Episode Stats:

Japanese Episode AG 050: "Pokemon Kontesuto - Hajitsuge Taikai!!"

("Pokemon Contest - The Hajitsuge Convention!!")

American Episode 322: "Pros and Con Artists"
Orchid-Hakase Pokemon Lecture:  Mantain
Japanese Air Date:  November 6th, 2003
American Air Date:  October 30th, 2004
Important Characters:  Grace (Grace)

Satoshi-tachi have arrived in Hajitsuge Town!  When the gang arrives at the town's Contest Hall, Haruka meets a Charem trainer named Grace.  Grace already has three Contest ribbons, making Haruka feel doubt toward her chances of winning the Contest.  Grace cheers Haruka up, however, by giving her advice for the upcoming competition.  Afterwards, Haruka decides to train her Agehanto to use combination attacks, but becomes discouraged when they don't work.  Suddenly, Haruka's rival Shuu appears!  Shuu will be entering this Contest, and he tells Haruka that a Coordinator like her has no chance of winning.  As Haruka trains harder, desperate to prove Shuu wrong, the Rocket-Dan are selling fake Polocks elsewhere in the town.  Back at the Contest Hall, Shuu approaches Satoshi and challenges him to a battle.  Shuu's Roselia defeats Satoshi's Subame despite the type disadvantage, all while Haruka watches.  The young Coordinator gets some more advice from Shuu before he heads off to prepare for tomorrow's Contest.  Later, Grace comes across the Rocket-Dan's Polock stand and exposes their scam before sending them blasting off with her Charem.  Soon, the day of the Hajitsuge Convention arrives!  Can Haruka beat the odds and pull through with a victory?  To be continued!

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Thoughts
I thought that this was an OK episode.  It wasn't great, but it wasn't terrible either.  Grace was an amusing enough Coordinator, and the Rocket-Dan's scheme was pretty hilarious as well.  "Low-Key Sonansu" will remain one of my favorite Sonansu disguises ever.

The dubbed version has quite a few edits, including what I think may be the series' first tobacco edit ever.  I think it's a bit odd that the censors had a problem with an unlit pipe, but I'm not surprised that it was edited at all.  I do wish, however, that 4Kids would play the theme music for the Pokemon Contests at least once before the series is over.  The music, which plays whenever you enter a Contest Hall in the games, is used throughout the Japanese version of the anime, yet for some reason 4Kids never lets us hear it.  If

Cut--2 seconds
About two seconds were trimmed from the opening shot of the episode.

Paint Edit
During Takeshi's fantasy sequence, the wine glasses Takeshi has set out for himself and Grace are painted to look more like cylindrical glasses.

Since it's kind of hard to see, I've included a full-sized image of the scene for you guys.

Dialogue Edit
4Kids changes a good portion of Nyasu's sales pitch in the alley.

In the dub, Meowth talks about the five c's:  "cuteness, cleverness, confidence, classiness, and courage."  However, the Japanese version states the five attributes as being cute, smart, cool, beauty, and toughness.  In other words, Nyasu is listing off the five different Pokemon Contest types.

The other two attributes that Meowth talks about are "coolness" and "charis-magnetism."  In the Japanese version, however, the two attributes are being low-key (silver) and sexy (gold).  Because of this, this line from Meowth had to be changed:

Meowth:  "Increased charis-magnetism needs a silver block.  Some side effects may include enlarged lips and a desire to kiss things."

Originally, Nyasu says that the silver Polock will increase a pokemon's sexiness.

So really, Sonansu is supposed to represent being low-key when it eats a silver Polock, while Sabonea is supposed to represent being sexy when it eats a gold Polock (off-screen) in the second half of the episode.

Paint Edit
When Sonansu eats the silver Polock, it has a pipe in its mouth.  4Kids erases this prop in an effort to stop underage smoking.  Or something.

You can see other images (including a larger version of the image above) on this page.

Dialogue Edit
The part right before the commercial break is a little different:

Drew:  "I get it.  You're afraid, huh?"
Ash:  "No!  I'm not afraid of anything!  And, I'd never back down from you or anybody else!"

Originally, Satoshi tells Shuu that the reason he doesn't participate in Pokemon Contests is because he's on a journey for Gym Badges, and that the gang is on the way toward Fuen Town and its Gym.  For some reason, Ash doesn't mention any of that in the dub.

Paint Edit
Sonansu's pipe is erased again during the Rocket-Dan scene in the second half of the episode.

More images can be found here.

Cut--3 seconds
Three seconds are cut after Kids' WB!'s final commercial break.

And did anyone else roll their eyes when the narrator ended the episode with that merciless barrage of puns? 

Cut--2 seconds
Two seconds are cut from the TO BE CONTINUED... screen.

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