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| Season | Pokémon Journeys: The Series (Season 23) · A tour of the regions arc (JN006–JN011) |
| Episode | Season 23, episode 10 · English episode 1090 · Japanese episode 1096 · Bulbapedia code JN010 |
| English title | A Test in Paradise! |
| Japanese title | カイリューの楽園、ハクリューの試練！ Kairyū no Rakuen, Hakuryū no Shiren! — “The Kairyu Paradise and Hakuryu’s Ordeal!” |
| First aired (Japan) | 26 January 2020 · TV Tokyo |
| First aired (US) | 12 June 2020 · Netflix |
| Screenplay | Yuka Miyata |
| Opening / ending (Japan) | Wan, Tsū, Surī (One, Two, Three) – After the Rain · Pokémon Shiritori (Pikachu → Mew Ver.) – Pokémon Music Club |
| English opening | The Journey Starts Today – Walk off the Earth |
| Who’s That Pokémon? | Dragonite (US) · Dragonite (Japan) |
| Previous episode | Finding a Legend! (JN009) |
| Next episode | Best Friend…Worst Nightmare! (JN011) |
Plot episodeAsh catches Dragonite
A Test in Paradise! is the 10th episode of Pokémon Journeys: The Series, the twenty-third season of the Pokémon anime, and the 1090th episode of the English dub overall (Japanese episode 1096, Bulbapedia code JN010). It first aired in Japan on 26 January 2020 and in the United States on 12 June 2020. It falls within the season’s A tour of the regions stretch (EP6–EP11).
Synopsis
Searching for a legendary island inhabited only by Dragonite, Ash helps a Dragonair that cannot fly to master Dragon Dance, and after it evolves to save him from Team Rocket’s Wailord he catches it as his first Pokémon of the series. At the Cerise Laboratory the boys watch a TV interview with a ship’s captain who was rescued from a wreck by a Dragonite; Ren explains that the Dratini line is rare in the wild, and Professor Cerise mentions rumours of an island where only Dragonite live. Goh maps recent sightings, finds that they cluster in one area, and the two set off by boat, Goh’s bag stuffed with Poké Balls for the whole Dratini line. Overhearing them at the port, Team Rocket decide to catch a Dragonite for the Boss. Goh chooses to catch a local Dewgong to ride rather than rent a boat, but it breaks out of ball after ball before he finally secures it. Out at sea his Dewgong falls for another Dewgong and chases it straight into a storm, the waves throw both boys into the water, and Ash glimpses a flight of Dragonite just before he passes out.
The boys wake on a beach ringed by Dragonite—they have reached the island—but Goh finds his bag empty, having wasted every Poké Ball on Dewgong, and refuses Ash’s offer of one. A Dragonite and a Dragonair guide them through the lush, GPS-less island to a clearing where three Dragonair dance, glow and take to the air, though their own Dragonair guide looks sad. Scorbunny turns up wearing a shed Dratini skin and leads them to a cave of skins behind a waterfall, where they watch a Dratini shed and Ash wonders why the line ends with a Pokémon that has arms and legs. Goh then works out the island’s secret: the Dragonair trio uses its power over the weather to keep a permanent storm hiding the island. On the beach the Dragonite fly off effortlessly into the storm, but the guide Dragonair keeps falling back and is left behind.
Ash offers to train it, and Goh’s video of the trio’s dance reveals that they took off using Dragon Dance. Pikachu stretches an Electroweb over some rocks as a trampoline; Ash is shocked again and again, but he and Dragonair keep bouncing, spinning harder until Dragonair performs Dragon Dance and flies, then squeezes Ash in a grateful hug. It senses trouble and heads out to sea, and the boys follow on Goh’s heartbroken Dewgong. Team Rocket, disguised as castaways on a raft, have caged a Dragonite; their Rocket Prize Master yields a single ball containing a Wailord that knows only Splash, yet its splashes still toss everyone about. Pikachu frees the caged Dragonite with Iron Tail, but a Wailord splash flings Ash into the air, and Dragonair, too slippery to hold him, evolves into Dragonite and catches him in its new arms, while the freed Dragonite blasts Team Rocket off with Hyper Beam. Ash concludes that Dragonite have arms so they can rescue people, and when the new Dragonite hugs him he catches it. Professor Cerise decides to keep the island’s location secret to preserve the mystery.
Major Events
- Dragonite Island. Goh catches a Dewgong
- Ash helps a Dragonair that cannot fly to learn Dragon Dance, and it evolves into Dragonite and becomes Ash’s first catch of the series, the longest wait for a first catch in any series and his first permanent fully evolved catch since Noctowl in EP154
- Team Rocket’s Wailord knows only Splash
- Professor Cerise keeps the island’s location secret
Captures and evolutions
Dragonite#0149 · Ash · his first catch of the series, newly evolved from Dragonair
Dewgong#0087 · Goh · after it breaks out of ball after ball- Dragonair → Dragonite#0149 · Ash’s, before he catches it · catching him as he falls
Trivia
- The screenplay is by Yuka Miyata.
- This is a plot episode: it advances the Kanto, Galar & beyond storyline.
Changes in the English Dub
- Dub error: captions add a plural “s” to Pokémon names that do not take one
- When Dragonite hugs Ash and Cerise, Netflix US, Pokémon TV outside the US and the VIZ discs say “Not so tight!”, while other Netflix regions, POP, Pokémon TV US and the Pokémon Asia ENG YouTube channel say “I can’t breathe!”
Part of our Pokémon Journeys: The Series guide. Browse every season of the Pokémon anime.