DR. BELCH
08-25-2001, 02:32 PM
POK JJ: The Bug Stops Here
Fresh from victory in Goldenrod City, Ash meets an old friend at a Pokemon catching competition--Casey the rabid Electrabuzz fan. Seems both have been enjoying a good streak lately, and she doesn't hesitate in regaling her old friends with the team fight song. Charming girl, but her pitch is a mite off.
Misty learns that the competitors will be fighting to catch bug Pokemon for a sun stone and whatever they catch, they keep....and she's visibly freaked. She nearly soils herself at the sight of a Wheedle on the Jumbotron, and when she catches Togepi making friends with a Caterpie, she shrieks and beats it with her backpack. Brock has to hold her (hello!) to calm her nerves. Though her old feelings for Ash are still evident, as despite her fear of bugs, she hopes Ash does well and catches one
Casey seems a little overexhuberant, first muscling out Ash to nab a Wheedle, then driving her Chikorita to the brink of exhaustion on a Scyther. Ash--knowing Scyther's habits well from his days with Tracey--takes over, and Misty gives the girl a stern lecture on empathy and Pokemon training.
Jessy gets a couple of great disguise scenes--first, in order to look younger for contest admission, she puts on a schoolgirl outfit (I wonder if that's the same one from "Legend of Dratini"?) Then she dresses as a female Venemoth and tries to...seduce a male Venemoth. :eek: Oh, poor dear, has it been that long? Either he sees right through her or he swings the other way, as the male moth just douses her with stun spore and flutters off.
After Ash falls into a pit trap with a built-in cage (Jessy and James are getting smarter, folks) Chikorita and the runt meet up again with the Rockets (who don't recognize her at first). Chikorita evolves into Bayleaf--the Pokemon who makes a great stew seasoning--and dispatches the Meowth balloon.
Wobbafett keeps popping up and annoying Jessy needlessly throughout this whole scene--which is doubly funny as I recently learned that its name is Japanese slang for "that's right". So whenever someone insults Jessy, then Wobbafett utters its name, it's little wonder she blows her cool.
Ash caught a Beedril during the event...and gives it to the girl. (Beats candy and flowers.) She's visibly touched, eyes wet and everything...and she offers to sing her fight song for him. Now if Ash were smart, he'd grab her, bend her over backwards and kiss her to shut her up! ;)
CRDCPTRS: "A New Set of Wings"
In the opening, we see Sakura troubled by visions, in which she sees an autumn landscape, flower petals blowing in the wind (a reference to her name, which in Japanese is either "apple blossom" or "cherry blossom"), and Clow Reed. Kero tells her to remember that, as dreams carry meaning.
Sakura sees Eli buying thread at the craft store, and when she asks why, he cryptically replies, "Thread has many uses." Of course, he's hardly into crocheting. He later uses the thread to magically control Li like a marionette and force him to try to cut Sakura in two with his sword. Li uses a water spell to cause droplets to cling to the strands, letting Sakura see what to cut.
I thought Sakura would see the thread and get suspicious, but she didn't, unless that part was redubbed.
Later Eli happens by while Sakura is examining her craft project, a teddy bear for Julian. While touching it and offering advice on attaching the ears, he casts a spell on it. Later, when she presents it to Julian, it grows fifty feet tall and begins to trash the neighborhood.
Keroberos and Yue realize the bear was bewitched and that the only way to stop it is to remove its magic core--located in the ear. The dilemma is, Sakura needs to fly, but she needs her sword as well, and the staff can't do both. She prays to her star and is granted the boon of angel wings (there has to be a double meaning in that, like the blossoms in the dream). She slices the bear's ear off--a rather gruesome moment even though it's only cloth and stuffing--and it shrinks back down into a tame plush toy.
Eli, again, seems pleased that she's won rather than upset...like he's only toying with her, or testing her. Still, the sword business earlier seems prettty serious--like a playful child with a malicious touch, setting toy soldiers on fire and crashing his toy cars together.
Note how much the bear resembles Keros, and how he takes offense when Sakura points it out.
Li again blushes visibly as he says Sakura can call him any time...and again as she mentions this to Kero. Seems if nothing else, she at least wants some company walking through the park. Though ironically he does nearly kill her, so it proves Eli can use even her friends and lovers against her. It seems he has power to rival Clow Reed's; is he some connection to the old wizard, like an illegitimate son or a spurned ex-disciple?
CUBIX: Bubbletown Underground
Something about a hip-talking sewer robot who goes rogue under the city cutting power cables and almost causing a huge gas explosion, and more about this Solex stuff. Hella tells the kids not to go down there, but like a cut-rate cast of It they do anyhow. Note the sewer system set looks a lot like the KWB CGI commercial bumpers. Pretty clean--I didn't see one drop of sludgewater in the whole place. And yes, that girl is a mite chesty for her age.
RH:GRT: Wildfire/White Wall of Terror
Couple of poachers cause a fire on the African savannah, and two kids get trapped under an avalanche (which basically rehashed last week's plot with mountain bikers). The punning names are grating on me--got a new one: Al Pine. Though I admit I did like seeing the lioness with her young, and the poacher forced to give a chest massage to a cub suffering from smoke inhalation (was hoping he'd do a whole repentance act and study veterinary medicine in prison or something, but no such luck).
