playing favorites

[kuruk22]

I've been thinking long and hard about it, and after much consideration and careful rumination, I'd have to say that my favorite character from Pokémon's Generation V is Bianca.

I would bombard you with pictures of Bianca being her lovable self, but I don't have very many. I need to remedy this.

Oddly enough, I was sure that I wouldn't like Bianca

Comments

[kuruk22]

That's why I always make it a point to buy the third installment of each generation. It's the same basic storyline, but the extra nuances that they add makes the characters, especially the antagonists, much more fleshed out.

I must admit that I never really gave the PCs' names that much thought. I mean, I always knew that they were meant to bring about opposing forces and their synthesis, but everything you just explained really made my appreciation for the series increase all the more.

When I'm in a particularly dark mood, I tend to feel more bad for the rivals than usual. They're crafted to be sympathetic characters, and I think it's heavily implied that if it weren't for the PC, they would be the ones in the spotlight. This is done most strikingly with Green, who you literally dethrone as Champion (it's subverted with Silver though, who would have gone down the wrong path had it not been for the PC forcing him to reevaluate his attitude). I think my main issue with Cheren, at least relative to the other rivals, is that he's not as sympathetic because he's so strong and different. Green, Silver, Wally, and even Barry, to a certain extent (when you subscribe to the "Palmer-is-too-busy-to-have-as-close-a-relationship-as-they-could" theory), really lend themselves to sympathy from the audience, but Cheren's lack of any inkling of "tragic backstory" negate that for me. It's incredibly stupid of me, so I'm trying to find the nuances about him that I like. I'm just used to liking the rivals immediately, so this is a bit different for me. The first thing I've found I like about him is the amount of development he undergoes, but I also like that he faces his shortcomings head on (unlike Green and Silver who, like you very aptly said, always avoid responsibility for their losses).

I'd never really thought of the held item conversation with Cheren as a way of humanizing him. While I definitely see how it does that, I still think it's also indicative of his preoccupation with the mechanical aspects of pokémon battling. One thing I will say is that the characters of this generation were definitely some of the best developed and unique - so the possibility of using Cheren's comments on held items, a primarily human aspect of competitive battling, really strikes me as brilliant.

Do you prefer calling them Hilbert/Hilda or Touya/Touko? I have a preference for the original names from the Japanese release, and that preference only seemed more justified when you mentioned the transparency thing. That being said, I'm pretty sure they're going to go down the "Gray" route, especially in the translated releases. I guess it can be said that pure white light and unfettered darkness are equally as blinding - it's gray, the medium, that allows for sight.

I tend to prescribe to the idea that Touya and Touko represent the golden mean over the transparency, but I think those views can be reconciled, as transparency is a midpoint between "too obfuscated" and "without substance." Speaking on a metaphorical sense, air is transparent but it has no substance (air is matter, but it's not exactly "tangible" in purely human terms). At the same time, a brick wall has substance but you can't see through it. Glass, on the other hand, is both clear enough to see through and yet substantive enough to be solid. It's a bit of a convoluted explanation, but I think that it applies, especially when applying the adjective to a human being. Touya/Touko have a clear view of the world that is unaffected by the extremes of black and white ("the truth" - arguably), but they have enough substance to process and act on what they believe is right ("their ideals").

On the other hand, the fact remains that these are just video games and Touya and Touka are the avatars. It could just mean that it is by playing as them the player gets an unbiased view at Unova as they are "transparent?"