League, feeling he at least deserved better than that.
  • Alternate Self Shipping:
    • There's at least one doppleganger shipping: between Ash and a cross-dressed Ash.
    • A variant of malevolent shipping: Ash and the king of Pokélantis, who takes Ash's form.
  • Animation Age Ghetto: While the franchise as a whole has developed a diverse fanbase over time, after Takeshi Shudo left, the anime started to focus much more exclusively on young children, with recycled scripts and a Strictly Formula format of Ash and the gang helping a local, then riding off into the sunset. As such, fans of the games either loathe the anime, or look on it fondly. Starting from Hoenn (and with the possible exception of Unova) the anime has slowly made attempts to appeal to both younger and older fans, but the success of these attempts is another divisive subject in itself.
  • Anti-Climax Boss:
    • The conclusion to the Team Aqua and Magma, Team Galactic, and Team Plasma arcs all suffered from this. The battle between Groudon and Kyogre is pathetic and barely-animated, with Archie and Kyogre ending up going down way too easily. Cyrus and Ghetsis are not battled at all, and neither are the Legendaries under their thrall (Dialga & Palkia and Reshiram respectively), who instead get talked down.
    • Averted by Team Rocket in Unova and Team Flare, with Giovanni and Lysandre both bringing things to truly apocalyptic levels before being taken down after a fierce, all-out brawl.
    • Zigzagged with the Aether Foundation arc. While the battle itself takes advantage of an Adaptational Badass Motherbeast and gets all the companions involved in a 2-episode struggle against it and Lusamine's Pokémon, most of the fights are considered to not be noteworthy, with only Lusamine's Absol managing to get an effective hit, as well as Nebby not even participating in battle and Silvally not doing what it was designed to do. The subversion comes in that Talking the Monster to Death is used less as a resolution and more to allow Ash and Pikachu the final blow. Though even that is contested.
    • During the Necrozma arc, the elite force of Team Rocket known as Matori Matrix is built up as a major threat for the arc, with one of their members even shown to have a Mega Aggron capable of defeating enemies in one hit. Not only do they never interact with the classmates, said Mega Aggron is ultimately defeated quite abruptly in only one move by having Kukui's Incineroar use Malicious Moonsault on it, which then prompts Matori Matrix to abandon the fight.
    • Ash's battle with Hapu. It's effectively the same as an eighth Gym battle, typically the culmination of Ash's main arc pre-League, however, the battle being 1-on-1, Ash using Pikachu instead of the underused Rowlet and Torracat and the battle, itself, not even starting until halfway into the episode contributed towards the battle being underwhelming. This was compounded by very few strategies used and Pikachu's victory by splashing Mudsdale with regular seawater to make it weak to Electric attacks (something that, even with a Hand Wave, has never happened past the infamous Brock Gym battle) and ending, as usual, with Gigavolt Havoc, making the fight lackluster.
  • Arc Fatigue:
    • Ash's quest To Be a Master went on for just under twenty-six years before it finally concluded. Heck, he's still 10 years old; some say that he looks younger at the end of the series than when he started. It didn't help that with each new arc he hit a Reset Button on his team, his Pikachu's level, his own experience as a trainer, and that he never caught particularly many Pokémon each region (if you consider that one of the qualities of a master, it's never clearly outlined). Compare this to Gary whom eventually quit his journey and got a job as an advanced Pokémon researcher under his grandfather's prestigious name reviving dinosaurs from fossils. It took him 22 years to finally win a Pokemon League Conference and even then, that's only the first step to becoming a Pokemon Master.
    • Johto took 160 episodes, with the lack of plot advancement being compounded by Ash's companions not having goals of their own to actively pursue instead (Contests and the like would not be introduced until the next season). Some contend that the Whirl Islands Tournament and Special Guest arcs could've been removed, but that would have had the tied-for-4th longest gap between badges (27 episodes) succeeded by what would have been the shortest gap (1 episode, usurping Kanto's Boulder-Cascade's and Marsh-Rainbow gaps of 2).note 
    • Sinnoh lasted 191 episodes note , and is to date still the single longest arc in the anime. It also holds the record for both the longest and second longest gaps between Gym battles, with 31 episodes between Gardenia and Maylene and 52 episodes between Candice and Volkner.note  Granted, said gaps contain the buildup and resolution, respectively, of both the Contest and Team Galactic arcs, and there's a large distance between both sets of Gyms, but that still meant that the main quest was demoted to C-Plot status twice.
    • Sun & Moon only ran for 146 episodes, but nevertheless is believed by some fans to suffer from it. The beginning of the series was mostly spent with a rather laidback pacing that focused more on trying to capitalize on the new format to focus on some unique fillers that couldn't be done in previous series. While said pacing was seen as being rather balanced between progression and less important episodes up to the Akala arc, the period after that (the Ultra Adventures part of the series post-Aether arc in particular) had a rather massive drought of important developments happening, with not many major captures aside from Ash's Poipole which was released roughly 20 episodes later after never being involved in battles save for a few semi-serious instances, no evolutions beyond Ash's Litten and Mallow's Steenee, and no major milestones beyond the short Ula'Ula and Necrozma arcs (the latter of which felt remarkably self-contained in terms of story importance). While the subsequent Ultra Legends season heightened the pace of important episodes, with more battles, team changes, and story and character development (including the long-awaited debut of Team Skull Boss Guzma), some fans feel this started going too far in the opposite direction, with a lot of characters obtaining notable boosts in quick successions in a way that felt contrived. This wasn't helped by the fact it became obvious that the characters received them so they could complete in the Alola League.
      • The trials. With huge gaps in between each of Ash's trials (albeit to deal with other plot points), it makes what most consider the main plot feel relegated to C-Plot status.note  Its a bit more glaring than in previous series due to the fact that Ash isn't Walking the Earth and normally stays put on Melemele Island where he attends school (with occasional visits to Akala). Basically Ash advances his Island Trials when the writers feel like they showcased the newest game plot point and tie-in long enough.
  • Archive Panic: A 1000+ episodes, 20+ movies, numerous TV specials and movie shorts. Anyone who wants to watch all the episodes of the anime better be prepared for tons of sleepless nights, or at least several breaks, since there's so many episodes. Even if you restrict yourself to the dub, which cut out many episodes from the Japanese original, there's still tons to get through. And say you still decide to just restrict yourself to one arc? The official DVDs for the Kanto arc alone have 78-79 episodes, depending on the edition you own, and that's after removing a few episodes here and there.
  • Ass Pull:
    • Many an attack has had its power mitigated by introducing strange physics into battle at the writers' convenience — in the rematch for the Thunder Badge, Pikachu safely No Sells Raichu's Thunderbolt by balancing on its tail and using it as a ground to divert the electricity. Said strategy got an explicit Call-Back in the Journeys series, only with the usage of Iron Tail to serve as a proper ground.
    • The very well known "Aim for the horn!" trick used during Ash's first fight against Blaine, which somehow allowed Pikachu to ignore the Ground-type Rhydon's immunity to Electric attacks by aiming for its horn. While Ash didn't win the match due to this, it's still easily the most well known example of the writers' disregard for the games' rules.
    • During the battle against Tate and Liza in Advanced, Pikachu uses "Thunder Armor", an improvised move that has him use Thunder on himself and Swellow to increase their power and speed (WITHOUT even damaging themselves) and let them beat Lunatone and Solrock with an Electric-infused Aerial Ace. It comes out of nowhere with no real foreshadowing, and the technique is never used again.
      • At one point in the Advanced saga May had Bulbasaur use a Razor Leaf to divert an incoming Fire Blast. No explanation is given for how this works, as the leaves should burn up due to the fire.
    • Ash's loss in the Sinnoh League. Tobias shows up, having no prior appearance, with a Darkrai at the League and one-shots half of Ash's Pokemon. When Ash beats Tobias's first, he sends out a Latios! Who then wipes the floor with Ash's remaining Pokemon before drawing with Pikachu. Nothing is ever explained about how Tobias had those two and he is never heard from again.
    • Some Pokémon captures that are just suddenly given to certain characters without any explanation whatsoever could be viewed as such. Brock's Zubat that he caught off-screen at the entrance of Mt. Moon, and James' Weepinbell that he apparently left at Butch and Cassidy's fake Breeding Center, are prime examples of this.
      • The reveal in Pokémon Journeys that Delia's housekeeper Mr. Mime was actually one of Ash's Pokémon this entire time is viewed as this by some people. Since the show never once hinted at it being under Ash's ownership up to this point except for very obscure pieces of japanese promotion (notably, he wasn’t in the picture of all Ash’s Pokémon residing in Pallet taken at the end of the BW series), the fanbase always assumed that "Mimey" either stayed a wild Mr. Mime, or was caught by Delia.
    • During the climax of the Aether Foundation arc, Ash's Electrium-Z spontaneously turns into a Pikashunium-Z, allowing him and Pikachu to unleash 10000 Volt Thunderbolt against the Motherbeast. No explanation for what happened is given, and the Pikashunium-Z returns to be an Electrium-Z after the move. This isn't helped by the fact that it keeps happening later and never gets an explanation, aside from a vague and poetic talk about the “Power of Alola” in its final usage that does little to contextualize why it happened when it did prior.
    • Hidden Power has been vaguely used to reverse certain situations: usually an attacking move, it's also used to heal Brandon and his Regis.
  • Audience-Alienating Era:
    • The Johto seasons: The Johto Journeys, Johto League Champions, and Master Quest. They have an absurd amount of Filler (nearly half of the 167 episodes) that spaced out the time between Gym fights too much, the main cast got Flanderized, and focus on Brock and Misty was lessened. Most of this was due to it being the point when Takeshi Shudō quit the show over the formulaic nature contrasting with his vision. Of these Master Quest is the least disliked due to a notable reduction of filler in compared to the previous two.
    • From the perspective of the dub, Battle Frontier is considered to be the lowest point since it was at this time that the entire English cast was replaced following TPCi taking over the dubbing, and the new cast hadn't found their footing yet. While the episodes themselves are liked, their english performances are considered the worst in the entire franchise.
    • Black and White and its subsequent seasons covering the generation 5 games. The writers pushed the Reset Button on Ash in such a way that his Idiot Hero qualities got highlighted in a negative manner that contradicted his experienced Diamond and Pearl personality, many highly questionable narrative decisions were made like making the new rival Trip beat Ash's Pikachu in battle with an inexperienced Snivy, the Plasma story arc from the games didn't get involved as the anime advertised until after the Tournament Arc was over, and there was some Ending Fatigue caused by said Plasma story arc combined with a Filler Arc created to stall until Pokémon X and Y were released. Along with this, the movie Pokémon: Genesect and the Legend Awakened and its controversial Mewtwo character caused some heated debate on the anime's relationship with its adult Periphery Demographic and whether the creative team was capable or willing to cater to older fans at all.
    • While the XY series was typically (though not universally) seen as an improvement over Black and White, the same cannot be said for the era's movies. Pokémon: Diancie and the Cocoon of Destruction and Pokémon: Volcanion and the Mechanical Marvel are usually seen as a collection of the series' cliches and So Okay, It's Average, while Pokémon: Hoopa and the Clash of Ages is rather disliked and seen as one of the weakest overall movies.
  • Audience-Coloring Adaptation: Unfortunately, Black and White was largely responsible for the casual attribution that Ash gets completely reset as a trainer in each region, brain cells and all. This is despite the fact that only Black and White truly had him take a level in dumbass. While he started to cycle his team around Hoenn, Ash improving as a trainer can actually be seen over the course of the anime since Kanto, with Ash starting to use actual strategy more and more as early as late Johto, he starts to mellow out and mature more in Hoenn, while most of his losses in Hoenn and Sinnoh usually came from equally skilled or well-above-average trainers. X and Y also rerailed him to continue that natural progression. In reality, Black and White is the only true "reset" Ash has ever gotten; but it was infamous enough for people to apply it as being true for every region he starts in.
  • Award Snub: An infamous example of this happened at the 2000's Kids Choice Awards. The anime, which was at its peak popularity at the time, was nominated for "Favorite Cartoon". Because of this, many people expected Pokemon to reign victorious, only for Rugrats, Nickelodeon's flagship show at the time, to win. Nickelodeon always had a habit of rigging the awards to have their flagship cartoon to win said award (best shown with SpongeBob SquarePants later on) and they also used it as a way to plug the Rugrats in Paris film, as after the winner was announced, they cut to a specially-animated sequence of Angelica Pickles.
  • Awesome Art: If there's one element of the show that is praised for consistently improving upon it's the animation quality, with XY in particular providing a larger selection of much sharper and more fluid battle and action scenes, with SM expanding on that with a looser art style that enabled the team to cut corners in order to churn out far more expressive animation on a regular basis. Note the attention to detail is often no less, animator Iwane Masa'aki tweeted he thought he would die making a scene in "Faba's Revenge!".
  • Awesome Ego: Gary is incredibly smug about his abilities and knowledge as a trainer during the original series, but the way the show portrays him is so over-the-top it's hard to not enjoy it. Even though he's only a 10-year-old he has his own car, a group of cheerleaders that always follow him around, and he was able to get 10 badges to qualify for the Indigo Plateau even though only 8 were required. This lead to several memes such as GARY OAK to declare how awesome he is.
  • Badass Decay:
    • In the first season, Gary was always three steps ahead of Ash, rolling around the region in a Corvette with teenage cheerleaders, acting like a total jerk to Ash whenever they met, flaunting his superiority. Then after a Break the Haughty moment occurs when he loses a big match, Gary is far more modest and humble out of nowhere, only lightly teasing Ash for the rest of his rivalry.
    • When introduced, Brock was a cool headed Gym Leader and a genuine threat. After joining Ash and Misty, his character became softer and comedic, with his battling became less frequent (and more prone to suffering The Worf Effect). Just by looking at his previous most used Pokémon (Onix) and one of his last teams (Happiny and Bonsly), one can start to notice the difference. Generally most return appearances after his tenure as main character tend to subvert this and showcase his competent side more often, in particular his two returns in Sun and Moon where he could hold his own against powerhouses such as Kiawe and Olivia, even if his comedic lovesick persona is still very prevalent.
    • Jessie's Lickitung. It was one of the most powerful Pokémon they ever owned; it easily defeated Ash's Bulbasaur, Brock's Vulpix, and Pikachu, before it was eventually defeated by Misty's Psyduck. In later appearances it was defeated easily by Ash's Pokémon, especially Pikachu, who previously couldn't even harm it.
