ENGLISH NAME	JAPANESE NAME	POKEMOPOLIS NAME	DODGINESS RATING	ANIMATION	STORY	TEAM ROCKET	MORAL LEARNT
666: Minccino – Neat and Tidy!	672: Chiramii wa Kireizuki!?	Buoyant Bianca: Chattering Chinchilla.			Ash gets a badge case and promptly loses it. Crazy-ass Bianca is introduced.	Can they figure out a way to escape being boring?	Pokémon can also clean for you as well as cockfight!

Today finds the twerps heading alongside a river on their way to Nacrene when a loud voice gets their attention. Turning around, they see a happy blond girl in a long, somewhat constricting dress trying to run after them. She trips on a rock and falls forward, barrelling through Ash and Cilan and sending them crashing into the river.

A very short time later, the girl is bowing frantically and apologising as Ash and Cilan stand half-naked in front of a fire drying themselves. Cilan has taken off his shirt (to the delight of many fangirls) as well as his shoes but has left his presumably wet pants on. Ash is straight up just wearing his boxers and nothing else, while Iris is hanging out by a tree getting far too much of a look at her male companions' skin. She explains she's come along to talk to Ash, and wiggle-walks her way over and shows him her phone wristwatch. On the screen, Professor Juniper appears and doesn't seem at all alarmed to see him standing their half naked. She asks how his Gym Battles are going and is proud to learn he has won his first badge, but sheepishly admits that she forgot to give him a badge case (how the fuck did this woman get her PhD?) so she sent Bianca to deliver it. Bianca? That's the happily pleasant blond lady who just knocked them into the water, who game players will recognise as one of the friends from the starting town in Pokémon Black or Pokémon White.

There's also something.... oddly familiar about Bianca. Something I can't quite put my finger on.

The twerps introduce themselves and Cilan makes a little bow with his shirt off, and Bianca happily reaches into her big bag to get out Ash's badge case.... and her face falls as she can't immediately find it. She begins digging about as the twerps nervously watch on, and time passes, the campfire going out and Ash and Cilan getting dressed again in their now dry clothes. Bianca is hunched over her bag looking miserable as she struggles to find it, and Ash asks her if she's had any luc-and up she pops with a smile saying casually,"Here it is!"

Pulling out the case, a surprising amount of dust and dirt billow from it, apparently Bianca isn't the cleanest girl around, you'd expect that level of dirt from a boy really.....

What is it this girl reminds me of? Something.... something on the tip of my tongue?

As Iris goggles at the dirty case, up in the trees something flashes by through the leaves, apparently taking an interest in what it is seeing. Bianca blows away the dust and gives the case to Ash, who happily poses with it and pops the first Badge into the case. Bianca asks if she can see the badge and Ash happily hands over the case.... and a grey flash zips by grabbing the case from her hands and zipping away. Horrified, Ash chases after followed by a goggling Bianca and the other twerps. It disappears into the bushes as the twerps are temporarily blocked by a fallen tree trunk, and Bianca suggests that he can just go and get a replacement badge instead. Ash is furious at that, leaping up on the trunk and then falling off of it and crashing into the ground. Popping back up, he insists that THIS badge is special and he means to have it back, and heads on after the little Pokémon again. They spot it in a small clearing, where it is blissfully cleaning the case with its fluffy tail. Bianca is in love, gasping happily and moving her mouth so she looks like a chipmunk herself. The Pokémon is Minccino - a Chinchilla Pokémon - which loves shiny things and can't help but clean dirty things with its tail to make them shiny. Bianca wants it, because it's fast and it's incredibly cute, and she pushes past Ash rudely to get what she wants....

Pushes past Ash? Why do I.... where do I know this girl from?

Minccino is alarmed to see her approaching and grumpily hides the badge case in its mouth, stretching out its little cheeks amusingly. Bianca calls out a Pokémon - Pignite! It's the evolved form of Tepig, and it charges straight in with a Tackle on Minccino which quickly dodges. Pignite leaps out and bravely poses its fat little body, then uses Flame Charge, stomping its fat little paws to kick up dust, then blasting through with a spearing, flaming burst of power and...... Minccino zips easily away and up a tree. Bianca stomps her foot furiously over being denied, echoed by Pignite which is taking its cues on how to act from her. Ash rather brattily asks her to speed things up, and she insists that she's got this, while Minccino pops the badge case out of its mouth onto a branch of the tree it's climbed up and looks down over the tantrum throwing Pignite. It rolls up its ears tight, takes a deep breath and then lets out a massive blast of Hyper-Voice that tears into the ears of Pignite. Minccino then leaps down onto its back and uses Tickle, its fluffy tail working at specific points of Pignite's body to send it into hysterics. Bianca has no choice but to recall her Pokémon, but she gasps and giggles and rabbits on in her chipmunk way until Ash just talks over her and says he'll get it done himself.

Non-stop nonsensical talking that irritates Ash.... what is it? What aren't I remembering?

