>>52662073XY was the beginning of the end, and this isn't me hating on XY. When Ash lost the Kalos league the entire anime franchise shifted. Ash wasn't allowed to lose anymore which is why he won Alola's memeleague. After that the writers had him become the best of the best and because of that are retiring him. The big thing here is Alola, while boring as fuck, worked with establishing character beats for Ash that could be carried forward. The issue with PM is that it was so poorly done and disgusting that they never did anything with Ash and simply had him "become the best battler" and ended his story. There were so many possibilities that could have happened had they continued the old "journey" narratives instead of the school/yokaiwatch shit.
>Ash loses Kalos>Goes to Alola for a training arc/helps establish a league there>Goes to Galar and enters the canonical "hardest" gym challenge where the best trainer in the world isEven if Ash won Kalos he could go to Alola, help establish a league, then go on to fight the world championships. The story is all there but because of the backlash and hard change in formula for Ashs journey things flatlined hard. Add in a shitty male companion, no clear story checkpoints and PM wound up being a disaster for what have been a simple "world tour of nostalgia."
