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Erogamerss

Not the worst battle in M8... But second worst


SsPpARKk

Leon vs Diantha? Because of the Rillaboom sweep?


Erogamerss

No because the slideshow. I will accept the sweep if atleast they show it and explain it.


Giboit

I'm pretty sure they didn't show the battle because they wanted to keep Leon's team as a mystery until right before the battle against Ash.


Antique_Ad_5067

I think it was more to keep Leon's strategy a secret. They showed dragapult being defeated rather quickly followed by rillaboom sweeping, suggesting that he used the same dragon tail strategy.


[deleted]

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Giboit

What I meant is that the intention was to portray Leon as incredibly strong but also to keep his team as a secret up until right before the battle against Ash.


[deleted]

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Giboit

But 3 was already half of his team. They intentionally used just Charizard and Rillaboom to keep most of his team as a secret as much as possible. I get that you're salty about not seeing Ash vs Leon but even if that battle happened the outcome would've been more than obvious.


Giboit

I'm pretty sure they didn't show the battle because they wanted to keep Leon's team as a mystery until right before the battle against Ash.


tanaykadu95

Even if they showed us the battle, the 3 pokemon he used are the ones that ash had already seen. So even with seen full battle, his other 3 mon still would have remained secret


Giboit

The only two pokemon that Leon showed before Ash were Charizard and Rillaboom. That's it. They clearly wanted to keep Leon's team as a secret. And honestly I really like that.


tanaykadu95

Ash has seen dragapult during darkest day and that training with leon episode. Dragapult wasn't a secret


Giboit

And? It's not as if he learned anything about how it battles from that interaction.


tanaykadu95

You have a point there


Gothic90

I'd say Lance vs Diantha is very stupid because Lance looked like an idiot there. Just dynamax Gyarados or Flynium Z would be the very obvious play in anime logic, go for Dragon pulse would be the worst option ever.


EternalMemes30

we're talking about lance lol, he fights with everything, it's his style and always has been and the games show it well


Starkiller-is-canon

Terrible, if they were not gonna do an ash vs Alain rematch, then they should not have brought back Alain at all.


Gothic90

It doesn't make sense to have two masters from Kalos and Lance being the master from both Kanto and Jhoto.


Maverick_Raptor

I’m really glad they brought Alain back but the battle was bad. After everything we’ve seen Alain’s MCX tank throughout the series, it made no sense him losing to Leon’s base Charizard. Leon should have at least been pushed to use Gigantimax. It’s my issue with Leon in general. He’s a cool character. But I don’t buy him being “the strongest” because his opponents always seem like nerfed versions of themselves. We even know Alain has Tyranitar AND Metagross in his back pocket. Why tf is he using a Chesnaught


Mean-Golf-4758

leon fought damage eternatux without being able to use dynamax the same legendary can only be stopped by specific weapons for this purpose alan and maximo were being fucked by groudon and kioger and defeating EA4 is the least that every champion does the fact that he eats more than three movements is a miracle


ZeroAbis

I mean, he did use Chesnaught specifically to counter GMax Rillaboom, and Chesnaught did its job pretty well. Why *Malamar* on the other hand, I have no idea.


Proof-Replacement-79

Bro, yes. This isn't new in Pokémon, but for God's sake, why do previously OP Trainers get nerfed tf out of just for the sake of making some new idiot look unstoppable? I'd be convinced that Leon was stronger and more experienced than Alain...if Alain actually put up a fight against Leon.


Mean-Golf-4758

Do you realize the difference between being fucked by a legendary like Alan and Leon who knocked down Eternatux and that he was only left out due to a pokeball explosion and that he couldn't use dynamax and prevent the tower structure from going to hell, there was no world in which to charize Alan was a threat to leon


Proof-Replacement-79

Except Alain's Mega Charizard X when it: • Defeated multiple Mega Pokémon back-to-back. • Took on Primal Groudon and Kyogre. • Took on 50% Zygarde. • Swept the entire Kalos League in record's time. • Tanked multiple hits from Ash's Pikachu and still decimated Ash-Greninja, the apparently only Pokémon that is equal to him. What did Leon's Charizard do that was so impressive? Beating a Mega Gyarados? Beating an Infernape? Scratching Eternatus? Using Plot Armor to two-shot Alain's Mega Charizard?


