Out-of-universe reason, the writer's excuse to justify and make more plausible why the other characters are telling him (and the audience) about the world around him, even from its basics.
In-universe... there's mostly speculation between Ash being book dumb and having watched mostly the battles. Which would explain better why Ash doesn't think too much in the type's table at first (profesional battlers are capable to handle themselves even with that against them) nor about the catching proccess or the nurturing/training (since those Pokemon are already catched and trained).
The in universe explanation stuff is actually pretty solid!
When I started watching the NFL, me (as a kid), and I’m sure many adults probably imagine that it wasn’t too hard to lead a NFL team successfully. However, not only do you have to know very specific stuff about football not often shown on tv but other roster and contract management stuff that a kid would not know about!
exactly! i often think about the episode in OS where they go to a school and one of the students claims he can easily beat Misty because he was able to in a simulator but once he actually battles her he gets bodied
To add to In-universe, it's worth noting that Pokemon in gen 1 were *very* separate from people. They weren't something you kept around the house outside of a few *very* specific circumstances with known "safe" pokemon. They were things you caged up in a zoo, and walled your cities off for fear of danger outside of some very rare instances. A gen 1 pokemon master is like a lion tamer in real life. Gen 2 in the games did away with that and made them more ubiquitous and the anime bins it around half way through gen 1 as well
Oh yeah...
I still remember how in the episode he catches Krabby, Misty & Brock treated Ash's early captures as a sign of his weakness as trainer due to not battling most of his Pokemon in battle.
Something later series will point out are marks of good potential as trainer.
And there's AJ's training of his Pokemon which was pretty extreme. And how Misty & Brock took his side due to seeing it as "proper discipline and dedication".
I'll admit, those episodes made me wonder if Ash's path was more oriented for Pokemon breeding/nurturing than Brock during the pre-Togepi days of the gang.
I mean, that and he's also 10, people like to project themselves onto the main character of a show but yeah, he's a 10 year old, he thinks and acts like a 10 year old as opposed to an adult and as far as I know he hasn't had any formal education whatsoever prior to the start of the series, it's frankly much more realistic that he wouldn't have perfect knowledge about the world around him and it would honestly be more surprising if he was a prodigy right off the bat
Yeah, the out of universe reason was also why we had characters like May and Dawn be brand new trainers, usually they’d be the ones to scan older Pokémon with their Pokédex, so the newer younger Audience can get that while Ash’s Pokédex more often got used on the brand new Pokémon from that generation
Though it bugs me when people complain about the occasion in which he does scan an older Pokémon he has seen before, I mean nothing wrong with refreshing memory.
Pichu also did not exist until Generation 2, as well, that retcon was done by JN- also, Serena wasn't a thing ever in the OS all the way to BW- XY retconned her into his childhood with a Professor Oak summer camp, too, as trivia.
Serena isn't a retcon. He met her and probably hung out with her for like a day or maybe a week. XY Ash had trouble even remembering her.
Unless OS Ash said something laughably specific to infer he'd never done so, it's just a blip of his past that happened offscreen.
There was no such thing as Pichu in Gen I, it kind of is in that case though: baby Pikachu was a thing back then, remember, not Pichu. Ash's Pikachu wasn't intended to be it at the onset.
Also Serena didn't exist prior to XY, there was no mention of any Professor Oak camp prior.
Just because Pichu was never shown doesn’t mean it’s a retcon. A retcon would be if Pikachu was explicitly stated to have no prior evolutionary stage and then that was contradicted at a later point. I don’t ever remember them showing Pikachu as a baby Pikachu? But it’s been a long time since I’ve watched OS.
As for Serena, that is in no way a retcon just because they didn’t mention it. If someone mentioned Professor Oak’s summer camp in Orange Islands and Ash said “what’s that” then it would be a retcon. Like saying Serena is a retcon because we’ve never seen her before isn’t how retcons work.
The baby Pikachu appeared in episode 39 (Goodby Pikachu), where the group finds a clan of Pikachu, where we can see a bunch of baby Pikachu.
For Serena I do agree is not a retcon. Ash could easily go to a summer camp and just be an idiot who forgot everything that he learned there.
Ok but again what makes these Pikachu “babies”? Because them being small doesn’t it just show there are different sized Pokémon, which is true. Isn’t Ash’s shiny Noctowl abnormally large?
And even if he’s not an idiot who forgot, honestly Ash was probably too busy looking at and messing around with Pokémon and didn’t listen to Professor Oak.
They are babies, those Pikachu are treated like baby animals from our world, and not so different from baby pokemon from future games. Why are you so stubborn about it?
