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| Episode Comparisons | Orange Islands
Episode
Stats:
Japanese Episode 104: "Pikachu vs. Nyarth!?"
American Episode 248: "Bound For Trouble"
Pokémon Dare Da? Pigeot (Japanese), Charizard (English)
Dr. Ookido's Pokémon Course: Pocket Monsters The Movie "Revelation Lugia" Special Feature
Japanese Air Date: July 15th, 1999
American Air Date: September 15th, 2000
Thoughts
Whenever I think of the episode "Pikachu vs. Nyarth!?" the first thing that pops into my mind is just how fantastic the whole thing looks. This episode's animated by the superstar duo of storyboard artist Yuuji Asada and animation director Masaaki Iwane and, as usual, they do an absolutely amazing job here. There was an interview Mr. Iwane did for Animage magazine back in 2015 I want to quote from here because I think it's a great place to start when talking about the look of this episode:
Once scene that illustrates this very well occurs in this episode, when Pikachu shocks the giant Pigeot as it's starting to carry them off toward its nest. Now the animation of the scene itself is actually quite limited -- it really just boils down to a slide show of key frames lasting a few seconds each -- and yet somehow Mr. Iwane is able to imbue each drawing with this incredible sense of movement regardless.
We see a similar mastery in action during all the scenes in this episode where characters slam into one another. Mr. Iwane lingers on the actual impact frames themselves just long enough to give a certain weight and snappiness to the action, while also still being conservative with his overall drawing count. In the hands of a lesser animator scenes like these would look cheap and jerky, and yet when Mr. Iwane's at the drawing board the whole thing just kind of works.
On the story end of things the episode's a bit of a mixed bag for me. On the one hand, I actually like how Pikachu is allowed to be mean to Nyarth throughout the episode, especially given how much the show's been working to de-fang the characters ever since it started to become an international hit. Pikachu spends the majority of the episode bossing Nyarth around and controlling him through fear of violence, and to be honest it's actually kind of refreshing...? We would never see Satoshi's Pikachu electrocute Nyarth of its own volition if they were still making new episodes with the characters today and yet, this early in the show's run, it's still very much possible. It reminds me a lot of Episode 016 "The Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of Pokémon," and that scene where Pikachu is visibly upset to learn that Nyarth didn't drown to death. Satoshi's partner Pokémon absolutely loathes Nyarth, and it's nice to remember a time when it was allowed to have such open contempt for the show's villains.
While Pikachu not liking Nyarth is an established part of its character, Musashi and Kojirou also not liking Nyarth is, well, not. And that's the part of this episode I like the least. Episodes like "Nyarth's ABCs" and "Lord Nyarth's Island!?" show us just how much the talking Pokémon means to Musashi and Kojirou, and yet in this episode it seems like they actively despise their talking companion. It's like oh, we're going to act completely uninterested when we're searching for Nyarth, and then when we do find him we'll act like we don't care about him at all, because that's supposed to be funny or whatever. A large part of the blame for all this goes to writer Yukiyoshi Ohashi, who for some reason loves, loves, loves writing the Rocket-Dan as this trio of co-workers who can barely stand being around each other instead of the group of lifelong friends we know them to be. It's a shame because the duo being so out-of-character in this is an unfortunate stain on an otherwise fantastic episode.
When Kids' WB! got to this part of the series they decided that playing the show in order was for chumps, apparently, because a lot of these later Orange Islands episodes ended up premiering out of order. Kids' WB! first showed this episode, for example, after the fourth Orange Islands Gym when that's obviously not at all where it's supposed to go in the rotation. I'm not sure why they decided to play so fast and loose with the episode order now when they had been pretty decent about playing this serialized show in order up to this point, and the order will be fixed when the show's eventually released on DVD anyway, but it's still very odd that it even happened in the first place.
Apparently there were certain airings of this episode in Japan that replaced the ending theme, Type: Wild, with Pokémon Ondo. All of the versions of this episode I've been able to find online (Hulu, Amazon Prime) use Type: Wild so maybe it was only in the first airing...?
The giant Pigeot keeps its Japanese voice, though there are a few times in the episode where 4Kids mutes the final syllable of its cry ("Pijot-to") to make it sound closer to the English pronunciation "Pidgeot" than the Japanese pronunciation "Pijotto." They aren't really consistent with it, though; there are still plenty of times where "Pigeot" can be heard saying "Pijot-to," clear as day. The giant Saidon also keeps its Japanese voice.
Dialogue Edit
The first change of the episode is, you guessed it, in the opening narration:
The English version simply cannot wait to tell us the gimmick of this week's island while the Japanese original isn't so quick to jump the gun.
Also, random fact: The Memorial Book of Orange Islands, a guide book to the series released toward the end of 1999, refers to the island this episode takes place on is referred as DekaPoké island (デカポケ島), or "Huge Poké Island." The name is never stated in the actual episode itself so whether or not this "counts" is entirely up to how much you trust this guide book as a source of information.
Our heroes find a fruit basket in the middle of the road:
The spirit of this exchange is intact but there are still differences here and there, mostly in regards to the boys' dialogue.
