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| Episode Comparisons | Orange Islands
Episode
Stats:
Japanese Episode 109: "Koiking! The Secrets of Evolution!!"
American Episode 304: "The Wacky Watcher!"
Pokémon Dare Da? Koiking (Japanese), Poliwag (English)
Dr. Ookido's Pokémon Course: Madatsubomi
Japanese Air Date: August 19th, 1999
American Air Date: September 16th, 2000
Important Characters: Midorikawa (Dr. Quincy T. Quackenpoker)
Important Places: Tankan Island (Rind Island)
Thoughts
The Pocket Monsters animated series has the job of showcasing all the Pokémon that exist at any given time, and in doing so it has to make decisions about how to adapt each species for television. It'd probably be boring if all the Pokémon were depicted as strong and/or cool, and so every now and the TV show will take a species and decide to use them mainly as joke Pokémon. So for example, Yadon and Yadoran are always depicted as dopey, Trancell is always just sort of sitting there, Biriridama and Marumine just explode, etc. And among those, of course, is the king of useless gag Pokémon, Koiking. Most of the time the show makes Koiking an absolute joke, and while I think that's generally fine in the grand scheme of things it's also nice when the show takes an episode every now and then to give the species at least a little bit of respect. For Koiking, that episode is this one, "Koiking! The Secrets of Evolution!!"
The plot of the episode is pretty simple -- it's basically just an adaptation of the Dragon Gate myth on which the Koiking species is based -- but it still manages to show off what it is about Koiking that makes it worth admiring. So much of the conversation around Koiking revolves around its evolved form, about how Koiking is just an annoying little stepping stone you have to put up with until you can finally get it to evolve into the infinitely more useful Gyarados, and yet this episode dares to say you know what, Koiking's not so bad itself! Yes, it's weak, but it's also a hard little worker, and even though nobody except the Pokémon Watchers in this episode seems to care much for it there's still something admirable about the Water-Type and its can-do attitude! The aforementioned Dragon Gate myth is all about doing your best to become better, and I think the Koiking we see in this episode do a great job of showcasing that spirit.
Another standout to me is the animation. Water is notoriously difficult to animate by hand, and so to have dozens of Koiking splashing around at any given time requires a level of skill and hard work that I believe deserves special recognition.
"Koiking! The Secrets of Evolution!!" also gives us pretty much the only time Kenji gets anything even resembling a focus episode. The young Pokémon Watcher is usually seen by fans as a bit of a nothingburger of a character (I'm fairly neutral on the kid myself), and unfortunately I don't think this focus episode of his really does much to change that perception. The closest thing he gets to character development is...he shows off his sketchbook to a fellow Pokémon Watcher? And that's about it...? I feel like by this point the show's staff had to have known Kenji's days were numbered (production work on the early Johto episodes would've already started by now), and so to use what little time we have left with him to not really do all that much feels like such a waste. I mean, so much of this episode takes place near a body of water; the least they could have done is give his Maril get a little more screentime!
A lot of the people who defend 4Kids' localization changes like to argue that some of the edits they make to the English dub -- like erasing Japanese text from signs but then not bothering to put anything in their place -- are done for the sake of everyone, not just for the U.S., and so if you think about it the dubbers are actually being incredibly altruistic by making the show easier for everyone to understand. But, episodes like this prove that's not what's going on here at all. The company took the episode's localization-friendly character-of-the-day (Midorikawa's just a regular guy in the original!) and turned him into a Groucho Marx caricature, and while that might have been a fun thing for the team working on the English dub it also created a bunch of brand new localization nightmares for literally every other localization team out there. And look, I'm not saying 4Kids making an English dub specifically for Americans is necessarily a bad thing, per se. But, I also think this narrative of "the English dub of Pokémon is made for everyone, not just Americans" is simply nonsense, and that we should probably stop pretending otherwise.
The Gyarados keep their Japanese voices.
Dialogue Edit
Dr. Quincy T. Quackenpoker's the star this go around, but that doesn't mean everyone else doesn't get their fair share of rewrites either! Let's start off, as we often do, with the opening narration:
"Now our friends are making their way to the Orange League competition...wherever the hell that is."
Continuing on with the rewrite from the previous episode, the 4Kids dub removes any and all mention of the actual location of Satoshi's final Orange Islands challenge. My theory as to why 4Kids is so hell-bent on keeping this a secret from its viewers is that they simply hadn't come up with the name "Pumello Island" yet, and while I admit that's a pretty dumb theory I also think that it is, unfortunately, entirely plausible.
Tracey scoops up some water:
Misty's unprovoked warning reminds me so much of that viral Patti LaBelle "what makes you think I think I can eat the paper boo?" meme from a few years ago. Why does Misty automatically assume Tracey's going to drink this ocean water? Does she really think a kid who's been traveling all over this archipelago these last however many months or whatever wouldn't know not to do that?
I'm also not a fan of Misty's sarcastic "greeeeat," which is like the umpteenth time this season (and we're only four episodes in!) where these kids are just flat-out rude to each other for absolutely no reason whatsoever.
Side Note
In the English dub, the character-of-the-day is depicted as a Grouch Marx caricature. However -- and I cannot overstate this -- the Groucho Marx thing is 100% a 4Kids invention.
In the Japanese original, Midorikawa -- whose name was changed to "Quincy T. Quackenpoker" for the English dub -- is just a regular old man. He's a bit eccentric, and rude, and aloof...but that's really about it. Midorikawa's Japanese voice actor Hiroshi Otake isn't doing an impersonation of Groucho Marx, and none of the dialogue he delivers does anything to evoke the spirit of the early 20th century comedian either. He's just...a guy.
And yet, the English dub decides to turn him into a caricature of the American comedian anyway. Most of Midorikawa's dialogue is completely rewritten so that he's now spouting off one-liners that sound a lot like the kind of jokes Groucho Marx might've said back in the day, and it actually gets to the point where background information about the character gets lost in localization because 4Kids is too busy cramming its script with jokes to accurately translate any of what he's saying. The company apparently got actor Jerry Lobozzo to come in and do the voice, and while the voice itself is fine when Quackenpoker's just sitting around firing off one-liners, it comes off as incredibly flat when he has to do anything resembling real acting in the episode's second half.
But why go through the trouble of completely redoing a character like this in the first place? Some fans claim it's because Midorikawa actually looks like Groucho Marx, but a simple side by side comparison makes that line of reasoning fall apart fairly quickly. The similarities basically boil down to "is man, has glasses and mustache," and a lot of the key elements people pick up on when depicting Groucho Marx -- the eyebrows, the cigar, the suits -- are completely missing from the Pocket Monsters character. And it certainly wasn't for the kids watching, either, because American children in the year 1999 absolutely would not have gotten a reference to a comedian old enough to have been drafted into World War One.
So then all that leaves is....that someone working at 4Kids just really, really liked the Marx Brothers? And wanted to find a way to shoehorn them into the show, regardless of how much they had to trample over the original in order to do so?
But the way I see it, if the people who actually made this show wanted to insert a Groucho Marx type into the episode, they would have done exactly that. But they didn't, and I think the English dub localizers should have respected that.
Dialogue Edit
The rewrite bonanza begins:
So as you can see, pretty much none of what's in Midorikawa's dialogue makes it over into the English dub. This is something that will happen constantly throughout the episode.
After the title screen:
The entire rest of the episode is going to be 4Kids taking Midorikawa's dialogue, throwing it all out, and then replacing it with Grouch Marx-type schtick instead. Sometimes the English dub just happens to line up with the Japanese version, but I assume most of that's probably just a happy coincidence more than anything else.
Paint Edit
The "text" on Kenji's map gets erased.
This is just all meaningless scribbles so it absolutely could have been left inta...wait a minute, what's that on the island in the middle? It kind of looks like the letter C, followed by the letter O...and a V, and...oh my gosh, were they trying to spell out the word COVID!? Did Pokémon know about the COVID-19 pandemic, 20 years before the fact?! What in the Unsolved Mysteries is going on here!!
Dialogue Edit
Once our heroes arrive on Rind Island:
"Oh, just what I've been looking for -- non-union labor" says the voice actor currently participating in a non-union dub.