    • In-story case. Ash's Charizard was repeatedly trashed, demeaned, and outshone during the episode featuring the Charicific Valley, in order to justify Ash leaving it behind. However, it should be noted that unlike most examples, Charizard is still seen as one of Ash's strongest, coming back after that moment to not only defeat Clair, Gary and injure Harrison's Blaziken, but also becoming the first of Ash's team to defeat a Legendary. Given the head Charizard of the valley was implied to have a crush on Ash's by a later episode, he supposedly evolved out of being the runt of the litter.
    • Turtwig. In his first major battle, he was able to beat a Rampardos that's more than four times his size. Then writers turned him into a Jobber to make Paul (and by extension, Infernape) look stronger. Torterra was meant to still be considered strong, but beating nobody except Team Rocket seriously weakened his cred.
    • Team Rocket during Black and White Took a Level in Badass and had become a viable threat. But then in X and Y, they went back to being a Goldfish Poop Gang (if a slightly more formidable one than before). Similarly, they became more credible foes once more in Sun and Moon, only to fall back into general incompetence in the subsequent Journeys series.
    • Goodra and Noivern suffered from this late in the series. Prior to getting Put on the Bus, Goodra was able to win Ash his 5th gym badge and save his homeland. Meanwhile, after evolving, Noivern was able to give a Zapdos a run for its money. Come the Kalos League, neither Pokémon is able to get a single straight win in both of Ash's full battles.
    • Downplayed for Kiawe who, similar to Brock, started off as a stoic and cool headed battler in the early parts of Sun and Moon, though shortly after, his personality became increasingly comical as the battles became less frequent. However, he did retain his skill level whenever the plots became more intense (such as the Akala and Poni Island trips and the climax of the Aether Foundation arc). This is particularly noticeable in the Alola League, as he was the only other main cast member besides Ash to make it all the way to the semifinals.
  • Big-Lipped Alligator Moment:
    • The Johto episode "Hocus Pokémon". The gang helped a magician, Lily, find ingredients in order to help her complete a spell that would allow her to understand Pokémon speech. Ash volunteered to be the guinea pig, but the spell ended up turning him into a Pikachu instead. The spell carried over into the beginning of the next episode As Clear as Crystal, but wore off after a few seconds.
    • Also from Diamond and Pearl is the evil Togepi episode "Where No Togepi Has Gone Before!" that had the main cast randomly sent to space for a few minutes (which included a cameo from a Rayquaza).
  • Bile Fascination: The episodes in which Ash loses a League, particularity the Kalos League, gained this reputation by the curiosity of the backdraft generated by fans.
  • Bizarro Episode: Several Sun and Moon episodes qualify due to the huge break in formula and even many episodic plots being far more random or unusual than the usual format of the show. In particular, the seventeenth episode in the series is A Day in the Limelight for the Rotomdex, seeing it play Clueless Detective after Ash loses his Electrium-Z crystal.

    C-D 
  • Can't Un-Hear It: While the voice actor change for the main characters is usually diverse, many agree that Eric Stuart is this for both Brock and James.
  • Catharsis Factor:
    • Ash finally beating Paul in the Sinnoh League with the same Chimchar (now Infernape) that he dumped many episodes back for being weak.
    • Regardless of the debatable quality of the League itself, finally seeing Ash win an official game related Pokemon League after 22 years of trying and failing was major catharsis for those who stuck around since the start way back in the 90s.
    • For those who still weren't satisfied with the Alola League or the final battle with Kukui, Episode 65 of Journeys marks the first time ever in the anime's entire run where Ash finally defeats one of the champions from the games in an official WC battle. The champion in question? Champion Iris.
    • Ash defeating Cynthia after a long and hard-fought full battle.
    • Ash beating Leon and being crowned the new World Champion of the Pokemon world. After 22 years or so of Ash trying and failing to win a league, debates surrounding his Alola victory counting or not because of how it was handled, and decades of constantly being reset as a trainer... Ash is finally, indisputably the best, like no one ever was.
    • Lastly, while it's controversial in its own right, Ash finally having his story come to an end is a huge relief to many of his longtime fans. For those that were worried his next journey would hit the Reset Button again and make his World Champion victory moot, he's actually allowed to leave the series with his greatest achievement still intact.
  • Contested Sequel: Sun & Moon to a higher degree than any past series. Fans either praise it for breaking from a stale formula, having a much more expressive art style, animation and cast, its lighthearted and comedic tone and its focus on slice of life, or dislike it for being directionless and poorly paced, several old and new characters being mishandled or poorly represented, the downgrade in battle presentation, and seemingly putting more focus on incidental stuff than what should be the main plot. There's little middle ground to be found.
  • Creepy Awesome:
    • Conway remains an Ensemble Dark Horse well after the end of Diamond and Pearl due to his hilariously disturbing demeanor (A Badass Bookworm strategist frequently framed in Scary Shiny Glasses while speaking in a Creepy Monotone) and equally creepy awesome Pokémon.
    • Jessie's Mimikyu runs off the sheer hatred and contempt of Pikachu because of how much love he gets. Fans love this for being somewhat of a Take That! to the species while being highly disturbing, especially the animation of the disguise ability.
    • Guzma's Golisopod counts, if its menacing giant isopod-samurai-tank design along with a brutal fighting style that makes Mimikyu look tame doesn't make it a huge Ensemble Dark Horse more popular than it was. Then its English Dub voice went from a soft sounding Pokémon Speak to a more monstrous sounding version of it further emphasized it which fans have absolutely enjoyed it.
  • Creepy Cute: Many of Team Rocket's Pokémon are supposed to be menacing antagonists to Ash and his friends, but at the same time, they're just as cute and endearing as the protagonist's Pokémon.
    • There are many pokémon that can qualify as this. Of particular note is Jessie's Pumpkaboo/Gourgeist in Kalos, whose true face is just a couple button eyes and an expressive mouth. It has Cute Little Fangs as Pumpkaboo as well.
    • Jessie's Mimikyu is portrayed as a terrifying creature due to its intense personality, but remember that its still a tiny little costumed creature.
    • James' Mareanie. Get under the starfish-like tentacles, and she's actually pretty cute.
  • Critical Backlash:
    • While Black and White remains one of, if not the least favored by fans, there has been an increase in support over time from those who don't find it to be that bad and give credit to its positives, sometimes even improvements over the previous ones. These include a decrease in the formula used for filler episodes, Team Rocket not appearing in every episode, Team Rocket being more competent, well-received story arcs such as the Meloetta arc and the Don George Tournament Arcs, and a large, colorful cast of rivals for the main trio. It helps that several of these trends were carried over and used to even greater effect in later series. Defenders will often claim that it is still mostly enjoyable as a standalone Pokémon series — while it largely falls apart when directly comparing it to the previous ones (especially Diamond and Pearl), there's good to be found when judging it solely on its own merits.
    • After the huge backlash stirred up by Ash's loss at the Kalos League, some fans who saw it as a Foregone Conclusion were confused by the amount of vitriol it stirred up, and found it ridiculous that some people claimed that it retroactively ruined the whole Kalos series.
    • When the Sun and Moon anime trailer was first shown, there was a massive Tainted by the Preview among the fanbase, due to several factors such as the overly "gag show"-ish nature, Ash's hideous face, the removal of Serena, the much more "rounded" animation style, Ash's hideous face, the fallout and resentment against the anime due to the Kalos league, the school setting, and Ash's hideous face. Then when the first episode was released, many fans retracted their opinion, as while Ash did become more wacky, he still was competent, and while the storytelling was more comedic, it managed to win some fans over with its different approach. Despite this, the show was still very controversial due to the other reasons above.
  • Critic-Proof: For all the complaints critics and older fans have for the series and the movies, nothing they say has an impact on their success (Word of God even says this is by design — right as the current demographic is disillusioned, the uninformed/carefree next one starts to tune in, keeping the cycle going). The movies in particular never had a continued slump until the Kalos era, whose movies were relative disappointments and the lowest-grossing of all (though still making a lot), and still managed to make a large comeback with the next film.
  • Delusion Conclusion: Some fans speculate that Ash Ketchum has been in a coma ever since Pikachu electrocuted him in the first episode, and that every adventure he's experienced since then was All Just a Dream - as "evidenced" by the fact that Ash has never been seen to age in the years since then.
  • Designated Monkey: Ash in the Sun & Moon series is seen as this for some people. While past series did give him some Butt-Monkey qualities, the comedic and slapstick tone of Alola means that he ends up receiving far more comedic abuse than even his co-protagonists, such as in episodes like the Ride Stoutland (where his Stoutland ate his pants, in addition to constantly licking him with Big Friendly Dog-like behavior, while the others were all serious) or the Pokemon Center episode (where Ash is forced to crossdress while Kiawe and Sophocles are not for seemingly no reason other than humor). Given that Ash is still the usual Nice Guy he's always been for the most part in SM and rarely deserves such punishment, treating him like a punching bag feels undeserved for a part of the audience.
  • Designated Villain:
    • An Orange Islands episode involving a school of wild Lapras has, as its villains, a team of what are essentially pirates who are leaving the local police on edge by tracking a herd of wild Pokémon and then...weakening them with Pokémon they already have and tossing Poké Balls to capture them. In other words, exactly the same thing every trainer ever does. All the episode has to go on for why this is a bad thing when these pirates do it is mention of a "no-capture zone". Not even that Lapras are rare and endangered and need to be left alone to keep from going extinct, which would make sense with what its Pokédex entries have mentioned - no, just an arbitrary no-capture zone in the middle of the ocean with no actual reason specified for its existence.
    • Guzma's tactics in the Alola League (positioning Kangaskhan's child between her and his Scizor so Kangaskhan hesitates to attack, and having Golisopod use Throat Chop on Lana's Primarina to prevent it from using Sparkling Aria) are treated with shock and contempt by the cast...Even though those are valid strategies and Guzma isn't breaking any rules. Zigzagged since Lana does point this out after her defeat when the other students object to his style, while the Kahunas and Kukui's objections with Guzma are more his overall callousness towards his opponents and the league itself than how he wins, never once threatening him with disqualification.
  • Don't Shoot the Message: Ash's loss in the Indigo League was meant to be intentional, to show that being a scrappy underdog/the protagonist alone doesn't mean you will win, as a contrast to the 'underdog victories' that were running rampant at that time. However, the unfair circumstances that led up to it combined with Ash still losing each subsequent official league afterwards until Alola despite being less of an underdog as time went on wound up diminishing the message.

    E-F 
  • Ending Fatigue: The quick pace of the Unova season plus the Executive Meddling that surfaced during the development of Black 2 and White 2 resulted in the last 5 months prior to the release of the Gen VI games having an Orange Islands/Battle Frontier-style round of pure, aimless island-hopping filler, only without a pseudo-tournament like those arcs had. The subsequent ratings drop shows the extent of the wear and tear.
  • Even Better Sequel:
    • You can't get a universal sentiment with this fandom, but a fairly common opinion about Diamond & Pearl is that it took everything Advanced Generation did right note  while rectifying that season’s flaws note , resulting in an even stronger season in the process.
    • While technically the same series, the XYZ season arc of the XY series was an improvement over the previous two years of the series in terms of momentum of an ongoing Story Arc and paying off elements that were getting slowly built up before, with the writers going out of their way to also avoid the pratfalls of the third year of Best Wishes: Season Two.
  • Evil Is Cool:
    • Mewtwo. While not a truly "evil" character, it's also praised for its dark backstory and being a chilling portrayal of the original ultimate Pokémon, and even more for its surprising character depth in the Japanese version.
    • Pokémon Hunter J. While clearly one of the worst human beings in the show, she's got plenty of Rule of Cool going for her and happens to be pretty damn effective in a show that is starved for competent characters.
    • The evil Malamar are also loved by the fandom for the sake of being a rare example of truly evil Pokémon.
  • Fan Myopia:
    • A loud contingent of Sun and Moon fans tend to praise the series for supposedly changing everything for the better, calling it the best series out of every region, dismissing anyone who harbors any criticism as a hater or someone salty from Ash losing the Kalos League. This comes with being ignorant of many of Sun and Moon's flaws such as the more fluid animation and "better" art style being mostly wasted on comedic expressions instead of battles, the shying away from battling in general outside of the trials, which are few and far between, and many questionable writing decisions that fans feel weigh down the impact of many important episodes (the Alola League being where this problem became most apparent). These fans became far more vocal after Ash won the Alola League, intensifying the split between fans into becoming "fans from every prior series vs Sun and Moon fans".
    • To a similar extent, some XY/XYZ fans claim that the series is flawless for engaging in the Periphery Demographic and making Ash a badass, touting fans who criticize it as having bad taste. This comes with ignoring that series' flaws such as Ash's newfound badasseery coming at the cost of some of his personality, making him feel more like a Vanilla Protagonist. Serena being a Love Interest, while widely loved by these fans, also gets some flak for being built off of a Forgotten First Meeting and with her coming off as a Satellite Love Interest. That XY and SM are almost polar opposites in direction and moderation (especially in arc vs filler quality and abidance of the old formula) does not help the division one bit.
  • Fanon Discontinuity:
    • Ash being confirmed to still be 10 years old at the start of Black and White was NOT accepted by those who believed Ash was just in a slow aging process. That this fact has been reiterated repeatedly since then hasn't deterred these people.
    • Some fans tend to dismiss the Orange Islands, Battle Frontier and Alola as actual Ash wins.
      • The Orange Islands tend to be dismissed because they were a filler saga created only for the anime, despite being the arc where Ash captured Snorlax and finally got Charizard to obey him, and both Pokemon would play a big role in giving Ash future victories, such as the one against Gary at the Silver Conference.
      • The Battle Frontier, despite existing in Pokemon Emerald and actually playing a role in Ash's rivalry with Paul in the following series, is dismissed as another filler event.
      • Alola's status as the first 'official' League victory is disputed by some fans for several reasons, among them the Lighter and Softer nature of Sun and Moon (which always treated battling as a minor concern at best, with several episodes not featuring any battling at all) and the lack of several of the usual hallmarks of a Pokémon League such as badge-esque entrance requirements and a very limited number of Pokémon per match, alongside other complaints such as Ash's fluctuating competence level, the writing seemingly rigging several matches in his favornote , and the fact that several of the other trainers who made it to the tournament portion weren't portrayed as particularly strong, all of which contribute to dampening the feeling of the Alola League being on the same level as any of the previous ones, with some going as far as to consider the aforementioned Orange League a worthier achievement.
  • First Installment Wins:
    • Older fans tend to defend the first season (and occasionally the Orange Islands/Johto seasons that are a part of the same series) as legitimately good or at least an enjoyable Guilty Pleasure compared to the later seasons, due to them not having as strict an adherence to the formula. The formula is still there, just not as blatant as later on in the show's lifetime. It also features some episodes that seem downright bizarre now, which may add to the appeal for some.