Our heroes fall for the Rocket trio's ploy:
Kasumi actually apologizes in the original (in the most Kasumi-like fashion, anyway) while Misty is just flat-out mean to Ash.
I also wonder what's up with Jessie's line here because it seems like it's missing a few words in the middle there. Shouldn't it be "We knew you'd suspect something was up if we left that basket in the road...," or "We knew you'd be suspicious if we left that basket in the road...," or something like that? Why does it read like two clauses were recorded separately and then hastily pasted together in post?
Meowth explains their newest weapon:
The general idea of "these gloves repel electricity" is left intact but literally everything else about Meowth's explanation is a rewrite. If you're wondering about Nyarth's claim that these are made of rubber, the design sheets for this episode clarifies that it's the black part in the middle that's made of rubber:
The Rocket trio lets Pikachu know the predicament it's in:
4Kids never got around to creating a consistent equivalent to ii kanji (their "translation" changes every time the phrase appears) and, well, it doesn't seem like they're going to be starting anytime soon! And so to avoid having to settle on anything they just rewrote this whole exchange and then had it end with the Rocket trio cackling instead.
Meowth and Pikachu have trouble walking around the forest:
The main theme of Pokémon is communication -- both in the real world and in the world of this TV show -- and so the English version of the Pokémon TV show randomly removing Nyarth's question about communication here is a very odd choice!
It's also odd to hear Meowth say the word "kill" in the English dub of this show, especially when there was nothing even remotely close to that in the original.
Meowth decides to play nice:
This isn't the first time we've seen the show more or less confirm Pikachu's gender (that would be way back in Episode 017) and yet 4Kids still doesn't want to explicitly reveal this information about the show's mascot, for some reason.
After Ash fails to find Pikachu in the giant Pidgeot's nest, Tracey and Misty worry about their friend:
Misty's little history lesson here is all 4Kids; in the original Kasumi simply talks about how much Satoshi and Pikachu need each other. Her dialogue toward her own partner Pokémon, meanwhile, is also completely different.
Eyecatch
A giant Pokémon from this episode gets replaced with the star of next week's episode:
They're both large Pokémon so I guess they're sorta-kinda related...?
Sound Effects Edit
The second half of the episode has an abnormally large number of changes made to the sound effects used in certain scenes.
The first of these occurs when Pikachu and Meowth are running away from the giant Rhydon. In the original version of the shot pictured below, we can hear two sounds: 1) the "boing" of the bungee-like cable snapping and 2) the sound of Pikachu and Nyarth slamming into each other. This happens two times in this shot. The first time around the sound effects are exactly the same in both versions, but the second time around 4Kids mutes the sound of Pikachu and Nyarth hitting each other, leaving only the sound of the bungee cord intact.
The volume of the CLANG sound made during the full screen impact stars that show up when Pikachu and Nyarth are hit by Saidon is greatly reduced for the dub, just like it was in the last episode.
Similarly, the
sounds of Pikachu and Nyarth bouncing along on the ground have their
volume greatly reduced.
Same with Nyarth slamming Pikachu off a cliff...
And Pikachu and Nyarth hitting the ground.
It's tempting to simply write all these off as bad sound mixing and call it a day, but the fact that literally every other sound effect is left intact while only the sounds of these characters hitting each other / the ground are altered tells me this is some attempt to soften the violence being shown on screen. But even that explanation isn't altogether satisfactory; these scenes aren't all that "violent," and we see worse stuff in this very episode of Pokémon (much less the rest of the Kids' WB! lineup) that's left untouched. So why these scenes in this episode, specifically?
Dialogue Edit
Pikachu and Meowth vs. Rhydon:
This isn't a dialogue edit per se, I'm just bringing this up to highlight how Nyarth's "tickling attack" isn't the same thing as the "Tickle" attack that would eventually be introduced in the Generation 3 Pocket Monsters games. Here, the "attack" Nyarth uses in the TV show is kusuguri (くす ぐり) while the attack in the games is kusuguru (くす ぐる).
Meowth celebrates their win:
Y'know, Meowth's little play on words about Rhydon keeping "its big mouth shut" would have worked a whole lot better if this particular Rhydon was ever shown to be a chatterbox, or boastful, or annoying, or pretty much any other personality trait that could be used to set up such a joke. But it doesn't, and so they really should have just translated Nyarth's dialogue as-is.
Music Edit
I haven't brought this up in this comparison yet, but this episode has a lot of 4Kids filler music in it. You remember how I had this whole section of my comparison for "The Mandarin Island Miss Match" where I talked about how replacing silence with music is just as much of a change to the overall sound of an episode as replacing one piece of music with another? Well, this episode is a(nother) great example of what I'm talking about.
The total runtime for this episode is 20 minutes 15 seconds. There are six pieces of Miyazaki / Tanaka music that got replaced in this episode, and when you add their runtimes all together (yes, I actually did the math) it comes to a combined total of 2 minutes 57 seconds. Not terrible, right? But then also, you have to take into account the number of scenes where there's no background music playing whatsoever, since 4Kids changes all those as well. The total runtime for those scenes comes to 9 minutes 17 seconds. So, 2 minutes 57 seconds of dub music replacing Japanese music + 9 minutes 17 seconds of dub music filling in moments without any background music = 12 minutes 14 seconds of 4Kids dub music. That works out to about 60.4% of this episode being scored by John Loeffler and Manny Corallo.
