The Unveiling Donamite! Scraggy VS Simisage!!
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Quick Succession Donamite! Druddigon VS Bisharp

Satoshi, Shooti, Kenyan, Iris, Dento, Belle, Cabernet and Langley all meet up at the Donamite and enter that contest I spoke about. A battling contest spanning 4 episodes.
Anyway, might as well get it started..the quicker these battles are over, the better.The first round matches up Kenyan against some newcomer, Dent against a newcomer, Satoshi against a newcomer, Cabernet against Iris, Langley against some newcomer and Shootie against Belle.

Kenyan’s match sucked, to be blunt. Dento’s match was kinda cool, but that’s only because I always enjoy watching Dento fight. Next up was Satoshi with Scraggy…and quite why he picked Scraggy escapes me. I guess it is kinda cool that Scraggy learnt a new move, but that’s what I really hate about these battles…Satoshi looses, he learns a new move, he wins. The formula hasn’t changed.

Then we move onto Iris and Cabernet in the second episode. It..was alright. It was well balanced, but I didn’t like the way Cabernet fought…it seemed very petty and hateful. She deserved to loose, and Iris was fun to watch battle like always, even though she may be slightly overpowered. Oddly enough, the battle in the name of the episode lasted around 50 seconds and got concluded before Druddigon even got a move in.The guy with the Throh looked really, really really tough, though. Seeing him battle probably highlighted this episode. Shooti’s Conkulduur was nice, even though it WAS a little OTT. Anyway, see you in a few weeks time for the conclusion to this four-parter.

Mistralton Gym! Decisive Aerial Battle VS Skyla!
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Obstacle Breakthrough! Climb the Tower of the Sky!

The first episode was dedicated to the actual gym battle. It was actually really fast paced and really well done, with some great choreography between the flying battle at the end, but apart from that, it suffered from the “one-sided syndrome” that’s plagued the show from the start. It was almost too obvious that things were doing to turn around halfway, so it was really awkward to watch for most of it.

The second episode…was back to what the show does best. In a ridiculous twist, the trio of heroes meets up with Kenyan and takes place in a festival to rind the Wish-Granting-Bell. It involves trials of guessing who the grandpa prefers out of Joy or Junsa, and imitating Champion Adeku and Professor Araragi, and getting through a forest filled with angry Pokemon. Fun, ridiculous, and over the top in every aspect, the episode was fun and enjoyable to watch, like it should be.

If i’m right, there’s a four-parter about another fighting tournament coming up, followed by an individual episode, followed by another Rocket gang double parter. I wonder if it’ll be as good as the genie trio one..

Mistralton Gym Air-Battle! Challenger Dento!?

Well, as the title says, Dento actually challenges the Mistralton gym. Why? Well, the gym leader got overly confident in her battling skills and decided not to bother, simulating the battles which would take place in her head instead of actually doing the battles. Everyone likes this because they’ve got a pretty good chance of winning..I mean, take the first challenger we saw. He had two electric Pokemon and a rock Pokemon. Because of that, he automatically won. Swanna’s Bubblebeam could take out the rock type, unlike what she expected to happen.

So yeah, Dento gets angry over seeing this and convinces her to have a real battle. One tasting time and a lecture later, Dento still ends up loosing, just like was predicted. The battle was good, but there was too much talking…and it was too one-sided. Pansage didn’t do anything, Crustle did too much and then died too easily, and Stunfisk should have thundershocked instead of wasting time with Mud Bombs at the end. Plus I highly doubt the fact that her flying Pokemon was just able to shrug off the second Rock Wrecker like that. Bleh…anyway, Satoshi follows in Dento’s footsteps, and tries one last time to convince the leader to battle properly.

Double Battle! Pikachu & Krokorok VS Scolipede and Siesmitoad!
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Afro, GO! Bouffalant, NO! 

