Wired for Battle! – Pokémon Season 3, Episode 24

Filler / stand-alone episodeScizor debutFirst digital animation

Wired for Battle! is the 24th episode of Pokémon: The Johto Journeys, the third season of the Pokémon anime, and the 140th episode of the English dub overall (Japanese episode 142, Bulbapedia code EP140). It first aired in Japan on 23 March 2000 and in the United States on 24 February 2001. It falls within the season’s Between the Gyms stretch (EP135–EP140).

Synopsis · Major Events · Trivia · Dub Changes · All episodes

Synopsis

Team Rocket are in the bushes, plotting their next pitfall plan attack on Ash and friends when a mysterious guy appears from the bushes and asks if they’re looking for a Pokemon battle; they immediately decide to try and 2v1 him when they see something strange overhead. Team Rocket are beaten quickly by the mysterious gentleman and his Pokemon.

Just then Ash and co hear a strange noise nearby, Pikachu launches into the air to look for it, and quickly finds itself confronted by a Scizor, the two prepare to go head to head when the Scizor’s trainer emerges from the bushes and introduces himself as Muramasa and his Scizors name is Masamune. Muramasa states that he is impressed with both Ash and his Pikachu and that Ash is just the type of trainer he has been looking for. Muramasa takes Ash and friends back to his Elite Pokemon Training Center where they find all sorts of trainers and powerful Pokemon training. All the students clearly have great admiration for Muramasa and Masamune, his Scizor that was once known as The Crimson Streak.

Just then another student named Shingo appears, he doesn’t seem to have the same levels of admiration and respect for his teacher as the other students. Muramasa asks Shingo if he would like to battle Ash but Shingo proceeds to be quite ignorant, looks Ash up on his laptop and declines the battle request as the laptop states Ash will lose. Another student approaches Ash and says he’s sorry to say that Shingo is probably right as his laptop said he would defeat every trainer at the school and he did. Shingo declares that he no longer has the need for Pokemon battles, as he has all the information he needs right at his fingertips with the laptop and it’s databases.

Team Rocket are nearby and have been listening in on everything as it unfolds, deciding it would be a great idea to steal all the information on Shingo’s laptop so they could use it to find out which trainers have the best Pokemon and exactly how to beat them. Shingo tells Muramasa that if he wants him to participate in battles the old way so much he needs to find him an opponent who can teach him something he doesn’t already know, he then rudely walks off. Later on Muramasa explains that Shingo lost his way and forgot the true spirit of Pokemon, and now he just has his head stuck in a laptop all day. Ash vows to bring Shingo back and get him into a real Pokemon battle again.

Ash proceeds to beg Shingo for a battle, he declares as long as he has his computer he doesn’t even need to battle. Meanwhile Meowth has sneaked in through the window of the same room and plugged one of Team Rocket’s data cables into Shingo’s computer to download all the information. Jessie starts pulling the wire in however and drags Meowth, and Shingos laptop out of the window along with it, before both are stopped in their tracks by Masamune the Scizor; Meowth screams when it sees him alerting Ash, Shingo and Muramasa. A confrontation ensues with Team Rocket sending all of their Pokemon to go against Masamune however the whole process is interrupted by Shingo ignoring them and trying to look them up on his laptop; but they aren’t on his database. Team Rocket make out that they are a big deal and that his trainer data must be worthless if they aren’t included in it. This makes Shingo angry and he actually battles them; sending out his own Scizor; Blade – a younger, faster, stronger and undefeated version of Masamune supposedly.

Team Rocket send their entire Pokemon including Meowth to attack Blade who cuts through all of them with a quick attack and sends Team Rocket blasting off. Everyone is impressed by Shingo’s efforts, Ash uses the opportunity to beg Shingo for a battle again; this time he agrees. It’s a 1 vs 1 Pokemon battle, Ash sending out Heracross to face Shingo’s Scizor. Shingo continues analysing stuff with his laptop during the battle, Shingo and Blade make a good start and Heracross is on the back foot. Some good battling by Ash and Heracross puts them back in the fight, and the fact that Shingo’s data didn’t predict what was going to happen sends him into disarray. Heracross manages to connect a fury attack on Scizor and knocks it down. Scizor struggles to its feet and Heracross continues its attacks going head to head with Scizor and knocking it back. The battle rages on, the two trainers and Pokemon giving it their all (and Shingo getting away from his laptop!). Heracross manages to prevail and Shingo and his Scizor score their first ever defeat.

Shingo rushes over to his Pokemon, and leaves his laptop on the floor, his battling spirit is restored, and so is that of his old teacher; Muramasa. Ash and Shingo shake hands and vow to battle each other again some day.

Major Events

• Scizor debut
• First digitally animated shots
• First Steel-types beyond Magnemite/Magneton
• Heracross’s Leer/Take Down/Fury Attack
• Banned in South Korea
• Muramasa is Shingo’s father in Japanese, teacher in the dub

Pokémon making their anime debut

• Scizor#0212 · EP140

Trivia

• The English title plays on “Shingo’s laptop-driven battle strategy”.
• The screenplay is by Atsuhiro Tomioka.
• This is a stand-alone episode: it can be skipped without losing the thread of the Johto story.
• The Who’s That Pokémon? segment features Scizor in Japan, where it almost always matched the episode, but Cyndaquil in the US, where 4Kids picked the Pokémon at random.

Changes in the English Dub

• Muramasa is Shingo’s father in Japanese but his teacher in the dub; Prima is called an Elite Four member for the first time in the dub.
• Pokémon Karaokémon: “All We Wanna Do” (Élan Rivera & Jamily Gray).

Part of our Pokémon: The Johto Journeys guide. Browse every season of the Pokémon anime.