That's actually a lot.
The music editing in the dub is also kind of sloppy at parts. There's this one scene (pictured below) where Ash is sliding down a hill that 4Kids decides to put one of their "serious" pieces of music over, but I guess they didn't bother to calculate things right or whatever because the music just kind of abruptly cuts off as soon as the scene switches over to the shot of the Rocket trio's balloon. Usually when the music jerks around like this it's because the dub removed some footage but then didn't bother to re-edit the music to cover that up, but that's not what's going on this time. It's just that the music editors didn't pick a piece of music of the correct length to go over the scene.
There's also that part in the second half where Pikachu and Nyarth enjoy an apple together. In the original we get an instrumental of Nyarth no Uta, the second ending theme to the animated series as well as a song whose melody was left intact in the episode "Go West, Young Meowth" from earlier in the season. Fans of the English dub would have been able to recognize that song but 4Kids said nope, we're going to play an instrumental of one of our other songs instead, but then also the song we pick isn't going to be the correct length either and so we're just going to have it fade out awkwardly halfway through and hope nobody notices.
Yes the TPCi dub generally fares a lot worse when it comes to the background music department, but that in no way means that the 4Kids dub wasn't also pulling some nonsense back in its day either.
Dialogue Edit
In the original version of the scene where Pikachu and Nyarth wake up, we can hear Pigeot's cry from off screen. The English dub mutes this sound for some reason, making it so Pikachu and Meowth react to...nothing.
Our heroes team up with our villains to take down the giant Pokémon:
If you've ever wondered why Arbok just kind of slams its body into the giant Pidgeot after Jessie orders it to use "Bite" then, well, here's your answer!
Meowth reunites with his teammates:
The English dub taking what the Japanese version says and dumbing it down so much that even a toddler can understand is nothing new, of course, but for some reason this example here strikes me as particularly egregious.
Sound Effects Edit
The volume of the sound of the ball hitting Kojirou's head is reduced significantly for the English dub.
It's wild to me that this gets a slight tweak while the very loud CRUNCH sound of Arbok biting into Pidgeot from earlier in this battle got to be left as-is.
Dialogue Edit
Jessie vs. Ash:
Something I didn't know about this episode before sitting down to do this comparison is that literally 100% of the commands Jessie calls out in this battle are completely rewritten, for some reason!
Sound Effect Edit
More sound effects edits! The sound of Utsubot chomping down on Arbok gets altered.
The same edit happens again a few seconds later when the Pokémon's sent flying into its Trainer. The sound of Arbok slamming against Musashi is softened as well.
As with all the others the sound effects are technically still there, it's just that the volume's been turned down so low you probably wouldn't realize it was there if you weren't listening for it. I'm not sure what it was about this episode, in particular, that made the sound editors leap into action here but hopefully this isn't something we'll be seeing a lot more of in the future.
Dialogue Edit
After the Rocket trio's sent blasting off again:
4Kids actually removes Satoshi's line, for some reason! Were the sound engineers who worked on this episode so in the zone when it came to muting all those sound effects they got a bit overzealous and accidentally muted this one line of dialogue as well?
The narrator sums things up:
The 4Kids dub has let it be known that it is physically incapable of not rewriting like 70% of the narrator's dialogue in this show. But here, they take things to a new level by having Rodger Parsons use the first person personal pronoun "I" in his little speech here. So what, is the narrator an actual person now? Is the narrator not just a literary device employed by the show to help open and close each episode, but is actually supposed to be some omnipotent being who exists in-universe, dutifully watching over the adventures of these children week to week? The implications this has are absolutely chilling.
The Rocket trio land near an apple tree:
I think the "joke" here is supposed to be that James doesn't know that "famished" and "hungry" mean the same thing? But also that maybe he does? Is this supposed to be funny?
This page was last updated on May 6th, 2024
Japanese Episode 104: "Pikachu vs. Nyarth!?"
American Episode 248: "Bound For Trouble"
Pokémon Dare Da? Pigeot (Japanese), Charizard (English)
Dr. Ookido's Pokémon Course: Pocket Monsters The Movie "Revelation Lugia" Special Feature
Japanese Air Date: July 15th, 1999
American Air Date: September 15th, 2000
A suspicious
fruit basket placed in the middle of the road tricks Satoshi and his
friends into walking right into one of the Rocket trio’s pitfall traps!
Satoshi’s Pikachu is quickly apprehended and fitted with a special belt
that ties the Electric-Type to the Rocket trio’s Nyarth, preventing it
from escaping. The villainous trio starts to make a run for it when an
oversized Pigeot flies in out of nowhere and grabs both Pikachu and
Nyarth! The two enemies manage to escape their captor but are now
separated from their respective groups, all while still being tethered
to each other! As the human Trainers search for their companions
Pikachu and Nyarth find themselves constantly bickering. All that
starts to change when they come face to face with a giant Saidon.
