Ash finally delivers the GS Ball to Kurt, and explores the nearby forest for apricorns...
At last, we come to the end of the utterly pointless GS Ball storyline; a story that is seldom mentioned and never finished after this episode. It's a shame, what could have led to an interesting Celebi arc instead got reworked into the 4th movie. Speaking of dropped storylines, Ash, Brock, and Misty all receive specially-made Pokeballs at the end of this episode, which are never used or mentioned again. I don't know why this show loses interest in its own story set-ups, but it's always disappointing.
As for the contents of this episode, there's some good and bad. The good is that the focus on apricorns makes this episode feel unique, with lots of cool lore that ties nicely with the games. Also, Brock catches a new Pokemon for the first time since...Zubat, I think. That marks a pretty special occasion, even if it felt sort of rushed at the end.
The not-so-good is that the rest of the episode feels very filler-heavy. The Team Rocket encounter is barely worth mentioning. Brock getting blown up by Pineco is amusing once, but I was already tired of it by the end of this episode, and with one in his party now, I expect to see this many more times.
I'd rate this episode higher, because I like how it relates to the games. But, the fact that so much of the focus of the episode is on storylines related to apricorns and the GS ball, two things that we never see again, this ends up feeling more hollow and pointless than it should have.
At last, we come to the end of the utterly pointless GS Ball storyline; a story that is seldom mentioned and never finished after this episode. It's a shame, what could have led to an interesting Celebi arc instead got reworked into the 4th movie. Speaking of dropped storylines, Ash, Brock, and Misty all receive specially-made Pokeballs at the end of this episode, which are never used or mentioned again. I don't know why this show loses interest in its own story set-ups, but it's always disappointing.
As for the contents of this episode, there's some good and bad. The good is that the focus on apricorns makes this episode feel unique, with lots of cool lore that ties nicely with the games. Also, Brock catches a new Pokemon for the first time since...Zubat, I think. That marks a pretty special occasion, even if it felt sort of rushed at the end.
The not-so-good is that the rest of the episode feels very filler-heavy. The Team Rocket encounter is barely worth mentioning. Brock getting blown up by Pineco is amusing once, but I was already tired of it by the end of this episode, and with one in his party now, I expect to see this many more times.
I'd rate this episode higher, because I like how it relates to the games. But, the fact that so much of the focus of the episode is on storylines related to apricorns and the GS ball, two things that we never see again, this ends up feeling more hollow and pointless than it should have.
