Pearls are a Spoink’s Best Friend – Pokémon Season 7, Episode 39

Filler / stand-alone episodeGiovanni threatens the trioMagikarp salesman returns

Pearls are a Spoink’s Best Friend is the 39th episode of Pokémon: Advanced Challenge, the seventh season of the Pokémon anime, and the 352nd episode of the English dub overall (Japanese episode 355, Bulbapedia code AG079). It first aired in Japan on 3 June 2004 and in the United States on 21 May 2005. It falls within the season’s Towards Fortree: Swellow, Combusken & the Feather Badge stretch (EP79–EP85).

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

Synopsis

Team Rocket make an awkward video call to Giovanni, admitting that they have nothing to report and that their Hoenn secret base has been destroyed. The Boss brands the mission a costly failure and threatens to send Butch and Cassidy in their place, and the trio vow to start over as the “new Team Rocket”. The next morning, Ash’s group are having breakfast when Skitty hears a rustle in the bushes and a Spoink bounces out. Max’s Pokédex explains how important the pearl on a Spoink’s head is, and this one has lost its own. Spoink leads them to the cliff where the pearl fell, but it is nowhere to be seen, so Brock sends out Mudkip to help search while Spoink keeps trying out other round objects on its head, including an Igglybuff, a Voltorb and an Electrode.

The group find the real pearl, only for Team Rocket’s pitfall trap to catch them all in a net. Corphish cuts everyone free, but the pearl lands in the villains’ hands. Corphish dodges Seviper’s Wrap and blocks Cacnea’s Pin Missile with Harden, and a combined Bubble Beam and Water Gun from Corphish and Mudkip blasts Team Rocket away towards a nearby fair. Searching the crowds, Spoink keeps getting distracted by round things, from a juggler’s balls to a fortune teller’s crystal ball. Team Rocket, meanwhile, run into the Magikarp salesman who once cheated James. He offers Jessie a “Feebas” that he claims will evolve into the beautiful Milotic in exchange for the pearl, and Jessie eagerly agrees despite her teammates’ doubts.

When Jessie releases her new Pokémon into a river, its colour washes away to reveal a painted Magikarp, and the trio realise they have been swindled yet again. Ash’s group find them and scold them for trading the pearl for a worthless fish, and both groups head back into the fair to hunt down the salesman, finding him trying to sell another fake Feebas. Brock’s Mudkip washes off its paint with Water Gun, and when the salesman tries to run, the group corner him and the pearl falls out of his bag. As soon as Team Rocket try to claim it, a battle breaks out, and Spoink, reunited with its pearl, unleashes its Psychic power to send the villains flying. The salesman slips away in the confusion, but Ash notes that at least Spoink has its treasure back, and the group continue on their way to Fortree City.

Major Events

• Giovanni threatens to replace the trio with Butch and Cassidy
• Spoink’s lost pearl
• The Magikarp salesman sells Jessie a painted Magikarp as a “Feebas”
• Torkoal’s Body Slam
• Spoink debuts

Pokémon making their anime debut

• Spoink#0325 · AG079

Trivia

• The English title plays on "Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend".
• The screenplay is by Yukiyoshi Ōhashi.
• This is a stand-alone episode: it can be skipped without losing the thread of the Hoenn story.

Changes in the English Dub

• A scene of Spoink with trading cards cut
• Pokémon Trainer’s Choice (dub only, in place of Who’s That Pokémon?): which Pokémon is best against Electabuzz? Answer: Steelix

Part of our Pokémon: Advanced Challenge guide. Browse every season of the Pokémon anime.