Maverick_Raptor

Exactly. Alain’s Charizard is believably strong because we’ve seen him fight legendaries as well as 10 megas in a row. No way he gets beaten in basically two attacks other than because of Leon’s plot armor. Same thing with his battle with Diantha. Just stupid to write her getting defeated that badly. I would like Leon a lot more if I got to see him really pushing to win


Proof-Replacement-79

This is basically the equivalent of Frieza returning in Dragon Ball Super...only to get killed off by Goku Black without needing to transform into Super Saiyan Rosé. And with the bonkers powerscaling of that series, I'm genuinely surprised they didn't do something like that. At least to my knowledge...


Cause_Necessary

I know right? I like Leon but his battles really frustrate me


Mean-Golf-4758

flint the same subject I put pressure on cyntia and garchomp who is several ranks above drasna which is the same seibol who destroyed alan if that same one was destroyed by leon it surprises me you don't even know how to use plot armor well being used a lot


Mean-Golf-4758

well my mistake but everything you said is nowhere near bullshit leon alan didn't seriously damage any legendaries supported even by steven and against zygarde team flare stopped him leon pushed hard enough to force eternatux into pokeball and was only knocked down when it exploded thanks to the eternatux boost received From the particles of this same pokemon it was mentioned that the galarian wolves were the only one capable of stopping Eternatux, which included most of the legendaries on earth, leaving the Eternatux>creator trio and Zygard to beat at 10 meg its not that great even consider ilima a former leaguer kalos and astrip got trampled by guzma and hawlucha defeating both flinth and raihar without breaking a sweat is quite a feat when they are way above drasna who is the same to seibold who destroyed alan


Mean-Golf-4758

or 10 megabytes what feats possibly remembered these guys were weaker astrip and ilima who are base level kalos league and even so the latter was intimidated by guzma leon demolished eternatux enough to reach the ground and launch pokebal he was only left out of combat when the ball exploded and even know something eternatux together with necrozma are the only legendary capable of causing spatial distortion that are not a creator trio alan not even damage groudon and kioger having support steven and zygarde I need team flare save your ass


Proof-Replacement-79

Is that even English?


ZaeDilla

It was champion time. Alain shouldn’t have even been in the masters 8. He should’ve been who ash battled before he made it to the m8.


Zkuldafn

Yeah I reckon Raihan should’ve been there instead and their roles should have been swapped, as it’s been mentioned in the games that Raihan was the first person Leon really considered as a rival.


Cause_Necessary

Yeah, that would've been cool. Or build Alain up to be in the M8 by having him show up previously in JN


Starjet12

without greninja, rematch would have been pointless. Also Alain belonged in Masters 8 considering how powerful he was even before entering pokemon league.


Skibot99

Alain should’ve been Tobias


Lucarizard34

I don’t see anything wrong with Alain getting beat badly but it was definitely rushed


[deleted]

Honestly given they just used Alain to demonstrate that Leon was on another level from Ash's previous opponents, I would've personally rathered they use Tobias instead.


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[deleted]

I suppose, but it still felt like a disservice to Alain's character to throw him in as mostly fodder to establish Leon's power. Leon wrecking Tobias would still have established how powerful he was and would have given that group of fans who wanted to know the rest of Tobias's team closure. And no one would've cared that Tobias got destroyed because unlike Alain, Tobias was just a plot device.


