>>20455797...It's what the writers do. No matter how far he supposedly gets, he will still fail because they have to keep him in. Without it, there is no real purpose, but then again, one could argue that there is no real purpose in going through the 8 gyms every region either since we know he can do it. Regardless, you know they will continue to make him fail just so they can go around in circles for all eternity. I might even go so far as to say, yes, all the previous so-called development DOESN'T matter in any saga. Whatever he does is only because the writers allow it, it is not a natural progression. It will all become moot at the beginning of the next saga, too, regardless of if he does better or not. That level of skill will never stay consistent. If it did, then nothing like what the anime is doing right now should give him problems at all. If they actually made it more difficult, I would understand that, but that is not the case. (no, it's not. none of it is ever more difficult, all these regions are the same) This was why Paul was so great, he was an actual more difficult challenge, but the problem is that he shouldn't have lost to someone like Ash. He did not progress at all from this, and instead continued to believe in his lame philosophy, and because this is the anime, it worked because children. I do not condone Paul by any means, but he does make more sense than Ash. That alone should have made him unbeatable. Instead, this entire anime is BS land. Your progress is but an illusion, the same as the flat horizon, and achieving the same thing: all you do is go around in a giant circle.