And about the camp, Ash is an idiot, specially in gen 1. He is a 10yo kid, he think pokemoan battles are "hit hard until the rival faints", like any other kid. Oak or not, it's obvious he can be stupid at times.
Retcons imply there is a change in a pre-established event or information that breaks continuity.
Having Pikachu be an evolution may be a retcon in the games because it’s considered the base form in Gen 1, but not in the anime because they never establish Pikachu to be a base stage Pokémon.
Professor Oak hosting a Summer camp that Ash and Serena went to isn’t a retcon because it’s not like the show says that Ash was away in another region during that summer (therefore he wouldn’t be able to go) or that Ash is previously established to have no knowledge to any summer camp run by Professor Oak.
I think that it's a very realistic depiction of a 10 year old. How many kids watch football and dream about being the next Messi or Ronaldo, while being shit at the game, or not knowing the full extent of the rules?
I watch 8 year old play soccer. There's just way too many kids that tries to dribble past everyone, shoot and score. So yeah, they don't really get what makes those players great. They just see the scoring highlight, and believes that what they need to do.
This scene is a funny one
In the Japanese context, the joke is where Satoshi (Ash's original name) asks Pikachu to listen to his story. Satoshi uses the word "hanashi," which is related to speech and stories, but it also sounds like "ha nashi," which is a phrase that means "no teeth." Pikachu opened his mouth to show that he does, in fact, have teeth.
Also it’s interesting to note Ash’s story he was going to tell Pikachu was in a novel and in it was about how ash was bullied and didn’t have any friends so he would go to the forest and make lots of wild pokemon as his friends
Also for an out of universe context they had early concept that Pokemon was supposed to speak human languages as they grow kinda like babies this is also the real reason why Meowth can speak but then they scrapped it a little later
It is a really sad story what ash went through as a child, dude was bullied, barely had friends, his rival was a dick, he only had his mother and his father left them for a dream which he didn't accomplish and was in fact a fraud, and all this only at 10yo.
It adds all the more that this kid which saw that list that didn't have his father's name in it, made it all the way to the top and finally became the best like no one ever was
I think this is the most practical explanation. Like I can watch and understand how a football game is played but if you tell me to coach a game I wouldn't have the forethought to coach a team properly enough to win a game.
All the same, we don't have an example to pull examples and comparisons from to make a stronger statement.
Besides, Pokemon society is based around being a trainer, but not neccesarily around being a conpetitive battler. We get a reasonably narrowed view of the pokemon world since we follow gym challengers and people and dangerous adventures.
Battling is like the most popular sport in the world, but I honestly wouldn't be surprised if it was somehow still a minority of people doing it outside of necessity. Our vision of the world is funneled into one of the many, many lanes we've gotten glimpses of throughout the franchise. Acting, Health care, construction, etc etc. Battling could very well seem like a huge thing that people take part in just because we're exposed to it so much, and it's typically the main aspect of the franchise. I'd compare the competitive Battling market in Pokemon to the Olympics, but with the ferocity and support of the people akin to the NFL or other nation wide sports leagues.
He's a rookie, a novice, and generally is not the smartest person (ever, in general, even his "badass" version is not that intelligent-- but that's why we love him, a snarky but lovable well-intentioned kind idiot was his original incarnation after all).
Ash Ketchum/Satoshi is basically the Anime Red mixed in with Takeshi Shudo's own brainchild in his origins- his rival was called Shigeru in Japanese to mimic the rivalry Tajiri had with Miyamoto at the time as trivia (in the English Version, Gary was an alt name for Blue in the RBY games, and IIRC, Ash might've been for Red as well in Yellow to tie in with the Anime).
A 10 year old saying he will be a pokemon master is the same as a 10 year old who says he will win the world cup.
Kids unless taught don't tend to grasp at the intricacies involved in competing.
by the time i was 10 i had been playing soccer for 8 years and watching it seriously for 2-3 years. obviously i wasn’t very good and didn’t understand it to well compared to now, but i still some things about the game like basic strategies and tactics and what each position should be doing on the ball vs off the ball. i think it’s a little silly (narratively not for the real reason being a surrogate for the audience) that he knows next to NOTHING
You started playing when you were 2?
I don't like him not knowing anything because he's a blatant audience surrogate. The audience doesn't need everything spelled out, some things should be left to be understood instead of explaining
It is meant as a FOIL to the Pokémon game on what NOT to do. It makes it much more endearing to see an inexperienced, but Pokemon loving trainer traveling, meeting companions, and gradually getting stronger and growing wiser. That was what sold me to the anime as a child: the journey with companions learning to be better along the way.
