I've recently been chronicling my incredibly nostalgic experience of watching through the Pokémon anime with my son. I previously posted my review of Season 1, also known as the Indigo League, as well as my review of Pokémon: The First Movie - Mewtwo Strikes Back. I'm pleased to announce that we've just wrapped up the second season of the anime, officially known as Adventures in Orange Islands.
Following very much in line with Season 1, this arc was an adventurous romp through the relatively early, unpredictable days of Ash's multi-decade journey. Adventures in Orange Islands feels similar to the Indigo League, in that the show was still finding its footing, and didn't know exactly what formula they wanted to roll with. The titular Orange Islands serve as a beautiful setting; an exotic, tropical archipelago of islands that Ash and company must traverse. In a very superficial sense, the seafaring, cheerful energy combined with the late 1990s anime art style hearkened back the early days of One Piece for me. The story isn't quite as focused as Season 1, though there is a loose framework connecting it together. Professor Oak requests that Ash travels to Valencia Island, in the Orange Islands to retrieve the enigmatic GS Ball from Professor Ivy, another Pokémon expert and friend of Oak. Ash, Brock and Misty travel to Valencia and retrieve the GS Ball, but Brock decides to remain behind with Professor Ivy. Ash and Misty try to find a way back to Pallet, and inadvertently learn about the Orange League; the archipelago's very own Pokémon league, which Ash decides to pursue, laying the groundwork for this season's main focus.
I'm not sure if the writers were trying to shake things up with Season 2 or what, but some surprising changes rolled out across this story arc. The first thing, something that literally made me hate Ash, was in the very first episode. His Pidgeotto, probably his most reliable Pokémon as well as the second ever Pokémon that he caught, finally evolved into Pidgeot, and Ash promptly released Pidgeot so that it could act as a guardian over a bunch of wild Pidgey and Pidgeotto. This was such an insane move to me. The release of Butterfree (the first Pokémon that he ever caught) was an emotional, interesting moment where Ash knew that his Butterfree would be happier with a mate than it would be with him. His release of Pidgeot felt so awkward and out of place, like the writers were just going to try and eventually force another bird into Pidgeot's role, but I know Noctowl doesn't even join Ash's team until the next season. It just felt disrespectful to the Pokémon who carried Ash through countless battles and encounters with Team Rocket.
Brock leaving the team, which I stated above, was perhaps the most substantial change in Season 2. After he leaves the group, we're introduced to Tracey Sketchit, a Pokémon "Watcher," which feels like a dead end job, if I'm being honest. Tracey joins the team after assisting Ash and Misty in saving a beached Lapras from a group of thugs. I really like Tracey as a character. He's not as pronounced of a character as Brock, but he brings a mellow, likable energy to the group that I enjoyed. I think Tracey gets a bad rap from fans for being a "boring" character and for replacing Brock. I really think Tracey's only downside is that he just doesn't have enough personality. We know Brock wants to be a Pokémon breeder, that he likes Rock Pokémon and that he loves the ladies even more. Tracey doesn't really receive any of that kind of development. He's an artist, and seems to know a lot about Pokémon, but who exactly is Tracey? While I like him, he did feel much less realized.
The story structure of Adventures in Orange Islands is quite similar to the Indigo League, though obviously through the lens of a completely different setting. Each episode takes place on a new island, as Ash navigates his way to the various islands that have Pokémon Gyms. That Lapras that the team saved becomes Ash's Pokémon and serves as their mount to ride between each island. This format allows for incredibly distinct islands with unique towns, cultures and environments. The "adventure of the week" episode format creates terrain for fresh, creative concepts. There are so many great episodes, and the originality of many of these kept me wondering what neat thing we would see next. My son, the world's number one Onix fan, loved an episode where the team encounters a rare Onix made entirely of dazzling, shiny crystals. One of my favorite episodes was heavily themed around an Old West desert region where a cowboy rides across the harsh sands with a team of Magnemites and harvests electricity from lightning storms to provide power for a nearby city.
