Episode Stats:

Japanese Episode AG 041: "Kimori no Shin Gejuu!!  Suika Hatake no Tane Mashin Gan"

("Kimori's New Technique!!  The Seed Machine Gun of the Watermelon Field!!")

American Episode 313: "What You Seed is What You Get"
Orchid-Hakase Pokémon Lecture:  Hellger
Japanese Air Date:  September 4th, 2003
American Air Date:  September 11th, 2004
Important Characters:  Natchi (Natasha)
Important Places:  Hajitsuge Town (Fallarbor Town), Fuen Town (Lavaridge Town)

After arguing for a while about the gang's next destination, it is decided that Satoshi and his friends will go to Hajitsuge Town to allow Haruka to compete in the next Pokémon Contest before heading up to Fuen Town for Satoshi's fourth badge.  Meanwhile, in a watermelon field, Musashi and her friends try to steal some fruit before they are sent blasting off by a Marumain.  As they're sent flying, the watermelons they were holding fall into a river, which eventually drift toward the area where Satoshi and his friends have set up camp.  As Satoshi begins spitting out the watermelon seeds, he gets an idea:  he'll teach his Kimori how to use Seed Machine Gun ("Bullet Seed").  Just then, the group is approached by a young girl named Natchi, who accuses the young trainers of stealing her watermelons.  After Natchi realizes that they aren't the thieves, she challenges Satoshi to a double battle.  The battle is between Satoshi's Kimori and Heigani and Natchi's Juptoru and Magmag, and Natchi puts up a really good fight.  Magmag and Heigani eventually knock each other out, leaving Kimori to face off against its evolved form.  Juptoru wins the battle, so the two trainers congratulate each other on a battle well fought.  After Natchi bids our heroes farewell, Kimori shows that it has finally learned how to use Seed Machine Gun!  Now that Kimori has learned its first grass-type attack, Satoshi and his friends head off to Hajitsuge Town.

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Thoughts
I really enjoyed this episode.  Kimori finally learns a grass-type move (meaning we'll get to see it to more than use Pound and Quick Attack over and over), and it gets to meet its evolved form.  In addition, the double battle in one of my favorite double battles in the series because both trainers put up such a great fight.

The dubbed version is pretty standard except for the typical things that go along with the start of a new season.  This episode is the first episode in 4Kids' 2004-2005 season, and so the show gets a new opening theme to go along with it.  The theme, which uses the animation from The Challenger!! Japanese opening theme, is actually one of my favorite dub openings (though my favorite is still the Johto Journies theme).  The only thing regarding the opening theme that I have a problem with is the fact that 4Kids is showing it now instead of 30 episodes from now, when the opening animation first debuted in Japan.  Because of this, dub fans get some pretty massive spoilers WAY before they should have which, in my opinion, isn't fair to the fans trying to avoid spoilers..

In addition, this season marks the end of 4Kids' "Who's That Pokémon?"  Replacing it is a segment called "Trainer's Choice," which asks some sort of multiple choice question before the commercial break, and then answers it when the show returns.  Most of the questions ask which pokemon is the best choice to face off against a particular pokemon, but other questions will ask which pokemon evolves into which.  The Trainer's Choice has been shunned by fans because 4Kids will get the answer wrong about half the time, showing fans just how little they actually know about the franchise that they've been working on for the past seven years.

So what about the actual episode itself?  Well, one thing that fans (myself included) have made a mistake about is thinking that the watermelons in this episode are actually Watmel Berries.  This isn't true.  Berry #33, Watmel Berries, are called Kaisu no Mi ("Kaisu Berries") in the Japanese version, but nobody in this episode uses that word at all.  Instead, they call the fruit that everyone's eating suika ("watermelon"), meaning that 4Kids is correct when they don't call the fruit Watmel Berries.  

We also get a preview of Grovyle's dub voice, which is just plain awful, in my opinion.

Cut--about 1 second
A little less than a second is cut from the opening shot of the episode.

Side Note
I think the people who worked on the script for "Having a Wailord of a Time" had a hand in dubbing this episode, because this one has just as much innuendo (when taken out of context, of course) as that episode had:

Meowth:  "I ain't never been so happy ta be wit somethin' so fruity!"

Jessie:  "Come to me you great big ball of juicy deliciousness!"

Meowth:  "Talk about your forbidden fruit~!"

...and, just like in the Wailord episode, the best lines are saved for when Team Rocket is blasting off:

Jessie:  "All of that hard work for nothing!"
James:  "So much for the fruit of our labor!"
Meowth:  "Guess we're just stuck wit da fruit we already got."

Cut--2 seconds
During the last attack launched by Natchi's pokemon before the main commercial break, we see Kimori jump behind Heigani, and then we see the water pokemon get pummeled by Juptoru's Bullet Seed and Magmag's Flamethrower.  There's a two-second close up of the pokemon getting attacked before we see a split screen with Satoshi telling his pokemon to hang in there (in the dub, Ash says "Hang on Corphish!").  In the English version of this episode, the two-second close-up is removed.

Cut--3 seconds altogether
A second is cut from the scene right after Kids' WB!'s final commercial break.

And, just like last season, the TO BE CONTINUED... screen is shortened.  This time, we get two seconds removed.

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