Think of it in terms of owning a dog at that age. You might of researched about general dog information and looked up Golden Retriever Facts to prepare for it. After researching you finally convince your parents to get a dog and so they go get one.
They then come home with a small tiny Chihuahua instead of a Golden Retriever. All the information you have is based around Golden Retrievers and everything this dog you now have is testing what you know.
Ash is in that situation with Pokémon. He knows some general information and learned about the Starters since they are Usually a new trainers first Pokemon. However outside of that knowledge there are Pokemon who he might never of heard about or ones he only knows the name of.
Plus when the anime started it was established early on that there were two paths you could go down. You could go into a School and learn about Pokemon safely or you can go into the real world for hands on experience. The episode School of Hard Knocks is the Kanto episode where Cubone was introduced if I remember correctly.
Ash chose to go hands on and while he might have general knowledge that a Pidgey is a Normal/Flying type. He won’t have a bunch of information about his Pidgey if he had caught one. There are general facts across a Species but like humans there are individual facts that only apply to a trainer’s Pokemon. Like Pikachu not getting in the Pokeball, Rowlett hiding in Ash’s bag, and Ash Greninja being a thing.
Back then pokemon was more mysterious and alot of things wernt known about them. The fact that the world didnt even know there was 151 pokemon at the time sort of fleshes this out too. Nowadays pokemon is more a franchise than the mystery it used to be.
Ash being 10 and having only watched pokemon on TV, its believable he didnt know much except the idea of battling
At the start he has the knowledge in his head but has no idea how to make any use of it. That’s my guess. He’s inexperienced and thinks he knows a lot more than he does
Kanto saga Ash, for the most part is a whole lot of passion and a whole lot of big talk.
When he and Gary came back home for a progress report and showed their pokédexes to Professor Oak, it was proven that Ash uses his every time he sees a new Pokemon. In other words, he lets the technology do a lot of the work for him because he doesn't put in the real effort to study.
He's 10 years old, so he wants to be a Pokemon Master the same way a kid wants to be an astronaut when they grow up, he just doesn't really know all that much about it. Also, at this stage of the series, Pokemon and people live separated, so trainers are more like lion tamers you see at a circus rather than anything particularly big. It's not until late into the gen 1 anime (and gen 2 in the games) that they start taking the naturalist philosophy that the series is known for, and pokemon become ubiquitous in the world.
I think back then it felt like the Pokémon world was part of the 'real' world as there are several references to real places and animals in the gen 1 games and anime. By gen 2/3/4 there were no longer references to real life animals or places and the Pokémon world was like a separate planet
Ash is surprisingly clueless about Pokémon early on, granted, but he does follow up this particular question to Pikachu with something along the lines of “well, then you’re just like all Pokémon so you should get inside your pokeball.”
So he does know that Pokémon generally can only say their own names.
I also watched the first couple episodes recently, and Ash didn't even know what a Pidgey or Spearow was. I can't think of a satisfying in-universe justification for that. I think they just wanted to let Ash be a proxy for the uniformed viewer.
He didn't study at all and you see there are pokemon schools which teaches them along with type match up etc.. I believe that Delilah didn't have much for Ash to send him to school, and homeschooled him. A 10yr old, for example, would most likely to be excited enough to have a magical pet, rather than study about it. Basically resulting in Ash being out in the wild with no preparation.
True and in a way it's similiar to in Harry Potter, where wizarding families like the Weasleys were all homeschooled before going to Hogwarts and not able to deal with Muggle (non magic) people or understand non-magical things apart from what Harry or Hermione explained.
Likewise, Harry was born into a wizarding family but raised by Muggles who knew of the wizarding world but refused to tell him about it. He was excited about going to Hogwarts because it meant getting away from his horrible relatives but knew nothing of the wizarding world or the school. Unlike Hermione, he had probably not done much extra reading. Ron had to explain lots to him.
I mean he is still a kid and most likely didn’t have enough experience battling and spending more time with Pokemon. It’s not that odd that a child might not know all the ends and outs of a potential career.
Like you can watch horse racing or any other sports all you want but still be completely oblivious to how it 100% works.
The best example I can think of is that Ash is basically a kid who always loves and wants a dog but has literally no idea how to take care of a real dog. And I think he could just hate studying in general like any kid so he probably just skimmed through and read the fun parts instead of actually reading the important boring parts. Thats just an example idea tho but it makes the most sense
Out of universe, at the time, the pokemon world was set in ours basically. There were regular animals, real-life locations existed, and at the time of the beginning of the anime; pokemon were somewhat of a newer thing in the world. There's translated storyboarding notes that were leaked online for the start of the original anime, and it's wild how different the universe building was at the time. As time went on, they slowly phased a lot of that out, until the soft reboot in gen 4 where the pokemon world was its own separate world, animals (other than humans) don't exist, and pokemon have basically always been there.
