- [JAMES] Awhile back,
I did a video covering 5 Pokémon anime episodes that got banned,
all from the first few seasons of the Pokémon anime series,
or, as it has been retroactively titled,
Pokémon: The Original Series.
However, that only comprises 274 episodes
of this now over 1,000 episode long series!
Also, for those wondering, as much as I love
the Pokémon franchise, I haven't watched the anime much if at all since I was 11 or so.
I watched a bit of Advanced,
I got a few scattered Diamond and Pearl episodes in,
and as far as movies go if we aren't counting Detective Pikachu,
I haven't seen any of the films since the Arceus one...
or "Arc-ee-us" as they pronounced it there, it was weird.
So, that made this list especially fun
as, in the making of this video,
I got to actually watch some of these now-banned episodes,
or, you know, whatever remnants of them that there are.
Now of course, when I say "banned"
I use 1 of 2 criteria.
These are either episodes that were made
but were never allowed to air at all in any region
or were episodes that did air in Japan
but got banned in North America for some reason.
Now, episode banning was prevalent during the Original Series
or, well, somewhat prevalent, anyways,
but this has been much less prevalent
with the newer series, which Nintendo themselves have had more direct involvement with.
So with that in mind,
today on Master Trainer, let's take a look at 5 more Pokémon episodes that got banned!
This time, they're from all the Pokémon seasons
after the Original Series!
#5!
Starting off this list
is an episode that, as far as anybody knows,
was fully complete and ready to air
but never was.
In fact,
the footage being shown right now
is from a teaser for this episode
and this is all that ever was released of it.
This episode was known as "Shaking Island Battle! (Incoherent Butchered Japanese)"
and excuse me as I butcher those names.
But, this episode features Ash and his friends
learning the location of the final Hoenn Region Gym,
that being in Sootopolis City!
However, on their way there,
they are stopped by a series of earthquakes
caused by the Pokémon, Whiscash.
Thus, along with a new character named Chōta,
it's up to them to drive all of the Whiscash from the area
and to stop the earthquakes caused by these Pokémon
from ruining everyone's lives.
Wow, another example of why real-life Pokémon would be terrifying!
Anyways, this seems like a fairly standard Pokémon plot.
I mean, it doesn't seem any worse than the one where a giant Tentacruel destroys a city,
so what happened?
Well,
this episode was originally set to air
on 4 November 2004.
But, about a week beforehand,
a devastating earthquake struck Nagata Prefecture in Japan,
and due to this episode prominently featuring the moves Earthquake and Fissure,
and due to it being set to air so soon after the real lif earthquake,
those in charge of the anime series
felt that it would be in good taste to postpone this episode.
However,
posteponement eventually want from meaning sometime within a few weeks
to some undetermined future date and finally
the episode was quietly permanently removed from any and all listings.
Due to never being in the Japanese rotation,
it never made its way into any of the international dubs, either.
And perhaps oddest of all,
due to this episode being pulled,
Ash never learned the location of the Sootopolis Gym on screen.
I wonder, though,
as, as far as anybody knows, this episode was complete,
is there a chance that this episode is still out there in some Pokémon Company warehouse somewhere?
Eh, we'll probably never know.
#4!
So the next "episode" on our list is actually 2 episodes!
It's a 2-part special known as "Team Rocket Vs. Team Plasma"
and was set to be one of the biggest Pokémon TV events ever,
or, y'know, at least for the duration of the Black & White series,
or, as it was known in Japan,
the "Best Wishes" series.
Part 1, which would've been Black & White episode 23,
would begin with Team Rocket's boss, Giovanni,
arriving in the Unova Region,
where he would receive an item known as the "Meteonite",
which was a macguffin sought by the organization
in the Unova Region during some point of the anime series.
Also, for those only familiar with the games,
unlike in the games, where Team Rocket disbanded after the events of Pokémon Gold, Silver, and Crystal
with the latter of those coming out all the way back in 2001,
but Team Rocket is still very much so alive and well in the anime!
Anyways,
Ash and company are travelling with Professor Juniper and Officer Jenny
to investigate a Pokémon attack
that occurred in the last episode.
But then, their helicopter gets shot down by a mysterious group of individuals
who are also seeking the Meteonite.
Officer Jenny, using her years of police training to realise that
oh no! They're all in serious danger -
then has them rush back towards Castelia City,
but an encounter along the way with an angry looking Krokorok
leaves Pikachu in critical condition.
Back with Team Rocket,
Giovanni successfully gets the Meteonite
and heads to Castelia City,
where they crash a masquerade ball being held by several of those in the Unova Region's social elite.