Pikachu and Nyarth put aside their differences and work together to
bring down the rocky giant, showing the duo that maybe they can make
this whole thing work after all. After the two Pokémon share a
meal and spend a peaceful night sleeping under the stars they’re
eventually reunited with their respective groups. Musashi and Kojirou
have no intention of handing over Pikachu and so Satoshi, with the help
of his Pokémon, swipes the key to the belts from Musashi and
unlocks the two Pokémon. A powerful attack from Togepy (!?!?)
sends the Rocket trio blasting off, allowing Pikachu to rejoin its
Trainer on his journey through the Orange Islands. Meanwhile, Nyarth is
actually starting to miss being with Pikachu…
Thoughts
Whenever I think of the episode "Pikachu vs. Nyarth!?" the first thing that pops into my mind is just how fantastic the whole thing looks. This episode's animated by the superstar duo of storyboard artist Yuuji Asada and animation director Masaaki Iwane and, as usual, they do an absolutely amazing job here. There was an interview Mr. Iwane did for Animage magazine back in 2015 I want to quote from here because I think it's a great place to start when talking about the look of this episode:
| Let's go back to talking about the number of drawings. When we were doing a separate interview for Pokémon, OLM said that "The episodes that Mr. Iwane works on might look like they use more drawings than the others but that's not the case. But because his action cuts are big and flashy, it looks like they're moving more than they actually are." |
Once scene that illustrates this very well occurs in this episode, when Pikachu shocks the giant Pigeot as it's starting to carry them off toward its nest. Now the animation of the scene itself is actually quite limited -- it really just boils down to a slide show of key frames lasting a few seconds each -- and yet somehow Mr. Iwane is able to imbue each drawing with this incredible sense of movement regardless.
 |
 |
We see a similar mastery in action during all the scenes in this episode where characters slam into one another. Mr. Iwane lingers on the actual impact frames themselves just long enough to give a certain weight and snappiness to the action, while also still being conservative with his overall drawing count. In the hands of a lesser animator scenes like these would look cheap and jerky, and yet when Mr. Iwane's at the drawing board the whole thing just kind of works.
On the story end of things the episode's a bit of a mixed bag for me. On the one hand, I actually like how Pikachu is allowed to be mean to Nyarth throughout the episode, especially given how much the show's been working to de-fang the characters ever since it started to become an international hit. Pikachu spends the majority of the episode bossing Nyarth around and controlling him through fear of violence, and to be honest it's actually kind of refreshing...? We would never see Satoshi's Pikachu electrocute Nyarth of its own volition if they were still making new episodes with the characters today and yet, this early in the show's run, it's still very much possible. It reminds me a lot of Episode 016 "The Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of Pokémon," and that scene where Pikachu is visibly upset to learn that Nyarth didn't drown to death. Satoshi's partner Pokémon absolutely loathes Nyarth, and it's nice to remember a time when it was allowed to have such open contempt for the show's villains.
While Pikachu not liking Nyarth is an established part of its character, Musashi and Kojirou also not liking Nyarth is, well, not. And that's the part of this episode I like the least. Episodes like "Nyarth's ABCs" and "Lord Nyarth's Island!?" show us just how much the talking Pokémon means to Musashi and Kojirou, and yet in this episode it seems like they actively despise their talking companion. It's like oh, we're going to act completely uninterested when we're searching for Nyarth, and then when we do find him we'll act like we don't care about him at all, because that's supposed to be funny or whatever. A large part of the blame for all this goes to writer Yukiyoshi Ohashi, who for some reason loves, loves, loves writing the Rocket-Dan as this trio of co-workers who can barely stand being around each other instead of the group of lifelong friends we know them to be. It's a shame because the duo being so out-of-character in this is an unfortunate stain on an otherwise fantastic episode.
When Kids' WB! got to this part of the series they decided that playing the show in order was for chumps, apparently, because a lot of these later Orange Islands episodes ended up premiering out of order. Kids' WB! first showed this episode, for example, after the fourth Orange Islands Gym when that's obviously not at all where it's supposed to go in the rotation. I'm not sure why they decided to play so fast and loose with the episode order now when they had been pretty decent about playing this serialized show in order up to this point, and the order will be fixed when the show's eventually released on DVD anyway, but it's still very odd that it even happened in the first place.
Apparently there were certain airings of this episode in Japan that replaced the ending theme, Type: Wild, with Pokémon Ondo. All of the versions of this episode I've been able to find online (Hulu, Amazon Prime) use Type: Wild so maybe it was only in the first airing...?
The giant Pigeot keeps its Japanese voice, though there are a few times in the episode where 4Kids mutes the final syllable of its cry ("Pijot-to") to make it sound closer to the English pronunciation "Pidgeot" than the Japanese pronunciation "Pijotto." They aren't really consistent with it, though; there are still plenty of times where "Pigeot" can be heard saying "Pijot-to," clear as day. The giant Saidon also keeps its Japanese voice.