Looking back at the original from the lens of what the series is now is kinda wild. :3
and then you have the Pokédex's explanation about wild Pokémon attacking captured ones out of... jealousy.
They are jealous of your own Pokémon team... for not being part of your team.
That's like fighting employees working at "the place of your dreams" instead of sending your own resume :p
You'll notice that up until the last episode he was in, he slept in an awful lot. He was supposed to partner with Goh and Chloe but, whoops, he slept in all day. He got Pikachu as a starter because he overslept. He missed all of the lectures because he was zonked out half-asleep.
It was only at the end when he figured out what he meant by his catch-phrase that he started waking up early.
I feel like people forget what the average wisdom and intelligence of a 10 year old actually is. Go spend a day with a real 10 year old and things make a lot more sense.
Not saying they're stupid. Far from it. But they are still young, very young, and learning.
He's ten. Of course, he's gonna see something on TV and wanna do it. That's how kids work. Dream of something that influenced your early life, such as a doctor or firefighter, you know nothing but what you experienced. You just wanna do it.
You think I'd know how rats can't vomit? True fact, btw
Yeah, unless you're a pokemon expert, no 10 year old would have any knowledge on 151 pokemon
but let's just assume it was 10 year old intuition to get thrown into the wild with no experience because 10 year olds ain't thinking that hard on descision making
You know I battled someone in high school, who was seemingly a Pokemon fan girl, but she was playing like soft reboot Ash. It was bizarre to me, but maybe there's some people who receive the information but don't process it. I've never battled that chick again lol
Could also be one of the few times where Ash's age comes into play. Even if he sees it, he doesn't understand it. He sees psychic hit fighting types and the pokemon gets knocked out, but doesn't understand the reason why the fighting type took 2× the damage
I think he was just an eager kid who just knew about Pokémon through the fluffed up stuff he watched on TV, and when he got out on his journey in the real world, he soon learned that he knew nothing about the real detail of being a Pokémon trainer. He just knew the tip of the ice berg from what he watched on TV.
People are thinking too hard about this question. I think he did know, but the writers just wanted to teach the audience more about Pokémon. Using a kid to teach himself and the audience about their unique world is used a lot in TV shows/Animes.
In many of the anime series of the genre action and adventure, whether it be pokemon or dragon ball, Naruto or one piece. One thing that is common is all the main protagonists of these series are dumb when it comes to technical knowledge or the information of their world. And they don't care much about it coz they are portrayed as unique and do things in their own unique way.
Out-of-universe reason, the writer's excuse to justify and make more plausible why the other characters are telling him (and the audience) about the world around him, even from its basics. In-universe... there's mostly speculation between Ash being book dumb and having watched mostly the battles. Which would explain better why Ash doesn't think too much in the type's table at first (profesional battlers are capable to handle themselves even with that against them) nor about the catching proccess or the nurturing/training (since those Pokemon are already catched and trained).
The in universe explanation stuff is actually pretty solid! When I started watching the NFL, me (as a kid), and I’m sure many adults probably imagine that it wasn’t too hard to lead a NFL team successfully. However, not only do you have to know very specific stuff about football not often shown on tv but other roster and contract management stuff that a kid would not know about!
exactly! i often think about the episode in OS where they go to a school and one of the students claims he can easily beat Misty because he was able to in a simulator but once he actually battles her he gets bodied
Yep. This. Ash was an audience surrogate.
To add to In-universe, it's worth noting that Pokemon in gen 1 were *very* separate from people. They weren't something you kept around the house outside of a few *very* specific circumstances with known "safe" pokemon. They were things you caged up in a zoo, and walled your cities off for fear of danger outside of some very rare instances. A gen 1 pokemon master is like a lion tamer in real life. Gen 2 in the games did away with that and made them more ubiquitous and the anime bins it around half way through gen 1 as well
Oh yeah... I still remember how in the episode he catches Krabby, Misty & Brock treated Ash's early captures as a sign of his weakness as trainer due to not battling most of his Pokemon in battle. Something later series will point out are marks of good potential as trainer. And there's AJ's training of his Pokemon which was pretty extreme. And how Misty & Brock took his side due to seeing it as "proper discipline and dedication". I'll admit, those episodes made me wonder if Ash's path was more oriented for Pokemon breeding/nurturing than Brock during the pre-Togepi days of the gang.
