Pokémon Black and White Anime Review 

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I did love how when Pikachu used Iron Tail during Unova, its tail ACTUALLY looks like it's made of iron.

Unfezant was so bad that when ash switched it out for charizard, even professor oak said “That’s a smart choice”.

They should have given Ash a Braviary. That’s a WAY cooler bird than Unphesent.

Cilan: "I like Trains" Ash and Iris get ran over by a Train that was passing by.

Zac: "Let's give all of Ash's Pokemon credit, in order of capture!" Unfezant: "Hey."

"It's always hard when the journey begins" was probably the excuse the writers used the most of the time when making "Black and White"

Honestly, as somebody who grew up with Black and White's anime it's really nice to see a review that isn't just shitting on it. Also man, Black and White was my childhood and is still my personal favorite anime season even if it isn't the best objectively.

I really liked that Bianca wasn’t a very serious rival. It was such a good contrast to alot of the other rivals that Ash had over the years!

Hot take: Cilan was a great companion. Y'all are just mean.

“One more challenge that comes our way”

Funny how Iris gave Ash crap all the time, but in the next series he was able to help two Dragon Pokémon fully evolve! Heck, one of them hatched from an egg! Take that miss wannabe dragon master!

I did like Cilan's battle strategy with Pansage. He'd usually begin with a Bullet Seed to test the opponent's reflexes, speed and defense before going in close with something like Bite, using Dig for evasion/damage before launching a Solarbeam finisher. Crustle's Shell Smash was like the Kaio-Ken from DBZ to powerup in order to defeat opponents. Stunkfish...eh...the only time I remember any cool strategy was going into Larvesta's Flamethrower to burn away the String Shot it was caught in.

This Region was a Re boot of the original :> *or He just didn’t save his game...*

Finally someone who appreciates ashs oshawatt.

I freaking love Cilan. He’s like Brock on tea. His look on everything is ridiculously fancy and I love it!!

I love how so many people were expecting him to completely hate on the series, they must be pretty shocked right now

Ash had one of the best outfits he's ever had in Unova dont @ me

Funny, because this series is what inspired me to be a Pokemon fan. Also, can't wait for your review on the XY series, my personal favourite.

"ash loses to this idiot who doesn't even bring a full team to the league" when i was little, i always brought a team of 5 to the league. ouch

Zac rewatching BW anime in 2020: “Hey, that’s pretty good!”

If y’all actually seen Zac’s tweets you would’ve known that this wasn’t gonna be trash talk. Y’all got JEBAITED CAUSE THIS WAS CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT

Big missed opportunities are: -Ash VS Drayden -Ash VS Marlon (I can never remember him for the life of me)

I honestly thought this would be you bashing Black and White, but you also talked about the good. Thanks for giving the anime which introduced me to Pokémon a fair review.

Iris: ash you're such a little kid! Ash: watch me in the next region..

This anime has a solid Japanese soundtrack

I think the most frustrating thing about this arc is Ash's ability as a trainer. I get that this was one of his worst teams (arguably the worst), but I think it gets overlooked that Ash made a lot of questionable choices/calls as a trainer during this arc. It also feels very inconsistent with the Ash that we ended w/ in Diamond/Pearl.

One thing that I've NEVER understood about this series is why the hell does poor Palpitoad get so much hate?! It was a strong Pokemon with some great moves upon capture; STAB Hydro Pump and Mud Shot before learning Sludge Wave later on! If I were Ash, I would've use it more than that comedic relief otter of his! I'm sure that if it was used in more battles then its win ratio would be higher! That debut fight with Stoutland was great! Heck, maybe it would've evolved as well! Before people complain about how Ash already had a Water-type in Oshawott or Ground type with Krookodile, remember in the next series that his Kalos team consisted of 3 flying types, 2 dragon types, half the team was weak to electric, 3 were weak to ice...need I go on?

I think a lot of people forget that BW was in production when the 2011 earthquakes hit Japan. They had to keep producing and releasing this anime after a national tragedy because it already had an international release going. The video mentioned the cut Team Plasma arc, and it really shows in the anime.