Giovanni pulls out and unleashes the Meteonite
and threatens to hold all of those at the ball ransom
unless he is given full political control of the Unova Region.
In the process,
a dangerous energy burst is unleashed from the odd relic
which causes Pikachu to have a bit of an electrical meltdown.
And that's where that part would've ended.
Part 2, which would've been Black & White episode 24,
continues with the mysterious group from before
being revealed as none other than Pokémon Black and White Version baddies
Team Plasma.
They attack the ball that is being held ransom by Team Rocket
and steal the Meteonite for themselves,
hoping to use its powers to make Pokémon attack their trainers.
As Giovanni and his personal goons retreat,
he sends Team Rocket's Jessie and James to pursue Team Plasma,
which is funny seeing how Jessie and James constantly prove themselves tobe
pretty terrible at this whole "bad guy" thing.
So,
Jessie, James, and Meowth pursue Team Plasma to
the Desert Resort north of Castelia City,
where a huge fight breaks out.
During said fight,
the Meteonite releases a large power surge that
both greatly powers up the Pokémon of those involved
but also starts causing massive imbalances
in the balance of nature itself.
Ash and company arrive at the scene of the fight
where they hope to use the Meteonite to put Pikachu back to normal.
They then realize that the fight has escalated to such a point
where it could destroy the entire area they're in,
including Castelia City.
And then, as Pikachu is overpowered,
Ash's Pikachu kicks both of the evil teams to the curb
and sends them running away with their tails between their legs
and the day is saved,
the end.
So like with the previous episode on this list,
these 2 were skipped
due to an earthquake.
Specifically,
this is the massive 2011 earthquake that
struck Japan's east coast and the following Fukushima nuclear disaster.
Due to scenes similar to those tragic events appearing in these episodes,
TV Tokyo pulled them from rotation
but stated that they had plans to air them at a later date.
They never did.
What makes these so interesting is that, if they had aired,
the Best Wishes storyline
would have likely been radically different.
Team Plasma here looks as they did in the original Black and White games
while when they later appeared,
they looked more as they did in Black 2 and White 2,
with their stated motives better matching those from those games.
As these episodes were skipped,
the Meteonite subplot
never really had any equivalent either.
Perhaps most interestingly here,
is that former Pokémon voice director Tom Wayland
stated that versions of these episodes were sent abroad to be dubbed,
though this ultimately wasn't done.
I'm guessing that the plan to completely rework Team Plasma's role in the series
was decided pretty soon after these were delayed in Japan
because, as of 2019,
they've never aired anywhere in the world.
#3!
So here's something neat:
an episode that was banned
and then un-banned!
This was Pokémon X&Y episode 24:
An Undersea Place To Call Home!
This episode features Ash and friends going on a fishing trip.
Ash needs to prepare to fight a rock-type Gym Leader,
so naturally a water-type Pokémon could be effective here
thanks to that wonderful thing called type advantage!
Suddenly,
Ash gets attacked by a Skrelp,
a seahorse Pokémon that proceeds to poison Pikachu.
Our protagonists are about to run to the Pokémon Centre
but then they encounter some nice strangers in a big van.
So, being the good children that they are,
they take the strange antidote that the strangers offer to cure Pikachu.
Luckilly it works.
The weird strangers from the big van
then introduce themselves as a couple of undersea archaeologists.
They are searching for the remnants of a ship called the Cussler,
a luxury liner that up and pulled a Titanic
after hitting an iceberg and sinking.
Long story short,
Team Rocket overhears our protagonists and tries to beat them to the ship's priceless treasures,
everyone nearly dies thanks to some huge whirlpools,
and the angry Skrelp from earlier is re-encountered and peace is made with the angry seahorse,
and everyone lives happily ever after
except for Ash who, spoiler alert,
didn't win the Pokémon League in the X&Y anime either.
Originally set to air in April 2014,
this episode was cancelled due to the sinking of the MV Sewol,
a passenger ferry that sunk shortly before this episode's Japanese release
in South Korea
in which over 300 people died,
most of whom were high school students.
Due to being cancelled in Japan,
this episode was also skipped in the English dub as well.
But then,
miraculously,
it was somehow worked back into the series.
It was aired in Japan on 20 November 2014,
and finally in North America
on 7 February 2015.
Strangely enough,
it also aired in South Korea
on 8 August 2014,
making it the only episode I can find
that ever aired outside of Japan
before it did inside of Japan.
And also weirdly enough,
when it was finally aired,
it wasn't changed to fit into the series' continuity at that point.