Dialogue Edit
The first change of the episode is, you guessed it, in the opening narration:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ナレーション 「ユズ島で３個目のバッジをゲットしたサトシたちはオレンジリー
グに出場するため旅を続けていた」 |
Narrator: "After getting his
third badge in Yuzu Island, Satoshi and his friends continue their
journey to compete in the Orange League." |
Narrator: "After earning his
third Orange League badge on Trovita Island, Ash and his friends have
stopped off at a place with a reputation for super-sized Pokémon." |
The English version simply cannot wait to tell us the gimmick of this week's island while the Japanese original isn't so quick to jump the gun.
Also, random fact: The Memorial Book of Orange Islands, a guide book to the series released toward the end of 1999, refers to the island this episode takes place on is referred as DekaPoké island (デカポケ島), or "Huge Poké Island." The name is never stated in the actual episode itself so whether or not this "counts" is entirely up to how much you trust this guide book as a source of information.
Our heroes find a fruit basket in the middle of the road:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| カスミ 「よ～く考えてみてよ。こんな所にフルーツの盛り合わせが置いてあるな
んてどこからどう見ても不自然でしょう？」 |
Kasumi: "Think about it. A
fruit basket being left in a place like this...? No matter how you
look at this isn't right." |
Misty: "Don't you think it's
just a little bit suspicious that a basket filled with fruit just
happens to be sitting in the middle of the road waiting for us to come
along and eat it?" |
| サトシ 「でも落っこってんだからさあ。なあピカチュウ」 |
Satoshi: "And yet there it is.
Right, Pikachu?" |
Ash: "Maybe somebody who
doesn't like fruit left it. Right, Pikachu?" |
| ピカチュウ 「ピカピカ」 |
Pikachu: "Pika Pika." |
Pikachu: "Pika Pika." |
| カスミ 「これはきっと何かのワナよ」 |
Kasumi: "I'm telling you, this
has gotta be some kind of trap." |
Misty: "This has to be some
kind of trap." |
| ケンジ 「確かにこれはどう考えても不自然だな」 |
Kenji: "She has a point. There
really isn't anything about this that seems right, is there?" |
Tracey: "It does kind of seem
like some trick Team Rocket would try to play." |
The spirit of this exchange is intact but there are still differences here and there, mostly in regards to the boys' dialogue.
Our heroes fall for the Rocket trio's ploy:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| コジロウ 「アーッハッハーイッ！そっちのリンゴは偽物、本物はこっちだよ～」 |
Kojirou: "Ah~ha hai! That
apple's a fake, the real ones are right here~" |
James: "Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!
You fell for the fake fruit. This is the real stuff." |
| ムサシ 「こっちにおびき寄せるためにわざと不自然にカゴに入ったフルーツの盛
り合わせを道の真ん中に置いといたのよ」 |
Musashi: "We put a fruit
basket in the middle of the road, on purpose, in order to make you
think 'huh, that's not right' and lure you this way." |
Jessie: "We knew you'd suspect
we left that basket in the road so we cleverly used reverse psychology
and dug our little hole right near the apple tree." |
| ニャース 「まんまと引っかかったニャ～」 |
Nyarth: "And you walked right
into our trap Nya!" |
Meowth: "And you fell for it~." |
| サトシ 「だから素直にあのフルーツの盛り合わせを取っておいたほうがよかっ
た…」 |
Satoshi: "See? That's why I
wanted to just go ahead and eat the fruit without ask-..." |
Ash: "We shoulda taken that
fruit basket like I wanted to instead of listening to you." |
| カスミ 「悪かったわね！はいはい。私が悪かったわよー！」 |
Kasumi: "OK OK, I was wrong
(my bad, my bad) I'm admitting it, OK!?" |
Misty: "Forget about the
fruit! (pant pant) Figure out some way to get out of here!" |
Kasumi actually apologizes in the original (in the most Kasumi-like fashion, anyway) while Misty is just flat-out mean to Ash.
I also wonder what's up with Jessie's line here because it seems like it's missing a few words in the middle there. Shouldn't it be "We knew you'd suspect something was up if we left that basket in the road...," or "We knew you'd be suspicious if we left that basket in the road...," or something like that? Why does it read like two clauses were recorded separately and then hastily pasted together in post?
Meowth explains their newest weapon:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ニャース 「説明するニャ。これは電気を通さニャい絶緑体プロテクターだニャ。
ゴムでできてるニャ。もうピカチュウの技は効かないニャー」 |
Nyarth: "It's exposition time
Nya! These things on nyour hands are insulated protectors that block
electricity. They're made of rubber, Nya. That means Pikachu's
attacks won't work on us Nya!" |
Meowth: "This may come as a
big shock to you, Pikachu, but these patent pending devices protect us
from your electric attacks so you might as well save your energy you
little rat." |
The general idea of "these gloves repel electricity" is left intact but literally everything else about Meowth's explanation is a rewrite. If you're wondering about Nyarth's claim that these are made of rubber, the design sheets for this episode clarifies that it's the black part in the middle that's made of rubber:
The Rocket trio lets Pikachu know the predicament it's in:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| コジロウ 「どこまでも一緒だな」 |
Kojirou: "You two are stuck
together." |
James: "You two are stuck
together." |
| ムサシ 「イヤな感じ～って飛ばされても一緒よ」 |
Musashi: "When we're flying
through the air shouting 'this feels bad," you'll be right there with
us." |
Jessie: "From now on wherever
Meowth goes, Pikachu goes." |
| ニャース 「ンニャ これでもう」 |
Nyarth: "And Nya, that makes
us want to say..." |
Meowth: "Like...my shadow." |
| ニャースたち 「いい感じ～！」 |
Rocket Trio: "What a great
feeling~!" |
Rocket Trio: "Ha ha ha ha ha
~!" |
4Kids never got around to creating a consistent equivalent to ii kanji (their "translation" changes every time the phrase appears) and, well, it doesn't seem like they're going to be starting anytime soon! And so to avoid having to settle on anything they just rewrote this whole exchange and then had it end with the Rocket trio cackling instead.