Alright, Episode 67. My first thoughts were something along the lines of “what is this?” It felt like I was watching completly different characters. Satoshi took the leading role here, as a mentor to a young child who saved Pikachu. He taught the child and his friends what it means to be a proper Pokemon trainer, and how to properly love your Pokemon. It really didn’t feel I was watching the proper Satoshi, more like a Satoshi who’d grown up a year or two. As much as I hate to admit it, he was actually slightly cool in this episode instead of just being the usual bratty child he is. I’m not really sure if I like the idea of him having yet another Pokemon to add to his growing team which doesn’t get enough attention as it is, but Krokorok did have a large amount of development. Lets just see how it goes. >>

Following on with Episode 68, I always thought that the afro Pokemon looked ridiculous. So I guess it’s only fitting that they got a equally ridiculous episode, and I mean…a really ridiculous episode. Probably borderline stupid, when I think about it.Being trapped in their habitat, the only way they can escape without any problems is to wear afro wigs. It was amusing to see the hirachy among the Pokemon everyone’s caught, but the rest of it felt like a filler. Not a bad filler, but a filler, nontheless.The preview looks good, though.

Also; just a note of mine. Aren’t they at the 6th gym? Going at this pace, Best Wishes will end at Episode 100 at the latest.They normally start ending when news of the new game or new region’s been announced…it couldn’t be that they’re doing a Battle Frontier styled thing again, could it? Or maybe a tie-in with Pokemon Grey?

Joltik, Galvantula! Chargestone Cave!!
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Trade Evolution! Escavalier & Accelgor!!
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The Black Hero’s Ruins! Sigiliyph and Cofagrigus!!

Alex: Alright, first things first. Let’s start with Episode 64~ That said, the first thing i’m wondering…is Jessie’s Woobat really that strong? >> That’s pretty much implying that her Woobat single handedly took on all the Joltik and Galvantula in the cave, and Belle’s Mincinno is able to take on two Galvantula but not any more or any less.

It was just fell of inconsistancies if you think of it like that, but putting that aside, it was a fun episode, and rather engaging too. Team Rocket had only just recently been defeated, but it was great to see them back in action.They constantly steal the show now that they’re proper badguys, and it’s always enjoyable to see them in action.On the downside, the running gag about Belle knocking Satoshi into water all the time is getting a tad old, but it’s funny how they manage to get ridiculous scenarios every time.

Continuing on with Episode 65, I wasn’t actually that thrilled to see an episode dedicated entirely to evolving some Pokemon. Turns out that it was also about getting in sync with their new Pokemon, especially since Belle’s new one really didn’t seem to like her. But even so, the best part of it was to see Araragi and Dento get serious at battling again. Both of them dominated the tag match, and i’d love to see more of them. Judging from future episodes, it looks like Dento challanges one of the Pokemon gyms, so that should give me the episode I want.

Episode 66 shows the appearance of Araragi’s father, a researcher who researches legendary Pokemon, otherwise known as Zekrom and Reshiram. As you might guess from the episode title, he’s stumbled across some ruins belonging to Zekrom and Zekrom’s “hero”, who’s N from the games.After the fun-filled toungue in cheek traps through the ruins, they reach the room with the Dark Stone, yet go no further due to fear of a huge trap or ancient danger…and get attacked by the guardian Pokemon Sigiliyph and Cofagrigus for intruding on the ruins. Makes me think that there’s some awesome secret to that Dark Stone which the heroes completly missed. Or..not. Considering that the researcher took it with him even though he knew it would be a huge trap and anger all the Pokemon. A fun, enjoyable and slightly different episode was pretty much just what the series wanted, and even though the story here wasn’t as good as it could have been, it was still pretty solid. I do, however, have a complaint with their new habit of making a cliffhanger out of everything.

Underground Gym Battle! VS Clay!!

Alex: It always was time for another gym battle, and this episode didn’t disappoint nor promise anything exciting. It was very much your standard gym battle, with Clay testing Satoshi’s skills before bringing out the big guns to end the battle.