    • The first series also remains the most iconic of franchise. The show's image developed in the mind of the general audience during that era and has stuck there since. When most people think of Ash's traveling companions, they think of Misty and Brock; when most people think of Ash's rival, they think of Gary. This is despite the fact that Misty and Brock haven't traveled regularly with Ash in over a decade (nearly two decades in Misty's case) and Gary stopped being his rival at the end of Johto.
  • Fountain of Memes:
    • Brock's anime characteristics such as his love of "jelly-filled donuts," his squinted eyes, his fondness for women, being able to tell each Nurse Joy and Officer Jenny apart, having his ear pulled for flirting with women by Misty then Max, and eventually being knocked out cold by Croagunk have all stood the test of Pokémon fandom time.
    • Team Rocket's various antics, costumes, and plans have all generated their own memetic appeal over the years.
    • Gary Oak doesn't just have his anime memes, but his game counterpart Blue's memes as well due to his large fandom.

    G-L 
  • Gateway Series: A fair few anime fans and fans of other Pokémon incarnations started with this in their youth.
  • Gotta Ship 'Em All: As befitting the alleged Trope Namer, practically every notable character has been shipped with every other character that they've had a decent amount of interaction with that could be construed as romantic. Many of those characters even each borderline qualify as a Launcher of a Thousand Ships.
  • Growing the Beard: In Japan, Pokémon: The First Movie showed that Pokémon stories could entertain adults as well as children through compelling characters and interesting storylines - which was one of Takeshi Shudo's goals from the beginning - and the next couple of films followed suit. In the US, the film was dubbed as a straight-up kids' movie (mainly due to 4Kids bowdlerizing the film by changing Mewtwo from a complex character trying to find his purpose in life, to a generic "destroy the world" villain, most likely due to the belief that kids would find the plot too confusing) and only became popular with adult fans years after its debut, but either Pokémon 3 or Pokémon: Lucario and the Mystery of Mew more or less filled this role instead.
    • Master Quest for the Johto era. (Seasons 3-5) The Johto era is widely known for its too many filler episodes that spaces way too far out the era's main story involving Ash battling Gym Leaders to get into the Johto League, Brock and Misty are both relegated in most of the episodes, and most of the episode plots are formulaic with very little variety. (Ash and friends arrive in a new area, they meet a "Character of the Day", Brock falls in love with a pretty girl, and Team Rocket shows up to kidnap Ash's Pikachu and/or other Pokemon they are interested in) Around the middle part of Master Quest, the heavy amount of filler episodes is downplayed, making the gym leader battle episodes a lot less spaced out, the episode plots steer away from the formula and offer episodes that not only brings variety to the formula, but also gives the characters like Team Rocket some development, in which they even get an episode where they are the main focus with Ash and friends being side characters. Brock and Misty's downgraded roles are even downplayed giving them more time to shine.
    • Advanced Generation was seen as a general improvement over the Original Series after a initial rough start: Ash was generally smarter, the pacing issues were amended by having May seek Pokémon Contests out, and the animation improved over the previous seasons. Some fans say it was a case of this trope from the start, while others hold up the Battle Frontier segment of Advanced Generation as stronger than the earlier Hoenn-set episodes; this is mostly due to the season's brisk pacing note , Ash's Grovyle evolving into Sceptile and becoming a true powerhouse, Ash making frequent use of his reserve Pokémon, and most significantly, Ash actually seeing his goal through for once by defeating all the Frontier Brains.
    • The Mega Evolution specials themselves follow this pattern. Act I focused more on action than story, and mostly served as an introduction to the new cast of characters. Act II introduced more backstory and plot elements, including a Plot Twist for fans of the games that the main character is working as an Unwitting Pawn for Lysandre, secretly the leader of Team Flare. It helped that these specials appealed to the Periphery Demographic, and were later tied into the main series.
  • Harsher in Hindsight:
    • In Battle Aboard the St. Anne, the captain decides to "test out one of the life boats". Then take a look at what happened in Korea in 2015.
    • One city in the Kanto saga features mass disappearances of young children. The culprit for this missing persons case? Hypno, who would later gain a reputation for being a Memetic Molester. In Sun and Moon, Faba even uses a Hypno to forcibly erase Lillie's memories, furthering this.
    • "Volcanic Panic" has Ash and co. try to stop the eruption of Cinnabar Island's volcano. In Pokémon Gold and Silver, Cinnabar Island has not only erupted, it's buried the whole island. There was only one year in between the Japanese debuts of the episode and the game.
    • In "So You're Having a Bad Day!", Bonnie receives a fortune saying she's going to have her "worst day ever". This episode was first aired in the US on July 11, 2015, which, for many Nintendo fans, did indeed become a very bad day when Satoru Iwata died.note 
    • During the penultimate episode of XY, Olympia predicts that Kalos will be facing a great crisis. She's actually referring to the events of XYZ, but one real life month later, Paris was struck with terrorist attacks.
    • It is not uncommon for Pokémon Center to be portrayed as an ultimate healing service, even being able to cure cancer from humans. But by the time SM021 rolls around, a Stoutland is brought there, and Nurse Joy couldn't do anything as it's dying from old age.
    • James fabricates a fake childhood story in the episode “Holy Matrimony” that has him freeze to death while his Growlithe, Growlie watches and howls in despair. Fast forward twenty years later in Pokémon: I Choose You!, Sorrel reveals that his Luxray died freezing to death when he was a child.
    • Mallow lashing out at her father and running away becomes even harsher when it's revealed that her mother died when she was younger, and Mallow lashed out angrily at her before her death for always apologizing for getting sick.
    • Watching "Sleight of Sand" becomes this after you learn it's the last time we see Butch and Cassidy not just as part of Team Rocket, but as a duo.
  • Heartwarming in Hindsight:
    • The episode "Noodles; Roamin' Off!", Meowth discovers his Fury Swipes are intricate enough to make him a talented cook and is offered a Friend-or-Idol Decision to leave Team Rocket for a successful noodle business. He ultimately stays with the team, though said skill remains a Chekhov's Skill throughout many of Jessie's coordinator escapades, even winning contests and showcases. A talent that nearly had him abandon his teammates for business ventures instead helps one of them with their own.
    • In a sense, nearly all of the Team Rocket trio's idolizing and yearning for Giovanni's respect becomes heartwarming when they finally achieve success in Black and White and become respected agents, even managing to save Giovanni's life at one point.
    • Pretty much any rare praise or encouragement Ash got at the start of the series about his potential to become a good trainer becomes heartwarming by the later periods of the anime, especially by XY where he verges as The Ace for his current team.
    • Both voice actresses for Ash noted Greninja's departure scene in XY to have been emotional for them, helped partially due to the tragic coincidence of them both losing pets shortly before voicing the scene (a dog and a cat for Rica Matsumoto and Sarah Natochenny respectively). Come the next series, two of the Pokemon Ash captures and develops affectionate bonds with are Rockruff and Litten, a dog and a cat.
    • These line from the very first Japanese Pokemon opening became this after Ash finally won a Pokemon League.
      "Chase your dreams, keep them close, they'll eventually come true. So it's said in all those songs and childhood stories. And I know just like flower buds eventually will bloom, that all my dreams will soon come true."
  • He Really Can Act:
    • No matter which language you're watching, there is one consistent; Team Rocket's actors can make you laugh and cry.
    • For the TPCi dub, Sarah Natochenny has really stepped up her voice-acting ability as Ash ever since her early Battle Frontier days.
  • Ho Yay:
    • A lot of Ash and Alain's dialogue to and about each other can come off this way, which also isn't helped by the fact that Ash is the one who ultimately triggers Alain's Heel Realization about Team Flame, not to mention his internal dialogue about Ash during their match with one another.
    • In JN03 Goh is visibly blushing whenever Ash reaches out his hand and is frozen in adoration at the boy's heroics. Goh is also very flustered when asking Ash if they're still friends, his face red and going redder when Ash confirms it as if he doesn't want to be just that. This continues in the following episodes, Goh being completely comfortable with reaching for Ash's hand, patting his shoulder, hugging him, and faintly blushing at his compliments.
      Ash: What are you talking about? Of course, we're friends!
      Goh: O-oh, right! *stammers and his face lights up like a tomato* Of course! *nervous laughter*
      • Goh and Gary's behavior in JN68 threw more fuel onto the fire, with Goh's frustration over being an inferior trainer to one of Ash's oldest and closest rivals while Gary stole Ash's attention for a good chunk of the episode looking like a real The Missus and the Ex situation.
  • Hype Backlash: The Kanto saga is by far the most iconic part of the anime, and gets a lot of praise for its comedy and banter making it feel fresher than the seasons after. However, this praise is met with occasional backlash against those who use it to deride all the later seasons as nothing but a repetitive, saccharine kids' show, ignoring Kanto's many flaws and weaknesses that the later arcs vastly improved upon. While Kanto is near-undisputed as the most unique season, it's not rare for newer fans to question it being held as the gold standard for dialogue and interactions, feeling its cynical plot and humor have aged poorly and are carried more by nostalgia than genuine quality.
  • Idiosyncratic Ship Naming: Pick any two characters. There is a ___Shipping name for them. The more complete lists have thousands of entries. Here's the list.
  • I Knew It!:
    • During Diamond & Pearl, the hints were pretty obvious that Ash and Dawn were eventually going to trade their respective Aipom and Buizel. It was always really questionable why Dawn was the one that captured Buizel when she already had Piplup as her team's Water-type, and Buizel being battle-hungry while Aipom enjoyed Contests just seemed like a better fit if their trainers were swapped.
    • Kukui's 6th Pokemon being Tapu Koko was something many fans called, even before the episode titles were released, due to it watching the battle between Ash and Kukui.
  • Iron Woobie: Ash Ketchum never wins any regional tournament, is constantly chased by Team Rocket for his Pokémon, has to see friends go in separate ways to achieve their own dreams and has even died temporarily multiple times. But that never stops him from taking joy in his adventures and forming meaningful relationships with the people he knows, not to mention he saves the world on a yearly basis through The Power of Friendship and Heroic Resolve. It takes a lot to make Ash depressed, but when that happens, he always finds the strength to soldier on.
  • It's the Same, Now It Sucks!: One of the show's biggest criticisms, as not much has actually changed in 20+ years:
    • Every episode hits the same beats as all the others, and the plot resolutions are very predictable. Even the deviations from the norm (like Gym Leader battles) have their own norm that rarely, if ever, is broken. The lack on any overarching plot does not help at all (To Be a Master does not count to some when the main character is perceived as being no closer to his goals than when he started).
    • The movies get this treatment too. One can count on a typical Pokémon movie consisting of Ash and friends teaming up with the current "cute" legendary or Lucario clone to help save the world from either a human villain or a scary Pokémon that turns out to be not evil, but just misunderstood. Or a human villain and a scary Pokémon that's not really evil.
    • One of the many recurring elements is the backstory for most of Ash's Fire-type starters; they all get abandoned by their abusive trainers, meet Ash, become his Pokémon, and eventually confront their former trainer in some fashion.
    • Ash never being able to win a Pokémon League has not sat well with a lot of fans, given how long the show's been running for. This feeling started gaining ground when Tobias, an enigmatic trainer who uses legendaries, appeared out of nowhere during the Sinnoh League. The feeling continued to gain steam with the Unova League when Cameron, who was already widely despised, defeated Ash with a 5-on-6 handicap. The fandom's outrage reached a fever pitch with the Kalos League when all the hype surrounding the final match made it seem like Ash was finally going to claim a complete League victory against Alain. This was finally averted in Sun and Moon, with Ash finally claiming a League victory.
    • The moveset of Ash's Pikachu has kept the same 3 moves (Thunderbolt, Quick Attack, and Iron Tail) ever since the days of early Hoenn, which can end up feeling somewhat stale after awhile since it leaves Pikachu's 4th move to be the only one that ever gets swapped out. Pikachu dropping Volt Tackle for Electro Ball in particular received some backlash when it happened since doing so just ended up giving Pikachu another long-range electric special move alongside Thunderbolt. Pikachu learning Electro Web in Sun and Moon does serve to counter this, as it functions differently from most of Pikachu's other moves, allowing for more versatility and creative battling.
    • Lana's Eevee, Sandy, has gotten this, as not only is it the third time a female companion has gotten an Eevee in spite of it being a Breakout Character, its personality is eerily similar to Ash's Poipole in the worst ways, making Sandy one of the more divisive Pokémon during the Sun & Moon saga.
    • Ever since the show's inception, the basic red-and-white Poké Ball has overshadowed everything. Compared to the wide variety of Poké Balls seen in the games that only continues to get larger with each passing generation, the characters will only continue to fall back on using the red-and-white ball. There are some rare exceptions, such as Ash and the gang being handed some of Kurt's custom balls during the Johto journey, or how the Sun & Moon series actually did have some different Poké Balls used for catching. However, the other 99.9% of the time is just the characters using the standard red-and-white Poké Ball. For some, this is viewed as a bit of missed potential for not pushing the concept of using different Poké Balls any further, and it became especially noticable by the time of Pokémon Journeys where Gou's entire quest is centered around him catching a multitude of Pokémon in order to one day get a chance at obtaining Mew. You'd think that this would be the time to finally introduce a character amongst the main cast that will go about using a variety of different Poké Balls to help with his quest of catching different Pokémon, yet he still ends up relying on just the basic red-and-white Poké Ball.
    • Up until Pokémon Journeys threw everything for a loop, the Pokémon that made up Ash's team for each new series was usually quite predictable to the point of lacking any real creativity in how his team was built. Ash's primary team of six would, of course, always start with his partner Pikachu, and up until Alola, he always had to catch the early route regional bird Pokémon. The next three Pokémon would then be made up of the Fire/Water/Grass trio, which almost always involved the generational Starters, and those that weren't were Pokémon of said types to fill the void. Finally, since Ash didn't usually catch extra Pokémon that would immediately get sent to storage (aside from his Kanto and Unova journeys), this left the 6th spot of Ash's team as the only opening for an actual wildcard that would get people guessing as to what Pokémon would fill the final slot.
  • It Was His Sled:
    • Ash never wins the regional Pokémon League. Until Alola. All of social media, including news organizations like CNN and ESPN and the official Pokémon Twitter, was all over that within moments of it happening.
    • Serena kisses Ash in the final episode of XYZ.