Meowth and Pikachu have trouble walking around the forest:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ニャース 「違うニャ！こっちだニャ！」 |
Nyarth: "Nyot that way! This
way Nya!" |
Meowth: "What are you trying
to do, kill me? I had about enough of you." |
| ピカチュウ 「ピカチュウピカピカ！」 |
Pikachu: "Pikachu Pika Pika!" |
Pikachu: "Pikachu Pika Pika!" |
| ニャース 「こっちったらこっちだニャ」 |
Nyarth: "I'm telling you it's
this way Nya!" |
Meowth: "Now this is the way
we're going and that's that!" |
| ピカチュウ 「ピ～カー…」 |
Pikachu: "Pi~ka~..." |
Pikachu: "Pi~ka~..." |
| ニャース 「マズい！わっ…分かったニャ。そっちに行くニャ」 |
Nyarth: "Nyot that! OK, you
win. I'll go that way Nya." |
Meowth: "OK, OK! We'll try it
your way." |
| The two start walking
side by side |
||
| ニャース 「おミャ～のコミュニケーションは電気しかニャーのか？」 |
Nyarth: "Is electricity the
only form of commu-nya-cation you've got?" |
Meowth: "But I don't see why I
don't get to decide where we go." |
| Pikachu prepares to
launch another electric attack |
||
| ニャース 「わっわ…分かったニャ。十分伝わっているニャ―ッ」 |
Nyarth: "No, that's fine Nya!
You're making yourself understood loud and clear Nya" |
Meowth: "OK, OK, you decide!
I'll go wherever you want to go just don't shock me!" |
The main theme of Pokémon is communication -- both in the real world and in the world of this TV show -- and so the English version of the Pokémon TV show randomly removing Nyarth's question about communication here is a very odd choice!
It's also odd to hear Meowth say the word "kill" in the English dub of this show, especially when there was nothing even remotely close to that in the original.
Meowth decides to play nice:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ニャース 「分かったニャ、ピカチュウ。ニャ―も男だニャ。こうなったらおミャ
～をあのジャリンコボーイたちのところに連れていってやるニャ。さあさあこっちだニャ～」 |
Nyarth: "I've got it, Pikachu
Nya. We're both men, right Nya? So I'll be a buddy and take you to
where those twerps are Nya. Come on, let's go this way Nya~" |
Meowth: "Pikachu, you're the
boss, buddy. And just to prove to you that I want us to be
Pokémon pals I'm gonna lead you right back to those twerpy
little friends of yours, OK? Come on, my Pikamigo." |
This isn't the first time we've seen the show more or less confirm Pikachu's gender (that would be way back in Episode 017) and yet 4Kids still doesn't want to explicitly reveal this information about the show's mascot, for some reason.
After Ash fails to find Pikachu in the giant Pidgeot's nest, Tracey and Misty worry about their friend:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ケンジ 「すごい気合だ。よっぽどピカチュウのことが心配なんだな」 |
Kenji: "He's really going
through it. He's really worried sick about Pikachu." |
Tracey: "This must be hard. I
know how much Ash and Pikachu care about each other." |
| カスミ 「そりゃそうよ。ピカチュウあってのサトシ、サトシあってのピカチュ
ウ。それくらい仲のいいコンビだもの」 |
Kasumi: "You can say that
again. There's no Pikachu without Satoshi, and there's no Satoshi
without Pikachu. That's just how close of a duo they are." |
Misty: "Pikachu's the first
Pokémon Ash ever had and if I know Ash, he'll keep looking till
he finds Pikachu, even if it takes forever." |
| トゲピー 「チョッゲプリィ～」 |
Togepy: "Chogge Purii~" |
Togepi: "Chogge Purii~" |
| カスミ 「トゲピーも心配よね」 |
Kasumi: "You're worried about them too, aren't you Togepy?" | Misty: "And I'd do the same
for Togepi." |
Misty's little history lesson here is all 4Kids; in the original Kasumi simply talks about how much Satoshi and Pikachu need each other. Her dialogue toward her own partner Pokémon, meanwhile, is also completely different.
Eyecatch
A giant Pokémon from this episode gets replaced with the star of next week's episode:
 |
 |
They're both large Pokémon so I guess they're sorta-kinda related...?
Sound Effects Edit
The second half of the episode has an abnormally large number of changes made to the sound effects used in certain scenes.