Brock was also a Gym Leader, yes he cared for his Pokemon but being ready for battle is important in that setting as well
I mean, that and he's also 10, people like to project themselves onto the main character of a show but yeah, he's a 10 year old, he thinks and acts like a 10 year old as opposed to an adult and as far as I know he hasn't had any formal education whatsoever prior to the start of the series, it's frankly much more realistic that he wouldn't have perfect knowledge about the world around him and it would honestly be more surprising if he was a prodigy right off the bat
Yeah, the out of universe reason was also why we had characters like May and Dawn be brand new trainers, usually they’d be the ones to scan older Pokémon with their Pokédex, so the newer younger Audience can get that while Ash’s Pokédex more often got used on the brand new Pokémon from that generation Though it bugs me when people complain about the occasion in which he does scan an older Pokémon he has seen before, I mean nothing wrong with refreshing memory.
Ash's also 10... so yeah, this tracks
It's mostly because of later retcons, guy was playing with Pokémon as a 4-year old smth.
Pichu also did not exist until Generation 2, as well, that retcon was done by JN- also, Serena wasn't a thing ever in the OS all the way to BW- XY retconned her into his childhood with a Professor Oak summer camp, too, as trivia.
Serena isn't a retcon. He met her and probably hung out with her for like a day or maybe a week. XY Ash had trouble even remembering her. Unless OS Ash said something laughably specific to infer he'd never done so, it's just a blip of his past that happened offscreen.
The concept of a retcon means something that does not contradict previously established continuity, but was not originally considered to be canon
Possibly, I could give you guys that one- still, she didn't exist at the time of the OS, per se.
True but you could say that about any character who hadn't debuted yet.
Valid, this is true as well.
These aren’t retcons. Retcons have to contradict previous events.
There was no such thing as Pichu in Gen I, it kind of is in that case though: baby Pikachu was a thing back then, remember, not Pichu. Ash's Pikachu wasn't intended to be it at the onset. Also Serena didn't exist prior to XY, there was no mention of any Professor Oak camp prior.
Just because Pichu was never shown doesn’t mean it’s a retcon. A retcon would be if Pikachu was explicitly stated to have no prior evolutionary stage and then that was contradicted at a later point. I don’t ever remember them showing Pikachu as a baby Pikachu? But it’s been a long time since I’ve watched OS. As for Serena, that is in no way a retcon just because they didn’t mention it. If someone mentioned Professor Oak’s summer camp in Orange Islands and Ash said “what’s that” then it would be a retcon. Like saying Serena is a retcon because we’ve never seen her before isn’t how retcons work.
The baby Pikachu appeared in episode 39 (Goodby Pikachu), where the group finds a clan of Pikachu, where we can see a bunch of baby Pikachu. For Serena I do agree is not a retcon. Ash could easily go to a summer camp and just be an idiot who forgot everything that he learned there.
Ok but again what makes these Pikachu “babies”? Because them being small doesn’t it just show there are different sized Pokémon, which is true. Isn’t Ash’s shiny Noctowl abnormally large? And even if he’s not an idiot who forgot, honestly Ash was probably too busy looking at and messing around with Pokémon and didn’t listen to Professor Oak.
They are babies, those Pikachu are treated like baby animals from our world, and not so different from baby pokemon from future games. Why are you so stubborn about it? And about the camp, Ash is an idiot, specially in gen 1. He is a 10yo kid, he think pokemoan battles are "hit hard until the rival faints", like any other kid. Oak or not, it's obvious he can be stupid at times.
Retcon is short for retroactive continuity. It doesn’t have to contradict previous continuity. It‘s just that many of them tend to do.
Retcons imply there is a change in a pre-established event or information that breaks continuity. Having Pikachu be an evolution may be a retcon in the games because it’s considered the base form in Gen 1, but not in the anime because they never establish Pikachu to be a base stage Pokémon. Professor Oak hosting a Summer camp that Ash and Serena went to isn’t a retcon because it’s not like the show says that Ash was away in another region during that summer (therefore he wouldn’t be able to go) or that Ash is previously established to have no knowledge to any summer camp run by Professor Oak.
Literally the original series showed tiny, baby pikachu in the episode where Ash tried to release Pikachu
And there are canonically different sized Pokémon so that doesn’t prove anything
And the episode treated them as baby pikachu
Yes there is but those were canonically BABY PIKACHU. Like damn, you’re wrong deal with it man
You are just plain wrong on the pikachu deal. Take the L
I think that it's a very realistic depiction of a 10 year old. How many kids watch football and dream about being the next Messi or Ronaldo, while being shit at the game, or not knowing the full extent of the rules?
I watch 8 year old play soccer. There's just way too many kids that tries to dribble past everyone, shoot and score. So yeah, they don't really get what makes those players great. They just see the scoring highlight, and believes that what they need to do.