There was also an awesome episode where an ancient Orange League Pokémon Championship trophy is found in an old shipwreck and put in a local museum. Team Rocket steals the trophy from the museum and flee out into the bay where they are taken on board a ghost ship. Ash and team follow them to retrieve the trophy and find the same ship. They discover a Gastly and Haunter who "live" aboard the ghost ship and they want the trophy back, as it was their master's from back when he was alive and a Pokémon trainer. Eventually Team Rocket is dealt with, and the Gastly and Haunter raise their ship up into the sky and fly away, presumably to the Moon. It was unclear where they were headed but the Moon was clearly framed that way in the scene. How Gastly and Haunter would survive there is beyond me, but I love the concept. The moon is indeed haunted in this Pokémon world. These kinds of bold, odd choices for Pokémon episode plots still had this universe feeling mysterious and I really loved that. To my understanding, a lot of this is absent by the time we get to Johto in Season 3. There's a reason why the first two seasons of Pokémon have their own distinct reputation from the rest of the series.
A key difference between the Indigo League and the Orange League is that Ash is only required to obtain four badges here to be able to pursue the championship. The first couple of Gym battles aren't really straight-forward Pokémon battles. He engages in a water-based race (kind of like that classic N64 game Wave Race) against one Gym leader, she on her Blastoise and Ash on his Lapras. And the second Gym battle is a mountain climbing challenge, followed by a sled race back down the mountain. The final two Gym battles are actual Pokémon battles, and are quite entertaining. Finally, Ash manages to get to the championship and has an all-out battle against the champion: Drake. This was an awesome sequence of battles against Drake, and Ash really got to showcase his improved skills as a trainer, after embarrassingly failing at the Indigo League. In fact, Ash was pretty handily rocking Drake, until the champion threw out his big dawg - Dragonite. This powerful Dragon-type Pokémon cut through several of Ash's Pokémon, and all they could do was whittle away at the immensely powerful Pokémon, each providing critically important chip damage at Dragonite's endurance. Finally, Pikachu sealed the deal and dealt the final thunderous blow to knock out Dragonite. Ash won the Orange Championship and it felt like he deserved it. Notably, this is Ash's only proper championship that he will earn for another twenty years. While I was amped for Ash's much deserved win, he did immediately follow that up with yet another move that made me hate him.
After the championship, Ash decided it was time to finally return to Pallet Town and return the mysterious GS ball to Professor Oak. En route, they come across a herd of Lapras and discover that Ash's Lapras is kin to these and had gotten separated from them when Ash found it. Ash, being the do-gooder that he is releases his Pokémon to rejoin its herd. I would've hated this much less if this season had not been bookended by Ash releasing both Pidgeot and now Lapras. It felt like suddenly this was going to be a thing that Ash would regularly do. It didn't help that Lapras had become endeared to the audience, and one of Ash's most reliable and trustworthy members of his roster. Releasing Lapras felt more akin to letting Butterfree go though, in that it did genuinely feel like Ash was doing a kind thing, and again, it probably would've gone over better for me if hadn't ditched Pidgeot not long before this.
Also speaking of the GS ball, it was meant to serve as a core narrative structure for the story to build around for a long arc, but they unceremoniously drop it sometime into Season 3 and never bring it up again. According to the director of the series, Masamitsu Hidaka, it was intended for the GS Ball to contain Celebi, but after they decided to hinge the fourth movie around Celebi, they dropped that entire narrative arc involving the GS Ball, leaving the story unresolved. Interestingly, Hidaka also asserted that Brock was removed from the show, with Tracey being his intended replacement. His claimed reasoning is that due to the show's exploding popularity outside of Japan, they were concerned that Brock's physical appearance would court controversy due to his exaggeratedly slanted eyes. Hidaka states that they feared that Brock would be viewed as an offensive stereotype, so Tracey was conceived as a replacement. When no controversary arose, they brought Brock back.
All in all, Adventures in Orange Islands was a really fun follow-up to the Indigo League. While it forged its own path in some creative ways, it still carried the zany, adventurous feel of the original season. I always wished we could've gotten a game set in the Orange Islands, even if it was with the Kanto Pokedex, but in this new, maritime setting. Between Pokémon: The First Movie and this season of the TV show, I loved how we started slowly getting drip fed Johto Pokémon. The movie showed off Donphan. And a major feature of Adventures in Orange Islands is that Tracey's main Pokémon is Marill (or Pikablu for all my OGs.) Generation 2 is my favorite Pokémon generation, and Johto is my favorite setting. I have a ton of nostalgia for that era of Pokémon, so I'm very excited to jump into Season 3. But first, it's time for Pokemon the Movie 2000, as it technically takes place during the Orange Islands arc. Look out for that review in the near future. Hold on, Lugia! I'm on the way!
VERDICT: Recommended
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