The first of these occurs when Pikachu and Meowth are running away from the giant Rhydon. In the original version of the shot pictured below, we can hear two sounds: 1) the "boing" of the bungee-like cable snapping and 2) the sound of Pikachu and Nyarth slamming into each other. This happens two times in this shot. The first time around the sound effects are exactly the same in both versions, but the second time around 4Kids mutes the sound of Pikachu and Nyarth hitting each other, leaving only the sound of the bungee cord intact.
The volume of the CLANG sound made during the full screen impact stars that show up when Pikachu and Nyarth are hit by Saidon is greatly reduced for the dub, just like it was in the last episode.
 |
 |
 |
 |
Same with Nyarth slamming Pikachu off a cliff...
And Pikachu and Nyarth hitting the ground.
It's tempting to simply write all these off as bad sound mixing and call it a day, but the fact that literally every other sound effect is left intact while only the sounds of these characters hitting each other / the ground are altered tells me this is some attempt to soften the violence being shown on screen. But even that explanation isn't altogether satisfactory; these scenes aren't all that "violent," and we see worse stuff in this very episode of Pokémon (much less the rest of the Kids' WB! lineup) that's left untouched. So why these scenes in this episode, specifically?
Dialogue Edit
Pikachu and Meowth vs. Rhydon:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ニャース 「くすぐり攻撃だニャ～！コチョコチョコ～チョ！」 |
Nyarth: "I call this my
tickling attack. Coochie coochie coo!" |
Meowth: "I'll try a tickle
attack. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!" |
This isn't a dialogue edit per se, I'm just bringing this up to highlight how Nyarth's "tickling attack" isn't the same thing as the "Tickle" attack that would eventually be introduced in the Generation 3 Pocket Monsters games. Here, the "attack" Nyarth uses in the TV show is kusuguri (くす ぐり) while the attack in the games is kusuguru (くす ぐる).
Meowth celebrates their win:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ニャース 「ピカチュウの電撃の恐ろしさはニャ～が身をもって知っているニャ。
ざまあみろニャ～」 |
Nyarth: "Hurts, doesn't it? I
know from experience how strong Pikachu's electricity is. Serves ya
right Nya~!" |
Meowth: "Now I guess Rhydon
knows it's a lot safer to just keep its big mouth shut! Too bad!" |
| ピカチュウ 「ピカチュウ」 |
Pikachu: "Pikachu." |
Pikachu: "Pikachu." |
| ニャース 「やったニャ」 |
Nyarth: "We did it Nya." |
Meowth: "We did it." |
| ピカチュウ 「ピカア～」 |
Pikachu: "Pikaa~" |
Pikachu: "Pikaa~" |
Y'know, Meowth's little play on words about Rhydon keeping "its big mouth shut" would have worked a whole lot better if this particular Rhydon was ever shown to be a chatterbox, or boastful, or annoying, or pretty much any other personality trait that could be used to set up such a joke. But it doesn't, and so they really should have just translated Nyarth's dialogue as-is.
Music Edit
I haven't brought this up in this comparison yet, but this episode has a lot of 4Kids filler music in it. You remember how I had this whole section of my comparison for "The Mandarin Island Miss Match" where I talked about how replacing silence with music is just as much of a change to the overall sound of an episode as replacing one piece of music with another? Well, this episode is a(nother) great example of what I'm talking about.
 |
 |
The total runtime for this episode is 20 minutes 15 seconds. There are six pieces of Miyazaki / Tanaka music that got replaced in this episode, and when you add their runtimes all together (yes, I actually did the math) it comes to a combined total of 2 minutes 57 seconds. Not terrible, right? But then also, you have to take into account the number of scenes where there's no background music playing whatsoever, since 4Kids changes all those as well. The total runtime for those scenes comes to 9 minutes 17 seconds. So, 2 minutes 57 seconds of dub music replacing Japanese music + 9 minutes 17 seconds of dub music filling in moments without any background music = 12 minutes 14 seconds of 4Kids dub music. That works out to about 60.4% of this episode being scored by John Loeffler and Manny Corallo.
That's actually a lot.
The music editing in the dub is also kind of sloppy at parts. There's this one scene (pictured below) where Ash is sliding down a hill that 4Kids decides to put one of their "serious" pieces of music over, but I guess they didn't bother to calculate things right or whatever because the music just kind of abruptly cuts off as soon as the scene switches over to the shot of the Rocket trio's balloon. Usually when the music jerks around like this it's because the dub removed some footage but then didn't bother to re-edit the music to cover that up, but that's not what's going on this time. It's just that the music editors didn't pick a piece of music of the correct length to go over the scene.
 |
 |
There's also that part in the second half where Pikachu and Nyarth enjoy an apple together. In the original we get an instrumental of Nyarth no Uta, the second ending theme to the animated series as well as a song whose melody was left intact in the episode "Go West, Young Meowth" from earlier in the season. Fans of the English dub would have been able to recognize that song but 4Kids said nope, we're going to play an instrumental of one of our other songs instead, but then also the song we pick isn't going to be the correct length either and so we're just going to have it fade out awkwardly halfway through and hope nobody notices.
