489: Oh Do You Know The Poffin Plan!
Dodgy Synopsis
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493: Kaiketsu Rozureido to Hana Densetsu!
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....and then we'd have to ask why they didn't use a question mark?
Late at night near bushes loaded with berries, Team Rocket quickly sneak up and begin chowing down on the free food, stuffing their faces with berries and fruit. James actually has a tear in his eye, but then they all begin sniffing the air, and spot a nearby building from which emerges a delicious aroma, so they move towards the building only for.... Midget Batman to strike!?!
It blasts Team Rocket with a windy attack (Magical Leaf) that lifts them into the air and sends them blasting off far too soon, and then returns to its lone, midget vigil. Who is this mysterious shadowy figure that shouts ROSERADE when it attacks? Perhaps we will never know the secret of its true identity, there simply AREN'T. ENOUGH. CLUES. DAMN YOU!
The next day, the twerps find themselves in Floaroma Town, which is absolutely loaded with flowers and happy looking couples. Dawn rushes around excitedly and finds a poster for the next Pokémon Contest, and then a dignified, elderly women approaches asking if this is their first time in Floaroma, and then launches in to the tale of the town's history.
Apparently, Floaroma Town used to be a desert town where nothing grew, until a beautiful mystery woman appeared and turned the town into a beautiful paradise.
She heads off after they thank her for her filthy lies, and then Dawn notes a smaller poster near the Contest Poster, which advertises a chance for people to learn how to cook poffins. What are poffins? Ash and Brock don't know, which startles Dawn so much that her hair half-lifts and then just holds there doing nothing for a bit before lowering back down.... hooray for animation!
"Now don't tell me you don't know what Poffins are!?!" gasps Dawn.
"I won't have to if you'd tell me!" snaps back Ash angrily.
Poffins, apparently, are a Pokémon snack, similar (but not quite the same) to Hoenn's Pokeblock. They head down to where the classes will be held, and discover the same large building where Team Rocket got their asses handed to them the previous night. A Roserade stands in the garden waving to a Lotad as it directs it to use its Water Gun on the gardens, then gets upset when Ash stomps up shouting out that he wants to learn to cook the poffins now goddammit what's going on where are the poffins!?! Dawn tells him to keep it down since he's probably upsetting the Pokémon (the evolved form of Roselia, which is such a prim and soft looking Pokémon that it surely cannot be the midget Batman we saw the previous night.... why they would be like suggesting that millionaire playboy Bruce Wayne was regular sized Batman!) and then Forsynthia - the woman who runs the cooking classes - steps out holding a Psyduck watering can and apologises for making them wait. Brock drops instantly to a knee to tell her that one so beautiful need make no apology, and then begs to hear her name. When she gives it to him, he lies and waxes lyrical over the ridiculous name while he gets closer and closer to just dropping the flowery language in exchange for crude euphemisms.... and then Croagunk makes its arrival to remind Brock once again that he will die alone.
It drags him away for who knows what, and Forsynthia invites the others in, not at all concerned with the possible horrors awaiting Brock. Inside, however, Brock has somehow returned and Forsynthia directs the trio in how to make Poffins. First they have to add berries to water, and then put it on the boil, being careful to stir it and watch for it to burn. Dawn uses her Poketch to time her cooking, explaining to Ash that the poffins have a tendency to burn otherwise, and Forsynthia correctly guesses she has made poffins before. She is impressed to learn that Dawn used to help her mother cook (since most children have such negligent parents that they let them leave home at ten) and Brock takes advantage of her nostalgia to scream and roar that he not only helped his mother, but his father too! And his brothers, and all his sisters! And.... and.... and freezes as he realises the inevitable that awaits him.
"I got it... can we move on to something else?" he mutters to Croagunk, and it turns and STARES at nothing in the distance with a creepy grin on its bucktoothed face.
Shortly after, Dawn pours the Poffin mixture into the moulds while we see the pre-episode teaser again, as Ash fails miserably to stir the poffins properly and they start to burn. Dawn shows off her Poffins as being ready while Ash does the same to the burnt, blackened monstrosities he has created. Dawn calls out her Pokémon to treat them to the food she has cooked them and they eagerly chow down and..... their reaction isn't exactly what she was hoping for. Bursting into tears, they rush backwards and forwards in disgust, not understanding why their mother/trainer/the moon/talking skin monster thing would abuse them like this.
Brock offers his poffins to Croagunk and Sudowoodo, while Ash's Pokémon chow down on Forsynthia's instead of Ash's. He sighs in despair and then..... roars that he'll just eat the burnt poffins himself and begins defiantly shovelling them into his mouth!
Forsynthia assures him that it takes time to prepare good poffins, while Dawn chases her Pokémon around insisting that they try hers again. The house twists and shakes improbably as Dawn tries to get hold of them, and one of the poffins falls outside, landing at Meowth's feet. The Scratch-Cat picks it up, and Jesse offers a sage piece of advice that both she and James are both probably well aware of by now.
"Meowth, be careful, if you start putting any old thing in your mouth, you'll get sick!"
He ignores her and chows down, then gasps that it was delicious and turns into an angel holding a trumpet, because that's how Meowth shows pleasure, apparently.
Inside, Dawn grumpily helps do the dishes as Ash enjoys that someone else completely screwed up too. But Forsynthia assures Dawn that different Pokémon have different tastes, and when she finds out that Dawn's mother has a Glameow, she tells Dawn that she should try to work on a different type of Poffin for HER Pokémon.