The kids find out who this old man is:
Kasumi's perfectly reasonable question about what it he's making them carry all this equipment is replaced with some jokey jokes about Dr. Quackenpoker's name.
Oh also, this guy's name is Quincy T. Quackenpoker, which -- and I'm sorry to anyone I offend -- is a really, really terrible name. Just absolutely awful! The most popular fan theory I can find for this disaster of a name is that "Quincy T. Quackenpoker" is supposed to be a take on Groucho Marx's character Dr. Hackenbush from the 1937 film A Day at the Races, in which Marx plays a horse doctor who's called in to pretend to be a human psychiatrist, and then also at one point in the movie Groucho and his brothers do a musical number in blackface for some reason. So in other words, Quackenpoker's named after a character who has absolutely nothing in common with Midorikawa from Pocket Monsters!
The gang keeps walking:
Another one of the big changes 4Kids makes to this episode is making it so that Dr. Quackenpoker is a "famous" Pokémon Watcher who Tracey's actually heard of, when that is very much not the case in the original. In the Japanese version Kenji has no idea who this old man is!
The English dub also gives Quackenpoker a doctorate, something else that's not in the Japanese original.
Tracey gets splashed in the face:
The "waterproof pen" bit is a dub original, as is the mention of the real world animal "lox."
The expedition team sets up base near a river:
If you were thinking "Y'know, Midorikawa's been hogging all the rewrites lately. Surely 4Kids has some out-of-character dialogue to give the show's regulars, right?" then boy oh boy do I have some good news for you! In the exchange above we get to see Misty, the biggest Water Pokémon super fan in this whole entire franchise, complain at length about how boring she finds a Water-Type Pokémon. Meanwhile Ash, a kid who loves Pokémon more than life itself, doesn't "get" how anyone could enjoy watching Pokémon out in the wild.
Dr. Quackenpoker explains his machine:
This is aaaaaalmost close enough to not deserve a mention here, but that last joke rewrite at the end earned this exchange a spot in the comparison.
Dr. Quackenpoker explains the Magikarp's journey:
The English dub makes up the "thousands of Magikarp" and the "Dr. Quackenpoker comes here every year" bits.
I'm also a bit obsessed with how terrible the "But I wonder why the Magikarp go away" line reading is. Were the 4Kids actors not allowed to do more than one take? How was that line reading the one that made it into the show?
Speaking of strange voice acting, after the scene where Rachel Lillis puts on a bizarre accent when saying her "I've hardly evER, seen something that clevER" line, we get this:
I'm going to ignore the lack of fidelity to the original for a moment to focus on Dr. Quackenpoker's fourth wall break here. He claims that "the plot's come to a screeching halt"...when that simply isn't true? The story's been chugging along fairly well, actually! Is 4Kids just adding in random jokes to random scenes, regardless of whether or not they make absolutely any sense in context?
Paint Edit
We get another "well, we don't actually know if this is Japanese writing or not, but we're gonna erase it anyway" type edits.
This "text" (in reality it's just a meaningless scribble) is only on-screen for like half a second so it's a wonder why 4Kids even bothered.
A shot of the sketchbook later in the episode goes unscathed, somehow.
Dialogue Edit
Dr. Quackenpoker evaluates Tracey's sketchbook:
I seriously think 4Kids has an allergy to going more than two lines of dialogue without having their Groucho Marx cosplayer delivering some kind of jokey joke joke. It really is nonstop with them!
The Rocket trio set their eyes on the Koiking:
So this right here is probably the first and only dialogue change of the entire episode that actually makes any amount of sense.
Musashi's first line has her spouting out a bunch of Japanese idioms in a row that all consist of four kanji each -- ten-chi-kyou-gaku (天地驚愕), kan-zen-mu-ketsu (完全無欠), ji-jou-sai-dai (史上最強) -- and then caps the whole thing off by calling out how everything she just said are all yo-ji-juku-go (四字熟語), or "four character Japanese idioms." For the Americans out there, "four character Japanese idioms" are pretty similar to SAT hot words in that they're phrases you're expected to memorize and understand before you graduate high school.
Musashi's second line has her calling her plan the "Three-Tiered Sliding Scale Gyarados Capture Operation" (三段階スライド方式ギャラドス捕獲大作戦). This is a nod to a real world place called the Hatoya Hotel, which famously had a fishing spot on its campus that offers a deal known as the "Three-Tiered Reverse Sliding Scale" (三段逆スライド方式). With this system there are three pricing tiers, and the more fish you're able to reel in the less you have to end up paying for each one. The TV commercial advertising this deal became very well known in Japan and has been parodied by comedians and other entertainers over and over.
While both of these changes are perfectly understandable, I'm not so fond of Jessie's declaration that they'll be "Pokémon masters" because by this point in the series 4Kids should know better than to carelessly pair the words "Pokémon" and "master" together like that.
The Rocket trio continue:
I feel like 4Kids has used the "Maybe so-and-so's right" "Well there's a first time for everything" insult before? It certainly sounds like a repeated joke to me.
Anyway, Musashi's plan to make sure they get the Water-Types while they're still Koiking so that they'll have a better chance of controlling them once they evolve into Gyarados doesn't really get conveyed in the English dub dialogue, does it?
Dr. Quackenpoker and the kids watch a Magikarp try, and fail, to climb up the waterfall:
Some details about the Koiking who tries to climb the waterfall and fails gets left out of the English dub. Meanwhile, the dub adds Dr. Quackenpoker talking about his mustache because why the hell not.
The Rocket trio wait at the top of the waterfall:
I'm pretty sure that when it comes to "out of," it's still considered a single preposition even though it consists of two words...?
Anyway, there's no wordplay during this scene in the Japanese version.
Ash hears the Rocket trio scream:
Midorikawa tells the children to hurry up. Dr. Quackenpoker, however, implicitly threatens them with "trouble" instead!
Eyecatch
A piece of original artwork (note the blue bands on Koiking's tail there) gets replaced with the star of next week's episode.
I don't really understand why Poliwag is shown at such an awkward pose here. But then when you see the image of the Pokémon used in the eyecatch of the next episode it seems like all the official art of this Water-Type used for the animated series liked put it at a weird angle, for some reason, and so this was probably the only image made available to 4Kids.
Oh well, on the plus side I guess this makes the silhouette guessing game that much more interesting!
Dialogue Edit
Our heroes continue to wait:
Aside from adding in a patience/patients joke, the English dub also removes the part where Midorikawa says his research will continue past what they observe in today's episode.
Dr. Quackenpoker talks about his love of Magikarp:
Midorikawa and Dr. Quackenpoker are two completely different characters, and changes like this are a great example of that difference. In the original we get all this backstory about the Pokémon Watcher we met at the start of this episode, and the English dub decides to replace all that with...Dr. Quackenpoker abruptly launching into a Pokémon-ified take on an old Groucho Marx bit...?
Even if you completely ignore the complete and utter disregard for the source material for a minute, how does Dr. Quackenpoker's response here make any sense as a follow-up to what Tracey said? Quackenpoker says Magikarp are his favorite, Tracey says "Really!?," and Dr. Quackenpoker responds by telling a joke about Magikarp in pajamas? Why is the doctor just spouting off nonsense all of a sudden?
The Pokémon Watchers trade theories.
The "last three years" part is made up by 4Kids.
The two continue:
According to the English dub Dr. Quackenpoker is over 50 years old, which...I mean, maybe? I guess? Anyway, the bit about Dr. Quackenpoker's age and his little joke about income tax are all dub originals.
It's also at around this point in the episode 4Kids has more or less given up on giving Dr. Quincy T. Quackenpoker any more Groucho Marx dialogue. His actor's still doing the vocal impersonation, sure, but as far as the Marx Brothers schtick goes this income tax line here's really about the last of it. Midorikawa's dialogue will still get rewritten throughout the rest of the episode -- this is still a 4Kids dub, after all -- but at the very least his rewrites won't give him a completely new personality the way all the others had up until now.
The Water-Type Pokémon start to jump erratically:
Midorikawa's fully aware of what's happening and tells the kids it's about time for the Koiking to evolve. Dr. Quackenpoker, meanwhile, seems a bit less sure.
The Rocket trio finish the motto:
In the original there's this funny little moment where Musashi thanks the kids for waiting for them to finish their motto before shouting out their names that gets written out of the dub.