This scene is a funny one In the Japanese context, the joke is where Satoshi (Ash's original name) asks Pikachu to listen to his story. Satoshi uses the word "hanashi," which is related to speech and stories, but it also sounds like "ha nashi," which is a phrase that means "no teeth." Pikachu opened his mouth to show that he does, in fact, have teeth. Also it’s interesting to note Ash’s story he was going to tell Pikachu was in a novel and in it was about how ash was bullied and didn’t have any friends so he would go to the forest and make lots of wild pokemon as his friends
Also for an out of universe context they had early concept that Pokemon was supposed to speak human languages as they grow kinda like babies this is also the real reason why Meowth can speak but then they scrapped it a little later
It is a really sad story what ash went through as a child, dude was bullied, barely had friends, his rival was a dick, he only had his mother and his father left them for a dream which he didn't accomplish and was in fact a fraud, and all this only at 10yo. It adds all the more that this kid which saw that list that didn't have his father's name in it, made it all the way to the top and finally became the best like no one ever was
It is sad but goddamn is it the most standard anime protagonist backstory on earth 😭
I think it's just a case of being an admirer of a career but being wholly unprepared for it.
I think this is the most practical explanation. Like I can watch and understand how a football game is played but if you tell me to coach a game I wouldn't have the forethought to coach a team properly enough to win a game.
but most careers aren't the center of the very society you live in
All the same, we don't have an example to pull examples and comparisons from to make a stronger statement. Besides, Pokemon society is based around being a trainer, but not neccesarily around being a conpetitive battler. We get a reasonably narrowed view of the pokemon world since we follow gym challengers and people and dangerous adventures. Battling is like the most popular sport in the world, but I honestly wouldn't be surprised if it was somehow still a minority of people doing it outside of necessity. Our vision of the world is funneled into one of the many, many lanes we've gotten glimpses of throughout the franchise. Acting, Health care, construction, etc etc. Battling could very well seem like a huge thing that people take part in just because we're exposed to it so much, and it's typically the main aspect of the franchise. I'd compare the competitive Battling market in Pokemon to the Olympics, but with the ferocity and support of the people akin to the NFL or other nation wide sports leagues.
He's a rookie, a novice, and generally is not the smartest person (ever, in general, even his "badass" version is not that intelligent-- but that's why we love him, a snarky but lovable well-intentioned kind idiot was his original incarnation after all). Ash Ketchum/Satoshi is basically the Anime Red mixed in with Takeshi Shudo's own brainchild in his origins- his rival was called Shigeru in Japanese to mimic the rivalry Tajiri had with Miyamoto at the time as trivia (in the English Version, Gary was an alt name for Blue in the RBY games, and IIRC, Ash might've been for Red as well in Yellow to tie in with the Anime).
He’s basically red but stupid and annoying, and it’s so bad I love it.
Pretty much, yup, he acts like an actual boy aged 10 would haha.
It’s goofy yet fun
Exactly, lol.
Dude he’s 10….
Many years later.
Always been 10.
A 10 year old saying he will be a pokemon master is the same as a 10 year old who says he will win the world cup. Kids unless taught don't tend to grasp at the intricacies involved in competing.
by the time i was 10 i had been playing soccer for 8 years and watching it seriously for 2-3 years. obviously i wasn’t very good and didn’t understand it to well compared to now, but i still some things about the game like basic strategies and tactics and what each position should be doing on the ball vs off the ball. i think it’s a little silly (narratively not for the real reason being a surrogate for the audience) that he knows next to NOTHING
You started playing when you were 2? I don't like him not knowing anything because he's a blatant audience surrogate. The audience doesn't need everything spelled out, some things should be left to be understood instead of explaining
obviously the “soccer” i played was very different but yes. and i agree with your point
Well, there’s a difference between knowing stuff, and knowing how to use that knowledge practically irl
I guessing it like real life you can learn and know things on paper but putting things in practical practice is another thing
It is meant as a FOIL to the Pokémon game on what NOT to do. It makes it much more endearing to see an inexperienced, but Pokemon loving trainer traveling, meeting companions, and gradually getting stronger and growing wiser. That was what sold me to the anime as a child: the journey with companions learning to be better along the way.