I feel like this Pokémon season is the equivalent of Dragon Ball GT, there were so many missed opportunities

Oh my gosh, Zac underwent character development with his BW opinion! But jokes aside, in my eyes it's OK. Flawed, but still OK. Plus the updated visuals introduced in this series was really lovely. As were the move animations. I miss BW Iron Tail... Now onto Kalos. This should be an interesting one to tackle.

I honestly really like black and white because it’s MY generation. My first generation. Also, I do like Iris as well.

Agreed, Team Rocket showing up sparingly doing their own thing and being somewhat competent is better than them showing up all the goddamn time to try and Pikachu like always

This is the first pokémon series I ever watched, and i’d describe it in one sentence: it was good, but full of missed opprtunities. Some things that could have made it better are: - iris getting the deino and a dratini instead of emolga. - replacing trip completely with cheren - making georgia and burgundy appear more have more character development - ash rotating his pokémon more often and evolving them all at least once - replacing cameron with hugh - have team plasma appear earlier, with violent pokémon appearing in season 1

Woo! Whilst not many people like this series, you can’t deny the English opening themes slapped. No 🧢

I love Iris so much. However, they really dropped the ball with her personality, team and character development

Most people hate black and white, but for me it felt like a breath of fresh air. In Diamond and Pearl, jokes like Brock being obsessed with girls, Team Rocket thinking of capturing a Pokémon for Giovanni every single filler episode, and Team Rocket getting blasted off every single filler episode after they fail to capture another person’s Pokémon got so old and so repetitive that it made DP’s filler so painful to sit through. However, BW finally removed Brock and replaced him with Cilan, finally ending Brock’s run, allowing someone else to get the spotlight. Cilan felt new to me because he was definitely a lot nerdier and geekier than Brock. He had a lot of interests in food, fishing, detective, movies, and even trains. BW had also remove Team Rocket from every single filler episode, and to that I say thank god because in DP it was so repetitive. BW’s filler instead focused on the characters interacting with each other and their Pokémon, with more unique situations without Team Rocket. Moments like when Ash reunited with Charizard, and when he reminisced his Butterfree. Moments like Iris befriending Pokémon like Deino, Bouffalant, and Druddigen. Moments like Cilan solving cases as a detective and fighting for his Gym and brothers. The tournament arcs that show all the characters interacting with each other. Moments like these were so fun and new, something that the anime had never tried before. I admit that the series does have its flaws, but it definitely has some good too, and it honestly doesn’t deserve the hate it gets for trying so much new things. It honestly would’ve been praised more if the Earthquake thing never happened too, and we actually get an exciting Team Plasma-Rocket arc. It’s honestly a shame.

Does this series even have any negatives??? Everyday when I wake up and watch Ash vs Elesa I’m reminded of the raw talent possessed by the show’s flawless writers!

Can’t wait to see nothing but positives here

Ash's main rival be *_TRIPPIN_* in Black and White.

@11:44-@11:53 That was the MASSIVE issue I had with Iris! The fact that she was quick to call out someone else for their mistakes like she was an annoying know-it-all, but she was a lousy trainer in her own right! Kind of like Max from Hoenn, but he didn't even have a single Pokemon or experience; just book knowledge. Iris' you can't tell me nothing attitude was annoying as well. Ash suggested the most efficient way of training Axew was REAL battle experience instead of having Cilan use moves at 10% of their actual power. That explains why Scraggy (who is younger than Axew) got stronger and it felt more believable when he learned powerful moves (Focus Blast/Hi Jump Kick) unlike Axew who asspulled Outrage and Giga Impact out of nowhere...