They back-and-forths continue:
Kojirou telling the kids their Koiking sub is cuter than the real Koiking they're all so worried about gets replaced with James setting up a quack/Quackenpoker joke.
The Rocket trio's dialogue as they throw the Koiking at our heroes and then try to get Pikachu has a fair number of rewrites, but it's one of those situations where the essence is close enough to what they're saying in the Japanese version that I don't need to bring it up here. This comparison's long enough as it is, after all!
The next part I'll talk about is when Dr. Quackenpoker rushes over to help James:
I'll skip over the "we're slowly morphing our version of James into a caricature of a flaming gay man" thing 4Kids has been doing for a while to point out that Midorikawa's advice of stroking the Koiking's dorsal fin is simplified to "treat it gently" for the dub.
Dr. Quackenpoker gets right to work:
One thing I find amusing about Midorikawa is that he doesn't seem like he ever bothered to learn Kenji's name throughout this entire adventure. Midorikawa using kimi ("hey you") here instead of the kid's name tells me that he's been traveling around with these children for like half a day or so and yet never learned what any of their names are!
Dr. Quackenpoker, on the other, apparently found out Tracey's name off-screen at some point.
The Gyarados start to move:
"They're swimming upstream!" Dr. Quackenpoker says, just seconds before we see the Pokémon actually swim down a waterfall.
The Pokémon Watchers compare their results:
If I had to choose one, I guess the biggest change here is the percentages being different, but Tracey implying once again that Dr. Quackenpoker is in any way "famous" is also pretty high up on the list.
The narrator's closing speech:
The Japanese narrator's focus on Kenji gets changed to a focus on the group as a whole.
The Rocket trio get the last rewrites of the episode:
The first half of this -- before the Gyarados glare -- is all dialogue that absolutely could have (and should have!) been translated as-is, but it gets completely rewritten instead. The second half, meanwhile, marks the second episode in a row where the dub's removed a fourth wall break from the original. Originally the trio remarks they've been in this situation before, which, well, they have.
Both these episodes were written by Shinzou Fujita and so it seems like a callback that was done very much on purpose.
The English dub removes this reference, which is very odd because why is 4Kids acting like they don't love fourth wall breaks all of a sudden? Except wait, they actually still love them because they added in that line about the plot coming to a screeching halt earlier in the episode. So then what in the world's going on here?
This page was last updated on March 8th, 2025
Japanese Episode 109: "Koiking! The Secrets of Evolution!!"
American Episode 304: "The Wacky Watcher!"
Pokémon Dare Da? Koiking (Japanese), Poliwag (English)
Dr. Ookido's Pokémon Course: Madatsubomi
Japanese Air Date: August 19th, 1999
American Air Date: September 16th, 2000
Important Characters: Midorikawa (Dr. Quincy T. Quackenpoker)
Important Places: Tankan Island (Rind Island)
On their way
to Kinkatsu Island, Satoshi and his friends get roped into helping a
Pokémon Watcher named Midorikawa follow after a school of
Koiking. The chase leads them to nearby Tankan Island, where Midorikawa
explains how the Koiking are all getting ready to evolve into Gyarados.
Elsewhere, the Rocket trio hatch a plot to get all the Koiking for
themselves and then raise them into an army of Gyarados. Later, Satoshi
and the others watch as the school of Koiking attempt to climb up a
series of waterfalls on the island. Those that are strong enough to
make the trip are usually about ready to evolve into Gyarados and so
Midorikawa and the others camp out at the summit in hopes of being able
to witness this phenomenon for themselves. That night, the Rocket trio
appears and grabs all the Koiking from the lake! The trio immediately
throws the Water-Types back into the water, and then takes advantage of
everyone rushing to catch the falling fish Pokémon to swoop in
and steal Satoshi's Pikachu! Satoshi manages to swipe his
Pokémon back just as some of the Koiking finally evolve into
Gyarados! The angered Pokémon use their newfound powers to send
the Pokémon thieves blasting off, saving the rest of the Water
Pokémon on the island. Now that the evolution ceremony’s come to
an end it's time for Satoshi and his friends to leave Midorikawa and
Tankan Island behind to continue the journey toward Kinkatsu Island and
the Winners Cup.
Thoughts
The Pocket Monsters animated series has the job of showcasing all the Pokémon that exist at any given time, and in doing so it has to make decisions about how to adapt each species for television. It'd probably be boring if all the Pokémon were depicted as strong and/or cool, and so every now and the TV show will take a species and decide to use them mainly as joke Pokémon. So for example, Yadon and Yadoran are always depicted as dopey, Trancell is always just sort of sitting there, Biriridama and Marumine just explode, etc. And among those, of course, is the king of useless gag Pokémon, Koiking. Most of the time the show makes Koiking an absolute joke, and while I think that's generally fine in the grand scheme of things it's also nice when the show takes an episode every now and then to give the species at least a little bit of respect. For Koiking, that episode is this one, "Koiking! The Secrets of Evolution!!"
The plot of the episode is pretty simple -- it's basically just an adaptation of the Dragon Gate myth on which the Koiking species is based -- but it still manages to show off what it is about Koiking that makes it worth admiring. So much of the conversation around Koiking revolves around its evolved form, about how Koiking is just an annoying little stepping stone you have to put up with until you can finally get it to evolve into the infinitely more useful Gyarados, and yet this episode dares to say you know what, Koiking's not so bad itself! Yes, it's weak, but it's also a hard little worker, and even though nobody except the Pokémon Watchers in this episode seems to care much for it there's still something admirable about the Water-Type and its can-do attitude! The aforementioned Dragon Gate myth is all about doing your best to become better, and I think the Koiking we see in this episode do a great job of showcasing that spirit.
Another standout to me is the animation. Water is notoriously difficult to animate by hand, and so to have dozens of Koiking splashing around at any given time requires a level of skill and hard work that I believe deserves special recognition.
"Koiking! The Secrets of Evolution!!" also gives us pretty much the only time Kenji gets anything even resembling a focus episode. The young Pokémon Watcher is usually seen by fans as a bit of a nothingburger of a character (I'm fairly neutral on the kid myself), and unfortunately I don't think this focus episode of his really does much to change that perception. The closest thing he gets to character development is...he shows off his sketchbook to a fellow Pokémon Watcher? And that's about it...? I feel like by this point the show's staff had to have known Kenji's days were numbered (production work on the early Johto episodes would've already started by now), and so to use what little time we have left with him to not really do all that much feels like such a waste. I mean, so much of this episode takes place near a body of water; the least they could have done is give his Maril get a little more screentime!
A lot of the people who defend 4Kids' localization changes like to argue that some of the edits they make to the English dub -- like erasing Japanese text from signs but then not bothering to put anything in their place -- are done for the sake of everyone, not just for the U.S., and so if you think about it the dubbers are actually being incredibly altruistic by making the show easier for everyone to understand. But, episodes like this prove that's not what's going on here at all. The company took the episode's localization-friendly character-of-the-day (Midorikawa's just a regular guy in the original!) and turned him into a Groucho Marx caricature, and while that might have been a fun thing for the team working on the English dub it also created a bunch of brand new localization nightmares for literally every other localization team out there. And look, I'm not saying 4Kids making an English dub specifically for Americans is necessarily a bad thing, per se. But, I also think this narrative of "the English dub of Pokémon is made for everyone, not just Americans" is simply nonsense, and that we should probably stop pretending otherwise.
The Gyarados keep their Japanese voices.
Dialogue Edit
Dr. Quincy T. Quackenpoker's the star this go around, but that doesn't mean everyone else doesn't get their fair share of rewrites either! Let's start off, as we often do, with the opening narration:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ナレーション 「リュウチンジムで見事４個目のバッジをゲットしたサトシ。オレ
ンジリーグ・ウィナーズカップに挑戦するためにカンキツ島への旅を続けていた」 |
Narrator: "Satoshi has
successfully gotten his fourth badge at the Ryuchin Gym. His journey
now continues toward Kankitsu Island to compete in the Winners
Cup." |
Narrator: "After an exciting
battle at the Kumquat Gym, Ash earned his fourth and final Orange
League badge. Now our friends are making their way to the Orange League
competition." |
"Now our friends are making their way to the Orange League competition...wherever the hell that is."