  • Jerkass Woobie: While the Team Rocket Trio may be a pain for Ash and friends to deal with, they also have to go through a lot of humiliation throughout the series; and while most of it is played for laughs, there are a few times where one can't help but feel bad for the three. For starters, Meowth was abandoned and left to die before he could even talk, and at some other point, he feels he was never meant to be happy. And although Jessie is the meanest of the bunch, she was bullied through most of her life and her mother, the one person she loved more than anyone else was killed in an avalanche. And James, the friendliest of the trio who nearly froze to death as a child after running away from his oppressive home. He also becomes broken when he's forced to leave behind a few of his Pokémon, such as his Chimecho. The three are always struggling and more often than not, they only have each other and their Pokémon with them.
  • Just Here for Godzilla:
    • A few fans of that stopped watching the show admitted they got back into the series during XY because of either Ash's status and competence and/or Amourshipping.
    • With the rise of YouTube, it's common for users to post video clips of a specific Pokémon from the anime (some even having entire gimmick channels dedicated to them), catering to fans who don't want to have to wade through hundreds of episodes just to find them.
    • In series where one of Ash's companions has an ongoing goal (such as contests or showcases), you have fans who either tune in specifically for those events or tune out because they prefer either Ash's plotlines or other parts of the series.
    • A fairly chatty part of the fandom watches the series for the antics of the Team Rocket Trio over anything else.
  • Launcher of a Thousand Ships: Given the fact he's been the main character for a story that has gone on for over 1,000 episodes, Ash has gone on to gain quite the collection of characters he's been shipped with. While currently he's a case of an Oblivious to Love Chaste Hero, plus the only cases of potential overt romantic interest being towards girls, there's been enough Ship Tease with countless characters that the fandom treats him like an Extreme Omnisexual. Who (or what) he's shipped with has been done so regardless of gender (he's had enough Ho Yay to rival his Ship Tease with girls) age (besides girls his age, he's also been shipped with those older and younger than him) and even species (he's had plenty of female Pokémon that are canonically in love with him, but even those that aren't have often had moments that can be seen as potentially romantic. That's not even getting into how much shipping fuel has been provided involving male Pokémon, the most prominent being his permanent traveling buddy Pikachu, the two of them having such a strong Heterosexual Life-Partners relationship, it's quite easily to view as not quite "heterosexual").

    M-N 
  • Memetic Badass:
    • Gary Oak. From being one step ahead of Ash the entire time, to catching over ten times the number of Pokémon Ash does and getting 10 badges when only eight are needed.
    • Ash's Sceptile for being the only Pokemon in the entire Sinnoh League to take down Tobias' Darkrai, a feat that many fans attribute to him being one of Ash's most powerful Pokemon.
    • Bewear was already a powerful Pokémon upon its debut in the games, being able to destroy anything in its path by accident, but its anime counterpart ramps this up to the point where it can leap several bounds into the air and on top of buildings, and even run so fast that it can tread waternote . Bewear even manages to top this feat by running on water for at least three days without any sign of exhaustion, from Kanto to Alola. When finally forced to battle, it fought toe-to-toe with not one but three Ultra Beasts, managing to keep a stalemate with Buzzwole, and outright destroying Pheromosa. The one and only time it ever got decisively overpowered was against Guzzlord, and even then was the only character shown able to keep pace with it individually without Z-Moves.
    • After its heavily controversial Bait-and-Switch victory against Hau, fans of Sun and Moon began to hype up Ash's Rowlet as a godlike figure that literally sleeps on its opponents to assert its dominance.
    • Ash's Lycanroc gets a lot of hype for being the Pokémon that finally allowed Ash to win a Pokémon League based on the games, particularly in comparison to Greninja.
  • Memetic Psychopath:
    • Cilan is often depicted as a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing who murders and eats his Pokémon, due to his catch phrases, "It's tasting time!" and "I caught a/n [X POKÉMON] with good taste!". Episode 19 introduced his rival, who claimed that Cilan was a monster when she battled him, complete with Slasher Smile. Naturally, this got more notice from the fandom: when he's not portrayed as her rapist, he's thought of as a psychological torturer.
    • Serena. One of the memetic depictions of her is nicknamed Yanderena, stemming from Serena's dedication and massive crush on Ash.
    • Mimikyu from the Sun & Moon series, particularly since Meowth is constantly terrified of what it's saying and unwilling to translate it for anyone since he finds it too disturbing to repeat.
  • Misaimed Fandom:
    • Paul. He's is written as a criticism of some competitive players, as he demonstrates a total Lack of Empathy, loves to gloat, and is strong enough to get away with it. A few of the less savory competitive players who otherwise cannot stand the show or its characters love Paul because they emotionally connect to him and see him as a role model, though how much of this is joking around is uncertain.
    • Similarly, Conway, who was intended to be a case of This Loser Is You. But again, it's rather botched in writing: if Conway's creepy attitude toward Dawn is meant to be bad and thus fans like him are bad too, then why does the anime staff go out of their way to show Dawn off? There's also the fact that in his first appearance, he and Dawn work together quite well in a Tag Battle tournament (more so than Ash and Paul).
    • A few fans of the series tend to root for Georgia over Iris regarding their petty squabbles and rivalry, while even a few even say that Georgia should have even replaced Iris as Ash’s female traveling companion. This is ignoring the fact that while Iris has her flaws, Georgia was written to be a meaner and nastier counterpart of Iris who gloats over her wins, blames others when she loses, and antagonizes everyone around her (she’s also even rude to Ash and Cilan on a few occasions, the characters that aren’t even jerks - well, usually in Cilan's case). And toward the end of Georgia's run on the show, it was highlighted that she has to learn from Iris as much as Iris has to learn from her, meaning their rivalry wasn't, pun intended, purely black and white.
    • In a cross-media example, there's the Ash vs. Red debate. Yes, the side for Red brings up some good points...but they completely ignore Ash's accomplishments and qualities while playing up Red's. And that's not going into the fact that many fans treat Ash and Red (often conflated the Adventures and Origins incarnations along with the games) as two completely separate characters, even though Ash is clearly the anime incarnation of Red (A young boy from Pallet Town whose rival is Professor Oak's grandson).
    • Many fans liked the Mega Evolution specials for making a story and protagonist unrelated the main anime, and accused Alain's crossover into XYZ later (along with his infamous defeat over Ash in the Kalos league) to be hashed in. Word of God revealed that Alain was designed to be Ash's final opponent in the league from the beginning, and the Mega Evolution specials were merely to make him a fully realized character beforehand.note 
  • Mis-blamed:
    • On the subject of the Pokemon episodes that were banned from airing on TV and creating plot holes in the English dub in the process, 4Kids gets hit with this frequently. But in actuality, the reason why those episodes were banned was not because 4Kids banned them, but because the networks banned them. The original voice actor of Brock and James in the dub, Eric Stuart explains more about this, saying that 4Kids had to comply with Broadcast Standards and Practices in order for their dubs to air on network TV. He confirms that 4Kids DID receive those banned episodes from Japan, but when they presented them to Broadcast Standards and Practices, they told 4Kids that the episodes were not allowed to air and had to air a different episode in its place because of how inappropriate or offensive the episodes were.
    • The 2011 Fukushima earthquake and nuclear disaster catches the blame for pushing Team Plasma into an arc after the badge quest, as well as for some fans, dramatically changing (for the worse) a saga that started off strong, or at least decent. In reality, the production of sequel games instead of the usual third version is what caused the Plasma arc to be temporarily aborted and the series to change so dramatically. This also made the aforementioned two-parter a Morton's Fork, in that, if it did air, the fans would be on the writers for giving Team Plasma as short of shrift as they gave Teams Magma and Aqua. That said, it certainly didn't help matters.
    • As the years have gone by, TPCi has come under increasing flak for their music replacements, especially once Ed Goldfarb took over from XY onward. While the quality of the dub soundtracks is fair game, the real culprit behind the cutting of the Japanese OST is Sony Music Japan.Explanation
    • When it was spread around online that the writing team for Black and White were behind Ash's loss in the Kalos League, many fans took up pitchforks and demanded their heads for screwing over Ash again, essentially accusing them of being brought back just to do this. Other fans have pointed out that the writing team from Black and White is the exact same writing team of the entire XY saga, and that the majority of them have been on board since the start of the entire anime.
    • With Sun and Moon a common misconception was criticizing the animation for making Ash and other characters look too different from how they looked in regions prior. While the animation isn't without it's haters for other reasons, it's actually the show's art style that was changed in order to improve the animation.
  • Moe: Various Pokemon and Humans have counted as this over time due to their Adorkable nature and cute designs, including Lillie, Snowy, Serena's Eevee, Goomy, and Togepi.
  • More Popular Replacement:
    • Halfway into the original series, Jessie's Lickitung was accidentally traded for Wobbuffet, who quickly became a popular Plucky Comic Relief for Team Rocket and ended up a mainstay in the anime series, compared to Lickitung, who made only sporadic appearances beforehand.
    • Dawn is this to her immediate predecessor, May, for reasons similar to Even Better Sequel above. Dawn took much of what fans liked about May and ironed out many of the flaws with the latter's Contests — most notably May's tendency to always pass the first round, regardless of whether or not she really deserved to. In contrast, Dawn struggled far more believably against her competition in Sinnoh (not to mention the effect those struggles had on her mentally), easing that criticism immensely. Combine that with increased plot focus, more creative Contests, and a likable yet still distinct personality, Dawn is typically held in high regard among Ash's companions.
    • Serena to Iris, who is one of the least popular female companions to date. While Serena is not without her detractors for her perceived Romantic Plot Tumor and for her never-before-mentioned Forgotten First Meeting with Ash, some of the fandom agree that she's an improvement over Iris. She also further won fans for having an arc of Character Development that helped to have her Rescued from the Scrappy Heap, although how it ended is a point of severe contention. Also, she's one of the few girls to kiss Ash, and the only female companion to ever do so, so she definitely has that going for her.
  • Most Wonderful Sound:
    • Any time XY&Z would start playing.
    • Many fans of the Best Wishes series enjoyed Ash's Leavanny's voice.
      • Another "Best Wishes" example (which is also In-Universe). Fans (and the characters) enjoyed Meloetta's singing.
    • In Sun & Moon, Guzma's Golisopod in the English Dub counts. Not only did fans enjoyed its Creepy Awesome sounding Pokémon Speak, its right up there to Tessho Gunda's Blastoise as the most awesome sounding Pokemon.
    • In Pokemon Journeys, Ash commanding his Lucario, the very Pokemon fans have been wanting Ash to get since Generation 4, to use Aura Sphere is one of the best things to hear in the series.
  • My Real Daddy:
    • Atsuhiro Tomioka, the head writer of the series from DP to XY, is considered by many to be one of the best writers in the series. He's responsible for writing a massive number of the show's most beloved arcs and plotlines, including (but not limited to):
      • A large number of May's major Contest episodes, including the one where she chooses to be a Coordinator and the entirety of both Grand Festivals, among many others. He proceeded to write her entire return arc in Diamond and Pearl, thus playing a key role in defining her as her own character, rather than the expected Replacement Goldfish for Misty.
      • A huge portion of plot-focused episodes from Diamond and Pearl. Much like May before her, he wrote a large number of Dawn's major Contests, including the vast majority of her overconfidence/depression arc (which culminates in her Wallace Cup battle against May herself), and almost every episode of the Grand Festival. He also wrote nearly every single episode that focused on either Paul or Team Galactic, which collectively make up almost all of the series' major plot threads.
      • The first and last episodes of Dawn's return in Best Wishes, as well as the Operation Tempest two-parter.
      • Every one of the four Mega Evolution specials, and almost every episode building up Team Flare in XY&Z, up to and including the entire 5-part Team Flare climax.
      • Even in Sun and Moon, where Tomioka is no longer the head writer, he wrote the majority of Litten's arc throughout the series, which is widely praised as one of the big highlights of the season.
    • In the same vein, while Takeshi Shudo defined a lot of OS elements and he's still highly respected by a section of the fanbase, Tomioka's contributions are valued as having some of the most mature writing of the show while tackling darker subject matters, while still retaining the more optimistic look that the anime adopted after Kanto.
  • Narm:
    • The early usage of Razor Leaf when it was performed by Ash's Bulbasaur looks terrible. The leaves just awkwardly swirl to the front from behind Bulbasaur's bulb, and don't look threatening at all as if the Razor Leafs are being pushed forward by a slight breeze.
    • The Orange League episode "The Mandarin Island Miss Match" puts in quite an effort to show off Lorelei'snote  assets to the viewers. It's pretty much a given that you will be distracted with regards to how far the animators were willing to push it.
    • Throughout the Johto episodes, the Narrator will often claim that Ash and his friends are currently "on the road to Johto," which can come off sounding really odd when the group is already traveling within the Johto region.
    • Serena's reaction seen here is supposed to come off as a heartwarming moment during her reunion with Ash. Instead, the look comes off kind of hilarious due to how over-the-top her eyes are drawn here...and maybe even a bit creepy.
    • Zygarde's voice in the Japanese version. A bit silly but still fitting enough when he's in his Core form, but hearing that same high-pitched voice coming from the Humongous Mecha-esque Perfect Zygarde makes it a bit hard to take his Big Damn Heroes moment seriously.
  • Narm Charm:
    • A lot of the title themes and image songs in both the Japanese and English edits are ridiculously tense and dramatic in spite of their cheesy lyrics and the subject matter of the show itself, but damn if they're not catchy. Especially so for the original English theme, which wouldn't be out of place as an 80s rock anthem, and is adored by nearly every long time fan of the series.
    • The dialogue from Teams Magma and Aqua (whose schtick is that no-one knows what they're up to, but it must be baaaad) tries so hard to be mysteriously menacing that it goes straight past bad and into genius. It's hard not to laugh with lines like "If the experiment is a success, we'll be much closer to succeeding in our plot! Hahahahaha!"
  • Nausea Fuel: For some, many of the odd faces made by Ash and co. in the SM anime. This is especially evident with a shot of Ash screaming with his mouth wide open, which among other things, shows his uvula screaming alongside him!.
  • Never Live It Down:
    • Fans tend to remember Ash's failures better than his successes. "Ash will never win in any Pokémon League" is a common punchline, even though he had won the Orange Islands League (which, due to being filler, fans tend not to count, even if the creator's do) and has been able to come out on top in other competitions. His loss at the Kalos League after seeming like he would finally win one is especially infamous. This thankfully died down once Ash won the Alola League Championship. Though it did admittedly take him more than twenty real life years to do it, the fact that Ash finally won was enough to silence most of those criticisms, albeit controversy persists on whether said victory was earned or not.
