Dethroning Moment of Suck (Darth Wiki)/Anime and Manga/Pokémon (anime)

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Ash and Pikachu feel your pain.

With over 700 episodes and numerous movies under its belt, this show's bound to run into these moments sooner or later.

Keep in mind:

  • Moments only, don't say "just everything he said, " or "This entire season, " entries.
  • No contesting entries. This is subjective, the entry is their opinion.
  • No natter. As above, anything contesting an entry will be cut, and anything that's just contributing more can be made its own entry.
  • Explain why it's a Dethroning Moment Of Suck.
  • No ASSCAPS, no bold, and no italics unless it's the title of a work. We are not yelling the DMoSs out loud.
  • In Pokémon Dawn losing to Zoey in the last content of the Sinnoh Grand Festival. By mere inches. Dammit, writers, would it kill you to let a main character WIN just for once, like you allowed Ash to do in the Orange Islands arc? No, you have to Yank the Dog's Chain by building up our hopes and then dashing them. And then you pull the Character Development card in an attempt to trick us into thinking that winning doesn't matter? We don't enjoy seeing our beloved main character fail all the time, so why do you continue to do that? I'm calling Fanon Discontinuity on this episode and pretend it never happened.
  • When Ash actually did win against Paul, at long last, in the Sinnoh League...and Paul shrugged it off, he and Ash parted as friends all of a sudden, with Paul being treated as redeemed despite very little indication of it and no formal apology for his Jerkass behavior in the past. This is Character Development for Paul gone horribly, horribly wrong, and as a result, he comes across as an incredible Karma Houdini Jerk Sue. Also, to put it more into perspective how inappropriate this is: this was in the Sinnoh League tournament, close to the end, with Paul's DREAM of becoming a champion in sight...and he loses to Ash, the trainer he looked down upon, and Infernape, the evolution of the Pokemon he let go! Ash went into depression after losing to Ritchie in the Indigo League; Paul should have had a flat-out Villainous Breakdown here. But no, Atsuhiro Tomioka (the writer) can't have his pet character's "coolness" and composure ruined like that. He has him accept the defeat easily and be treated as a reformed, respectable trainer by characters and fans alike. BULL. SHIT.
    • Gary tried real hard to be king asshole during Kanto and bits of Johto. And yet, he can't compare to Paul's ragequitting on Ash at the tag tournament! Good Arceus almighty, where to begin with that abominable act? If Paul's supposed to be a Stop Having Fun Guy, why does he do sometihng Smogon deems wrong (while I personally don't like metagame elitism, I have to cut them some slack aside from Tobias, who someone mentioned further down)?! The abuse of Chimchar goes to a whole 'nother level on top of that, and millions were watching, both in-person and via broadcast, meaning that everyone got a good glimpse of this debacle! And yet the writers treat the whole clusterfuck as a motherfucking blam - Barry chimes in later about Paul's victory (Ash made the winning effort, dumbass!), and worse still, even Ash doesn't bring it up when he and Mister Easily Forgiven Asshole buddy up after their match at the Sinnoh Conference! Fuck the fanboys - I want to see Paul suffer unlike any other before the anime is over, at least for this train wreck.
  • Ash giving away Primeape. Now, Ash and friends leaving their Pokemon behind is nothing new, but usually they have genuine reasons for needing to leave, even if it's a stupid reason (hey, Ambipom). But Primeape's case was just nonsensical - Ash joins a tournament for Fighting-type Pokemon, and Primeape wins it. Then Ash leaves it with the guy he defeated, because he promises to make of Primeape a true champion, or some. Compare this with Charizard's departure - the lizard was left in a valley where even the weakest Charizard was stronger than it. It would get stronger. Primeape, on the other hand, was left with people weaker than it. How in blazes does that make any sense?
    • Now, let's clarify some stuff here: Ash never faced Anthony during said tournament and Anthony's Hitmonchan lost to Team Rocket's Hitmonlee because they cheated. If anything, it's just another case of "leaving his Pokemon in the hands of a more experienced trainer". The true DMOS is that Ash gave it away in the very same episode he finally managed to create a bond with it. Moreover it was barely the second episode Primeape had appeared and we haven't seen anything about it ever since.
  • The departure of Misty from the team counts, which was the penultimate nail in the coffin after Johto League Champions started to embrace Filler and the Villain Decay/Took a Level In Dumbass in Team Rocket over what came before. The Nakama had really grown strong and developed, and then that episode came, good-bye Misty. Then the one episode where Misty makes an reappearance and....she doesn't have any Deadpan Snarker tendencies, she's actually kind of ditzy! WTH!? I tried to get May to grow on me, but this episode cemented that Pokemon is no longer watchable for me.
  • In Pokémon, the episode "The Scuffle of Legends" falls under this and was embarrassing to watch. This episode focuses around Archie taking control of the Red Orb and using Kyogre to devastate the world. Ash's Pikachu gets possessed by the Blue Orb and controls Groudon to stop Kyogre from destroying everything. Sounds cool right? It would've been cool if they had actually bothered to animate any of the action scenes. We get treated to still frame images of either a sea storm, any of the attacks, and anything that isn't still-framed automatically happens off screen. You'd think the animators would save at least most of their budget the show is run on to animate that episode instead of the pointless filler that every season has.