Yes the TPCi dub generally fares a lot worse when it comes to the background music department, but that in no way means that the 4Kids dub wasn't also pulling some nonsense back in its day either.
Dialogue Edit
In the original version of the scene where Pikachu and Nyarth wake up, we can hear Pigeot's cry from off screen. The English dub mutes this sound for some reason, making it so Pikachu and Meowth react to...nothing.
 |
 |
Our heroes team up with our villains to take down the giant Pokémon:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ムサシ 「アーボックたいあたりよ！」 |
Musashi: "Arbok, use Tackle!" |
Jessie: "Arbok, use Bite
attack now!" |
If you've ever wondered why Arbok just kind of slams its body into the giant Pidgeot after Jessie orders it to use "Bite" then, well, here's your answer!
Meowth reunites with his teammates:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ニャース 「ニャ～を捜して大変だったろうニャ。よく見つけてくれたニャ」 |
Nyarth: "I'll bet it was
really hard out there searching for me Nya. But look, you found me Nya." |
Meowth: "Thanks a lot for
coming to find me. For a while there I thought you didn't care about
me." |
| ムサシ 「サイドンを追ってたらたまたまニャースにくっついてるピカチュウを見
つけたのよ」 |
Musashi: "Well all we had to
do was follow that Saidon's trail and every now and then we'd find the
Pikachu attached to you." |
Jessie: "We were really trying
to catch that Pikachu and you
were just part of the package, Meowth." |
| コジロウ 「そう、ピカチュウをな」 |
Kojirou: "Yup, the Pikachu." |
James: "Sorry to burst your
bubble." |
| ニャース 「そりゃニャいニャ」 |
Nyarth: "You've got to be
joking Nya..." |
Meowth: "The painful truth." |
The English dub taking what the Japanese version says and dumbing it down so much that even a toddler can understand is nothing new, of course, but for some reason this example here strikes me as particularly egregious.
Sound Effects Edit
The volume of the sound of the ball hitting Kojirou's head is reduced significantly for the English dub.
It's wild to me that this gets a slight tweak while the very loud CRUNCH sound of Arbok biting into Pidgeot from earlier in this battle got to be left as-is.
Dialogue Edit
Jessie vs. Ash:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ムサシ 「やれ！アーボック」 |
Musashi: "Go get 'em Arbok!" |
Jessie: "Arbok, Poison Sting." |
Something I didn't know about this episode before sitting down to do this comparison is that literally 100% of the commands Jessie calls out in this battle are completely rewritten, for some reason!
Sound Effect Edit
More sound effects edits! The sound of Utsubot chomping down on Arbok gets altered.
The same edit happens again a few seconds later when the Pokémon's sent flying into its Trainer. The sound of Arbok slamming against Musashi is softened as well.
 |
 |
As with all the others the sound effects are technically still there, it's just that the volume's been turned down so low you probably wouldn't realize it was there if you weren't listening for it. I'm not sure what it was about this episode, in particular, that made the sound editors leap into action here but hopefully this isn't something we'll be seeing a lot more of in the future.
Dialogue Edit
After the Rocket trio's sent blasting off again:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| サトシ 「ピカチュウ」 |
Satoshi: "Pikachu!" |
Ash: "..." |
| ピカチュウ 「ピカピ」 |
Pikachu: "Pikapi." |
Pikachu: "Pikapi." |
4Kids actually removes Satoshi's line, for some reason! Were the sound engineers who worked on this episode so in the zone when it came to muting all those sound effects they got a bit overzealous and accidentally muted this one line of dialogue as well?
The narrator sums things up:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ナレーション 「離ればなれになっていたピカチュウとサトシ、お互いの心が引き
寄せたのか。再び一緒になれてよかったね」 |
Narrator: "Satoshi and Pikachu
may have been separated but it was maybe their hearts that drew them
back together. Thank
goodness they're back together." |
Narrator: "And so, Ash and
Pikachu are reunited. They say absence makes the heart grow fonder.
Looking at these two, I'd say it's true." |
The 4Kids dub has let it be known that it is physically incapable of not rewriting like 70% of the narrator's dialogue in this show. But here, they take things to a new level by having Rodger Parsons use the first person personal pronoun "I" in his little speech here. So what, is the narrator an actual person now? Is the narrator not just a literary device employed by the show to help open and close each episode, but is actually supposed to be some omnipotent being who exists in-universe, dutifully watching over the adventures of these children week to week? The implications this has are absolutely chilling.
The Rocket trio land near an apple tree:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ムサシ 「いやあ今日も飛んだね」 |
Musashi: "We really flew that
time, huh?" |
Jessie: "I am simply famished." |
| コジロウ 「なんかおなかすいたよ」 |
Kojirou: "And now I'm hungry." |
James: "Not me, I'm just
hungry." |
| ニャース 「ニャ果物だニャ！」 |
Nyarth: "Nya? It's a piece of
fruit Nya!" |
Meowth: "Hey, look up there! |
I think the "joke" here is supposed to be that James doesn't know that "famished" and "hungry" mean the same thing? But also that maybe he does? Is this supposed to be funny?
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