Continuing on with the rewrite from the previous episode, the 4Kids dub removes any and all mention of the actual location of Satoshi's final Orange Islands challenge. My theory as to why 4Kids is so hell-bent on keeping this a secret from its viewers is that they simply hadn't come up with the name "Pumello Island" yet, and while I admit that's a pretty dumb theory I also think that it is, unfortunately, entirely plausible.
Tracey scoops up some water:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| カスミ 「海の水をどうするの？」 |
Kasumi: "What're you gonna do
with that ocean water?" |
Misty: "You're not gonna drink
salt water, are you?" |
| ケンジ 「ポケモンの生息環境の資料にするんだ」 |
Kenji: "I'm going to log it as
data on Pokémon habitats." |
Tracey: "Oh no. This is
strictly for Pokémon research purposes." |
| カスミ 「へえ～」 |
Kasumi: "Wow, OK!" |
Misty: (sarcastically)
"Greeeeat." |
| トゲピー 「チョゲピ～」 |
Togepy: "Chogepi~" |
Togepi: "Chogepi~" |
Misty's unprovoked warning reminds me so much of that viral Patti LaBelle "what makes you think I think I can eat the paper boo?" meme from a few years ago. Why does Misty automatically assume Tracey's going to drink this ocean water? Does she really think a kid who's been traveling all over this archipelago these last however many months or whatever wouldn't know not to do that?
I'm also not a fan of Misty's sarcastic "greeeeat," which is like the umpteenth time this season (and we're only four episodes in!) where these kids are just flat-out rude to each other for absolutely no reason whatsoever.
Side Note
In the English dub, the character-of-the-day is depicted as a Grouch Marx caricature. However -- and I cannot overstate this -- the Groucho Marx thing is 100% a 4Kids invention.
In the Japanese original, Midorikawa -- whose name was changed to "Quincy T. Quackenpoker" for the English dub -- is just a regular old man. He's a bit eccentric, and rude, and aloof...but that's really about it. Midorikawa's Japanese voice actor Hiroshi Otake isn't doing an impersonation of Groucho Marx, and none of the dialogue he delivers does anything to evoke the spirit of the early 20th century comedian either. He's just...a guy.
 |
 |
And yet, the English dub decides to turn him into a caricature of the American comedian anyway. Most of Midorikawa's dialogue is completely rewritten so that he's now spouting off one-liners that sound a lot like the kind of jokes Groucho Marx might've said back in the day, and it actually gets to the point where background information about the character gets lost in localization because 4Kids is too busy cramming its script with jokes to accurately translate any of what he's saying. The company apparently got actor Jerry Lobozzo to come in and do the voice, and while the voice itself is fine when Quackenpoker's just sitting around firing off one-liners, it comes off as incredibly flat when he has to do anything resembling real acting in the episode's second half.
But why go through the trouble of completely redoing a character like this in the first place? Some fans claim it's because Midorikawa actually looks like Groucho Marx, but a simple side by side comparison makes that line of reasoning fall apart fairly quickly. The similarities basically boil down to "is man, has glasses and mustache," and a lot of the key elements people pick up on when depicting Groucho Marx -- the eyebrows, the cigar, the suits -- are completely missing from the Pocket Monsters character. And it certainly wasn't for the kids watching, either, because American children in the year 1999 absolutely would not have gotten a reference to a comedian old enough to have been drafted into World War One.
So then all that leaves is....that someone working at 4Kids just really, really liked the Marx Brothers? And wanted to find a way to shoehorn them into the show, regardless of how much they had to trample over the original in order to do so?
But the way I see it, if the people who actually made this show wanted to insert a Groucho Marx type into the episode, they would have done exactly that. But they didn't, and I think the English dub localizers should have respected that.
Dialogue Edit
The rewrite bonanza begins:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ミドリカワ 「あ～ そこの諸君！十分 注意するように！」 |
Midorikawa:
"Ah! You there! Make sure you stay alert!" |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Ah,
company. You're here just in time for the rush hour." |
| サトシたち 「え？」 |
Satoshi, Kasumi, & Kenji:
"Huh?" |
Ash, Misty, & Tracey: "Huh?" |
| ミドリカワ 「風力よし！ 水温オーケー！海流変化なし！太陽スペクトルに異常なし！もうすぐ来るぞ！」 | Midorikawa: "Wind power: good!
Water temperature: OK! Ocean currents: no change! Solar spectrum: no
issues! Alright, they'll be here soon!" |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "If my observations are correct we're about to see one of the most astounding scenes ever seen on the seas. Now we'll see what we shall see." |
| サトシ 「誰なんだ？ あの人」 |
Satoshi: "Who's that guy?" |
Ash: "I wonder what this guy's talking about." |
| カスミ 「こんな所で何やってんのかしら？」 |
Kasumi: "And what's he doing
out in a place like this?" |
Misty: "What could happen way
out in the middle of the ocean?" |
| ケンジ 「もうすぐ来るっていったい 何が来るんだ？」 |
Kenji: "What in the world did
he mean by 'they'll be here soon'?" |
Tracey: "I don't know, but
maybe we should hang around and find out." |
So as you can see, pretty much none of what's in Midorikawa's dialogue makes it over into the English dub. This is something that will happen constantly throughout the episode.
After the title screen:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ミドリカワ 「目標確認！速度、方向、予測どおり。よーし
急速潜行追跡開始じゃ～！」 |
Midorikawa: "Target sighted!
Speed and direction, as expected. Alright, time to follow them from
below deck!" |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "If my
calculations are correct I know exactly where the Magikarp are headed.
But with heads like that I suppose they don't have much of a choice. Oh
well, here I go." |
The entire rest of the episode is going to be 4Kids taking Midorikawa's dialogue, throwing it all out, and then replacing it with Grouch Marx-type schtick instead. Sometimes the English dub just happens to line up with the Japanese version, but I assume most of that's probably just a happy coincidence more than anything else.
Paint Edit
The "text" on Kenji's map gets erased.
 |
 |
This is just all meaningless scribbles so it absolutely could have been left inta...wait a minute, what's that on the island in the middle? It kind of looks like the letter C, followed by the letter O...and a V, and...oh my gosh, were they trying to spell out the word COVID!? Did Pokémon know about the COVID-19 pandemic, 20 years before the fact?! What in the Unsolved Mysteries is going on here!!
Dialogue Edit
Once our heroes arrive on Rind Island:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ミドリカワ 「これ、何をぼんやりしておるんじゃ！」 |
Midorikawa: "What're you guys
goofing off for!?" |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Oh, just
what I've been looking for -- non-union labor." |
| サトシたち 「ん？」 |
Satoshi, Kasumi, & Kenji:
"Huh?" |
Ash, Misty, & Tracey:
"Huh?" |
| ミドリカワ 「ほい ほい ほい ほい ほい ほいっと！ ほいっと！
ほいっと！ ほいっとなと！ ほいっと」 |
Midorikawa: "C'mon c'mon c'mon
c'mon c'mon. One for you, one for you, one for you, and one for you." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Come on,
there's no time to organize now. One for you, one for you, one for you,
and one for 'Chu." |
"Oh, just what I've been looking for -- non-union labor" says the voice actor currently participating in a non-union dub.
The kids find out who this old man is:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| カスミ 「おじいさん いったい何者？」 |
Kasumi: "Excuse me sir, but
who are you?" |
Misty: "Excuse me, but who
exactly are you?" |
| ミドリカワ 「んー？ わしはポケモンウォッチャーのミドリカワじゃ」 |
Midorikawa: "Hm? My name's
Midorikawa, a Pokémon Watcher." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Why the
last time I looked I was Quincy T. Quackenpoker." |
| ケンジ 「ポケモンウォッチャー？」 |
Kenji: "Pokémon
Watcher?" |
Tracey: "Quackenpoker." |
| カスミ 「ミドリカワさん…それで、この荷物何なんです～？」 |
Kasumi: "Mr. Midorikawa,
huh...and what is it we're carrying here, exactly?" |
Misty: "Quackenpoker? That's
kind of an unusual name, isn't it?" |
| ミドリカワ 「決まってるじゃないか？コイキング用の観察機材じゃよ」 |
Midorikawa: "Isn't it obvious?
