A look at Pokemon DP Episode 74 - Pika and Goliath.
Its a normal lunch time for Ash, Dawn and Brock when Pikachu has to deal with Piplup who wanders off. A trainer approaches with a Pichu mistaking Pikachu for a wild one, Sho is attempting to make a powerful evolution team of the whole Pikachu line and begs Ash several times to trade Pikachu but Ash is having none of it but does at least agree to battle Sho's Raichu.
Ash tries everything against the Raichu, even calling on his previous knowledge fighting Lt Surge but Raichu not only matches Pikachu's techniques but greatly over powers the electric mouse, the battle ends when Pikachu takes a point blank hyper beam.
Paul who was watching says Pikachu would never beat Raichu as it is and calls Ash pathetic for even trying, but insults would have to wait as Pikachu is badly hurt.
Over night, Pikachu is in intensive care and even goes into cardiac arrest, the extra voltage keeping him going.
Ash approaches Pikachu in the ward and places the thunderstone next to his bed with Team Rocket watching in the background contemplating the idea of Pikachu becoming Raichu, Ash gives Pikachu the option and leaves him to rest, Pikachu not so happy is found the next morning training to strengthen his attacks, it's heavily assumed that Team Rocket helped him make the decision by stealing the thunderstone.
Pleased that Pikachu will stay as he is Ash re-challenges Sho and in an epic clash of titans, Pikachu overcomes the Raichu using his new found strength and techniques learned by watching Dawn's contests, Sho admits defeat and accepts Ash as a rival, Paul still not impressed.
Three takeaways from this episode.
1. This is a callback to season 1 when Pikachu went up against Lt Surge's Raichu with the next logical step obviously going up against a fully trained Raichu but it's also the last time we'd get this story.
2. Pikachu nearly died, really think about that for a second, we've seen Ash dice with death several times and plenty of episodes have dealt with ghosts of the deceased but rarely do they cover the death of Pokemon, it wouldn't be until Alola that it really talks about it but for many people, this was a nervous episode to watch.
3. With that in mind, a question: what counts as "too far" in a Pokemon battle? With Pokemon having constant medical help, it's easy to assume that most will get up after a mere fainting but Pikachu took a point blank hyper beam while pinned to a rock and was lucky to be alive, this is also the major plot point of Arven's story when his Mabostiff is injured to the point of being on life support before the first Titan, something to consider when you next decide to incinerate that level 2 Pidgey with a maxed out Charizard.
Next time on Victory Script
Full Metal Panic