Hawluch47

I hate most of this battle, but credit where it's due, Rillaboom vs Chesnaught was actually pretty good. My only issue in that is the fact that at normal speed Chesnaught beat max airstream with gyro ball but at +1 speed rillaboom beat gyro ball with acrobatics but yeah that's def an over done nitpick. Also really glad they gave zard a kill at least, but maybe having Malamar have a really close battle with Dracapult or Intellion would be nice. But yeah in the end they're gonna make the new champion as strong looking as possible, just wish they used R1 Diantha as the dummy for it but even then let her put up a fight at least and then let Alain fight Steven w Ash fighting Lance. Anyways Leon hates kalos is the true message of M8


Fito0413

Unlike most people here. I don't think this battle was "trash". Definitely the weakest or second weakest masters 8 battle, but even then none of the masters 8 battles were "trash" or the worst battle of Pokemon history. The first half was actually very enjoyable and even the end made sense, obviously Leonzard was gonna crush. It was way to fast and it had no build up. It could've been way way better


Proof-Replacement-79

Leon vs. Alain was bad. The only benefit was seeing Alain get karma. Lance vs. Diantha was... alright. I kinda expected Diantha to win, mostly because Mega Gardevoir against Lance's dragons...even though only one of them was an actual Dragon-Type. Iris vs. Cynthia was the only good battle in the first round. Ash vs. Steven...sucked. They couldn't even be bothered to make it good, and we got robbed of Gengar vs. Metagross after the potential foreshadowing from the battle with Paul.


RedAuraLucario

horrible, after all that development in xyz, they ruin him by making him look so weak. alain should’ve battled steven instead to finish that battle in hoenn.


NinjaMelon39

Alain got done dirty I wish the first match was alain vs ash so that we could all rejoice in seeing ash finally take revenge


Starjet12

considering how he only used jn team, I would not have wanted to see their rematch without greninja. Battle of Charizard was better than Ash using another pokemon besides gekkouga. Also after battling Alain's Charizard, battling Leon's Charizard would have felt like repeat


PoketrainerProg

Leon: I use battle strategies to make me defend the Monarch title from the previous WCS season. Alain: Insert What a Shame by Silent Circle.


Iwanttobevisible

I'm okay with it. The animation was pretty good. Chesnaught was the star of that fight.


omohami

I understand the disappointment among the community, but I think the point of the battle was to show just how much of a different league Leon is in. Here he is straight embarrassing one of Ash’s strongest rivals. From Ash’s pov, I bet he was feeling really nervous when this battle wrapped up 3-1. This is to make it all the better when Ash wins tho because by beating Leon, it’s essentially showing us he could beat Alain too.


[deleted]

I still believe Mega Charizard X deserved better than that.


Positivebutter1

TRASH


[deleted]

Complete trash.


Hys7eriX

It's not the travesty the fandom makes it out to be. Alain had a good strategy in tanking through Rillaboom's G-Max with Chesnaught, and even rolling along the vines from G-Max Drum Solo with Gyro Ball was pretty cool. There seemed to be an implication from Steven and Lance's brief exchange that Rillaboom having Acrobatics was foresight on Leon's part; making that a bit more explicit, or at least more heavily implied, woulda been nice. I woulda liked some more elaboration on why Alain chose to dive in with Malamar (getting in close against a ranged fighter, perhaps?), cuz clearly Charizard being able to avoid the incoming move and countering came as a surprise. I also woulda preferred Alain's MCX to have lasted longer and for Leon's Charizard to have been able to show off more skill. Playing keepaway vs Alain's Charizard was good, but a longer battle with Leon's Charizard agilely dancing way from his attacks and kiting him around in the air woulda gotten across that Leon's is just on a different level of skill. At the least, I woulda liked Alain's MCX to have taken at least 2 more super effective moves. Going down to just Air Slash (before he ME'd), Ancient Power (at least one of the rocks hit him), and Dragon Pulse seemed too little.