It's equipment used to observe the Koiking." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Everybody
in my family was named Quackenpoker. At least on my mother's side." |
| サトシ＆ケン
ジ 「え？」 |
Satoshi & Kenji: "Huh?" |
Ash & Tracey: "..." |
Kasumi's perfectly reasonable question about what it he's making them carry all this equipment is replaced with some jokey jokes about Dr. Quackenpoker's name.
Oh also, this guy's name is Quincy T. Quackenpoker, which -- and I'm sorry to anyone I offend -- is a really, really terrible name. Just absolutely awful! The most popular fan theory I can find for this disaster of a name is that "Quincy T. Quackenpoker" is supposed to be a take on Groucho Marx's character Dr. Hackenbush from the 1937 film A Day at the Races, in which Marx plays a horse doctor who's called in to pretend to be a human psychiatrist, and then also at one point in the movie Groucho and his brothers do a musical number in blackface for some reason. So in other words, Quackenpoker's named after a character who has absolutely nothing in common with Midorikawa from Pocket Monsters!
The gang keeps walking:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| カスミ 「コイキング？」 |
Kasumi: "Koiking?" |
Misty: "W-Why are you here?" |
| ミドリカワ 「なんせ
わしはコイキング専門のポケモンウォッチャーじゃからのう」 |
Midorikawa: "Well, I'm a
Pokémon Watcher who specializes in Koiking." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "I'm a
Pokémon Watcher and I've dedicated my life to the study of
Magikarp." |
| サトシ 「コイキング専門？」 |
Satoshi: "A Koiking
specialist?" |
Tracey: "I knew I recognized
your name! If a famous Pokémon Watcher like Dr.
Quackenpoker thinks Magikarp are
worth a lifetime of study...there must be something I can learn from
them, too." |
| ケンジ 「そうか！このコイキングたちには何か特別な能力や習慣があるんだ！よ
し 観察させてもらいます！」 |
Kenji: "Oh I see! I guess
these
Koiking must have some kind of special ability or unique custom or
something. Let
me get a closer look!" |
Another one of the big changes 4Kids makes to this episode is making it so that Dr. Quackenpoker is a "famous" Pokémon Watcher who Tracey's actually heard of, when that is very much not the case in the original. In the Japanese version Kenji has no idea who this old man is!
The English dub also gives Quackenpoker a doctorate, something else that's not in the Japanese original.
Tracey gets splashed in the face:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ミドリカワ 「何やってるんじゃ！こいつらはごく普通のコイキングじゃぞ？」 |
Midorikawa: "What're you
doing? Can't you tell those are just regular Koiking?" |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "The first
thing you learn from watching Magikarp is always use a waterproof pen." |
| ケンジ 「え？ でも…」 |
Kenji: "Huh? But..." |
Tracey: "Thanks... Doctor." |
| ミドリカワ 「あぁ いかん
無駄話しとる場合じゃなかったわい。ほれ、出発じゃ！」 |
Midorikawa: "We don't have
time for all this idle prattle. Come on, let's get a move on it." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Come on,
you can't lie there like a lox all day. We've got observations to make." |
The "waterproof pen" bit is a dub original, as is the mention of the real world animal "lox."
The expedition team sets up base near a river:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| カスミ 「まったく～なんで私たちが荷物を運ばなきゃなんないのよ～」 |
Kasumi: "Ugh, I'm beat. How'd
we get roped into lugging all this stuff around?" |
Misty: "Would somebody
pleeeease tell me what's so great about watching Magikarp?" |
| サトシ 「オレ 腹減った」 |
Satoshi: "I could use
something to eat." |
Ash: "I don't get it either." |
| ピカチュウ 「ピカピーカ」 |
Pikachu: "Pika Piika" |
Pikachu: "Pika Pika." |
| カスミ 「大体コイキングなんてありふれたポケモン観察して何が楽しいわけ
～？」 |
Kasumi: "I don't get what's so
fun about watching Pokémon as common as Koiking." |
Misty: "They're boring. If
you've seen one Magikarp you've seen 'em all, if you ask me." |
If you were thinking "Y'know, Midorikawa's been hogging all the rewrites lately. Surely 4Kids has some out-of-character dialogue to give the show's regulars, right?" then boy oh boy do I have some good news for you! In the exchange above we get to see Misty, the biggest Water Pokémon super fan in this whole entire franchise, complain at length about how boring she finds a Water-Type Pokémon. Meanwhile Ash, a kid who loves Pokémon more than life itself, doesn't "get" how anyone could enjoy watching Pokémon out in the wild.
Dr. Quackenpoker explains his machine:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ミドリカワ 「特殊センサーによって 体長、体重、骨密度
筋肉の疲労度など。32にも及ぶデータを分析するすぐれものなのじゃよ」 |
Midorikawa: "It has special
sensors that measure body length, weight, bone density, muscle fatigue,
etc. It's an amazing tool that analyzes up to thirty-two different
data points." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "It measures
and analyzes thirty-two factors including fin length, bone structure,
muscle density, not to mention size-weight ratios and oxygen efficiency
quotients." |
| サトシ 「よく分かんないけどすごいなあ」 |
Satoshi: "I don't really get
it but it sounds amazing." |
Ash: "Size-weight ratios and
oxygen efficiency quotients?" |
| ミドリカワ 「そう！とにかくすごいのじゃ」 |
Midorikawa: "You've got it
just right. I really am amazing, aren't I?" |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "I asked you
not to mention those, didn't I?" |
This is aaaaaalmost close enough to not deserve a mention here, but that last joke rewrite at the end earned this exchange a spot in the comparison.
Dr. Quackenpoker explains the Magikarp's journey:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ケンジ 「旅立った？ コイキングが？」 |
Kenji: "They leave on a
journey? These guys!?" |
Tracey: "But I wonder why the
Magikarp go away." |
| ミドリカワ 「そのとおり！この島で生まれたコイキングは成長すると海へ旅立
ち、そして再び戻ってくる。つまりこのタンカン島はカムバック コイキングの島なんじゃよ」 |
Midorikawa: "That's exactly
right! The Koiking born on this island journey out to sea once they
mature, but then they always come back. In other words, Tankan Island
here's like a homecoming island for the Koiking." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "I'm getting
there! The Magikarp are born in the waters around this island but swim
out to sea as they mature. But once a year, no matter where they are,
thousands of Magikarp return here to the place of their birth. And I
return so I can study them all." |
The English dub makes up the "thousands of Magikarp" and the "Dr. Quackenpoker comes here every year" bits.
I'm also a bit obsessed with how terrible the "But I wonder why the Magikarp go away" line reading is. Were the 4Kids actors not allowed to do more than one take? How was that line reading the one that made it into the show?
Speaking of strange voice acting, after the scene where Rachel Lillis puts on a bizarre accent when saying her "I've hardly evER, seen something that clevER" line, we get this:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ミドリカワ 「あっ
お前さんの持っとる観察記録、ちょいと見せてくれんかの？」 |
Midorikawa: "Ah, do you mind
if I take a look at the observation notes you've taken?" |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Say, now
that the plot's come to a screeching halt why don't I take a look at
your sketchbook?" |
| ケンジ 「あ… はい！」 |
Kenji: "Ah, sure!" |
Tracey: "Oh sure, go ahead." |
I'm going to ignore the lack of fidelity to the original for a moment to focus on Dr. Quackenpoker's fourth wall break here. He claims that "the plot's come to a screeching halt"...when that simply isn't true? The story's been chugging along fairly well, actually! Is 4Kids just adding in random jokes to random scenes, regardless of whether or not they make absolutely any sense in context?
Paint Edit
We get another "well, we don't actually know if this is Japanese writing or not, but we're gonna erase it anyway" type edits.
 |
 |
This "text" (in reality it's just a meaningless scribble) is only on-screen for like half a second so it's a wonder why 4Kids even bothered.
A shot of the sketchbook later in the episode goes unscathed, somehow.