Ash sends Pikachu in to do battle, and so in goes.... Oshawott! Jumping out of its Pokéball, it smugly informs Pikachu that it is going to handle this, while Bianca squeaks in delight thinking that all of Ash's Pokémon just come and go from their Pokéballs as they please. Ash tells Pikachu they'll let Oshawott handle this, and it moves in with a Tackle... and Minccino easily dodges, then zips away followed by the determined Oshawott which catches up and eagerly poses bravely once more. Ash is pleased and instructs Oshawott to

"HYDRO-PUMP! LET'S GO!" interrupts Bianca happily, then begins roaring at the astonished Oshawott,"I SAID HYDRO-PUMP AND I MEAN HYDRO-PUMP!"

Ash points out grumpily that it doesn't know that move, and tells Oshawott to use Razor Shell. But when it turns around to use the sword-like move, Minccino is nowhere to be seen and Bianca cries out to stop wasting time and use Razor Shell again. Minccino leaps down from the branch behind Oshawott and uses Tickle to send it into paroxysms of laughter, then begins slapping it around the face with heavy blows from its tail. Oshawott is sent crashing down, then skulks miserably back to Ash and Pikachu and happily gets behind Pikachu and shoves it forward to "finish things off". But it's too late, Minccino has gulped up the badge case again and rushes away, leaving them all behind.

Ash mutters that they would have caught it if Bianca didn't talk so much, but she happily insists that he wouldn't want to miss out on getting such great advice from her. She squeaks that she desperately wants to catch Minccino and since it has Ash's badge case it's in his interest to help her. He sighs that this makes sense, and she cheers and fist-pumps in delight as Ash moans that he WAS trying to get to Nacrene City to get his next Gym Badge. Cilan happily points out it's "only" over the mountain, and points to a HUGE tree-lined mountain looming up in the distance, and Ash mumbles that this is "some mountain".

OVER the mountain, however, Team Rocket are already in Nacrene City. It's a colourful place, and the trio are standing on top of a warehouse roof looking at the many others that apparently make up a great deal of the city. Using a computer they register that the train tracks below them are no longer in use, figure out the museum location from where they are, and then agree that it's time to work out an escape route ahead of time. As a woman walks by in the foreground of the street below, her parasol blocks our view of Team Rocket for a moment, and when she passes they're now as absent as the personality and charm that used to make them such wonderful characters.



WHO'S THAT POKEMON!?! IT'S.... yeah, it's Minccino. They do this every week, it's the same goddamn Pokémon we've just spent 10-15 minutes watching on screen. Only they spelt it's name wrong (to be fair they spelt it wrong in the title too)... Jesus Christ.



The twerps are having no luck finding Minccino, but then Bianca has an idea. She asks if Cilan has any shiny pots or cookware and he tells her to have a look in his backpack. Moments later we see HIM going through his backpack, because apparently Bianca is too lazy to do it herself, and he brings out a shiny spoon for her. She happily takes it from him and then.... begins rubbing it in the dirt! He's horrified, facepalming as she triumphantly holds up the now filthy spoon for Ash and Iris to see.

She rushes off into the trees, only Iris seeming to figure out what she's doing, and props up a shiny pot with a stick with the dirty spoon underneath. They all settle in to watch, Bianca harshly shushing Pikachu when it makes a noise, and soon Minccino appears out of the bushes and cautiously approaches the spoon. Seeing it is dirty, it turns and begins brushing at it with its tail, and a triumphant Bianca hauls on the rope attached to the stick and brings it down over the top of Minccino. She's ecstatic! She did it! She caught Minccino, sh..... she watches as it gets up on tip-toes and begins walking away with the pot still over the top of it, disappearing into the bushes leaving her wide-eyed in its wake. Miserably hunching over, the twerps step up behind her and we're reminded that she's either incredibly tall and big-boned or the twerps are midgets... or maybe the animators don't know how the fuck old everyone is supposed to be either.

Ash insists that the only way to solve this problem is with a fight, and insists he has a plan to deal with Tickle. He leads them through the shallow waters of the river and locates Minccino up a tree contentedly cleaning Cilan's spoon with its tail. He vaults over the rock and calls out Snivy, impressing Bianca who happily tells a horrified Cilan and Iris that she still has only ONE Pokémon. Apparently so far she's only used Pignite for all her battles and relied almost primarily on Flame Charge for all of her battles. She giggles that she's done a lot of training at home but her journey is still new, and kind of bobs about in place doing soft little dancing fistbumps while she giggles about how her father didn't want her to leave home, causing Cilan to liken her to a vintage wine and Iris to mumble that she sounds like a "princess". But hey, it's been successful for the bizarre fully grown woman-child, she's got TWO badges so far, twice the number that Ash has.

Ash has Snivy use Attract, a clever strategy since it's negate Minccino's speed.... except Minccino's speed is enough to dodge it in the first place. And then Minccino comes back by using.... Attract!?! And that's when things get weird.



I love this show.