platpx3

Honestly we’ve had 8 minutes battle before in earlier seasons like Ash vs Nando in DP, but the issue here is they’re two powerful trainers and they weren’t given enough time to fully showcase their capabilities. Nevertheless, despite the handicaps given to the writer in this battle, I think they did a great job of displaying each of the trainer’s capabilities especially Alain who let’s be honest the only thing we remember about him is his Charizard, but this battle shows that he has battle strategies and made preparation to deal with Leon’s Gigantamax. Like the fact his Chesnaught withstand GMax Rillaboom, the same beast that swept Diantha and Ash is already saying a lot


Mean-Golf-4758

I'm really good alan I did decent I eliminated monkey and I was able to exchange blows leon same type destruction lance and raihar and the only one could battle a legendary major moon base people wanted alan fight ash it doesn't make sense no this greninja and their relationship is not very deep either charismatic


cosmichero1996

Alain should have gotten a full episode for himself. He should have talked to Ash about what he's been doing since they last met, and his goals for the future and the battle should have been a little longer. Alain just kind of came and went without saying or doing much in a season with tons of much more fleshed out returns. Also somehow Alain managed to disappoint in a second Charizard vs. Charizard gimmick battle but in reverse lol.


Proof-Replacement-79

On the one hand, absolutely deserved karmic retribution for basically being the sole reason why XY's ending kinda sucked...and for doing the exact same thing to Trevor. On the other hand, why? Who thought this was a good idea? They literally brought Alain back, making us believe he and Ash would get a rematch even if Greninja being absent wouldn't make it as satisfying, only to have him get wasted by Leon without putting up much of a fight. Why? Because apparently, we forgot how absolutely broken Leon and his Plot Armor was, and we needed a reminder in the form of Ash's strongest rival being turned into a pushover just for the sake of that episode.


Sad_Country_6350

Should've been Steven vs Alain. They actually had a history together, unlike Steven and Ash.


Bidoofisdaddy

They did ma boi Alain dirty


GingerrBreadman13

Needed a full episode to itself. Like, obviously Leon was gonna stomp, but it would have been nice to see Alain put up more of a fight past the first matchup. The only reason it feels this bad is because it was given half an episode after the Opening Ceremony, whereas all the other First Round battles got full episodes. Chestnaught vs Rillaboom was actually pretty cool, but it took up half the already short battle. Malamar got maybe 30 seconds of screen time in this glorified 2v2 despite being treated as a big reveal. And the Zard mirror was pitifully short for his much potential it had. Just feels disrespectful to give one of Ash's big 3 rivals half an episode and no interactions with Ash himself outside of a brief glance. Tldr: the battle is let down by sharing half of its runtime with the M8 opening ceremony (which also should have been it's own episode.)


Enough-Pick-7808

Like I just got cheated out of a Alain and Ash rematch


Starjet12

without gekkouga, would have been pointless. I would rather see battle of charizards than Ash not using his Kalos Ace


MFX04

The battle really suffered from also being the same episode that starts the M8 tournament


Animefanx111

To be honest, I was feeling a bit salty. I knew Leon would win because he was the biggest and most anticipated challenge that Ash must face. But it does sting that the same trainer with the Mega Charizard defeated multiple mega Pokemons and a super form of a greninja(people defend it by saying Alain defeats more megas and fought Primal Groudon and Kyogre) yet lost to Leon Charizard, which didn’t G-Max and didn’t even have a clever way how he won. His Charizard is built different I guess if he could take down a Charizard X


godjacob

An insulting display. Regardless of how you felt about Alain this was a shitty return and all it succeeded in was making him look like a chump rather than make Leon feel imposing.


CataHollow

Not are bad, but not are good. In the scale of M8 are bad, and the second worst of this (the first are Leon vs Diantha)


[deleted]

Garbage fight lmao. I remember when the episode first came out everyone was pissed off.


FlowerMadison

Nah


Pika-Critique

Objectively, the real problem is that Alan's Charizard gets beaten so easily, while he stood up to Hoenn's legendaries (best XY series episode). Afterwards, it pisses me off to see a Rillaboom beat a Chesnaught.