Cant wait for kalos , the one thats my favorite :) This is how many people get a smile from This video 👇

If you do me the favor of reading all the way, I would like to express my opinion too. What's sad about "Pokémon: Best Wishes!" it's that it happened during a period of art block. After that masterpiece of DP, the writers clearly didn't have ideas regarding how to excelle the original formula once again; therefore, they chose to exploit Gen 5's concept as a soft-reboot for the franchise: this anime feels different mainly because, instead of evolving and making progresses, it does many steps behind in favor of a high simplification of both story and characters. First, between either protagonists or rivals, the cast's main strenghts are indeed the individual personalities and the fun dynamics/interactions they have with each other. Without a doubt these are some of the simplest, yet most entartaining people we've ever had at this point: Ash and Iris' brothership was nice despite the latter's mocking at times, Cilan's fanboy moments (OFTEN) were enjoyable and I really like how Georgia sometimes opened herself to Bianca and Burgundy. Neverthless, the anime focused too much on these specific aspects alone, and when it comes down to growth and development we're EASILY in front of the weakest group of characters since OS: 9/10 of the times they're mostly one-note and flat, not to mention annoying in some cases; and the few ones who get the chance to be developed, like Bianca and especially Ash or Trip, are either left to be desired or just terribly written in general - this, in particular, might've happened because of the anime being handled by new and unexperienced writers. Speaking about the story, we all know that "Team Rocket VS Team Plasma" Special got canceled, but I think the main issue is how fairytale and generally light was the plot. Compared to DP, the anime maintains a certain action vein that makes it interesting, especially looking at the Operation Tempest Arc and the climax of the TP Arc; that being said, however, not only TRio was costantly OOC, but when we look at how the TR Arcs were written, we do realize they were basically some "Good VS Evil" type of stories and nothing else, light years away from the narrative depth offered by the original games: some dark fairy tales, in fact, but always fairy tales, and not exactly the best alternative waiting for B2W2 to pick up N's character. And regarding the latter, sadly not even this was good. I don't mind how they removed Kyurem, but the whole "mind control machine" tasted terribly mundane. A blatant attempt to adapt the wealth of characters such as N, Colress, Anthea and Concordia to a more lighthearted context and a much younger audience, resulting in a pretty average story arc - there were even 4 fillers in between, 1 of which literally started the whole arc. But my God, one of the best examples about BW's excessive semplicity isn't neither the lack of character development, nor the arcs: it's the Unova League. Mediocre rival build up, horrible writing behind the battles, not a clear character arc for Ash and the infamous "5V6" against Cameron. Worst League HANDS DOWN. While Diamond&Pearl represents the culmination of an Era, and XY constituites the first step towards an anime evolution, BW is sadly a bittersweet series. The product of a bunch of writers who didn't have many ideas, and tried something of very risky in order to continue, by greatly simplifying the narrative and therefore taking numerous steps backwards (as well as failing to compare with the games); it's still enjoyable for somebodies, ngl, especially if you like the action scenes within a story and the characters' dynamics, but in a way it proved how the anime needed to change approach and step up from the original formula.

My favorite part about Black & White was for sure the battle tournament arcs. I’ll admit those were really well done.

Alain's Unfezant was actually pretty good. It's just that Ash's wasn't

I’m legitimately trying to think of good things this anime did and I’m someone who’s first experience watching the Pokémon anime was this part of it. Nostalgia definitely isn’t holding me back.

Lumiose Trainer Zac:uploads Me:Grabs snacks and my blanket

I started with black and white, and I always look back on it with fond memories. I'm now realizing that for Pokemon noobs, this series is actually a good place to start.

Acutally there was a special episode when Iris caught Gible! so she has 3 dragon type's

idc what anyone says cilan was the funniest part of that series

Overall the series is pretty decent imo

14:55 In the Wikipedia it's revealed that he accidentally tripped over a purloin and it scratched him real bad, so that's why he was afraid of purloin

I think Iris and Cilan are great characters Iris is a free spirit and she is very caring toward wild Pokemon and Cilan is really funny when he does his evaluation time gag plus his experience in Unova can often help a rookie like Ash.

