>>20314609Yeah, Ash was pretty static through most of DP, but I just always wonder what happened to all the "advancements" in the show they had. They had a decent amount of callbacks (Misty Lure being the most notable, they even had Ash use aura in one episode), they had either planned out, or cleverly used, some elements right from the first few episodes, having a recurring villain that was ruthless as fuck (pic related), and lots of characters had clear character arcs (Brock plays doctor a few times through the series, Dawn has her ups and downs, etc). The biggest thing weighing the series down was the length and copious amount of filler. Overall though, it felt like the show was "maturing" into actually trying to do what they could with the show instead of just pumping out one filler after another interrupted by a gym battle now and again.
Now, to BW's credit, they did actually try to keep some of that. They still had quite a few recurring characters, tried to make Team Rocket serious villains again and tie them together with Team Plasma in some big story arcs, and they solved DP's length problem by making the show faster paced with a filler arc stuck at the end to fill out the generation. I think the problem was that they tried to "kiddify" the series again (like many people mentioned, soft reboot), so Ash was a mediocre trainer again and most recurring characters were comic relief. They tried to do something with Trip but it just didn't really flow well at all.
>Trip is a jerk and a natural trainer who thinks only of becoming strong>He beats Ash's ass in a 5v5 match>He only reappears to lose in the first match of every competition after that>Alder tells him maybe strength isn't the only important thing>He gets his ass handed to him by Alder at PWT>Suddenly becomes a nice guyAnd it sort of defeats the whole "moral" of the story if the instant Trip becomes a nice guy he lost a match again Ash.
Outside of that, you had Iris. Enough said about that.
