>>54032083I remember a bunch of theories and speculation surrounding Professor Hodaka back when he made his first appearance; with some even suggesting he had ties to Giovanni. Most people believed one way or another, he was going to be revealed to be evil, and that it was going to be one of those plot twists that you can see coming from a mile away. As much as people were rolling their eyes about how we were going to get another cookie-cutter villain arc at the end, pretty sure those same people would've taken that over what we got, lol.
PM had incredible storytelling potential, imo, but was introduced far too late and given far too little development, so I agree heavily altering the story arc would be a must if it was to be kept, or just don't do it at all. JN had this frustrating habit of introducing exciting ideas and new characters, and then doing squat with them. For the longest time, I figured the writers forgot all about Tokio, lol. Given the episode he appeared in, he definitely felt more significant than just CotD material, and yet the guy disappears for something like... 70 episodes.
I get it, covid caused all kinds of mayhem, but even still, the staff should've been able to get JN back on track at some point, but it feels like they never really did. In an alternate timeline where covid didn't happen and the anime didn't suffer from multiple changes in key staff, and OLM actually poured (instead of diverted) resources into the anime, I can't help but wonder what JN would've been like. Oh, and if Legends Arceus had been the big holiday game in '22, with gen 9 not launching until the following holiday.