Is no one talking about how Pikachu forgot volt tackle and Charizard seismic toss

OMG Zac didn't skipped the bw review 😱okay jokes aside I can't wait to hear the positive stuff about bw because we all know the negative stuffs 😂

Stephan is easily the best Unova rival.

I had no idea black and white was so hated, it was one of my favorite series

Can’t wait to see zac rant for an hour

What about the art style Black and white did start XYS amazing art style

I really appreciate that you went into this series with an open mind

Iris' Axew was a major reason Axew became my favorite Pokémon. BW was the first series I watched after the original since those were the only two series on Netflix at the time (this was like 7 years ago), and was part of my gateway into Pokémon. I know it's far from perfect, but it holds a special place in my heart

LOL CYNTHIA TOOK IT EASY ON AXEW....she was gassing Iris up

I am so happy to see this series get the love and attention it absolutely deserves! This was my introduction into the Pokemon anime, along with XY being my introduction into the Pokemon video games. I have so many good memories of sitting down and watching numerous episodes of this series. And even though I'm a huge fan, even I will admit the Black and White series didn't have the best moments, but every series has it's good and bad moments. When coming into this video I was afraid I would be the only one who liked this anime series and everyone would say I was blinded by nostalgia, but boy was I wrong, and I'm glad I was!

Okay but we can all agree that ash’s krookodile is a freaking beast.

Losing to Tobias really left Ash shook and it took him a while to get back into the right headspace and get his mojo back.

Guess this will be how this review goes: Welcome to my review of the Black and White Series. We shall cover the good and the bad. First the good. Now, where should I start from? Now, the bad. This was bad, that was bad, didn't like this, this was terrible, what the heck were they thinking, this sucks, hated this part, why would they do that, unforgivable, worst move, what were the scriptwriters doing... If this really happens, I'm gonna be so surprised😂 Edit: Okay, I guess it wasn't all that bad now that I saw the review completely 😂😂

Scraggy is one my favorite Pokemon still to this day

another point to the whole misty vs iris thing, misty was genuinely entertaining and fun to watch because of how exaggerated it is, but iris was more snarky about it and it just rubbed people the wrong way

One of my favorite things in Best Wishes Is That Team Rocket was almost like a huge threat for a while

X and y better be god tier or I' m throwing hands

Black and white was the generation I grew up on and to be honest the series really worked on me at least in the aspect of getting me into Pokémon as a whole. As flawed as it is I’ll always remember it fondly

This season is by far my favorite.

Ash’s team still makes me so mad like they couldn’t have made it stronger. Snivy should’ve evolved and also should’ve been the one with the storyline of always getting beat by trip’s serperior. Pignite should’v evolved into emboar and it should’ve been shiny to differentiate from Bianca’s. The rest of the team was fine I just wish they would’ve given him a more powerful team especially after the one he had in diamond and pearl.

This was...surprisingly well balanced and unbiased. Well done! And I think you also summed up my feelings on Iris perfectly too! She had a bad first impression, but she wasn't completely TERRIBLE. I personally think they should've had her catch Pokemon that mirrored her Champion or Gym Leader team in the games, which would've benefitted her Dragon Master arc WAY more. And yes, Cilan is VERY underappreciated, I love him.

in general the series is just too forgettable because of all the bad things... which makes me also forget about the good parts.

Thank you so much for giving my favourite Pokémon series justice, I am so thankful and appreciative for giving this wonderful series some love!

I honestly can't remember anything about this anime, but I really loved watching Cilan and Iris. They were so full of life that they made a very bland anime into an enjoyable show.

20:50 Also Cameron would not even get into the league if it werent for Ash who quite litteraly draged him to the sign up desk in the last minute.

Awesome review as usual, it's actually really made me interested to jump into my first proper watch of it since I dropped the series 20 episodes in

Awesome review. I am glad that BW isn't getting as overhated as it used to. Though it would have been really nice if team rocket vs team plasma aired

I really hate it when people say bad things about Ash’s Pokémon and the series!!! I like all of ash’s Pokémon and I also like all the series. Of course some are better than other, but it doesn’t mean you should say bad things about them.

