"Believe you me, I'd feel much better lyin'."
—Iris and Meowth
Japanese Title: Nyagotiator Nyarth! Zuruzukin Persuasion Tactics!!
Original Airdate: August 18, 2011
US Airdate: November 26, 2011
Could it be? Has Meowth turned over a new leaf?
Meowth has been kicked out of Team Rocket after a botched mission, and ends up travelling with Ash and his crew. His first crisis is dealing with Iris' Axew being snatched and held hostage by a particularly ornery wild Scrafty. Meowth and Ash's Scraggy have to figure out why.
This episode contains examples of the following tropes:
- Curb-Stomp Battle: Scrafty was little match for Ash and his Tepig.
- Cut Lex Luthor a Check: Demonstrated. With Meowth on Ash's team, he manages to use his ability to talk and manipulate to work as a negotiator for the heroes.
- Death or Glory Attack: Scrafty's weakness is missing the Hi Jump Kick attack.note Sure enough, Tepig dodges, and it doesn't take much from there. Scraggy learns the move from Scrafty, and uses it later to beat the Mandibuzz that stole Scrafty's cave.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: Both original and dub dance around the nature of the relationship between the two Mandibuzz. On the surface, it looks like a comedic domestic dispute, and a case of Exiled to the Couch. But Mandibuzz is a 100% female species. In both, Meowth refers to them merely as "friends".
- Double-Meaning Title: The title doesn't just refer to the situation with Scrafty, but to Meowth's "crafty tactics" in manipulating Ash and the others into thinking he was fired.
- Dub-Induced Plot Hole: In the dub, Meowth still calls Ash and co. "twerps" here and in the next few episodes. In the original Japanese he doesn't call them that, as he didn't want to blow his cover.
- Empty Eyes: When the group finds Meowth, he is in serious bad shape, and his pupils are like this when Cilan opens an eye to check him.
- Gambit Roulette: Even though his "firing" from Team Rocket was faked, Meowth's apparent condition when the twerps found him sure looked real. If it indeed wasn't faked, then his play required some luck to ensure he made it to the twerps while still in a recoverable condition.
- Heel–Face Turn: Meowth appears to do this after Cilan nurses him back to health, leaving Team Rocket and joining up with Ash's crew. It'll be revealed in a later episode to be a Fake Defector situation.
- Perp Sweating: Cilan and Meowth play Good Cop/Bad Cop to interrogate Scrafty after Tepig beats him.
- Pun-Based Title: The Japanese title begins "Nyagotiator Nyarth", tacking the Japanese onomatopoeia for a cat's meow (which Nyarth's name is based on, same as the English for Meowth) onto the word "negotiatior".
- Spoiler Title: The title sounds like "Meowth's crafty tactics" which hints that his claim to have been fired from Team Rocket was false.
- Very Special Episode: This was the
700th episode of the Pokemon anime series. - What the Hell, Hero?: At the end of the episode, Iris tries to catch Meowth in a Poké Ball. He makes clear he'll have none of that.