    • Pikachu's love for ketchup occurs in a total of one episode of the original show's run, yet it ends up becoming one of his defining characteristics (with the image of Pikachu crying over the "death" of its ketchup bottle achieving meme status. It has been referenced in a few episodes of later series,and even had an entire ending revolving around it.
      • Pikachu's infamous loss against Trip's Snivy is easily the worst black mark he has on his battle career. Never mind that Ash was unaware that he got locked out of his electric moves, leaving him with only Iron Tail and Quick Attack, until the battle itself already began while Trip's Snivy had access to Leaf Tornado, a move that a starter fresh from the lab shouldn't have access to. Pikachu's previous battle being against Tobias' Latios just made things worse for him. Now it is hard to find videos of Pikachu defeating a strong opponent without someone bringing it up in the comments about how he "couldn't beat a Snivy".
    • Ritchie gets this for winning against Ash in the Indigo League by default after Ash is disqualified for his disobedient Charizard. This is despite the unfair parts were caused by everyone except Ritchie.specifically Heck, all Ritchie actually did was happen to be Ash's opponent who did not go down easy. He even tried to convince the referee not to award him the match by forfeit, giving Ash as fair a fight as possible.
    • Serena is often treated by her detractors as walking scenery who only exists to be in love with Ash. While her development was slow initially, she has done plenty of things on her own, and her crush on Ash was only that big in the beginning before her character expanded beyond it, though it never actually went away and in fact developed healthily along with the rest of her character. This especially holds true after her outfit swap and Important Haircut.
    • In canon, Paul's abusive trainer side was only really showcased through Chimchar, which he only insisted on training in spite of not being receptive of it because he wanted to unlock the power of its Blaze, but a lot of fans seem to believe that Paul extended said treatment to his whole team or released every Pokémon that failed to live up to his standards, which the series itself shows to not be true due to the occasional Pet the Dog moment towards his team, proof that several of Paul's Pokémon respect him, how none of the other mainstays of Paul's team were ever released even when they lost onscreen, and how the few other Pokémon he released were always either on the spot or in far more humane ways than Chimchar was (most notably giving his Azumarill to a younger trainer rather than releasing it in the wild). His callous treatment of Chimchar and generally unpleasant attitude, however, was enough for certain fans to insist on a very exaggerated view of his negative qualities.
  • Nightmare Retardant: From the Sun & Moon series, Guzzlord's cries in the Japanese version. Hearing the yelling of what sounds like a grown man come from what is supposed to be a horrible Eldritch Abomination is...jarring, to say the least. In Journeys, a Fearow that sounds exactly like Guzzlord helps the gang, it honestly sounds more fitting on it than Guzzlord.
  • No Problem with Licensed Games: Yes there is at least one game based around the Pokémon anime (aside from Pokémon Yellow, which is basically Red/Blue with more Pikachu emphasis). Pokémon Puzzle League is often considered one of the better puzzle games on the N64. Even as a re-skin of Panel de Pon the staff put in more effort than expected, down to giving every character new recordings; even those that haven’t returned to the anime since.

    O-R 
  • Obscure Popularity: Everything outside of the original series. The anime has millions of watchers worldwide and has been running for twenty years, but people outside of children and the dedicated fandom are often surprised to see that it's still on-going.
  • Older Than They Think:
    • The first time a Picnicker was depicted wearing shorts with her uniform was in "Pokémon Scent-sation", just over two years before Generation II.
    • Ash not aging was in effect well before the Best Wishes series; though Best Wishes was the first time it was brought up in the show itself, The Pokemon Company had confirmed it as far back as 2003, likening Ash to Mickey Mouse.
    • Several people complained about Ash's defeat in the Kalos League by claiming that there were several bits of foreshadowing aimed in that direction, usually bringing up his battle against Emmett the Furfrou trainer where he promised to win and the last Kalos League episode title including 'Kalos League Victory', claiming that said things were nothing but 'hype bait'. However, every past season had hyped up the possibility of a League victory to a similar degree, notably having Ash promise to his Lapras in Johto that he'd win the League and both Ash and Gary resolving to reach the first place in the tournament of victory during the Silver Conference, and past League closure episodes had similarly bombastic titles in Japanese (Indigo's last battle episode being called 'Pokémon League! Final Battle!' and Ever Grande's being 'Conclusion of the Fierce Fighting! The Road to Championship!!').
    • The Alola finale is frequently claimed to be the first depiction of human pregnancy in the franchise. This isn't true. The Electric Tale of Pikachu beat the anime to it 20 years earlier when the Babies Ever After depicted Jessie pregnant by James.
  • One-Scene Wonder:
    • This series is highly well known for memorable one-shot characters, many of whom aren't even from the games. Many of these characters are considered far more appealing that the main cast (which in some cases is not hard to do), and while sometimes it is justified why we never see them again, other times it's not.
    • Gym Leaders: Lt. Surge, Erika, Koga, Falkner, Bugsy and Chuck (after which all Gym Leaders are featured in at least two episodes). Sabrina is hugely considered to be a One Arc Wonder, thanks to being such a memorably terrifying Arc Villain. Marlon and Cheren also count.
    • Elite Four: Lorelei, Bruno, Agatha and Bertha, and Drake.
    • Ironically, Steven Stone, despite being the Champion in Ruby And Sapphire, is reduced to one of these in the Hoenn episodes (he does return and is expanded upon in the Kalos episodes, where his personality is more similar to his game counterpart). However, in his home region, he was given a much different characterization (in particular, being hypocritical about Team Rocket digging holes in a cave, saying it would disrupt the Pokémon in the cave, as he blew a hole in the cave's roof), to the point that his one episode is rather infamous.
  • OTP: While pairings involving Ash or any of the other main characters will always be a subject of debate, you will be hard pressed to find any shippers who don't support Jessie/James, aka Rocketshipping. There's a very good reason why this pairing is believed to be what made the term "Shipping" really take off.
  • Once Original, Now Common: Back in the day, the fact that Ash lost the league was actively a major shock to the community, but actually was received rather positively, as 'scrappy underdog actually LOSES whatever major sporting event they're in' was nigh-unheard of back in The '90s; which were so full of stock "you can make it if you really try" aesops that a show having the balls to spell out that, no, "trying hard enough" will NOT guarantee you success was considered to be a nice breath of fresh air among the cynical Generation X at the time. It also helped that the loss made sense since Ash actively dodged a lot of valuable opportunities to train and instead got up to a lot of random shenanigans that caught his interest before the League, and that the loss actively served to further Ash's Character Development, as he did ultimately learn from it and take a more pro-active approach to Pokemon training from then on. However, as the years went on more shows in the Turn of the Millennium started to parrot that Aesop to the point of being suffocatingly nihilistic and Ash's repeated losses becoming more and more obviously done just to keep the Strictly Formula nature of the show ongoing, it can be hard to see why his first league loss was actually considered to be a good thing.
  • Only the Creator Does It Right: Team Rocket (Jessie, James and Meowth) as written by Takeshi Shudo can be considered one of the best parts of the show's history given his development of their origins, personalities, and even philosophy before Flanderization set in from Advanced Generation on, turning Team Rocket into a Goldfish Poop Gang. Some would argue that they never reached the status they were at when Shudo was writing them ever again.
  • Overshadowed by Controversy:
    • The episode "Computer Warrior Porygon"note  is known far more for gaining the questionable record of "Most Photosensitive Epileptic Seizures Caused by a Television Show" from Guinness World Records for causing 700 seizures in Japan upon its initial airing, and the resulting worldwide ban of the episode, than the actual content itself. This extends to the Pokémon Porygon itself. Despite not being the actual cause of the flashingnote , it's swept under the rug for no other reason than it being the Pokémon featured in the episode. Even its evolutions have been hit with it, as they've made no major appearances in the series.note  After this incident, OLM, the animation studio behind Pokémon, dropped all strobe lights caused by Pikachu's attacks in future episodes of the anime and re-edited the first 37 episodes to eliminate said effects. This even extended to anime as a whole—ever since this snafu, any fast-paced scenes that could conceivably cause seizures have to be darkened for the broadcast version.
    • Pokémon: The Mastermind of Mirage Pokémon is known less for any of its own merits and more for being associated with the controversy that followed after Pokémon USA, now known as The Pokémon Company International, fired the English voice actors that had been working on the anime since day one in favor of newer, cheaper ones.note 
    • Pokémon the Series: Black & White was initially met with much fan excitement in large part due to building up to Team Plasma, whose popularity in Pokémon Black and White was a driving force behind the franchise's Popularity Polynomial at the time. However, the 2011 Fukushima earthquake and nuclear disaster caused it to be canned right before they were intended to appear, after which its other praised parts petered out and weaknesses became more prominent. Meanwhile, the sequels Pokémon Black 2 and White 2 being released instead of a 3rd version as expected meant Team Plasma's appearance was based entirely on their sequel appearance, lacking what made them well-received in the first game and instead coming off as generic villains. This underwhelming payoff for a series-long wait and decline was followed up and ended on a filler arc due to its brisk pacing causing them to run out of material until the next games, irreparably tarnishing things. In short Black & White is best remembered for starting strong only for the 2011 Fukushima disaster to derail and cause it to rot, regardless of its strengths or missteps long after what can be fairly attributed to the 2011 disaster.
    • Pokémon: Genesect and the Legend Awakened is mostly remembered for the fan backlash surrounding the inclusion of a second, female Mewtwo and the implied (but eventually debunked) retcon of Mewtwo's backstory that it created, to the point where it has its own folder on the film's YMMV page. This backlash extended to Mega Mewtwo Y, which debuted in the film as the second Mewtwo's Super Mode and was subsequently "tainted." Only when it was used in the Final Smash of the Super Smash Bros. Mewtwo (who is mostly based on the original Mewtwo in Pokémon: The First Movie) was its association with the movie weakened.
    • Pokémon the Series: XY became this over Ash losing the Kalos League. Ash losing the regions league is nothing new nor is fan backlash, but the unprecedented appeal to older fans of XY, Ash's unprecedented skill and maturity as a trainer, his highly built and hyped up Ash-Greninja, the episode's title, promotional materials and other factorsExplanation all pointed to him finally winning. Ash's losing the Finals to Alain thus caused unprecedented backlash across both sides of the Pacific as invalidating everything praised about XY by having the seeming payoff of his win never happen and turned the previously well-liked Alain into a fandom pariah. Despite the immediately following Team Flare arc and rest of XY being seen as the best in The Series they're still mostly remembered by fans in terms of the debate if the Kalos League negated all their good or not. Ash won the next series League in what's seen as damage control and creator apology, but rather than forgive XY fans changed the issue to debating if his winning Kalos would have been better due to its stronger setup.
  • Pandering to the Base:
    • After the intense backlash over the bait-and-switch of Ash losing the Kalos League despite hints that he was finally going to win a league, him winning the Alola League and finally becoming a champion in Sun & Moon can come off as this.
    • The Journeys series. Ash catches a Gengar and a Riolu, (both highly-requested Pokémon for him to catch), the series travels across all regions and brings back many old faces, some that haven't made appearances in over a decade.
  • Periphery Demographic: Zig-Zagged:
    • The show's popularity with older fans has gone up and down over time, but as of Journeys it seems to be in a reasonably good place overall. During the earliest generations, a good chunk of the games' Periphery Demographic (especially in the West) disliked or outright hated the show for various reasonsnote , but a small following of teenagers and young adults existed. Its reputation also plummeted during Best Wishes due to Ash's infamous reset, alienating many longtime fans. Over the years, though, the anime has recovered from these low points and strived for a more universal appeal; in particular, the Kanto, Sinnoh, Kalos, and Alola sagas have gained significant popularity with certain communities and brought the show's goodwill back up to at least moderate levels. While the anime remains divisive, it seems to be agreed nowadays that it is capable of great writing at its absolute best.
    • Additionally, Pokémon Inc. creates separate animated features that deal with many of the older fans' wishes, such as Pokémon Origins, Pokémon Generations, and Pokémon: Twilight Wings, which are meant to appeal to a wider demographic. This has also helped indirectly to tone down some of the anime's hatedom, as even those who still dislike the main series are no longer limited to it being the franchise's sole animated adaptation.
    • This trope was one of Takeshi Shudo's goals for the series, as he wrote in his blog entries. Despite this, Executive Meddling prevented him from using all the Parental Bonuses and creative ideas he wanted, and the show's Merchandise-Driven and Strictly Formula aspects would eventually overpower his ideas and make the show less accessible to older fans. While the series did eventually delve back into more dramatic and creative writing, it's still done with the distinctly clean, idealistic tone used for every saga post-Kanto, creating a divide on whether his vision should have been respected or if the anime is better off the way it is.
  • Pop Culture Holiday: On top of Pokémon Day proper being February 27th, September 15th is Ash Ketchum Day, which celebrated the day that Ash won the Alola League. The trend started with a hashtag that went viral in 2019. The following year, it was recognized by The Pokémon Company and both of Ash's English voice actors, Veronica Taylor and Sarah Natochenny.
  • Popularity Polynomial: When the Pokémon anime was first aired, it was beloved by children around the world but hated by adults. As time went on, nostalgia for the earlier series grew, but Pokémon fans growing up saw the show as a negative Audience-Coloring Adaptation that made the franchise seem like little more than a shallow toy commercial aimed solely towards young children; this especially held true for Best Wishes which became one of the worst-regarded seasons of the show and accompanied games that were praised (especially at the time) for going in a more creative and slightly more mature direction. However, as the original Pokémon demographic grew into full-fledged adults with creative power of their own, the show learned from its mistakes and began new ventures to appeal more to older fans, including different approaches towards character and plot development, the dodgy DuArt English dub improving in quality, and (starting with Pokémon: I Choose You!) each movie going in a completely different creative direction. Despite some missteps, not only did the Pokémon anime come to no longer overshadow the games, but it also became a more respected entity in its own right, and one that many fans both old and new actively keep up with in some capacity.
  • Rainbow Lens: Go West, Young Meowth can be interpreted as a transgender allegory. Meowth defies the expectations of his species by learning how to walk and talk like a human being, only to be shunned as a freak by the one he was trying to impress. In the end, one of the reasons he sticks with Team Rocket even though they're not only criminals, but loser criminals, is because they actually accept him for who he is. Notably, this episode was reportedly the reason why the late Maddie Blaustein came out as transgender.
  • Replacement Scrappy: The anime is one of the longest running in history, so this was bound to happen at least once. Or several times:
    • All of the male companions to Brock, though Tracey was hit the hardest for temporarily replacing him in Orange Islands. Cilan also gets flack for being his first replacement after permanently leaving the main cast, though his replacements, Clemont and Kiawe, are much better received overall.