Still though,
it's neat to see a banned episode that finally did get a release!
#2!
This next episode is actually 3 episodes!
Wow, you came for a top 5 list
and you ended up with 8 episodes!
Aren't I kind?
Anyways,
with that said,
I think these hardly count as episodes.
These 3 episodes are known as the "Regular Broadcasting Clipshows"
and were a set of 3 flashback clipshows
shown during the Hoenn and Sinnoh anime series.
The first was Pokémon Advanced Generation episode 120:
Satoshi and Haruka! Heated Battles of Hoenn!
The plot was simply:
as Ash and company approach the site of the grand festival in Slateport City,
home of the mother of all Pokémon contests,
our group of protagonists takes time to reminisce on their adventure thus far.
The 2nd was episode 48 of the Pokémon Diamond and Pearl anime:
Satoshi and Hikari! Facing a new adventure!
This clipshow episode is pretty much just
Ash and company on the way to Hearthome City,
recalling their adventure thus far.
Wow, a recap only 40-something episodes into the series.
But then again, I remember what I saw of the Diamond and Pearl anime
containing Sailor Moon-levels of filler.
The final one of these was Diamond and Pearl episodes 120:
The Mysterious Creatures! Pocket Monsters!
This final episode in this trilogy of (regularly broadcasted) recap episodes
involves our protagonists on their way to the 7th Sinnoh Gym
in Snowpoint City,
where they recap their adventure thus far
but also hint at some things to come.
Now, these weren't the only recap episodes that had been done,
with the 1st one dating back to the Original Series in the late 90s
and, as was established in that first-ever clipshow recap episode,
these episodes are never dubbed or released outside of Japan.
Clipshow recap episodes, no matter what anime series they're from,
always come off as some sort of quick,
lazy, slapped-together filler
and I'm sure that The Pokémon Company International realizes that too.
Funnily enough,
the Pokémon anime series in Japan
still does a recap episode once per anime series or so,
with the most recent one being released in 2015
for the Pokémon X,Y,&Z anime.
So that's neat, I guess.
#1!
Alright, so this is the big one.
We've talked about earthquakes and sinking ships today,
but remember the last vid I did on these,
where I got to talk about stuff like Japanese kids having seizures
and Ash nearly getting killed by an angry Texan?
One episode I talked about then
was a Christmas episode involving the Pokémon Jynx,
which many in the US noted that
quite a lot like a woman with a face painted black.
And honestly,
I do see why that concern was raised.
Clearly those involved with the Pokémon series did as well
as following that controversial episode,
Jynx's skin colour
in every single piece of media related to the Pokémon series
following that point,
was changed to a dark purple
so as to not appear potentially racist.
However,
do you know what would likely have been worse
than an episode featuring a racist-looking Pokémon?
How about an episode in which
Ash wears what looks like a racist outfit?
And what if he did so to blend in with a group of monkey Pokémon as well?
That sounds like an absolute recipe for controversy,
so we should be glad that something like this would never happen, right?
Right?
Well, apparently not.
The most recent banned Pokémon episode
actually comes from the Pokémon Sun & Moon anime series.
This was Sun & Moon episode 64:
Satoshi and Nagetsukesaru! Touchdown of Friendship!
First released in Japan on 1 March 2018,
and clocking in at episode 1,003 of the anime series as a whole,
this episode has never seen release outside of Japan
and there are no plans for it to be localized any time soon.
At least it's mostly a filler episode, I guess?
Essentially this episode involves Ash,
who is attending a Pokémon school near Hao'li City in the Alola Region,
having to deal with some bad Passimian that are going around.
By the way, those are these angry looking monkey Pokémon.
Then shenanigans ensue
and whatnot, and at the end of the day,
these Passimians are just your standard 1-episode throwaway anime antagonists
who will likely never be seen again.
At one point in the 2nd half of the episode, though,
Ash paints his face black
as a Passimian to, I guess,
get into the minds of his enemies or whatever?
Sensing this could be problematic,
Disney XD,
who has been responsible for the Pokémon anime series in North America
since the start of the Sun & Moon series,
announced weeks before release that this episode
would be skipped
in their airing of the series.
It was also confirmed that The Pokémon Company International
never had this episode dubbed.
Crisis averted, for now, anyways.
So with that,
what Pokémon topics should I cover in the future?
Perhaps a video on episodes that are currently banned in Japan?
Let me know down in the comment section below
and while you're at it,
definitely subscribe to Master Trainer for more great content like this.
And with that,
I'll see you next time!