    • Moreover, there was Gaining Groudon to the parents who's children were fans. I was looking up stuff on Amazon for reviews on anime DVDs, and one that I was interested in was Gaining Groudon. It turns out that some parents just bought it because Groudon was their child's favorite Pokemon. It was hilarious to see the mad parents when they realized Gaining Groudon was the last episode on that DVD, and anybody who has seen the two specials can tell you that all Gaining Groudon had was a 5 second shot of Groudon in chains, meaning that parents would have to buy The Scuffle of Legends to get their money's worth. Well. Played.
  • While Mewtwo Returns is a decent special, it has a DMOS moment going against it. In it, Ash and Giovanni meet face to face for the first time. Ok, so are we going to get the "Ash VS Giovanni" battle we've all been waiting for? Nope, instead there's an off-screen battle between Giovanni and the secondary characters. (Beat) What!? The special sets up for the biggest battle everyone was hoping to see, and it never happens. Both moments are enough to lower the enjoyability of an otherwise good special.
  • The last Sinnoh League episode of Pokémon. Ash has finally defeated his Jerkass rival Paul, and is advancing in the league...but guess who he comes up against? An evil-looking trainer who defeats Ash with a fucking darkrei and latios! Okay, I'm suddenly enraged...this isn't like the previous leagues, where we had a trainer with a non-legendary defeat Ash and win the league or the chance to beat the Elite Four...but come on! Two fucking legendaries?! This is a fucking cop-out! Why did they just make an Ass Pull so Ash could loose and be "inspired" to go to the Unova region?! Why couldn't they just use a fully-evolved starter like Blaziken near the end of the silver conference!
    • While I didn't mind that Tobias had a Darkrai and a Latios (seriously, trainers have used Legendaries against Ash before, or have we forgotten Nolan and Pyramid King Brandon?). However, my main peeve with the episode is that there is no explanation as to why Tobias has Legendaries. None. We're just led to assume that he's always had them. Um, no, no. That's not how it works. Pokemon, if you want trainers to use Legendaries now, fine. Great. But, at least give us an explanation as to how they obtained said Legendaries. Otherwise, it just feels like you're pulling it out of your ass.
      • It wouldn't be that bad if Tobias had some screen time before his battle with Ash. At least the characters that won against Ash in previous tournaments had an episode or two that showed how they got their Pokemon, allowed them to demostrate their skills, had a close battle that kept fans on their toes, and made them likable people. Tobias came out of no-where and flat out curb-stomped Ash, so his apperence came across as a badly-done giant middle finger to everyone who dared to hope that Ash could win a tournament other than the one in the Orange Islands arc.
      • Agreed with the above. Personally, I would have adored this episode (as I hate Ash's guts, and the 'mons used to beat him are high on my favorites list), but the issue is it came right the fuck out of nowhere. No foreshadowing, no warning, hell, we've never even heard of this guy before now. If he'd had an episode or two of backstory and exposition, some reasons as to why he gets such a badass roster under his belt, he might well have become my favorite side character. As it is, though, he has the distinction of managing to come up with the biggest God Mode Sue Ass Pull since Sasuke and The Great Snake Escape.
  • This troper here with a magnificent tale of Ash, a trainer with four generations of Pokemon experience losing to a noob! That is right, folks, Ash's new rival in Best Wishes is a guy fresh out of the lab and in a 5 on 5 battle he goes and loses 2-5. How in the name of Arceus does that happen? Pikachu has its Electric moves back and Ash has all the starters at this point and he loses to this wannabe. Hell, Trip didn't even show his last two Pokemon, and has the audacity to taunt Ash after the battle. At least his Curb Stomp Battle with Paul had both trainers having equal experience but this is just Arrrggghhh!!
    • This troper was equally annoyed with this scene originally because she thought that the writer of this episode was Atsuhiro Tomioka (the writer who created Paul). As a result, this troper thought Trip would be exactly the same as Paul...thank god for Hidden Depths but what pisses me off is that the writer of this episode just had to make Ash look stupid (seriously, attacking Frillish that has Curse Body?!) and make Trip look like a prick. Luckily, Ash took it better than Paul did and thank God they didn't make Trip invincible after that. -_-
      • These things do have justification to some extent, though. Trip was clearly shown to have gotten much more grinding than Ash's team (sans Pikachu) was able to do, no thanks in part to the Filler. As for what ends up happening, that is just unreasonable. I mean, Trip's Mons may be powerful and Ash's immature, but that does not give justification for a single Tranquill to OHKO 2 starter Mons in a single hit. And that stupidity around Frillish, though also reasonable by Cursed Body being a new ability for Gen V, is equally stupid. First, it OHKO's Pidove just like Tranquill did to Tepig and Oshawott, then it somehow manages to evade attract, a move with 100% accuracy and a move that should not have a physical manifestation, by simply rising above it. And if that isn't enough, the writers decide to pull a Did Not Do the Research moment by having Cursed Body activate twice in the same battle! Why, universe?! Why must you make kids' shows so stupid!? Why can't you be like MLP and have a plot that's understandable to adults as well as oblivious children?!
