Episode Stats:

Japanese Episode 003:  "I Got a Pokemon!"
American Episode 103:  "Ash Catches A Pokémon"
Pokemon Dare Da?  Caterpie
Japanese Air Date:   April 15th, 1997
American Air Date:  September 8th, 1998
Important Places:  Tokiwa Forest (Viridian Forest)

Deep in the Tokiwa Forest, Satoshi throws a Monster Ball at a wild Caterpie and captures it!  The young trainer rejoices over his very first capture and sees this as his first step to becoming a Pokemon Master.  Kasumi is less than thrilled, revealing that she hates bug pokemon, causing Satoshi to start taunting her.  That night, Caterpie and Pikachu chat under the moonlight, and Pikachu discovers that Caterpie dreams of evolving into a Butterfree someday.  The next day, Satoshi comes across a Pigeon and decides to capture it, so he sends his Caterpie out to weaken it.  The bird pokemon makes quick work of Caterpie, so Satoshi ends the battle by having his Pikachu use Thunderbolt.  After capturing the Pigeon, Satoshi is scolded by Kasumi for putting his pokemon in danger.  Suddenly, the Rocket-Dan appear in the forest!  Musashi, Kojirou, and Nyasu reveal that they are after Satoshi's Pikachu because of the immense power it had displayed earlier.  They send their pokemon out to battle and quickly disable Pikachu, prompting Satoshi to send his Pigeon out to do battle.  The flying-type pokemon is unable to fend off Musashi's Arbo and Kojirou's Dogasu at the same time, so the young trainer brings out his Caterpie to do battle.  Despite its fatigue from its earlier battle, the pokemon is able to defeat the Rocket-Dan by using String Shot to mummify all the pokemon.  As Satoshi celebrates his first battle victory, Caterpie begins its evolution into Transell!  The trainer from Masara Town continues through the Tokiwa Forest, eagerly waiting to see what pokemon he'll run across next.

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Thoughts
This is the last of the three-episode beginning of the series, and I think it's pretty decent, all things considered.  Satoshi captures two pokemon in one episode (something I don't think he'll ever repeat) and sees one of them evolve in the very same episode.  We also see the beginning of the Rocket-Dan's goofy side, something that will only become more and more prominent as we progress through the series.  The animation is horribly off-model, but everything else about it is classic old-school Kanto.

The dub is decent enough.  I'm surprised they didn't shorten that scene with Pikachu and Caterpie because it's so nonsensical and goes absolutely nowhere, but I guess they couldn't be bothered to remove it.  Other than that, there's really not that much to talk about on the dub side.

Caterpie and Pigeon keep their Japanese voices.

Dialogue Edit
I really like this line in the Japanese version, but it had to be changed for the English dub for obvious reasons.  The "Heaven" being referred to here is Caterpie's comfortable Monster Ball:

Japanese Version	English Version
Satoshi:  "My pokemon's Heaven is also my Heaven!"	Ash:  "I love my new little pokémon!"
Kasumi:  "You guys' Heaven is my Hell."	Misty:  "I guess it takes a work to love a worm."
Satoshi:  "OK, OK, I get it."	Ash:  "Very funny."

You can't really mention quasi-religious stuff like Heaven and Hell in a kids' show on American TV, so 4Kids rewrote it.

Paint Edit
After the moon scene (a scene I'm sure made many a parent go "So this is what pok-AY-man's all about?"), Kasumi yells at Caterpie, telling it that it should stay in its Monster Ball since it's a pokemon.  After that, we get this shot:

Click on each image for a larger version.

The symbols behind Caterpie, ga~n, is a Japanese onomatopoeia for "big, horrible revelation."  And yes, there' s an onomatopoeia for something like that in Japanese.

Cut--1 second
Right after Ash's "I am the greatest!" line after capturing Pidgeotto, there's a cut made to the English version.  In the Japanese version, Kasumi slaps Satoshi across the face for his putting his pokemon in danger needlessly.  The slap is cut for the dub, but you can still hear the last half-second of the strike in the next shot if you listen closely.

I think this is the last time Kasumi slaps Satoshi, so I don't think we'll be seeing too many more edits like this one.

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