Fresh from victory in Goldenrod City, Ash meets an old friend at a Pokemon catching competition--Casey the rabid Electrabuzz fan. Seems both have been enjoying a good streak lately, and she doesn't hesitate in regaling her old friends with the team fight song. Charming girl, but her pitch is a mite off.
Misty learns that the competitors will be fighting to catch bug Pokemon for a sun stone and whatever they catch, they keep....and she's visibly freaked. She nearly soils herself at the sight of a Wheedle on the Jumbotron, and when she catches Togepi making friends with a Caterpie, she shrieks and beats it with her backpack. Brock has to hold her (hello!) to calm her nerves. Though her old feelings for Ash are still evident, as despite her fear of bugs, she hopes Ash does well and catches one
Casey seems a little overexhuberant, first muscling out Ash to nab a Wheedle, then driving her Chikorita to the brink of exhaustion on a Scyther. Ash--knowing Scyther's habits well from his days with Tracey--takes over, and Misty gives the girl a stern lecture on empathy and Pokemon training.
Jessy gets a couple of great disguise scenes--first, in order to look younger for contest admission, she puts on a schoolgirl outfit (I wonder if that's the same one from "Legend of Dratini"?) Then she dresses as a female Venemoth and tries to...seduce a male Venemoth. :eek: Oh, poor dear, has it been that long? Either he sees right through her or he swings the other way, as the male moth just douses her with stun spore and flutters off.
After Ash falls into a pit trap with a built-in cage (Jessy and James are getting smarter, folks) Chikorita and the runt meet up again with the Rockets (who don't recognize her at first). Chikorita evolves into Bayleaf--the Pokemon who makes a great stew seasoning--and dispatches the Meowth balloon.
Wobbafett keeps popping up and annoying Jessy needlessly throughout this whole scene--which is doubly funny as I recently learned that its name is Japanese slang for "that's right". So whenever someone insults Jessy, then Wobbafett utters its name, it's little wonder she blows her cool.
Ash caught a Beedril during the event...and gives it to the girl. (Beats candy and flowers.) She's visibly touched, eyes wet and everything...and she offers to sing her fight song for him. Now if Ash were smart, he'd grab her, bend her over backwards and kiss her to shut her up! ;)
CRDCPTRS: "A New Set of Wings"
In the opening, we see Sakura troubled by visions, in which she sees an autumn landscape, flower petals blowing in the wind (a reference to her name, which in Japanese is either "apple blossom" or "cherry blossom"), and Clow Reed. Kero tells her to remember that, as dreams carry meaning.
Sakura sees Eli buying thread at the craft store, and when she asks why, he cryptically replies, "Thread has many uses." Of course, he's hardly into crocheting. He later uses the thread to magically control Li like a marionette and force him to try to cut Sakura in two with his sword. Li uses a water spell to cause droplets to cling to the strands, letting Sakura see what to cut.
I thought Sakura would see the thread and get suspicious, but she didn't, unless that part was redubbed.
Later Eli happens by while Sakura is examining her craft project, a teddy bear for Julian. While touching it and offering advice on attaching the ears, he casts a spell on it. Later, when she presents it to Julian, it grows fifty feet tall and begins to trash the neighborhood.
Keroberos and Yue realize the bear was bewitched and that the only way to stop it is to remove its magic core--located in the ear. The dilemma is, Sakura needs to fly, but she needs her sword as well, and the staff can't do both. She prays to her star and is granted the boon of angel wings (there has to be a double meaning in that, like the blossoms in the dream). She slices the bear's ear off--a rather gruesome moment even though it's only cloth and stuffing--and it shrinks back down into a tame plush toy.
Eli, again, seems pleased that she's won rather than upset...like he's only toying with her, or testing her. Still, the sword business earlier seems prettty serious--like a playful child with a malicious touch, setting toy soldiers on fire and crashing his toy cars together.
Note how much the bear resembles Keros, and how he takes offense when Sakura points it out.
Li again blushes visibly as he says Sakura can call him any time...and again as she mentions this to Kero. Seems if nothing else, she at least wants some company walking through the park. Though ironically he does nearly kill her, so it proves Eli can use even her friends and lovers against her. It seems he has power to rival Clow Reed's; is he some connection to the old wizard, like an illegitimate son or a spurned ex-disciple?
CUBIX: Bubbletown Underground
Something about a hip-talking sewer robot who goes rogue under the city cutting power cables and almost causing a huge gas explosion, and more about this Solex stuff. Hella tells the kids not to go down there, but like a cut-rate cast of It they do anyhow. Note the sewer system set looks a lot like the KWB CGI commercial bumpers. Pretty clean--I didn't see one drop of sludgewater in the whole place. And yes, that girl is a mite chesty for her age.
RH:GRT: Wildfire/White Wall of Terror
Couple of poachers cause a fire on the African savannah, and two kids get trapped under an avalanche (which basically rehashed last week's plot with mountain bikers). The punning names are grating on me--got a new one: Al Pine. Though I admit I did like seeing the lioness with her young, and the poacher forced to give a chest massage to a cub suffering from smoke inhalation (was hoping he'd do a whole repentance act and study veterinary medicine in prison or something, but no such luck).