Dialogue Edit
Dr. Quackenpoker evaluates Tracey's sketchbook:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ミドリカワ 「ほうほう… いやなかなか詳しく調べてるのう…」 |
Midorikawa: "Oh...wow, you can
tell you've really got an eye for detail." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Ah,
excellent. I see a great future ahead of you, young man." |
| ケンジ 「エヘッ いや…それほどでも…」 |
Kenji: "Aw come on...they're
not
that great..." |
Tracey: "Do you...do you
really think so?" |
| ミドリカワ 「これから先が楽しみじゃのう」 |
Midorikawa: "I'm looking
forward to seeing what you come up with in the future." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Well you
certainly don't have a future behind you." |
I seriously think 4Kids has an allergy to going more than two lines of dialogue without having their Groucho Marx cosplayer delivering some kind of jokey joke joke. It really is nonstop with them!
The Rocket trio set their eyes on the Koiking:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ムサシ 「それよ、それよ、それよ～！まずは
大量てんこ山盛りのコイキングをゲットする！そして 進化させれば天地驚愕 完全無欠 史上最強 四字熟語！無敵のギャラドス軍団誕生よ！」 |
Musashi: "That's it! That's
it,
that's it, that's it! First we'll get us a huge number of those
Koiking!
And then if we can get them to evolve we'll be considerable! Impeccable!
Unprecedented! And a bunch of other big words! It'll be the
birth of an invincible Gyarados army!" |
Jessie: "Now listen to my
master plan. All we have to do is scoop up that school of Magikarp.
We'll train them hard, and before long they'll evolve into Gyarados!
And with a gigantic army of Gyarados, we'll be unstoppable. We'll be
the Pokémon masters of the world!" |
| コジロウとニャース 「ギャラドス軍団！」 |
Kojirou and Nyarth: "A
Gyarados army!" |
James & Meowth:
"We'll...be masters!" |
| ムサシ 「フッフ～これぞ：三段階スライド方式ギャラドス捕獲大作戦！」 | Musashi: "(laughs) I call this
scheme
the Three-Tiered Sliding Scale Gyarados Capture Operation!" |
Jessie: "(laughs) And luckily
my plan is so brilliantly simple that even a first grader could follow
it." |
So this right here is probably the first and only dialogue change of the entire episode that actually makes any amount of sense.
Musashi's first line has her spouting out a bunch of Japanese idioms in a row that all consist of four kanji each -- ten-chi-kyou-gaku (天地驚愕), kan-zen-mu-ketsu (完全無欠), ji-jou-sai-dai (史上最強) -- and then caps the whole thing off by calling out how everything she just said are all yo-ji-juku-go (四字熟語), or "four character Japanese idioms." For the Americans out there, "four character Japanese idioms" are pretty similar to SAT hot words in that they're phrases you're expected to memorize and understand before you graduate high school.
Musashi's second line has her calling her plan the "Three-Tiered Sliding Scale Gyarados Capture Operation" (三段階スライド方式ギャラドス捕獲大作戦). This is a nod to a real world place called the Hatoya Hotel, which famously had a fishing spot on its campus that offers a deal known as the "Three-Tiered Reverse Sliding Scale" (三段逆スライド方式). With this system there are three pricing tiers, and the more fish you're able to reel in the less you have to end up paying for each one. The TV commercial advertising this deal became very well known in Japan and has been parodied by comedians and other entertainers over and over.
While both of these changes are perfectly understandable, I'm not so fond of Jessie's declaration that they'll be "Pokémon masters" because by this point in the series 4Kids should know better than to carelessly pair the words "Pokémon" and "master" together like that.
The Rocket trio continue:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ニャース 「そう うまくいくかニャア？」 |
Nyarth: "But can we really put
this off Nya?" |
Meowth: "I never went to
kitty-garten." |
| コジロウ 「オレたちギャラドスとは相性最悪だし…」 |
Kojirou: "We don't have the
greatest track record with Gyarados you know..." |
James: "And we've always had
absolutely lousy luck with Gyarados." |
| ムサシ 「シャラップ！我を信じよ。コイキングのうちにゲットすればたとえギャ ラドスになっても心配無用である」 | Musashi:
"Shut up! And believe in yourself! If you can get at them while they're
still Koiking then we won't have to worry, even if they do become
Gyarados." |
Jessie: "Quiet you two! Wait
and see. Those Magikarp will evolve and we'll be the most powerful trio
in Team Rocket history." |
| ニャース 「ニャるほど～！」 | Nyarth: "Oh I get it Nya~!" |
Meowth: "Maybe she's right." |
| コジロウ 「そうか！その手があったか！」 | Kojirou: "Oh yeah! That should
work!" |
James: "Well there's a first
time for everything." |
| ニャース 「早速行動開始だニャ！」 | Nyarth: "So let's hurry up and
get started!" |
Meowth: "Let's get us a mess
of Magikarp!" |
| コジロウ 「おう！」 | Kojirou: "OK!" |
James: "Yay! Jessie? Jessie?" |
| ムサシ
「あ～ ありがたや ありがたや」 |
Musashi: "Ah~ thank you, thank
you so much." |
I feel like 4Kids has used the "Maybe so-and-so's right" "Well there's a first time for everything" insult before? It certainly sounds like a repeated joke to me.
Anyway, Musashi's plan to make sure they get the Water-Types while they're still Koiking so that they'll have a better chance of controlling them once they evolve into Gyarados doesn't really get conveyed in the English dub dialogue, does it?
Dr. Quackenpoker and the kids watch a Magikarp try, and fail, to climb up the waterfall:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ケンジ 「え！50パーセントも？」 |
Kenji: "What!? Up to fifty
percent!?" |
Tracey: "What happens to the
ones that don't make it?" |
| ミドリカワ 「ほ～れ、そこの青いやつ。あいつも去年登りきれなかった１匹じゃ
よ」 |
Midorikawa: "Look at that one
there, the one with the blue rings. That one couldn't make the trip
last
year either." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "They do
what that one there is doing. They keep trying." |
| サトシたち 「ああ！ あ～」 |
Kids: (gasp) |
Kids: (gasp) |
| ミドリカワ 「彼らは上流を目指し、ただひたすら登り続けるのじゃ」 | Midorikawa: "They just keep climbing and climbing, trying their best to reach the top." | Dr. Quackenpoker: "Everything takes time, Magikarp. Took me three years to grow this mustache." |
Some details about the Koiking who tries to climb the waterfall and fails gets left out of the English dub. Meanwhile, the dub adds Dr. Quackenpoker talking about his mustache because why the hell not.
The Rocket trio wait at the top of the waterfall:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ムサシ 「いいわね！チャンスは滝を登りきった瞬間よ！」 |
Musashi: "This should do it!
Remember, the second you see them reach the top, that'll be your
chance!" |
Jessie: "Get ready, and
remember, don't swing till you see the scales on their tails." |
| コジロウ 「っておいおい、なんでボールでゲットしないんだ？」 |
Kojirou: "Hold on, why
aren't we just getting them in Balls?" |
James: "Jess, wouldn't it be
easier to catch them in Poké Balls?" |
| ムサシ 「いちいちボール使うなんてもったいないからダメです！」 | Musashi: "Because throwing a
bunch of
Monster Balls at 'em is a huge waste! So just use these nets, okay?" |
Jessie: "James, Poké
Balls cost money, which is something we're out of." |
| ニャース 「ここんとこニャーたちの予算減りっぱなしなんだニャ～」 |
Nyarth: "Our budget keeps
getting lower and lower Nya~." |
Meowth: "Anger is no excuse
for ending a sentence with two prepositions." |
I'm pretty sure that when it comes to "out of," it's still considered a single preposition even though it consists of two words...?
Anyway, there's no wordplay during this scene in the Japanese version.
Ash hears the Rocket trio scream:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ケンジ 「どうした？サトシ」 |
Kenji: "What's the matter,
Satoshi?" |
Tracey: "What's the matter,
Ash?" |
| サトシ 「今何か声がしなかった？」 |
Satoshi: "Did you guys hear
any screaming just now?" |
Ash: "I thought I just heard
screaming." |
| ケンジ 「えっ何も聞こえないよ？」 |
Kenji: "Huh? I didn't hear
anything." |
Misty: "That's funny. I
thought I just heard your stomach
growling." |
| カスミ 「空耳じゃないの～？」 |
Kasumi: "You sure you didn't
just imagine it?" |
|
| ピカチュウ 「ピ～カ？」 |
Pikachu: "Pi~ka?" | Pikachu: "Pi~ka?" |
| サトシ 「変だな～。確かに聞こえたんだけどなあ…」 |
Satoshi: "That's weird...but
I'm sure I heard something." |
Ash: "I'm serious. Maybe
somebody nearby is in trouble." |
| ミドリカワ 「さあ、そろそろ行くぞ。ぼんやりしてるとコイキングの進化に間に
合わんぞ」 |
Midorikawa: "Alright, we've
gotta get moving. If we waste too much time dilly-dallying we won't
make it in time to
see the Koiking evolve." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "You'll be
the ones in trouble if I'm too late to see the Magikarp evolve." |
Midorikawa tells the children to hurry up. Dr. Quackenpoker, however, implicitly threatens them with "trouble" instead!