Snivy is lovestruck, and Ash has to recall Snivy. That's it then, it's time for his MVP to get in there, it's time for Pikachu to sort this shit out. Since they're both boys, Attract won't work (homosexuality has nothing to do with it, it's a gender based attack!), and Pikachu zooms in with Iron Tail. Minccino dodges and tries to run, knowing when its outpowered, but Pikachu keeps pace with Quick Attack and tries another Iron Tail. Minccino is able to mostly block it by using Double Slap, and they drop down to the shallow riverbed with water raining down over them. Minccino rolls up its ears and uses Hyper Voice again, but while this did a lot of damage to Pignite, Pikachu is able to stand up to it. But Minccino is able to get behind it and start using Tickle, which Pikachu desperately resists as Ash screams for it to hold on and finally.... Minccino is exhausted! Pikachu realises that it's free from Tickle, and now is there chance, now it is time fo-

"NOW PIKACHU! ZAP CANNON!" squeals Bianca enthusiastically.
"Pikachu can't use that move," sighs Ash.
"Hey!" demands Bianca,"Just give it a shot!"

Ignoring reality to insist on getting what SHE wants? Goddddddd it's right on the tip of my tongue who the fuck is she?

Ash has Pikachu use Thunderbolt, and successfully blasts Minccino which is left dazed and ready to fall. Bianca zips up begging to be "tagged in" and begins rummaging around in her bag for a Pokéball... but she can't find it! As Ash moans at her to PLEASE get on with it, Minccino recovers and starts to zip away.... until Bianca finally find the Pokéball and hauls it out to reveal it is dusty and dirty. She blows on it to clear the dust, while a wide-eyed Minccino can't resist, and zooms past Pikachu and rushes up Bianca's clothes and onto her shoulder where it starts frantically brushing at the Pokéball with its tail.... and triggers the catch mechanism!

Astonished, Minccino is sucked inside of the Pokéball which shakes and lights for a second and then... success! Bianca just caught (kinda) a Minccino!

"You see," she mumbles to a shocked Ash,"I got it."

Iris shrugs that maybe it's better to be lucky than good, but will Minccino and Bianca get on? Of course they will, says Cilan happily, Minccino's talents and Bianca's "unique" personality will mesh together perfectly. By which of course he means Minccino will clean up for the absent-minded Bianca. Ash agrees with "whatever he just said," but Bianca says it doesn't matter, whatever, she just caught Minccino!

Ash clambers up the tree and recovers his badge case, and the branch breaks beneath him and he falls to the ground where he lands planted firmly on his feet and probably blows out his knees. Cilan's pot lands on his head and he crashes down, and a worried Pikachu rushes up to him, but he insists there is "no need to worry", borrowing a line from a former companion.

They head to the local brightly-coloured Pokémon Center, where they have their Pokémon healed up to full by Nurse Joy. Joy also gave Ash's new egg a check-up and tells him it is as healthy as can be, and Bianca asks what type it is. Ash doesn't know, and Bianca seems slightly disappointed, but quickly gets over it because she wants to battle Ash.

Oh shit, almost had it there! I know this girl, there's something.... what is it?

Bianca calls out Pignite instead of Minccino as expected, and as Ash tries to go against his normal mindset and actually THINK about what Pokémon to use, Bianca insists that he HAS to use Pikachu.

Telling Ash what he HAS to do? I've almost got it!

Pikachu rushes up to Ash's side from the sidelines where it was sitting with Axew, Iris and Cilan, and the battle is on. It's one on one, they fight till one of the Pokémon can't battle any more. Pignite rushes in with Takedown and scores a glancing blow that sends Pikachu flying through the air, and it then surrounds itself in a burning ball of fire called Heat Crash and smashes Pikachu into the ground. The smoke clears, Iris and Cilan sure that Pikachu couldn't deal with that.... but it gets back up wanting to fight more, much to Bianca's delight.

Pignite stomps its fat little hooves and bursts in with Flame Charge, and Pikachu counters with Volt Tackle. They crash into each other and both are sent crashing back. Pikachu lands safely on all fours, but Pignite is down and out after only ONE hit - Ash wins despite Bianca having two badges!

She recalls Pignite, thanking it for its battle, then wiggle-rushes up to Ash happily and tells him that he may have beaten her but she's just starting out on her journey and next time she'll be a lot stronger. She thanks him for his help today, then suddenly declares BYEEEE! and just rushes off, stopping to leap into the air waving her arms about before tearing off down the road.



Oh shit, shit, I think I've got it.....

Ash watches her go as Cilan and Iris notes that she certainly does thing at her own pace. He shrugs it off though, he's met plenty of weird people in the past, and he's happy because he has a shiny new badge case and a Gym Battle coming up. So the episode ends, and.... hang on. He's meet plenty of weird people in the past... Bianca just rushed off out of nowhere..... she insisted on telling Ash what to do.... she was obsessed with battling Ash.... she has no concept of reality.... non-stop nonsensical talking.... rudely pushing past people to get where she wanted to go.... an almost boyish attitude.... holy shit. Oh my God, I know who she reminds me off..... hell I may even know who she actually IS.

Bianca is Barry. Barry is back.... and he's in drag.

BEST QUOTES

"NOW PIKACHU! ZAP CANNON!" "Pikachu can't use that move..." "Hey! Just give it a shot!"

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