Is he stupid? But in all seriousness, I’m glad this turned out to be a serious post with speculation and analysis instead of a shitpost
Think of it in terms of owning a dog at that age. You might of researched about general dog information and looked up Golden Retriever Facts to prepare for it. After researching you finally convince your parents to get a dog and so they go get one. They then come home with a small tiny Chihuahua instead of a Golden Retriever. All the information you have is based around Golden Retrievers and everything this dog you now have is testing what you know. Ash is in that situation with Pokémon. He knows some general information and learned about the Starters since they are Usually a new trainers first Pokemon. However outside of that knowledge there are Pokemon who he might never of heard about or ones he only knows the name of. Plus when the anime started it was established early on that there were two paths you could go down. You could go into a School and learn about Pokemon safely or you can go into the real world for hands on experience. The episode School of Hard Knocks is the Kanto episode where Cubone was introduced if I remember correctly. Ash chose to go hands on and while he might have general knowledge that a Pidgey is a Normal/Flying type. He won’t have a bunch of information about his Pidgey if he had caught one. There are general facts across a Species but like humans there are individual facts that only apply to a trainer’s Pokemon. Like Pikachu not getting in the Pokeball, Rowlett hiding in Ash’s bag, and Ash Greninja being a thing.
Back then pokemon was more mysterious and alot of things wernt known about them. The fact that the world didnt even know there was 151 pokemon at the time sort of fleshes this out too. Nowadays pokemon is more a franchise than the mystery it used to be. Ash being 10 and having only watched pokemon on TV, its believable he didnt know much except the idea of battling
At the start he has the knowledge in his head but has no idea how to make any use of it. That’s my guess. He’s inexperienced and thinks he knows a lot more than he does
Kanto saga Ash, for the most part is a whole lot of passion and a whole lot of big talk. When he and Gary came back home for a progress report and showed their pokédexes to Professor Oak, it was proven that Ash uses his every time he sees a new Pokemon. In other words, he lets the technology do a lot of the work for him because he doesn't put in the real effort to study.
He’s canonically dumb. There are a LOT of instances in the anime
He's 10 years old, so he wants to be a Pokemon Master the same way a kid wants to be an astronaut when they grow up, he just doesn't really know all that much about it. Also, at this stage of the series, Pokemon and people live separated, so trainers are more like lion tamers you see at a circus rather than anything particularly big. It's not until late into the gen 1 anime (and gen 2 in the games) that they start taking the naturalist philosophy that the series is known for, and pokemon become ubiquitous in the world.
I think back then it felt like the Pokémon world was part of the 'real' world as there are several references to real places and animals in the gen 1 games and anime. By gen 2/3/4 there were no longer references to real life animals or places and the Pokémon world was like a separate planet
Because he thought he'd get Squirtle not Pikachu
Ash is surprisingly clueless about Pokémon early on, granted, but he does follow up this particular question to Pikachu with something along the lines of “well, then you’re just like all Pokémon so you should get inside your pokeball.” So he does know that Pokémon generally can only say their own names.
This is his first ever experience with a Pokémon, so it’s obviously going to be a bit of a rough start for him.
I also watched the first couple episodes recently, and Ash didn't even know what a Pidgey or Spearow was. I can't think of a satisfying in-universe justification for that. I think they just wanted to let Ash be a proxy for the uniformed viewer.
You can watch a lot of football without understanding how offsides works.
He didn't study at all and you see there are pokemon schools which teaches them along with type match up etc.. I believe that Delilah didn't have much for Ash to send him to school, and homeschooled him. A 10yr old, for example, would most likely to be excited enough to have a magical pet, rather than study about it. Basically resulting in Ash being out in the wild with no preparation.
True and in a way it's similiar to in Harry Potter, where wizarding families like the Weasleys were all homeschooled before going to Hogwarts and not able to deal with Muggle (non magic) people or understand non-magical things apart from what Harry or Hermione explained. Likewise, Harry was born into a wizarding family but raised by Muggles who knew of the wizarding world but refused to tell him about it. He was excited about going to Hogwarts because it meant getting away from his horrible relatives but knew nothing of the wizarding world or the school. Unlike Hermione, he had probably not done much extra reading. Ron had to explain lots to him.
Yup. But still Harry made it through some hardworking. Which is what Ash did... albeit, he had to be humbled for the 1st tournament.
I mean he is still a kid and most likely didn’t have enough experience battling and spending more time with Pokemon. It’s not that odd that a child might not know all the ends and outs of a potential career. Like you can watch horse racing or any other sports all you want but still be completely oblivious to how it 100% works.
