"Battling Ash will be like drinking a flat glass of seltzer water."
Score: 6.5/10
The heroes reach Nimbasa Town, which is not Nimbasa City but instead a town a few miles away. It’s most famous for its giant Ferris wheel, because apparently that’s a thing you’re allowed to be proud of. Also here are Luke, Bianca, Stephan (remember him?), Burgundy, Georgia, and Trip, and they’re all entering the tournament. It’s nice how Burgundy has gotten even more annoying by speaking every fourth word in French for absolutely no reason. For whatever it’s worth, I kind of do like Georgia in this episode more, but I admit it is for absolutely no reason whatsoever.
Luke starts filming himself introduce the battle tournament, apparently having turned into a journalist instead of a director, which is... not the same thing. Bianca starts staring directly into the camera because she’s apparently never seen one before, and then tries to trade her Pignite for Luke's Zorua. Wow, seriously? That’s your first pokemon it and ****ing loves you, you evil girl.
The heroes go to Don George to register for the tournament, and somehow Iris and Cilan are still amused by the Don Georges all looking identical. The announcer for the battle tournament is Freddy, a guy who looks like the dad of your best friend from middle school. The prize will be a rare set of wings that improve your pokemon or something, it's not really made clear.
Each competitor registers three pokemon to choose from, but the actual battles are one-on-one. We learn the upcoming battles for round one: Georgia versus Blue-Haired Guy, Burgundy versus Ash, Trip versus Cilan, Stephan versus Bianca, Luke versus Random Guy, and Iris versus Jimmy Ray.
I do appreciate that the tournament actually does show us battles between the unimportant trainers, but it is admittedly kind of boring because we don't care when Nameless Guy 1’s Venipede loses to Nameless Guy 2’s Tranquill. The only one of note is Dino, and only because he's dressed like an extra from Road Warrior.
Georgia's Beartic versus Sylvester's Joltic. Joltic is just too quick to hit, but Beartic accidentally crushes it when it falls on its back, giving Georgia an easy victory. That’s… pretty damn lame.
Burgundy versus Ash. Cilan reminds Ash that she owns a Dewott and a Sawsbuck, no doubt trying to give him an unfair advantage by helping only one side of the battle he’s supposed to be neutral in, but it doesn’t matter anyway because she sends out a Stoutland. Ash’s choice? Palpitoad, who by the way acts nothing at all like it did in its debut episode. What’s weird is that every single person at the tournament acts like Ash’s choice is the most bizarre thing ever, like why would you ever choose a pokemon that’s neutral to something.
Burgundy uses thunder fang, and then when it does nothing, she reveals that this is part of her plan: now that Stoutland's teeth are around Palpitoad, it can use ice fang and freeze it. Even though she could have just used ice fang to begin with. A supersonic breaks the ice, and a mud shot/hydro pump combo finishes Stoutland off while Burgundy shouts things in French over the unnecessarily heroic music playing in the background. Everyone (except Trip and Burgundy) is extremely excited for Ash’s victory for some reason. Particularly strange is Bianca’s screaming for Ash, as if she had any stake in this whatsoever.
Next up: Trip versus Cilan and a To Be Continued.
Honestly, this is a pretty decent episode, but Burgundy is so damn annoying.
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Started: July 6, 2005