  • Alright, if anyone has noticed, every anime season has a past Pokemon to be the villain Pokemon. A.K.A. the Pokemon villains use in random appearances. The biggest example of this was Aggron in the Diamond/Pearl seasons. The biggest example of this was Trials and Adulations, and it starts swerving off into Mary Sue territory. It starts off with Dawn going off of the group for a bit to get water and an Aggron attacks her. The anime screams that it is trying to teach size does not equal power. Because, despite it's Pokedex entry saying it protects the land it claims, it just happened to attack a main character, so it must be evil. Sure enough, Ash and Brock find she went missing, go up to the exact spot where Dawn fell in, and Aggron attacks them, too. Now you can see where this is going. Dawn returns on the screen, fights Team Rocket for a bit, and Aggron comes out of nowhere again and chases her while Team Rocket watches. Dawn gets out her Mamoswine, which has not obeyed her yet. Mamoswine loses the ensuing battle. They all then fall of a cliff and Mamoswine's body breaks the fall for Dawn. Wait, what? And all Mamoswine has is an injured leg after falling off a cliff? The rest of the episode is Dawn nursing Mamoswine back to health, the most thinly veiled attempt to copy from an earlier season yet. Finally, Aggron returns to fight Dawn again, this time Dawn riding on Mamoswine's back while battling. And wins. Did I mention Dawn barely knew any of Mamoswine's attacks yet and calls them out like a pro? All this could have been avoided, if it weren't for the ending. Mamoswine uses two Attacks, Ice Shard and Ancientpower. After Ancientpower, Aggron runs away in fear. Think about that with me for 5 seconds. A 7 foot, 800 pound rock dinosaur with an area to protect... runs from battle. This troper is also a fan of Professional Wrestling, so imagine something like Andre the Giant running from Rey Mysterio in fear that he would get his ass kicked and you would get the same effect that the episode showed. I stopped watching the anime for that entire season, returning to it only with Best Wishes.
  • Episodes 77 and 78 of the Hoenn arc, where May competes in the Rubello contest, but mostly 78. She gets all cocky as she wants to win badly. After passing the Appeal Round, Ash attempts to give May some tips to use with her Bulbasaur and what does she do? Tells him to shove it! How could it get worse? Bulbasaur goes all Shrinking Violet and May doesn't sympathize at all! And Bulbasaur gets paralyzed by Savannah's Lairon's Shock Wave attack, despite the fact that the attack doesn't work that way! And to make matters worse, the judges act like total pricks to May when she loses. It's a total shame that Atsuhiro Tomioka went from writing great episodes such as "Ash Catches a Pokemon" and "Address Unown!" to complete trash like this two-part Filler.
  • Ash’s and Ritchie’s battle in the episode Friend and Foe Alike, not because Ash lost, but because everything goes wrong for Ash for the worst possible reasons. First, Ritchie’s Butterfree uses sleep powder on Ash's Squirtle, putting Ash’s Squirtle to sleep. Then the referee declares that Squirtle is fainted and unable to battle. This is the most blatantly stupid thing a referee has done on this show. Sleep does not equal fainting. If that were the move rest would be unusable. Besides, there have been instances of Pokemon falling asleep during battle on this show without being eliminated so this is just stupid and inconsistent. I honestly think that referee should have been fired. Also it turns out that most of Ash’s Pokémon are way too tired to battle effectively due to having to dealing with Team Rocket's nonsense earlier. Pidgeotto even had to fly Ash over to get to the battle in time. Ash is therefore forced to use the only Pokemon that isn’t tired from the Team Rocket Fiasco; unfortunately it’s Charizard. At first, Charizard does good against Ritchie's team, however at one point Charizard just stops battling, lays down in the middle of the battle and forfeits, costing Ash the match. I know that Ash wasn't the smartest guy in the world, particularly in the earlier seasons but most of the problems in this battle were due to bad luck. He did not deserve to lose in such a humiliating way. This debacle was painful to watch.
  • Charizard's Burning Ambitions. I get that Ash gives up all his Mon's except Pikachu in the lead-up to a new season (which has led to many of the DMOS on this page, come to think of it), but this is the one that personally offended me. As someone who lists "Volcanic Panic" (the episode where Ash's Charizard fights Blaine's Magmar) as one of his favorite episodes ever, the idea that there's an entire valley full of Charizard where even the weakest one can utterly Curb Stomp Ash's Charizard without any effort is just one big slap to the face, the implication here being that any single one of these wild Charizard could completely mop the floor with the strongest Pokemon of the 2nd strongest (and most entertaining) gym leader in the whole damn region! A whole bunch of buildup, a spectacular climax, one of the coolest battles in the series (in my opinion)... and then about 60 episodes later we basically learn that they're both total pussies. And what makes it worse is that they had NO REASON to make Charizard a total bitch compared to everyone else there. We've established already that Charizard is incredibly proud and arrogant, even just learning his strength was only average for a Charizard could have spurred him to stay and train. But no, we had to wring some cheap laughs out of one of my favorite Pokemon getting creamed by the runt of the litter.
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