I *knew* the cancellation was a joke! Time to witness this series getting torn a new one!

I wish Tomioka had more of a hand in this series. He was still the head writer here, but he didn't write nearly as much for this as he did for DP and XY. He writes so much good stuff too, the first three episodes of DP, the first two episodes of XY, the Hearthome Tag Battle arc, the Galactic arc, the Wallace Cup arc, most of the Snowbelle arc, Operation Tempest, the final BW episode, and pretty much anything to do with Dawn and Paul.

Coming to this 3 years later, I've realised Some team plasma defenders might say "They only had one season don't be so harsh". Well team flare had 1 season and they had the best villain arc because half the season wasn't dedicated to a filler island.

Let me give my opinion on why Pokemon Black and White had no good story: 1. Ash always leaves home to go to a new region when he finds out about a new region. In the Unova series, Ash started the Unova journey without any planning while in the other series, Ash found a new region Pokemon and then later left home for another goal after completing his previous goal. 2. Everything was new for Ash, there were no Pokemon that belonged to other previous regions so, Ash really had no plans at all to fight with the new Pokemon since he came to Unova for just a trip but, started his next journey there without any plan. 3. As we figured out Ash started the Unova journey without any plans so if he had already found out about Unova he could've left home early that's why the Unova series was 1st ever series in the franchise where Ash participated a Pokemon league too early and had no time to train his Pokemon 4. Because Team Rocket appeared too less, Ash couldn't fight with them too much and his Pokemon couldn't be trained at all otherwise, in other series Team Rocket appeared a lot and Ash fought with them most of the time so that's why his Pokemon were become strong and evolved and because of them, the Pokemon league gets pushed. 5. Unova Ash was kinda of better than Kanto Ash because Ash belongs to Kanto and didn't have knowledge at all about his hometown region Pokemon. But, in the Unova series Ash experienced and explored Unova more than battling. 6. There were no Pokemon contests that could make some episodes on them and push Unova League too late. 7. There was no female Pokemon trainer as a starter and travelling with Ash and that character was replaced with Iris. BTW, this is where Ash's Pikachu couldn't destroy anyone's bicycle. 8. The developer really tried to make the Unova series too original so that's why they didn't use the music that we could hear in the previous series. rest of reason I can't explain rn cuz I'm busy

You're so correct with your points! This is a great series to start out with, and this was indeed the first series that I watched! From here, I went back to watch Diamond and Pearl, and I'm yet to watch Advanced Generation as well as finish up the original series. Great video man! Keep up the amazing work with your reviews.

Team Rocket was actually bad ass in unova

Honestly, the guy who abandoned Pignite when it was a Tepig deserved worse. He had ZERO redeeming qualities. I’d feed him to Giratina’s Distortion World.

The decalore islands was a fun little adventure on their way back to kanto I liked the caterpie episode and the nice wholesome callback 29:22 it felt emotional for me

IT'S EVALUATION TIME!!

I personally liked Best Wishes when it was coming out, but most of what I like is coming from the beginning of the series, the story arc with Landorus, Tornadus and Thundurus and everything after the league the rest of the stuff was from tournaments that weren't the league just because I actually enjoy them.

Not going to lie I love BW, this is mostly due to nostalgia since it was the first pokemon series I ever watched or played the game. The critiques are definitely valid but I will never hate this anime.

This was the first Pokémon anime that I watched so I love it for nostalgic purposes 😅

I can just imagine how much rage Zac will have in this video..

I have a feeling he is really looking forward to reviewing next weeks series

I’m so glad you got fans of BW to join you on the review. Ozzy you did a great job and explaining why Iris was great and InsaneGameFreak on Cilan. I’m so happy with this refreshing review.

I have my fair share of annoyances with the Black and White series, but I honestly think the Unova saga is underrated overall.

It’s so great seeing zac’s undying love for unfezant. And yes, Unfezant does indeed suck lol

Didn't expect zac to be so calm in this video

This was literally the season I started watching Pokemon.