    • All the female companions past Misty will be this for some: May for replacing Misty, Dawn for replacing May, Iris for replacing Dawn, Serena for replacing Iris, and then a trio of girls (Lillie, Mallow and Lana)note  replacing Serena. It's an everlasting trend, unfortunately, not at all helped by the Ship-to-Ship Combat.
    • Sophocles to Clemont in a downplayed sense for some. He was initially presented as extremely similar to Clemont as an Electric-type expert and an inventor but without Clemont's amusing and interesting sides before his character was taken in a different direction thanks to his love for space being played up and his efforts into becoming a better trainer and grow more independent became more prominent, but between a lot of his development happening in the tail end of the series and him usually being one of the least focused on members of the main cast, he ended up feeling like a much less memorable character than Clemont was.
    • To Paul's fanbase and others, Trip's initial characterization — stuck-up and critical of Ash — was too similar to Paul's character, without the experience that the latter had. Even his design is a Palette Swap of Paul's with only minor differences of their facial features.
    • The second Mewtwo is VERY unpopular with fans due to her story's lack of originality and her replacing of the famous first movie Mewtwo.
    • May's Squirtle, due to being a poor replacement of Ash's beloved Squirtle from the first generation that lacks any of the charm and personality that made the original a fan favorite.
    • Every single one of Ash's rivals after Gary can be hit by this, mostly due to Gary's Memetic Badass status. Though it's not uncommon for people to cite other rivals as presenting a better rivalry than Gary. In particular Paul is the most likely to avoid being seen as an inferior replacement and, to many, actually surpasses him.
    • Matori became this. Initially, she was nothing more than generic secretary for Team Rocket, Sun & Moon would establish her as a rival for the Team Rocket trio, essentially replacing the more beloved Cassidy and Butch as their rivals. This was certainly not helped by the fact that Cassidy and Butch had been Put on a Bus for about fourteen years.
    • The TCPi English dub voice actors were initially this to the 4Kids voice cast, not helped by the jarring transition between the casts. While the bitterness has mostly subsided as the TCPi actors have settled into their roles, some fans still considered them inferior to the original cast.
    • Goh has become this in the eyes of many a Hop fan, as Hop is severely hit with Demoted to Extra in Journeys and Goh essentially took over the role he had in the games during the Eternatus arc.
  • Rescued from the Scrappy Heap:
    • Post-Togepi Misty to those who didn't like her Tsundere self.
    • May got criticized much less by Misty fans after the latter returned in Advanced Challenge and became fast friends with May. This also led the Advanced Generation/Ruby & Sapphire series in general to be rescued. After she returned not one, but two more times, fans of both characters were elated.
    • Bianca, after she Took a Level in Kindness in Nimbasa City, and one in Badass in the Clubsplosion.
    • For those who didn't like Dawn, many found her very enjoyable in BW, where she received less focus and bounced off Iris and Cilan well.
    • Ash himself in XY. In BW, he displayed the worst stereotypes of his own character, and was hated for it. In XY, the writers made him a lot more competent and mature despite not actually increasing his age, and fans are a lot kinder towards him despite his bad reputation never going away.
      • Even then, some fans felt that Ash was a little too bland that season, but still appreciated his skill as a trainer. In Sun and Moon, fans of both sides got a compromise: Ash not only keeps his competency in battle from XYnote , but also becomes less bland, having more animated facial expressions, being more prone to Amusing Injuries. Though, he's still subject to Base-Breaking Character status.
    • While Ash's Pikachu never needed saving per se, as he wasn't a full-on scrappy, his single-handed taking down of both Alain's Tyranitar and his Metagross has caused many fans to remember why the little mouse was so popular in the first place.
    • While Whitney maintained her status as the toughest Johto gym leader, her tantrum did not carry over, giving viewers less of a reason to hate her.
    • Team Rocket started to earn the ire of the Western fan base for being a tired Goldfish Poop Gang for most of the Hoenn and Sinnoh eras. After an unusual stint as competent, serious bad guys in the Unova era was met with mixed results, Kalos made them comical again, albeit with a more palpable number of formidable moments and even omission from certain episodes to allow full focus on the heroes' arcs, making their shtick less repetitive than before. Alola furthered this by downplaying their formulaic role for more ongoing plots such as working their operations around Bewear and obtaining Z-Moves, giving them some dynamic involvement without butting into the protagonists' storylines nearly as often.
    • Noibat got a lot of flak when it first appeared in trailers for taking Goodra's spot on Ash's team. However, it quickly redeemed itself upon first appearing as more than just a in-season rehash of Goodra's arc.
    • Bonnie was initially disliked for essentially being Max 2.0, but gained a slightly better reception after she turned out to be more supportive towards her brother than Max was to May, as well as not being nearly as smug and having quite a few legitimately funny moments to her name. Then XYZ arc made her a plot-relevant figure and borderline Woobie, which elevated her in the eyes of many fans, although a few consider her a Spot Light Stealing Squad instead.
    • Sawyer was considered the most polarizing rival of the anime since Paul, being way too nice and a new trainer. The Kalos League battle with Ash was considered a highlight of the already divisive league. His scene where he cries over the loss won him over many fans due to seeing his emotional investment in the league.
    • Lillie was initially less popular than the other SM girls due to how radically she changed from her game self, who is rather popular. Her backstory being later expanded upon and the focus on her in the Aether arc won her quite some fans, though, even if she's still considered a Base-Breaking Character.
    • After the controversial decision by TCPi to recast the entire series, Sarah Natochenny received the bulk of fan backlash for replacing Veronica Taylor as Ash. As time’s gone on and Natochenny has had the chance to settle into the role and make it her own, fans now positively regard her take on Ash.
    • During and after the Black & White anime, Iris was one of the less popular traveling companions for her arrogance and hypocritical catchphrase of "You're such a kid." But when she returned in Journeys, revealing that she had become Unova's Champion and finally evolved her Axew into a Haxorus, fans were delighted and proud.
  • Rooting for the Empire:
    • Despite their Base-Breaking Character status in the West, the Team Rocket Trio are cheered for more than Ash due to being Ineffectual Sympathetic Villains and having surprisingly well-developed backstories (It was Takeshi Shudo's intent for Team Rocket to be more interesting than Ash).
    • Gary is made to be an unlikable jerkass in the beginning of the Kanto region. A few fans of the show, however, would root for him over Ash due to the latter being a rookie trainer, Gary being more competent, and alway being one step ahead of Ash. This is also due to Ash wrongly earning fournote  out of the eight badges in the Kanto region (while Gary rightfully earned ten badges) and winning some Indigo league challenges out of sheer luck and not skill.
    • Georgia is meant to be a rival and a meaner and nastier version of Iris, but a few of the fans of this show tend to root for the former when both Iris and Georgia will get into their petty squabbles. This is due to Iris’ flaws as a character (her catchphrase towards Ash and her being condescending). This is also due to Georgia being able to throw Iris’ catchphrase back in her face, and the fact that despitebeing a Sore Loser she made a good point on how Iris winning against her was unfair due to Dragonite being disobedient and not about Iris’ competence as a dragon trainer. It also helps that Iris even agreed with her eventually.
    • Guzma is clearly intended to be seen as a pathetic ruffian holding a petty grudge and trying to destroy Kukui's dream out of spite. However, as seen in Unintentionally Sympathetic and Strawman Has a Point below, lackluster battles and questionable decisions (such as Mallow wanting to quit her match against Lana, or Ash's extremely controversial victory over Hau)note  make people feel Guzma is right when he called the league a "schoolyard tournament for weaklings". And coupled with the fact that Guzma had the better battles so far, it makes people want to see Guzma winning the league unironically.

    S-T 
  • Saved by the Fans:
    • Brock, after multiple allegations of him being a racist Asian caricature for his Eyes Always Shut design, was planned to be phased out of the series after the events of Master Quest. However, TPCi looked at how much he was adored by the fandom on both the eastern and western hemisphere, and ultimately decided to bring him back, leading to him staying as the tertiary protagonist for both Advanced Generation and Diamond & Pearl, and even making a comeback in Sun & Moon alongside Misty.
    • The Team Rocket trio were planned to be Put on a Bus during Black and White (and their previous Pokémon team were Put on a Bus for that series). However fans of the trio, including those in the production team, decided against the idea, and so they were allowed to stay, returning to their fan-favored goofy personalities from previous seasonsnote  as their serious characterization had only been for the case of Unova being their final story arc. A podcast vote also asked for the fanbase's favorite Team Rocket Pokémon to return, with Wobbuffet back with the trio in XY.
  • Seasonal Rot:
    • Pretty much everything after Kanto has a fair share of detractors, with the most common complaints being Executive Meddling, recycled plots or (perceived) lack of major character development for Ash and Team Rocket. The eras most commonly accused of this, however, are Johto (too much Filler resulting in poor pacing, Ash and his friends' misfortunes frequently being caused by idiotic moments especially when dealing with Team Rocket, Brock and Misty's characters began to stagnate, and Ash's Johto team note , wasn't very well-fleshed out in comparison to his original Kanto team) and Black & White/Unova (Ash lost all his character development and reverted back to being a naïve Idiot Hero, Cilan and especially Iris were poorly received and viewed as inferior copies for Brock and Misty, the League storyline was mishandled, the Team Plasma story arc was too short, Charizard's return was a wasted opportunity, and Decolore Islands was essentially an entire arc of Filler that made Johto look eventful).
    • Funnily enough, despite both Johto and Unova generally being considered the show's weakest eras, where the rot sets in for them is the opposite. For example, while Johto's beginning and middle sections are widely perceived as uneventful and moving at a snail's pace, the last third (featuring well-received moments like the Larvitar arc, Ash defeating Gary at the Silver Conference, and the original trio's emotional farewell in Gotta Catch Ya Later!) is widely viewed as an improvement. In contrast, Unova is widely considered to start out as promising, addressing many fan complaints (Team Rocket's incompetence, Ash not catching enough Pokemon) head-on, but it starts squandering this potential around the middle, so that by the time of Decolore Islands the season was viewed by many as irredeemable.
  • Ships That Pass in the Night: The giant list of pairings (like the one featured by Bulbapedia) includes hordes of couples constructed from characters that never meet in anime canon. One example might be Brendan/May (the anime incarnations of the protagonists of Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire), the latter of whom being, of course, the Deuteragonist of the Hoenn saga while the former only cameoed a few times in the movies.
  • Ship-to-Ship Combat: Pick any Ash/Female Companion, ships and you'll get this with another. Particularly between Ash/Misty, Ash/Dawn and Ash/Serena fans. note 
  • Shocking Moments:
    • Almost anytime Team Rocket Wins (or nearly wins).
    • Practically anything to do with Ash-Greninja once it made its proper debut in XY & Z. Episode 25 of XY & Z in particular really got the ball rolling with Ash-Greninja finally being fully revealed along with the battle against Diatha's Gardevoir, being able to push them enough to Mega Evolve and then briefly gain the upper hand despite not having mastered it yet. It was with this episode that many fans, at the time, believed that there was a real possibility of Ash winning the Kalos League.
    • Ash winning the Alola League, after 22 long years of failing in previous Pokémon Leagues.
    • Ash's first three captures in Pokémon Journeys, Dragonite, Gengar, and Riolu. The former two get this for being fully evolved from the start while the latter two were highly requested Pokemon for him to catch for years. The later capture of Farfetch'd was a surprise to fans for different reasons: Farfetch'd was only advertised ahead of time as a minor feature of an episode focusing on Leon and Raihan and viewership found the capture a pleasant surprise.
    • The announcement that Ash and Pikachu would be retired after 25 years of serving as the show's main protagonist shook everyone from how sudden it was, and even those who saw the writings on the wall were caught off-guard and admitted that it will be hard imagining a season without the world's most recognizable duo.
  • Signature Scene:
    • The first episode is just loaded with these from the moment Ash first receives Pikachu, to the Spearow chase on Misty's bike, and watching Ho-Oh fly across the sky. The last of which has had several Call Backs throughout the series.
    • Ash's rivalries usually result in this given the build-up to their final battles. Specifically, Charizard vs. Blastoise from the Johto League, Infernape vs. Electivire from the Sinnoh League, Greninja vs. Sceptile from the Kalos League, and Pikachu vs. Tapu Koko from the Alola League.
    • Out of all of Ash's companions being Put on the Bus, Misty's and Serena's are the two most iconic. Misty's because of her popularity and because she was the original female companion, and Serena because of the kiss.
    • Ash winning his first-ever game-based league in the Alolan League after 22 years of failures. It managed to make the news due to how huge it was.
      • Double it up with Ash beating Leon and winning the World Coronation Series, and proving himself to be the best that no one ever was after 25 long years of trial and error. Like with the above, it made international news headlines.
  • Signature Series Arc:
  • Slow-Paced Beginning:
    • Serena's character arc takes quite some time to take off, given that, unlike other female leads she didn't have a clear goal from the get go, and became a trainer mostly to get away from the Rhyhorn Racing her mother enforced upon her. A good deal of episodes at the beginning were spent on her trying different activities in order to find her calling, before she finally set on becoming a Pokemon Performer at almost precisely the full first year mark of the XY series. After that, she gets considerable focus and development at a much steadier pace.
    • This is also a criticism usually levied to the initial stretch of Journeys series episodes, particularly the ones making up the first batch uploaded on Netflix. The first six episodes effectively make up a Character Development arc for new companion and coprotagonist Goh, with Ash relegated in a more supporting role for its duration down to not having a clear goal for himself. The following episodes were dedicated to a first taste of the region-hopping series premise that were mostly seen as unremarkable, while giving little idea of what the show intended to do with its premise and cast, not helped by how the show didn't seem to want to embrace continuity in spite of going back to known locations beyond small nods. After the Leon introduction arc, however, things got much better as Ash obtained his own goal in taking part in the World Coronation Series (a global tournament to crown the implicit strongest trainer in the world), alongside making him more involved in the plot with several new captures and major battles, alongside allowing for more old character returns (such as Korrina) and continuity while delving deeper into Goh's backstory and further development, with the common sentiment being that the show improves from that point on.
  • So Bad, It's Good: Some fans believe the BW series gradually became this, even likening it as a self-referential parody.
  • So Okay, It's Average:
    • This seems to be the overarching fandom sentiment about Advanced Generation; it’s almost never ranked as one of the show’s worst seasons, but in time it seems to have been eclipsed in popularity by later seasons such as Diamond & Pearl and XY. Pluses include strong development for Ash, several memorable characters (May, her rivals, Ash's Sceptile and Corphish), and a more balanced focus on Ash's Hoenn team in comparison to his Johto team note  , but cons include Ash's lack of a rival, the mishandling of the Team Magma & Team Aqua arc, and an abundance of formulaic filler.