Eyecatch
A piece of original artwork (note the blue bands on Koiking's tail there) gets replaced with the star of next week's episode.
 |
 |
I don't really understand why Poliwag is shown at such an awkward pose here. But then when you see the image of the Pokémon used in the eyecatch of the next episode it seems like all the official art of this Water-Type used for the animated series liked put it at a weird angle, for some reason, and so this was probably the only image made available to 4Kids.
Oh well, on the plus side I guess this makes the silhouette guessing game that much more interesting!
Dialogue Edit
Our heroes continue to wait:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| サトシ 「まだなんですか？ 進化は」 |
Satoshi: "How much longer til
they evolve?" |
Ash: "Aren't the Magikarp ever
going to evolve?" |
| ミドリカワ 「ふ～む…
どうやらもう少しかかるようじゃのう。それにすべての
コイキングが進化するわけでもないしのう。そこんとこが今後の研究課題でもあるんじゃが…」 |
Midorikawa: "Hmm...it
shouldn't be long now. And I should point out not all the
Koiking here are going to evolve today. That
will be a research topic for another day." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Ash,
patience is very important, especially if you're a doctor. But as a
matter of fact, a lot of these Magikarp won't be evolving here today.
Some will have to wait till they get stronger, and that could take
years." |
Aside from adding in a patience/patients joke, the English dub also removes the part where Midorikawa says his research will continue past what they observe in today's episode.
Dr. Quackenpoker talks about his love of Magikarp:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ケンジ 「ミドリカワさんって、コイキング以外のポケモンにも詳しいんですね」 |
Kenji: "Koiking aren't the
only Pokémon you know a lot about, are they Mr. Midorikawa?" |
Tracey: "Magikarp aren't the
only Pokémon you know about, are they, Dr. Quackenpoker?" |
| ミドリカワ 「ハハハハッ。これでもな、昔はいろんなポケモンを観察したもん
じゃよ」 |
Midorikawa: "Hahahaha! As it
turns out I used to observe all kinds of
Pokémon a long time ago." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Hahahahaha!
All Pokémon interest me but Magikarp are my favorites by far." |
| ケンジ 「いろんなポケモン？」 | Kenji: "Really?" |
Tracey: "Really!?" |
| ミドリカワ 「うん。世界中を旅してありとあらゆるポケモンをな。そしてたどり 着いたんじゃよ、コイキングたちに…」 | Midorikawa: "Yes. I traveled
all over the world and observed different Pokémon here and
there. But I eventually found my way to Koiking..." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Mmhmm. Yes.
When I was a boy I woke up one morning and I saw a Magikarp in my
pajamas. How a Magikarp got in my pajamas, I'll never know." |
| コイキング 「コーイ…」 |
Koiking: "Koi!" |
Magikarp: "Magikarp~" |
Midorikawa and Dr. Quackenpoker are two completely different characters, and changes like this are a great example of that difference. In the original we get all this backstory about the Pokémon Watcher we met at the start of this episode, and the English dub decides to replace all that with...Dr. Quackenpoker abruptly launching into a Pokémon-ified take on an old Groucho Marx bit...?
Even if you completely ignore the complete and utter disregard for the source material for a minute, how does Dr. Quackenpoker's response here make any sense as a follow-up to what Tracey said? Quackenpoker says Magikarp are his favorite, Tracey says "Really!?," and Dr. Quackenpoker responds by telling a joke about Magikarp in pajamas? Why is the doctor just spouting off nonsense all of a sudden?
The Pokémon Watchers trade theories.
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ミドリカワ 「確かにコイキングが跳ねることには何か意味があるといわれてお
る。じゃが…」 |
Midorikawa: "They say there
must be some meaning behind the Koiking jumping. But if you look at
this..." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Well that's
a very interesting theory, young man, but I'm afraid there's just one
little problem with it. Look here." |
| ケンジ 「これは…？」 |
Kenji: "What's that?" |
Tracey: "What's that?" |
| ミドリカワ 「こいつは跳ねることが大の苦手じゃった…にもかかわらずちゃ～ん と海から戻ってきたんじゃよ」 | Midorikawa: "This here is a
Koiking who wasn't very good at jumping...and yet it still managed to
find its way back from sea." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "This is a
Magikarp that can't jump at all, but for the last three years it still
manages to find its way back home." |
The "last three years" part is made up by 4Kids.
The two continue:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ケンジ 「だとすると、ボクの太陽説ははずれってことになりますね」 | Kenji: "Then I guess my sun
theory isn't quite right." |
Tracey: "Well I guess that
just proves that Magikarp are more mysterious than I thought." |
| ミドリカワ 「うーん。観察すればするほどさらに謎が深まっていく…おもしろい やつじゃよ」 | Midorikawa: "Perhaps not. The
more you observe Pokémon, the deeper the mysteries. They really
are quite interesting, you know." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Mmm-hmm.
After fifty years of watching Pokémon I still find
Magikarp hard to understand. Even harder to understand than my income
tax return." |
| ケンジ
「奥が深いんだな、コイキングも」 |
Kenji: "I guess there are more
to Koiking than meets the eye." |
According to the English dub Dr. Quackenpoker is over 50 years old, which...I mean, maybe? I guess? Anyway, the bit about Dr. Quackenpoker's age and his little joke about income tax are all dub originals.
It's also at around this point in the episode 4Kids has more or less given up on giving Dr. Quincy T. Quackenpoker any more Groucho Marx dialogue. His actor's still doing the vocal impersonation, sure, but as far as the Marx Brothers schtick goes this income tax line here's really about the last of it. Midorikawa's dialogue will still get rewritten throughout the rest of the episode -- this is still a 4Kids dub, after all -- but at the very least his rewrites won't give him a completely new personality the way all the others had up until now.
The Water-Type Pokémon start to jump erratically:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| サトシ 「いつもの跳ね方と違うぞ？」 |
Satoshi: "The way they're
jumping's different from before." |
Ash: "It looks like they're
going crazy." |
| ミドリカワ 「コイキングたちの進化直前の儀式じゃ。もうすぐ始まるぞ」 |
Midorikawa: "What you're
seeing is a ritual the Koiking perform right before they evolve. It
won't be long now." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "That means
the Magikarp can sense that something is about to happen. Something
very exciting." |
| サトシ 「えっほんと？」 |
Satoshi: "Oh really?" |
Ash: "I've got to see this." |
| カスミ 「ワクワクするわ～」 |
Kasumi: "This is exciting!" |
Misty: "Maybe they're
evolving." |
Midorikawa's fully aware of what's happening and tells the kids it's about time for the Koiking to evolve. Dr. Quackenpoker, meanwhile, seems a bit less sure.
The Rocket trio finish the motto:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| サトシたち 「ロケット団！」 |
Satoshi and the others:
"Rocket-Dan!" |
Ash & friends: "Team
Rocket!" |
| ムサシ 「ありがと。コイキングは私たちが頂いてくよ！」 |
Musashi: "Thank you. We'll be
taking these Koiking now!" |
Jessie: "We'd love to chat but
we have Magikarp to train." |
In the original there's this funny little moment where Musashi thanks the kids for waiting for them to finish their motto before shouting out their names that gets written out of the dub.
