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| Season | Pokémon DP: Battle Dimension (Season 11) · Solaceon: the Unown ruins & Dawn’s slump arc (DP060–DP065) |
| Episode | Season 11, episode 11 · English episode 526 · Japanese episode 530 · Bulbapedia code DP063 |
| English title | Hot Springing a Leak! |
| Japanese title | ウリムートリオと湯けむりバトル！！ Urimū Torio to Yukemuri Batoru!! — “The Urimoo Trio and the Hot Spring Battle!!” |
| First aired (Japan) | 17 January 2008 · TV Tokyo |
| First aired (US) | 28 June 2008 · Cartoon Network |
| Screenplay | Junki Takegami |
| Opening / ending (Japan) | Together – Fumie Akiyoshi · Kaze no Messēji (Message of the Wind) – Mai Mizuhashi |
| English opening | We Will Be Heroes – Kirsten Price |
| Previous episode | Tanks for the Memories! (DP062) |
| Next episode | Riding the Winds of Change! (DP064) |
Filler / stand-alone episodeDawn’s friend Leona
Hot Springing a Leak! is the 11th episode of Pokémon DP: Battle Dimension, the eleventh season of the Pokémon anime, and the 526th episode of the English dub overall (Japanese episode 530, Bulbapedia code DP063). It first aired in Japan on 17 January 2008 and in the United States on 28 June 2008. It falls within the season’s Solaceon: the Unown ruins & Dawn’s slump stretch (EP60–EP65).
Synopsis
Turtwig’s Energy Ball fizzles again, but Ash keeps encouraging it. With no Pokémon Center in the next town, Dawn suggests a hot-spring hotel that welcomes Pokémon, run by the family of her old friend Leona. Leona greets her with the nickname “Dee Dee”, to Dawn’s annoyance, and admits that business has been slow; she has also watched Dawn’s latest Contest on television. She turns down Ash’s challenge because she is too busy, and when Dawn eagerly jumps into the springs, the pool turns out to be shallow and cold. The water stopped flowing a week ago, Leona explains; her parents have hiked up the mountain to check the pipeline, and if nothing changes the hotel may have to close. Leona plans to use her three Swinub, which know Dig, to sniff out another hot spring, and Dawn, remembering how Leona once stood up for her against a kindergarten bully who hogged the jungle gym, insists on helping.
The Swinub lead the group to a steaming site where a new hotel is under construction, run by Team Rocket in disguise, who are boasting about building a business of their own and getting one over on Giovanni. Leona insists the water is her family’s, but when Jessie demands proof she cannot provide any, and Brock has to admit that it would be legal to tap the same source through a different pipe. Then a Wooper pops out of a pipe with a transponder on its tail. Leona recognises her parents’ Wooper, and her parents arrive to explain that they found a pipe diverting their water, so the transponder proves the spring was stolen. Team Rocket drop their disguises, and Meowth activates a three-legged mecha that fires jets of water. With everyone soaked, Pikachu cannot risk a Thunderbolt, and its Iron Tail just slips off the wet machine.
Dawn and Leona repeat the tactic they once used on the bully: the Swinub dig under the mecha until it topples and spills its water, and when it overheats, Buneary’s Ice Beam chills it until it cracks, falls back on the trio and explodes, blasting them away. While Leona’s parents repair the spring, Leona proposes a Tag Battle, Ash’s Chimchar and Brock’s Sudowoodo against Leona’s Swinub and Dawn’s Piplup. Scratch blocks Peck, Flamethrower and Flame Wheel meet Ice Shard and Bubble Beam, and Swinub tunnels underground with Piplup to burst up beneath Chimchar for a Whirlpool, Bubble Beam and Blizzard combination. Sudowoodo answers with Double-Edge and then copies Blizzard with Mimic, and all four Pokémon end up frozen solid in a draw. The day ends with everyone, human and Pokémon, relaxing in the restored hot spring. When Ash asks Leona about the “Dee Dee” nickname, Dawn dunks her friend to keep the secret, and the next morning she leaves with her confidence restored.
Major Events
- Dawn’s childhood friend Leona and her three Swinub
- Team Rocket’s stolen hot spring and three-legged mecha
- The Dee Dee nickname
- A Tag Battle with Leona ends in a frozen draw
Trivia
- The English title plays on a hot spring that has sprung a leak.
- The screenplay is by Junki Takegami.
- This is a stand-alone episode: it can be skipped without losing the thread of the Sinnoh story.
Changes in the English Dub
- The mecha’s chant parodying The Drifters’ hot-spring song is in the Japanese version only
- Japanese voices can still be heard under the English ones
- Polka O Dolka and the Pokémon Symphonic Medley
Part of our Pokémon DP: Battle Dimension guide. Browse every season of the Pokémon anime.