    • The fans who don't find the Black & White series to be bad or So Bad, It's Good tend to settle on this rating as well, usually citing that the good things it established used to further effectiveness in the XY and Sun & Moon series helps balance out all the admitted bad things it did.
  • Spoiled by the Format: You could tell Ash's Kalos League defeat a mile away just from the fact that the theme song already played in full for Ash's fight with Sawyer, thus there'd be no way for it to repeat for the very next battle.
  • Strangled by the Red String:
    • A complaint of Ash/Serena, which is completely unsubtle in its Ship Tease and originates in a Retcon to Ash's backstory (though in its defense, it is one-sided on Serena's part, as the retcon to Ash's past doesn't affect him at all).
    • Kukui and Burnet in SM fall under this for some fans: while in the games and Pokémon Adventures they're a married couple from the beginning, the Anime opted to show them fall in love and get married during the show starting with Burnet's introduction during the Aether Foundation arc. However, they only shared four to five significant scenes that could be classified as romantic throughout the arc, before the final episode of it features their wedding after very little hints towards it. For some, this comes across as them ending up together because canon dictated they should.
  • Strawman Has a Point:
    • Several early episodes were about Ash learning important life lessons...except the show would deliver these lessons after giving Ash such a raw deal that the audience would take his side.
      • In the show's fourth episode, Ash encounters fellow trainer Samurai, who rakes him over the coals for the novice mistakes of letting a Weedle get away and letting his Metapod get kidnapped by a Beedrill swarm. Thing is, the Weedle actually got away because Samurai rudely intervened right as Ash was about to attempt the catch (sticking a katana in his face and demanding a battle), giving the bug time to recover and escape. Later, Samurai indicates that the Beedrill swarm only mustered because that same Weedle went to gather them, conveniently ignoring the fact that the swarm is therefore his fault. During a rescue attempt, Ash tries to excuse himself by pointing out that he got sidetracked and that it's Samurai who's really to blame, which the writers would have you believe is a case of Never My Fault...except he's correct in this case and it's Samurai who's been deflecting the blame. Ash's actual mistake in this episode is standing around gawking at the Beedrill swarm rather than getting himself and his Pokémon the hell outta dodge, but he can't be blamed for failing to anticipate Spontaneous Beedrill Kidnapping Syndrome, and it should be noted he takes immediate measures to try and rectify it...not that Metapod cares, since it also blames Ash for the disaster.
      • Upon being defeated by Ritchie in the Indigo League, Ash becomes incredibly upset; this was meant to serve up An Aesop about being a Sore Loser, judging from the criticisms the show delivers through Misty and Brock. The problem is that Ash has legitimate reasons to be upset about losing, considering it was a grossly unfair match. After nearly being disqualified due to fending off three separate Team Rocket attacks keeping him from the match, he and his Pokémon were under huge amounts of stress and exhaustion (so they battled under a handicap), a new elimination rule was added (and never used again) that declared sleep-status a case of "unable to battle" and equivalent to fainting (costing Ash his first Pokémon due to a lucky Sleep Powder attack), and Ash's last resort, Charizard, the only one healthy enough to be a viable choice in combat, decided to flake on him by taking a nap instead of fighting. It would be one thing if Ash was being moody and petulant after losing a fair match, but he actually lost because of bad luck and a wicked handicap, so this is a sting the audience can really sympathize with.
    • Back during the Indigo League, the episode "A Chansey Operation" introduced Doctor Proctor, a callous, lazy physician who would rather flirt with Nurse Joy than lift a finger while off duty. When Team Rocket causes a traffic accident that injures a literal truckful of Pokémon, Nurse Joy essentially commandeers him and his hospital into helping treat the monsters, a decision which he protests strongly. While the episode treats this decision as bad (and his casual attitude is admittedly cruel), he's absolutely right - he's a human physician, not a Pokemon doctor. He has little knowledge about their reactions to certain medicines or proper temperatures, if he had to do a major operation there would be no guarantee that he would have the faintest idea which major organs did what, never mind that a large number of the Pokémon are very dangerous and hard to control (many were severely agitated to the point that Ash and company had to use their own Pokémon to subdue them and one of them, an agitated Dodrio, ended up accidentally sedating the doctor in question). If anything, he's being more responsible than the trio or Nurse Joy. She never seemed to consider just using the clearly established Pokémon teleportation technology to send them to another Pokémon Center.
    • A minor moment in "Lost Leader Strategy". Maylene tried to get her Lucario to apologize to Electabuzz, Pikachu, and Piplup for using its Aura Sphere on them, and Lucario was made out to be in the wrong for not wanting to apologize. Sure Lucario went too far, but those three Pokémon refused to stop fighting one another even after the other trainers tried to get them to stop.
    • The Alola League. The main cast tries very ardently to defend the idea of a League where anyone can take part, because it defends Kukui's dream, against Guzma who looks at it as a schoolyard tournament for weaklings. It's hard to not see his point when Jessie and James make it to the Top 16 by running away and one of those Top 16 competitors tries to give up in the middle of battle. In fact, this became a major point of contention among fans regarding Ash's League win in Alola, with some stating that the victory didn't feel earned because of the circumstances and execution of it.
  • Subbing Versus Dubbing:
    • Pokémon is an interesting variation; at the time the series first went international, lack of development of the Internet made the raw Japanese versions of anime and comparisons with the dub (let alone Fansubs) not as easy to access in the West as they are now. So many fans were not aware of any differences between the Japanese version of the anime and dubbed version. But then early 2000 (mid-Orange Islands) Dogasu's Backpack launched, whose biggest feature is an easy-to-use Japanese-to-dub comparison for Pokémon, basically "Yu-Gi-Oh Uncensored: Pokémon Edition". Within a few years, 4Kids Entertainment's banning and censorship of episodes like Beauty and the Beach, music replacement, and radical editing of Pokémon: The First Movie became common knowledge. Still, many still preferred the dub, and the otherwise-criticized 4Kids still gets a pass on Pokémon, mostly because of the fact that it was actually one of their most faithful adaptations. So while the main series doesn't suffer much for it, a few episodes and movies have it quite bad - such as the first movie, with fans' perception of Mewtwo and the movie itself being affected by 4Kids' changes, and the dub getting a dismal rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Possibly justified due to 4Kids' Michael Haigney admitting his cluelessness in regards to the series and 4Kids' dub in general being aimed at a narrower demographic than Shudo intended; also, contrary to popular belief, the early Japanese dub did contain a bit more Parental Bonus humor, though not enough to make for a completely different series. Still, Dogasu's Backpack has made some fans go off to the Japanese version, and when TPCI took over, the dub became more of a target for criticism, especially since XY when the music replacement under Ed Golfarb not only was to a greater extent than 4Kids, but the music he often used seemed underwhelming by comparison to the original version. It doesn't help that, unlike with its contemporaries Dragon Ball Z and Sailor Moon, Pokémon has not released an official Japanese subtitled or uncensored English dubbed version to appease older nostalgic fans (aside from some specific works such as Mewtwo Strikes Back—Evolution), and is regarded as antiquated and out-of-touch in that respect.
    • Some also argue that the Pokémon Speak, which is usually lambasted by Western fans, is less Narmy in Japanese. It's handled quite differently due to Japanese syllable structure, is often used for puns that are inevitably Lost in Translation Example, and apparently has more work put into the voices themselves (as hinted by Michael Haigney just not caring for some of the English Pokémon voices). This can even be seen within the English dub itself, in which Charizard's cry, usually considered cool and not Narmy at all, is actually Pokémon Speak of "Lizardon!" retained from the Japanese version.
  • Superlative Dubbing:
    • Many people consider the 4Kids English dub to be this, thanks to the many talented voice actors and Woolseyisms in the script as well as the memorable dub-original songs (with their original "Pokémon Theme" possibly being the single best-known and most quotable song in the franchise in the West). The TPCI dub also fell into this over time, despite the annoyance over replacing the show's original Japanese score, as the new voice actors settled into their roles and the show began to feature prolific anime/game voice actors as guest stars.
    • The Norwegian dub may be one of the few dubs that actually has a guy voicing Ash, and while his voice is obviously way past hitting puberty, it's still cartoonish enough to fit, and has left many people agreeing it's a fresh and unique type of voice for Ash than the usual strained female voices (not counting the original). Listen for yourself here.
    • The French dub also used a similar teenager-ish voice for Ash by Aurélien Ringheim, which like the Norwegian voice, some may find more tolerable than the Crossdressing Voices used in most other languages. Of note is that it had a special edited version for French Canada that used the English dub names for Pokémon and characters, unlike most other French Pokémon media, along with fully domestic dubs for the first few movies (which instead featured Sébastien Reding as Ash), all of which made it even more liked in Quebec. This also led to They Changed It, Now It Sucks! and Americans Hate Tingle when Nintendo of Canada started importing the games and anime dub from France. In a way that makes sense, since French-Canadian viewers may have also already known the characters by those names from watching the English dub on YTV.
  • Surprisingly Improved Sequel: Coming off the heels of the heavily disliked Black and White series, the first two years of XY were widely well-received in the fandom for the most part for having improved writing, action and battle animation, a much more competent take on Ash, a better balance on having Team Rocket threatening at times while keeping their comedic traits, a likable group of companions and supporting characters, a good pacing that averted Arc Fatigue, and the Mega Evolution specials enticing viewers with a quite different take on the series than usual.
  • Suspiciously Similar Song: Team Skull's Leitmotif sounds similar to Soulja Boy's song Crank That (Soulja Boy).
  • Tainted by the Preview: Especially coming off Ash losing the Kalos League, the Alola arc reveal left many fans with negative expectations. Reasons include Ash being the protagonist once again, the more simplistic art style, the anime shifting to a school premise due to Alola having no league yet and much of the promotional material focusing on over-the-top gags, causing many fans to draw comparisons to Yo-kai Watch. Fortunately, the season started out not as badly as fans feared, and the announcement of Pokémon: I Choose You! also helped convince fans that the team was still making an effort.
  • They Changed It, Now It Sucks!:
    • Misty getting Put on a Bus after Johto will always leave a gaping hole in the hearts of some fans, thinking that her departure ruined the show completely.
    • One of the main complaints from the side of the Broken Base that doesn't like Black and White is how it diverged from the formula that the previous AG and DP arcs used, and drastically changed the characterizations of Ash and Team Rocket. Somewhat ironically however, both aforementioned seasons got similar criticisms (hence the other side of the Broken Base).
    • Pikachu learning Electro Ball at the cost of Volt Tackle. Many were upset that Pikachu's most powerful move was replaced by one far weaker. Some would eventually get used to Electro Ball, seeing it as a surprisingly versatile move, only for it to meet the same fate in Sun and Moon, getting replaced by Electroweb.
    • Sun and Moon changed quite a few things about the series, turning it into a more Slice of Life based series, drastically altering the art style for the previously existing characters, reducing the number of battles, and making it a more stationary setting wherein Ash goes to school instead of traveling. As detailed under Broken Base, this wasn't well received by a significant part of the fan base.
    • While Journeys' incorporation of Pokémon GO elements has been somewhat controversial (especially in regards to how Goh is handled), the fact that Eggs were changed from having unique designs to being only the generic colors and shades seen in Go and to a degree the main series games was one of the worst-received results of this by a part of the fanbase, as it was one of the better received elements of the Anime that had been consistent for more than two decades before the Generation VIII Anime.
    • The dub (4Kids/TPCI) gets hit with this hard whenever they decide to make changes to the original Japanese content.
      • The prime example nowadays is TPCI's music replacements over the original Japanese soundtrack, especially since XY when a new dub composer, Ed Goldfarb, took over and even less Japanese music got kept. Whenever a new dub episode is released, most of the forum discussion among viewers isn't about what occurred in the episode, but about how much Japanese music got replaced, and how much "suckier" the dub music is compared to the original music pieces. According to Goldfarb himself, this is a business decision by TPCi.
      • Some fans bailed on watching the English version of the show completely ever since the controversial voice-actor switch when TPCI took over the dub.
      • The title cards during X & Y often showed one of the main characters in the Japanese dub (even Korrina got one dedicated to her), as well as episode 14 parodying horror movies. Since episode 12, the English dub simply recycled the Ash-centric title card, continuing to do so for the rest of the series (even after Serena's attire change). Some older fans were not pleased.
    • In French-speaking Quebec, Canada, the decision to re-air the series using France's dub was met with this reaction, as French Canadians had their own dub of the early anime that used English Pokémon and character names rather than the French onesnote . A particular sticking point is that Netflix Canada's French audio track for the Indigo League season - one of the seasons with an existing French-Canadian dub - is the unmodified European French one.
  • Tough Act to Follow:
    • Sinnoh had Ash with one of his best teams, a great rivalry in Paul that culminated in a three-part battle, and ended on Ash having a very climatic battle against a trainer with legendaries, getting closer to beating him than anybody else would. It was safe to say that Unova had some big shoes to fill as the next series.
    • Kalos had Ash at his finest, most formidable trainer level to date. The perceived impossibility of topping this since his losing the Kalos League showed he still wasn't allowed to become formidable enough to break status quo, and Ash's competence seemingly having nowhere to go but down a la Unova left his fans with negative expectations for the anime's future. While his battle competence is generally better than Unova in Sun & Moon, he was far more of a childish, comedic Butt-Monkey than he was in Unova as well, creating yet another example of a Broken Base.

    U-W 
  • Unexpected Character:
    • Ash did not use Tauros at the Indigo League like he did with Krabby and Muk. Made it that much more of a surprise that he brought Tauros in for his battle with Drake.
    • The times when Ash caught Aipom and Gligar were seen as surprising captures due to the belief that the anime was on a bit of a trend where Ash will only catch Pokémon of the current generation that was going on. In these cases, Aipom was caught during the Hoenn generation when Ash was back in Kanto taking on the Battle Frontier, and Gligar was caught during the Sinnoh journey. Of course, everyone caught on shortly after that the reason they were captured was because Gen 4 provided them new evolutions.
    • It was surprising that the anime gave Grant an Onix; in the games, he's the first Rock-type Gym Leader who didn't have either Onix or a Geodude on his team (Roxanne had a Geodude but no Onix, and all Rock-type Leaders before Grant have had a member of the Geodude line on their team). This makes the anime version of Grant the first to have an Onix while lacking a member of the Geodude evolutionary line (counting Brock in the Gold and Silver games).