They back-and-forths continue:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ムサシ 「ありがと。コイキングは私たちが頂いてくよ！」 |
Musashi: "Thank you. We'll be
taking these Koiking with us now!" |
Jessie: "We'd love to chat but
we have Magikarp to train." |
| ミドリカワ 「バーカな！かわいいコイキングたちを奪われてたまるか！」 |
Midorikawa: "Ridiculous! You
think we'll just let you make off with these cute little Koiking!?" |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Release
those Magikarp at once or I'll be forced to sink that submarine." |
| コジロウ 「オレたちのコイキングだってかわいいぞ！」 |
Kojirou: "Our Koiking here's
much cuter!" |
James: "Mind your own business
you little quack." |
| カスミ 「どこがよ！」 |
Kasumi: "Says who?" |
Misty: "Quackenpoker!" |
| ムサシ 「そんなにかわいいんだったら返してあげるわよ！」 |
Musashi: "Well if you think
they're
so cute then you can have them back." |
Jessie: "If you want them so
much then you'll just have to catch them like we did." |
Kojirou telling the kids their Koiking sub is cuter than the real Koiking they're all so worried about gets replaced with James setting up a quack/Quackenpoker joke.
The Rocket trio's dialogue as they throw the Koiking at our heroes and then try to get Pikachu has a fair number of rewrites, but it's one of those situations where the essence is close enough to what they're saying in the Japanese version that I don't need to bring it up here. This comparison's long enough as it is, after all!
The next part I'll talk about is when Dr. Quackenpoker rushes over to help James:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| コジロウ 「あ～！ もっと優しく～！」 |
Kojirou: "Ah~! Not so hard!" |
James: "Hey, watch my hair!" |
| ミドリカワ 「それじゃあダメだ！こういうときは優しく背びれをなでるんじゃ よ」 | Midorikawa: "That won't work!
When this happens you need to gently pet the dorsal fin here." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "That won't
work. You can't muscle a Magikarp. You have to treat it very gently." |
| ロケット団 「背びれ？」 |
Rocket-Dan: "Dorsal fin?" |
Team Rocket: "Gently?" |
| ミドリカワ 「おー よしよしよしよし…。おー よしよしよしよし…。おー よしよしよしよし…」 | Midorikawa: "Oh, nice Koiking.
Good Koiking. That's it." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Nice
Magikarp. Good Magikarp. Relax, relax." |
I'll skip over the "we're slowly morphing our version of James into a caricature of a flaming gay man" thing 4Kids has been doing for a while to point out that Midorikawa's advice of stroking the Koiking's dorsal fin is simplified to "treat it gently" for the dub.
Dr. Quackenpoker gets right to work:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ミドリカワ 「キミ、手伝ってくれ。個体数のカウントだ。赤と青のリングの付い
たやつを頼むぞ」 |
Midorikawa: "Hey kid, help me
keep count of how many there are. I'll leave the ones with the red and
blue rings to you." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Tracey, I
need an experienced Watcher like you to help me count. You count the
ones with the red rings and blue rings, OK?" |
| ケンジ 「あっはい！」 |
Kenji: "Yeah, sure!" |
Tracey: "Yeah, sure!" |
One thing I find amusing about Midorikawa is that he doesn't seem like he ever bothered to learn Kenji's name throughout this entire adventure. Midorikawa using kimi ("hey you") here instead of the kid's name tells me that he's been traveling around with these children for like half a day or so and yet never learned what any of their names are!
Dr. Quackenpoker, on the other, apparently found out Tracey's name off-screen at some point.
The Gyarados start to move:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ミドリカワ 「ん？川を下るぞ 追うんじゃ！」 |
Midorikawa: "Hm? They're going
downstream. After them!" |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Quick,
they're swimming upstream! Follow them!" |
| ケンジ 「はい！」 |
Kenji: "Right!" |
Tracey: "Right!" |
"They're swimming upstream!" Dr. Quackenpoker says, just seconds before we see the Pokémon actually swim down a waterfall.
The Pokémon Watchers compare their results:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ミドリカワ 「おいキミ！データを！」 |
Midorikawa: "Hey you! Let's
see your data!" |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "OK Tracey,
give me your totals." |
| ケンジ 「はい！すごい！ 進化率が50パーセント超えてる！」 |
Kenji: "OK...wow, look at
this! More than fifty percent of them evolved!" |
Tracey: "Sure. Doctor, seventy
percent of the Magikarp have evolved!" |
| ミドリカワ 「これまでの最高記録じゃ！すばらしいデータが手に入ったぞ！」 |
Midorikawa: "That's the
highest record yet! We got some really great data today." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Hey, that's the highest percentage ever. Tracey we've made a momentous observation." |
| ケンジ 「やりましたね、ミドリカワさん！」 |
Kenji: "We really did, Mr.
Midorikawa." |
Tracey: "We sure have, Dr. Quackenpoker." |
| ミドリカワ 「早速 分析して高い進化率の謎を解明せねば」 |
Midorikawa: "I have to hurry
up and analyze this so we can find out the secret behind these high
evolution rates." |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Thanks to you I can finally begin to unravel some of the mysteries of Magikarp evolution." |
| ケンジ 「ボクももっともっと観察してポケモンたちの謎に迫ります！」 |
Kenji: "And I'll have to
continue
observing Pokémon so I can get closer to solving their many
mysteries!" |
Tracey: "And thanks to you I've had the honor of working with one of the greatest Pokémon Watchers ever." |
| ミドリカワ 「うーむ！ そうじゃしっかりやりたまえよ」 |
Midorikawa: "That's the
ticket! Make
sure you stick to it, OK?" |
Dr. Quackenpoker: "Hahaha.
Work hard, and you'll be great too." |
If I had to choose one, I guess the biggest change here is the percentages being different, but Tracey implying once again that Dr. Quackenpoker is in any way "famous" is also pretty high up on the list.
The narrator's closing speech:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| ナレーション 「ミドリカワとの出会いはポケモンウォッチャーケンジの心に新た
な決意を呼び起こした。そしてサトシたちの旅はさらに続くのである」 |
Narrator: "Kenji's encounter
with Midorikawa has awakened a new sense of determination in the young
Pokémon Watcher's heart. And now, Satoshi and his friends'
journey continues." |
Narrator: "And so as a new day
dawns our heroes have a new understanding and a renewed appreciation
for the many mysteries of Pokémon." |
The Japanese narrator's focus on Kenji gets changed to a focus on the group as a whole.
The Rocket trio get the last rewrites of the episode:
| Japanese
(original) |
Japanese
(translated) |
English
Dub |
| コジロウ 「ああ…だから相性最悪って言ったのに…」 |
Kojirou: "Didn't I say we
don't have the greatest track record with Gyarados?" |
James: "Why did we have
to...be so...greedy?" |
| ニャース 「ボールでゲットしてニャいから言うこと聞かないニャ～」 |
Nyarth: "They
won't listen to a thing we say since we didn't get
them in Monster Balls Nya." |
Meowth: "An army of Gyarados
seemed like a good idea at the time." |
| ムサシ 「いまさらそんなこと言ったって私分かんないも～ん」 |
Musashi: "I don't know what
I'm supposed to do with that information now." |
Jessie: "Maybe Gyarados are
much friendlier than they seem." |
| The Gyarados
glare |
||
| ロケット団 「前にもこんなのあったよね～？」 |
Rocket-Dan: "Didn't this
happen to us before?" |
Team Rocket: "Maybe not!" |
| コジロウ 「あんときどうしたんだっけ？」 |
Kojirou: "How'd we get out of
it then?" |
(no dialogue) |
| ムサシ 「忘れた」 |
Musashi: "I forgot." |
(no dialogue) |
| ニャース 「ニャ～」 |
Nyarth: "Nya~" |
(no dialogue) |
The first half of this -- before the Gyarados glare -- is all dialogue that absolutely could have (and should have!) been translated as-is, but it gets completely rewritten instead. The second half, meanwhile, marks the second episode in a row where the dub's removed a fourth wall break from the original. Originally the trio remarks they've been in this situation before, which, well, they have.
 |
|
| The ending of Episode 067 "The Legend of the Surfing Pikachu" |
The ending of this episode, "Koiking! The Secrets of Evolution!!" |
Both these episodes were written by Shinzou Fujita and so it seems like a callback that was done very much on purpose.
The English dub removes this reference, which is very odd because why is 4Kids acting like they don't love fourth wall breaks all of a sudden? Except wait, they actually still love them because they added in that line about the plot coming to a screeching halt earlier in the episode. So then what in the world's going on here?
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