Outside, Team Rocket overhear and rush off eagerly, James and Meowth gasping that poffins are obviously made from only the best, top ingredients, and see a chance in that for profit to them. But then Jesse emerges from out of frame glowing red and laughing (as she does), and when James asks what she's doing, she looms above them as their Bitch Goddess Queen, cackling in delight as they stare up at her with horrified, superstitious fear.
Jesse declares that Pokeblock is yesterday, and it is all about the poffins now... they'll sell them, make a fortune, become notorious in culinary circles AND Meowth will get a little bow tie! James can have a vest and a suit and Jesse will wear tight clinging red dresses that show ALOT of leg.
She roars at them when they fail to be too enthusiastic about her plan, and they quickly fall into line, as Jesse cackles and roars with insane laughter.
Inside, Roserade brings tea to the twerps and then backs out in terror from Ash, and Forsynthia explains that it has always been nervous and easily frightened. She remembers years earlier during a winter storm she went to the Pokémon Centre and met it as a Budew, and when it showed an interest in her flowers she offered to take it on as her trainer. She took it out into the cold, wrapping it up in a red scarf remarkably like the one worn by the Midget Batman who says "Roserade!" we saw earlier! Eventually it evolved in Roserade, but it's still nervous around strangers, both human and Pokémon. In the hallway, Roserade grins at Lotad to hear itself being talked up, but then Team Rocket break the good mood by bursting into the garden in a giant Mecha, sucking up massive amounts of berries and even uprooting trees before introducing themselves.
"It's speaking to me, loud and clear!"
"On the wind!"
"Past the stars!"
"In yer ear!"
"Creating utter chaos at a breakneck pace."
"Dashing all hope, and putting fear in its place."
"A rose by any other name's just as sweet."
"When everything's worse, our work is complete."
"Jesse!"
"And it's James!"
"Meowth, now dat's a name!"
"Putting the do-gooders in their place."
"Team Rocket!"
"We're In yer face!"
They leap back into the Mech when Pikachu tries to Thundershock them. Jesse sends in Dustox to deal to the twerps, and James tries to join in with Carnivine, which promptly and eagerly tries to eat him up. He calls out Cacnea hoping for more luck, but instead gets a spiny cuddle, while Jesse and Meowth whine in confusion, fright and surprise.
God DAMN look at Meowth's face, haha!
Dustox tries Poison Sting, but Croagunk blasts it with its own Poison Sting. Piplup uses Bubblebeam and Turtwig Razor Leaf against Bullet Seed and Pin Missile from Cacnea and Carnivine, and as they fight, Roserade rushes back inside and grabs the scarf seen in the earlier flashback when it first met Forsynthia... and wraps it around its head and becomes Midget Batman!
Back at the battle, Aipom fires Swift at Team Rocket but it is reflected by a happy Wobbuffet after Jesse sweetly calls it out telling it that she needs it. awn has Buneary use Icebeam, which shatters against Cacnea's Sandstorm.... Team Rocket is actually winning! Getting while the getting is good, Team Rocket decide to cheese it.... and Midget Batman shows up!
Team Rocket recognise it as the masked "man" that blasted them off the previous night, James noting it is no man. Forsynthia, to her credit, realises that it is Roserade, recognising the scarf wrapped around its head.
Meowth hears Lotad eagerly talk up Roserade's exploits as Midget Batman, beating up on burglars and dealing with Pokémon disputes and rewarding good Pokémon with food. Forsynthia wonders how her normally bashful Pokémon can be so forceful, and Lotad explains that the scarf makes it a superhero... and Team Rocket knows exactly what that means!
The twerps are caught up in fired baskets from the Mech, and then Meowth leaps at Roserade and grabs the end of its scarf, trying desperately to pull it off. Jesse roars at Meowth to get it off (usually it's people yelling that at Jesse) and then James leaps onto all fours, lifts his ass up and calls for a tickle.
Mime Jr. rushes in to tickle Roserade under the armpits, and Meowth uses the distraction to tear away the scarf and rush back into the mech. They grab it up with a metallic arm and rush away, but Forsynthia runs into their way, demanding they give Roserade back. They bear down upon her, asking just what she intends to do, and she.... talks.
She convinces Roserade that it never needed the scarf to be a Superhero, and it listens to her words and shatters the metallic arm. It blasts the Mech with Petal Dance and frees the twerps and the stolen berries, then blasts the Mech one last time to blow it up and send them blasting off again!
Everyone stares at the wreckage of Team Rocket's Mech... which has also affected the garden, wrecking it. But Roserade has one last trick up its sleeve and uses Sunny Day, which in conjunction with Lotad's watergun, causes it to "rain sun", returning the garden to its pristine state, just like the legend.
A short time later, the twerps stand in the kitchen having made another batch of poffins. Dawn offers her Pokémon the snacks and they stare nervously at them, "volunteering" Piplup for the honour of first taste. It refuses to be a guinea pig, so all three try some and their eyes bug open and... they grin, it's good!
The narrator declares that now Dawn had learned something more about herself and her Pokémon and it will hold her in good stead for her next Contest.... but no mention is made of Ash's second effort, leaving us to make only one conclusion, surely he has just murdered another batch of snacks.
| BEST QUOTES |
 "Don't tell me you don't know what Poffins are!?!" "I won't have to if you'd tell me!"
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