I'm intrigued by the fact that the character designs were already finalized by the time the storyboards were created. Since Bede's character sheet is the only source that mentions his watch being a gift from the chairman, it makes me think that this detail would have been more significant in the original storyline. Not that it's out of character for the Rose we ended up with to give a gold watch to some random kid he "saw talent in," but I’d bet their relationship was more developed in earlier drafts.
>>56763634But in the version we got he was never Rose's special boy from Rose's point of view. Even though Rose and Bede interact twice before the mural scene, both times Rose treats Bede like he would any other trainer, despite Bede talking about Wishing Stars and such, which you’d think Rose would show more interest in. It feels to me as if Rose "sponsored" Bede by just signing some papers prepared by someone else at Macro Cosmos without being personally involved in deliberately choosing Bede (and I say this as a dedicated "Chairman Rose did nothing wrong" fag).