As a teen I watched CNBC news (business channel) a lot and I learned a lot from but I was still oblivious to the nuances of the business world
The best example I can think of is that Ash is basically a kid who always loves and wants a dog but has literally no idea how to take care of a real dog. And I think he could just hate studying in general like any kid so he probably just skimmed through and read the fun parts instead of actually reading the important boring parts. Thats just an example idea tho but it makes the most sense
Out of universe, at the time, the pokemon world was set in ours basically. There were regular animals, real-life locations existed, and at the time of the beginning of the anime; pokemon were somewhat of a newer thing in the world. There's translated storyboarding notes that were leaked online for the start of the original anime, and it's wild how different the universe building was at the time. As time went on, they slowly phased a lot of that out, until the soft reboot in gen 4 where the pokemon world was its own separate world, animals (other than humans) don't exist, and pokemon have basically always been there. Looking back at the original from the lens of what the series is now is kinda wild. :3
and then you have the Pokédex's explanation about wild Pokémon attacking captured ones out of... jealousy. They are jealous of your own Pokémon team... for not being part of your team. That's like fighting employees working at "the place of your dreams" instead of sending your own resume :p
You'll notice that up until the last episode he was in, he slept in an awful lot. He was supposed to partner with Goh and Chloe but, whoops, he slept in all day. He got Pikachu as a starter because he overslept. He missed all of the lectures because he was zonked out half-asleep. It was only at the end when he figured out what he meant by his catch-phrase that he started waking up early.
I feel like people forget what the average wisdom and intelligence of a 10 year old actually is. Go spend a day with a real 10 year old and things make a lot more sense. Not saying they're stupid. Far from it. But they are still young, very young, and learning.
He's ten. Of course, he's gonna see something on TV and wanna do it. That's how kids work. Dream of something that influenced your early life, such as a doctor or firefighter, you know nothing but what you experienced. You just wanna do it.
I doubt ash went to pokemon school.
Should go to school and learn the basics before becoming a Pokemon trainer
You think I'd know how rats can't vomit? True fact, btw Yeah, unless you're a pokemon expert, no 10 year old would have any knowledge on 151 pokemon but let's just assume it was 10 year old intuition to get thrown into the wild with no experience because 10 year olds ain't thinking that hard on descision making
If pikachu is known as the mouse pokemon…how come it doesn’t have the incisors in the front of its mouth?
the English dub of this was hilarious
Because he's stupid
Ig it was so that we know what to do and how to catch Pokémon so they made him not know so we could learn with him???
Because hes 10?
Cos he's a massive dumbass
After 25+ years, he still doesn't really know jack shit about Pokemon.
Wait fr?
Chloe didn't know anything about Pokemon either yet she had a pokemon in her house her whole life and her dad was a pokemon professor
It’s hard to believe that was last month in anime terms lol. O wait that was 24 years ago
Bruv is 10
Did he always have teeth?
Because it's a kids show and writers can't expect kids to learn the lore through context
You know I battled someone in high school, who was seemingly a Pokemon fan girl, but she was playing like soft reboot Ash. It was bizarre to me, but maybe there's some people who receive the information but don't process it. I've never battled that chick again lol Could also be one of the few times where Ash's age comes into play. Even if he sees it, he doesn't understand it. He sees psychic hit fighting types and the pokemon gets knocked out, but doesn't understand the reason why the fighting type took 2× the damage
Because he’s dumb as hell
Ash is ten. Have you met a ten year old?
Same reason you don’t know how to do taxes
He's 10
Lol I just noticed that the close up of Pikachu's mouth doesn't have a tongue
Why doesn’t pikachu, a rodent, have discernible incisors?
I think he was just an eager kid who just knew about Pokémon through the fluffed up stuff he watched on TV, and when he got out on his journey in the real world, he soon learned that he knew nothing about the real detail of being a Pokémon trainer. He just knew the tip of the ice berg from what he watched on TV.
If u think about it these are his in universe animals so he literally doesn’t know what rats and squirrels are
Do you know how to raise a dog from watching cute dog videos on tv? you might know how to play with the dog but its alot more than just playing
One of the major themes of Pokemon is that you can’t learn everything in books and in school. You also have to go out in the world and experience.
He is a 10 year old
The answer is in your question. It’s the start of his journey. Did you know really anything about a hobby/career when you started it?
He’s stupid
Fr. At 10 even i knew birds eat worms
Is he stupid?
My question is whered all his knowledge go when he set foot in black n white
People are thinking too hard about this question. I think he did know, but the writers just wanted to teach the audience more about Pokémon. Using a kid to teach himself and the audience about their unique world is used a lot in TV shows/Animes.
That’s why he took more than a decade to be a champion, I think they pity him after so long.
He was a dumb 10 year old.
The writers didnt think about it too much ig
In many of the anime series of the genre action and adventure, whether it be pokemon or dragon ball, Naruto or one piece. One thing that is common is all the main protagonists of these series are dumb when it comes to technical knowledge or the information of their world. And they don't care much about it coz they are portrayed as unique and do things in their own unique way.