    • Clemont catching a Luxio during the Kalos journey was a bit of a surprise for a lot of people. This is primarily due to the Pokémon being from a past generation, and because the Shinx-line isn't even in the Kalos Pokédex in the games.
    • Astrid and Remo from the Mega Evolution Specials both participate in the Lumiose Conferance. Astrid loses to Ash in the Top 8, while Remo is soundly defeated by Alain in the semi-finals.
    • After both having been absent from the show for years and their exclusion from the 20th movie, very few, if any, fans were expecting Brock and Misty to make a guest appearances in Sun & Moon.
    • Jigglypuff (Yes. That Jigglypuff.) who was absent from the anime for nearly fifteen years, also returns in Sun and Moon.
    • The final year of Sun and Moon threw a big curveball by finally allowing main characters to capture mythical Pokemon, with Meltan and Shaymin ending up in Ash and Mallow's teams respectively. Shaymin was especially left field, being a Generation IV Pokemon that cannot be caught normally in any Generation VII games nor was tied to any promotion at the time.
    • Journeys quickly made this one of it's staples, becoming well-known for bringing in many unexpected chracters:
      • Ash's first capture being a Dragonite came out of left field for most fans for several reasons. Not only did it mark the first time since Gligar that Ash has caught a Pokémon not native of the current generation as part of his main team, it was also his first capture of a fully-evolved Pokémon since Noctowl, and a pseudo-legendary to boot. Getting such a Pokémon as his first series capture instead of a starter or a regional bird was something few predicted.
      • Korrina and her Lucario. Of all of Ash's friends who people had been expecting to return, she certainly wasn't high on the list, as while her arc had its fans, she was still ultimately a minor character in the XY series compared to Ash's companions and rivals. Additionally, Mega Evolution had been removed from Sword and Shield, making her and Mega Lucario's return an even bigger surprise.
      • Very few people expected Ash to catch Galarian Farfetch'd, especially right after Riolu, another pure Fighting-type. What also played into the surprise was many people feeling that the marketing around this time was leading up to Ash eventually catching a Sobble, who ended up being caught by Goh in the episode after Ash's Galarian Farfetch'd capture. Basically, the captures happened in the exact opposite of what people were expecting.
      • The 2021 new years trailer surprised people by revealing an appearance of Wikstrom the Steel-type master of the Kalos Elite Four as an opponent for Ash. This was not a highly expected character due to never having appeared properly in the series beyond a very brief cameo in the opening segment of the Diancie movie, not to mention being a fairly minor character from X and Y that didn't get particular focus during or after Generation VI.
      • Gary Oak and Iris' confirmed reappearances in the third opening. Despite Gary's iconic status, it had been more than a decade since he'd appeared outside of non-speaking cameos. Iris' appearance came even further out of left field, as most fans expected the XY companions would be the next to reappear, especially since Journeys up to this point had only featured returning characters and callbacks from the original series, XY, and Sun and Moon (The exception being Matori, who had appeared in every series since her debut anyway)
      • Ash's capture of Dracovish took many by surprise, not just because Ash never caught a Fossil Pokémon before or already had a Dragon Type on his team, but also because said Pokémon is just a really unconventional choice for Ash, in general.
      • Butch and Cassidy returning in JN 095 counts as this. They had been absent for over a decade, their episode's premiere almost landing perfectly on the 14-year anniversary of their previous appearance (Sleight of Sand).
  • Unintentionally Sympathetic:
    • Team Rocket:
      • Given the entire premise of the show involves catching Pokémon, the trio are sometimes condemned and attacked even when they try to take Pokémon or other goods through legitimate means or with a sympathetic motive. Some of their punishments can also get incredibly vicious in some of their more pitiful bouts as well (sometimes characters have had to maintain their "Blasting off" Running Gag for very petty reasons). Throughout Hoenn and Sinnoh in particular, they were so much more loser than actual villain it verged on depressing.
      • At times, only one or two team members are causing trouble, with the others sometimes even protesting or trying to help the heroes. They are still always blasted off indiscriminately. "Got Miltank!" was an especially bad case, since Ash knew Meowth didn't want any part in the scheme and even saw him get Bound and Gagged by the other members in response.
      • Their Pokémon even more so. Most of them are portrayed as more loyal and loving to Jesse and James than malicious in any way, and a lot of them (especially James') are blessed with heart wrenchingly cute designs and dispositions, making a lot of the heroes' smug Curbstomp Battles against them look like vicious Kick the Dog moments.
    • Guzma is very clearly meant to be seen as the villain that wants to destroy the League and Kukui's dreams. However, given the Alola League is an open League with no requirements compared to past Leagues,* his comment that it's just a schoolyard tournament starts to make sense. His later insistence on getting tired of Kukui and Hala's holier-than-thou attitude about following tradition (a tradition abandoned by those very two people by building their own stadium after stating that the traditional island challenge ended on Mount Lanakila) and wanting to get stronger without Z-Moves after they've been used to facilitate battles without strategy throughout the season, gives him a strong case of Jerkass Has a Point. That he's also taking part in the tournament legitimately and fairly, abiding by the rules to make his point, also makes one wonder just why Guzma is considered such a heinous villain by the cast.
  • Values Dissonance:
    • "The Legend of Dratini" was banned outside of Japan for this reason. The episode featured a character named Kaiser who wielded a gun on screen with him threatening to shoot Ash and his friends a few times, and even fired them at Team Rocket, which was all taken as comedy in Japan. In America however, network television has very strict standards at that certain content due to how controversial and offensive those subjects are that the episode was not allowed to be aired on TV, let alone have a dubbed episode because of the episode's heavy use of firearms.
    • In one episode, the heroes continuously vilify a Pokémon smuggler who was capturing wild Scatterbug, having them evolve into different kinds of Vivillon, and selling them to collectors all over the world. Which is pretty much what everyone does with Vivillon in the games.
  • Vanilla Protagonist: According to Shudo's notes, Ash (Satoshi) was never meant to stand out very much. His original vision for the series gave rise to far more interesting antagonists (and so we got Gary, a jerk with a harem of cheerleaders, and Team Rocket, who need no explanation), and even Ash's traveling companions are more dynamic and interesting (Brock and his women-starved antics come to mind). Certain points in the show do attempt to give Ash more of a distinct personality (Advanced Generation made him more short fused, while Sun and Moon converts him into a Loon with a Heart of Gold), though since said characteristics often come and go each series, it's still hard to paint a consistent picture of him.
  • Video Game Movies Suck: The movies wildly vary in acceptance with the fanbase, but barring a few (such as Genesect and the Legend Awakened and Hoopa and the Clash of Ages) they largely avert this, being seen as So Okay, It's Average at worst. Among critics? Of the seven movies to receive any sort of theatrical release outside of Japan, the only one to receive a "Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes is Pokémon: The Power of Us, twenty-one movies into the series. The second highest-rated is Pokémon: I Choose You! (which is not only the twentieth one, but also a full-on Continuity Reboot) at only 43%, with many of the more forgiving reviews boiling down to "(Young) Fans will probably enjoy it."
  • Vindicated by History: The Orange Islands arc was originally disregarded as Filler that didn't really amount to anything since the Gym challenges weren't always actual battles and the League itself wasn't based on an in-game region. Nowadays, whenever a debate starts concerning Ash's competence as a trainer, people will often mention it immediately, since his victory there technically means Ash qualifies for the title of Champion, and that also marks the first real sign of his growth as a Pokémon Trainer. It is also pointed out that the Orange Islands brought several fan-favorites such as Ash's Lapras, Ash's Snorlax, and the Crystal Onix, and that the battle between Ash and Drake was the series' first full battle. Its deviations from the usual gym formula were also viewed more favourably after the series' long run of Strictly Formula, especially after the anime more routinely began deviating with similar new premises.
  • Wangst:
    • Paul being the way he is because of his brother losing and giving up his dream has been met with this response, as it doesn't even remotely justify anything. It doesn't help that said brother doesn't have any angst over it himself, and only gave up his dream because he found a new occupation that he decided he liked better.
    • While it was understandable for Max to get upset over dealing with his Broken Pedestal regarding his father losing the gym battle to Ash in the Hoenn arc of the show, what made the whole thing qualify for this trope was the fact that Max thought that losing was a bad thing regarding battles and Norman being a gym leader. Even Norman had to argue against this by telling Max that losing is an important thing when it comes to being a gym leader and that losing overall can be a good experience, so Max was essentially whining over his father doing his job.
  • What Do You Mean, It's for Kids?:
    • It can get pretty damn dark at times, especially in some of the movies, but is still a children's show all the same. Special mention goes to the surprisingly dark and deep Japanese version of Pokémon: The First Movie, as well as Pokémon: Zoroark: Master of Illusions, which got the equivalent of a PG-13 rating in Japan - something very odd to hear about this show.
    • Takeshi Shudō hadn't originally wanted the show to be only for children. When one looks closely at episodes written by him, they're noticeably more serious in tone than a great deal of other episodes and tend to focus on the darker aspects of the Pokémon universe. For a quick example, the very first episode was a deconstruction of being a Pokémon trainer.
    • Paul’s relationship with Chimchar, and its subsequent healing from it, is horrifyingly similar to abusive relationships in real life, down to the repression, victim blaming and shaming, deeply-rooted trauma, as well as both physical and emotional abuse. In addition, Chimchar’s reaction to facing Zangoose in both Glory Blaze! and Tears For Fears! can only be described as PTSD.
  • Win Back the Crowd:
    • Advanced Generation (Hoenn) could be considered this after people started to get tired of the franchise due to the Johto era being plagued with tons of boring/irrelevant Filler. The makers even felt the need to shake up the main cast.
    • XY did this later down the line; not only was it one of the most well-loved seasons on its own merits, but it came immediately after the poorly-received Black and White season.
    • Sun And Moon to an extent, as several people who stopped watching the anime (especially after the Kalos League) said that the snippets they'd seen piqued their interests about it, so much so that some started watching it again. Many fans of the previous series remain at odds with it for various reasons, though.
    • The 20th movie preview did this. Fans had been accusing the movies of becoming less imaginative and descending into Franchise Zombie territory. Then the preview aired, showing the title of the movie ("Pokémon I Choose You") and nostalgic footage of Ash and Pikachu in Kanto with Ho-Oh flying overhead, heavily suggesting that the movie would be a nostalgia-laden Milestone Celebration. Fans were ecstatic.
    • After complaints about the lack of continuity in XY, Ash returning to Kanto for a two-episode arc in Sun & Moon, with the confirmed appearances of Misty, Brock, and at least some of his reserve Pokémon made older fans very excited.
    • Coming off of the divisive Alola League, the Ash vs Kukui 4-parter was seen as one of the best battles in the series, particularly in its final half. Many who were critical of the league admitted that the ensuing 6v6 full battle was a huge standout in the series and served as a better League final battle than Ash vs Gladion was.
    • The movies after years of Franchise Zombie accusations and diminishing returns that came to a head with the late Unova and Kalos movies. Starting with Pokémon: I Choose You!, the approach to the yearly Pokémon movie was shaken up drastically, with a different story approach and artstyle for each one. The movies since that era have been significantly better-received than the pre-reboot movies, with Pokémon: The Power of Us being widely praised and becoming the first Pokémon movie to get a "Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
  • Woolseyism:
    • Naturally quite a few, particularly the puns which can/can't be translated:
    • All of Team Rocket's English Mottos. Don't you dare deny it.
    • When the Squirtle Squad holds Misty hostage in Squirtle's debut episode, they originally threatened to kill her if Ash didn't do what they say. In the English dub, they threaten to dye her hair purple (which Misty is equally upset about). It might be censorship, but not only is it way funnier, it makes more sense given her reaction.
    • When Ash crossdresses to infiltrate the Celadon Gym, Team Rocket introduce him posing as "her" parents. In the Japanese version, the "-shi" in Satoshi is replaced with a "-ko", which gives him the very feminine alias of Satoko. In the English version, he's referred to as Ashley (the gender-neutral, full variant of Ash).
    • A lot of fans prefer 4Kids' flashback sequence during Misty's goodbye. In Japan, the clips focused on Misty's character while the dub clips focus on her relationship with her friends, which is seen as better suiting the episode. The Japanese clips are also considered to be too lengthy and less exciting.
    • Brock's Sudowoodo's use of "Take Down" in the original Japanese - which Sudowoodo cannot legitimately learn in the games - was changed in the English dub to "Double Edge", a move with similar properties which Sudowoodo can use. Similarly, in the episode where Ash challenged Roxanne's Gym, her Nosepass apparently used "Hyper Beam" twice in the Japanese version (during Ash's episode battling her) - but given the electric-based properties of the attack (which was actually plot-relevant), the dub changed these two instances to "Thunder Wave" and "Zap Cannon" respectively, which actually makes more sense (Zap Cannon is probably what the attack was meant to be, anyway).
    • Hikari/Dawn's Embarrassing Nickname, "Pikari"/"Dee-Dee", is a particularly clever one, which makes you wonder if PUSA had planned it ahead. Dawn's nickname is treated as a Noodle Incident until the last DP Season, where its origins are revealed to be from Dawn having been shocked by a Plusle and Minun when she was little - her friend Kenny partially traumatized her at the time by calling her "Pikari" (in reference to pikapika, the sound an electric sparkle makes). Since the dub changed her name, the nickname becomes Dee-Dee - which is short for "Diamond Dandruff", a rather suitable nickname for the scenario.
    • While being a "Pokémon Sommelier" fits for Cilan "tasting" the compatibility between Pokémon and trainers, "Pokémon Connoisseur" works much better when it comes to Cilan's various hobbies when he declares himself a "— Connoisseur", seeing as a connoisseur is another term for an enthusiast.
    • Throughout Sun and Moon, many of Samson Oak's Pokémon puns are translated very awkwardly. Since they're supposed to be cringeworthy however...
    • While Ed Goldfarb's score in the XY saga is divisive, his score for the Sun & Moon saga has some nice standouts, one of the biggest being the solemn piano piece from episode 21 that plays over Ash keeping vigil over the distraught Litten. Said sequence's original Japanese self simply had Shinji Miyazaki's "Meowth's Ballad" playing over it, not quite fitting for such sadness.
  • Writer Cop Out: Ash losing the Kalos League to Alain was seen as this by many after the far from insignificant amounts of buildup, including in the trailers and the episode's title itself, that strongly hinted Ash would finally win. This managed to negatively affect the view of the XY series, prior seen as one of the best due to its willingness to indulge the Periphery Demographic, now seen by some as something of a "Shaggy Dog" Story that copped out at the last minute.

Alternative Title(s): Pokemon Anime

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