Gen 1 had a lot of terrible TMs, even if the game was designed as a JRPG. Some of them have applications, like that TM12 Water Gun in Mt. Moon to give something like Rattata or Nidoran a fighting chance against the Geodudes of that cave, or the Mega Punch TM in that same cave (also repurchasable) to help you have a decently powered move to replace Tackle/Scratch/etc. We have 04 Whirlwind, which is effectively useless for in-game, 30 Teleport, which at least got replaced by Shadow Ball later on, and I guess it's cool to have a teleporting Arcanine. It doesn't work in caves anyways and 100 BP Dig is superior most of the time. Razor Wind is one of those moves that they never changed in later generations, and still is pretty worthless. Yes let's not forget the Rage TM blocked by Cut. Also Submission is still an 80 BP/80% accurate move with 25% recoil. I'm not sure why some of these Gen 1 moves weren't changed around to be more worthwhile. Mega Punch would be cool if it was a 95 BP/100% accurate move, for instance. Then you also get very "specific" TMs like the one for Egg Bomb, which only Exeggcute line and Chansey learns. Also Softboiled is a TM exclusive for Chansey as well. (We're not counting Mew here)... I am sure a lot of better moves could have been used for those TMs.
This didn't stop in Gen 1 and continued in later gens. For example, climbing Mt. Mortar in GSC gets you the almighty TM40, which contains Defence Curl. I think they wanted you to pair it with the TM for Rollout, but how was a child supposed to know that with little indication? "Too specific TMs" didn't stop here, as Aurora Veil became a TM only specific Ice mons can learn. I think it would have been better if it was naturally learnt by most Ice mons instead.