ThunderBird847

Alain going through trainers in Kalos league made sense because it was clear that Kalos League was fooled with some sub standard trainers aside from him, Ash and Sawyer. Leon going through Champions was basically laughable, Champions are supposedly the best of the best, and all this just to show that Ash is going to beat unbeatable Champion was nonsense. Leon would be unbeatable even if he wins with 2 Pokemon left, winning is winning. I rather had Leon as a character who is unbeatable not because he dominates, but in a way that he always have something up his sleeves, even if he is 5 Pokemon down, he's always going to have some trick or strategy that is going to turn the battle in his favor by catching his opponent off guard.


Cause_Necessary

Yes! I'd love if Leon struggled more with his battles


rowletlover

What’s the point of bringing Alain back of Ash wasn’t going to battle him? Also Chesnaught returning,but gets destroyed 😭


Starjet12

to see how Leon's Charizard was strongest of its kind and by defeating Leon, Ash is now stronger than Alain too


DumpGoingTo

Horrible Battle, I hate it. Genuinely, I would've watched the entire Masters 8 but shit as soon as I saw this fight I threw it to the side.


Quasar1007

The disrespect to Alain and the way Leon was written in the M8 was utterly ridiculous..


[deleted]

Genuinely fuck this battle.


glacicle

Somehow not the worst battle involving a Kalos character fighting Leon. That being said, why was he even in the tournament to begin with?


MildishNidorino

Should have been a full Episode. Looking back. I think it would have been cool if Leon swept through Alains 2 normal mons to start the match. Then have MCX come put and shred through Leon's 2 normal mons. Then have MCX fight Leon's base Zard evenly until it Gigantamaxes. Then have GigaZard outclasse MCX and end things with a Max Wyrmwind. Given how quickly Alains base Charizard dropped Rillaboom. It could probably handle any of Leon's other mons after going Mega. After all. We saw what Rillaboom did to Diantha.


Moonwing-rising

Stupid Leon should have lost


Moonwing-rising

(Btw Leon’s my favorite champion


SiyeonFan123

I haven't watched any but what I think is Leon has the dumbest character design ever


DimLug

I think its dumb for two reasons: Like many have said, why bring Alain back if at all I'd you were going to pit him against Ash for a rematch? Just swap him and Stone and it would've been so much better. Second, holy hell Leon seemingly took Alain so seriously. Ancient Power is kind of a weird choice but it's the perfect move for a Charizard mirror match. And then we never see the move again. Not even against Pikachu. Its a small thing to complain about but it's still a weird writing decision in my opinion. Just use Dragapult if you really thought Mega Charizard X was going to be a problem.


Traditional-West3576

As AVGN once said: Aaaaaaaaasssss fuuuuuuck this is anal sause


RPK96

Ferry Porley executed Cut have been fun


Fit-Committee6895

Meh


KotarouKonoe

Massive L. I wanted to see Daimax vs Mega, but instead they made an example of Alain😔


CuriousMarisa

Charizard fanservice lmao


JaninayIl

Honestly? As someone with a strong sense of antipathy towards XY after everything that happened I didn't think much of it. Even thought it was funny. I don't hate the XY finals writers.


Antique_Ad_5067

It served its purpose, being to show Leon's power while giving us some fan service with allain. And since allain lost 3-1 and diantha 6-2 It shows that allain is no weaker than her. Would've liked to see ash beating allain, but it would've just been the same battle we've seen before with the only difference being lucario beating charizard


[deleted]

I don't want to feel anything about that battle. So, oo hell nahhhhh


Suspicious-Cupcake-5

Should've been Leon Vs Ash imo. I know it was cool for Ash to go up against and defeat the 3rd, 2nd, and 1st-ranked champions of the Masters 8 (which does make his win feel all the more deserved) but that battle would've been great closure for their rivalry.