Pokéblock, Stock, and Berry – Pokémon Season 7, Episode 50

Plot episodeArrival in LilycoveSwellow starts Aerial Ace

Pokéblock, Stock, and Berry is the 50th episode of Pokémon: Advanced Challenge, the seventh season of the Pokémon anime, and the 363rd episode of the English dub overall (Japanese episode 366, Bulbapedia code AG090). It first aired in Japan on 19 August 2004 and in the United States on 3 September 2005. It falls within the season’s To Lilycove: Aerial Ace & the Lilycove Ribbon stretch (EP86–EP92).

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

Synopsis

The group arrive in Lilycove City, where a starving Ash and Pikachu head for food and May spots a poster for a Contest the next day. Pikachu runs off into the Berry market, where the group meet Kelly, a Coordinator haggling over prices with her Grumpig in tow. A vendor offers samples, and Ash finds a Nomel Berry far too sour before being handed a sweeter Mago Berry. When Kelly trips over her shopping, Grumpig rescues the spilled groceries with Psychic, an impressive display that also catches Team Rocket’s eye. On a park bench the Coordinators compare Ribbons. Kelly has only one and is impressed by May’s two, and a friendly rivalry over the Lilycove Ribbon begins. Kelly invites everyone to dinner at her family’s Pokéblock shop, run by her mother, Mrs. Otter.

Mrs. Otter offers to teach the group how to make Pokéblocks, but Ash leaves to train Swellow in Aerial Ace, the move he resolved to learn after facing Winona. Swellow’s first dive ends with its beak buried in the ground, and a former star Trainer known as Vladimir the Attacker appears and offers to coach Ash and Max, demonstrating the move’s three stages with his Pidgeotto. Swellow practises by flying under a bar that is lowered step by step, and when it reaches the correct height of about two feet it crashes again but gets straight back up, impressing Vladimir. Meanwhile, May makes her first Pokéblocks in a Berry Blender; they taste weak and only Beautifly likes them. Kelly reassures her that experimenting is part of the process and shares her dream of teaching classes one day, while May admits she has no long-term goal yet.

As Kelly heads home, Team Rocket’s balloon claw snatches Grumpig. May’s Combusken knocks the balloon aside with Sky Uppercut, Bulbasaur lowers Grumpig safely to the ground with Vine Whip and Beautifly’s Silver Wind blasts the trio away. Impressed by Combusken’s power, May decides to use it in the Contest. Team Rocket land in a dumpster containing a Contest notice, and Jessie forces James to lend her Chimecho, reminding him that he once borrowed her Dustox. On Contest day Ash goes back to training while the others take their seats. May is first up in the Appeals Round, but when she orders Combusken to use Fire Spin, the flames grow far larger than intended and engulf the stage around her, leaving her performance, and her safety, hanging in the balance as the episode ends.

Major Events

• Arrival in Lilycove City
• Kelly and Mrs. Otter’s Pokéblock shop
• May makes her first Pokéblocks
• Swellow starts learning Aerial Ace with Vladimir
• The Lilycove Contest begins with Combusken’s runaway Fire Spin
• Grumpig’s TV debut

Pokémon making their anime debut

• Grumpig#0326 · AG090

Trivia

• The English title plays on "lock, stock and barrel".
• The screenplay is by Atsuhiro Tomioka.
• This is a plot episode: it advances the Hoenn storyline.

Changes in the English Dub

• Pokémon Trainer’s Choice (dub only, in place of Who’s That Pokémon?): which Pokémon is best against Spoink? Answer: Makuhita (a wrong answer)

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