Clay was a better gym leader than perhaps, say, Elesa, but that doesn’t mean that I feel satisfied by this conclusion. Satoshi won because his living rock evolved and was able to fight on par with Excadrill, and even though he used strategy in some of the battles, it still felt rather incomplete. I’d rather have seen this spread into the start of next episode so that the battle could reach justice.

Anyway, Belle returns in the next episode, so this’ll be good…

Swift Hero Acelgor VS Cryogonal Man!!
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Dento and Poddo, The Brothers Battle! Pansear VS Pansage!!
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Tornadus VS Thundurus VS Landorus!! (Part One) 
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 Tornadus VS Thundurus VS Landorus!! (Part Two) 

Alex: Alright, let’s start with Episode 59, the one about the hero A-Glider and the criminal group of ice-cream loving Pokemon.It was mostly a comedy episode, and it worked. It was just so stupidly cheesy that anyone would enjoy it.I’m starting to wonder if it was just a spoof on some of the earlier episodes against the stupid and moronic Team Rocket, what with the over the top costumes, stupidly over the top plot and over-acting villains with a weird plan to rule the world.It was funny and a good way to spend twenty minutes, so no complaints there.

Next up, Episode 60, where Poddo comes looking for Dento for a battle to find out which brother’s the strongest. It’s been a while since we had a proper Taste Testing time. It’s just a shame that Dento’s so skilled, since the battle was over in seconds. However, underneath his reasoning for wanting to fight Dento lies some rather messy family trouble between the three brothers, as Poddo’s feeling that as the one who’s always loosing, he’s the weakest link and he shouldn’t be running a gym if he’s loosing all the time. It’s a rather touching episode of brotherly love and respect, and it was a great Dento episode. It was probably one of the better episodes of Best Wishes, if i’m to be honest :L

Finishing up this post comes the long awaited Team Rocket duel parter, where they’ve awoken the genies, Tornelos, Voltolos and Landlos by destroying their sacred shrines.Ultimatly, their subway plot seemed rather unabitious, so going for Legendary Pokemon is much more “evil gang”. Excited? Very. The story about them is pretty much what you’d expect; with the gods angered, the soil(Landlos) and the sky (Voltolos and Tornelos) are in termoil, with flowers and plants withering due to the poor soil, and the lack of rain coming onto the island.Apparantly it’s really unusual for the island, and a rather rare occurance. When the legendary Pokemon appears in front of everyone with a fury capable of trashing the island, it’s clear that it’s become angry over something…and they managed to capture the power of a legendary Pokemon perfectly.In terms of the first episode, i’m full of nothing but compliments and praise for it. They took it seriously and created a great sense of tension, and i’d go as far as to say that it was some really amazing build-up.They even managed to create some great fight scenes between the two genies and our heroes, as they were utterly overpowerd and thrashed.It was all going so well that during the first episode, my only concern was how they were planning to tie Team Rocket into this. Turmoil and strife is all well and good, but when it’s not for anything, it’s kinda like being evil for the sake of being evil. With Part 1 ending at the summoning of Landlos, the only Pokemon capable of stopping the fight, my concerns carried across onto Part 2.
Thankfully, they didn’t try to overcomplicate things, and settled on Rocket Gang just kidnapping the Pokemon to use their power for themselves. And…they won this time. They captured the three Pokemon and made a perfect escape where nobody could do anything about it…until their horrible design flaw was overlooked by escaping through a normal helicopter. Facepalm. Why is it that the evil geniuses always fail when it comes to the escaping part…Team Rocket had everything nailed 99% and there was no way that they could lose if they’d done something sensible like put the containers on a truck or even got Pokemon to carry them. They lost because they forgot that helicopters are really weak…>_>

But, that doesn’t stop it from being an astounding pair of episodes, and possibly the best episodes in Best Wishes so far. It’s for episodes like these that I keep watching this series, you know…