While trying to bond with his new Turtwig, Ash runs into Paul again, who challenges him to another battle, Chimchar vs. Turtwig. Ash struggles to get Turtwig to dodge attacks instead of taking them head-on, but the battle is interrupted by Team Rocket. Although they are easily dispatched, the resulting shock-waves from their blast-off sends Ash and Paul flying over a cliff. When they reach the bottom, they find themselves at the edge of Bewilder Forest, so called because the Stantler population like to use their reality-warping abilities to confuse trainers. As Paul goes off alone, refusing to work together to get out of the forest, Ash and Turtwig try to find their own way out, but keep running into Stantler. Eventually, Ash and Turtwig run into an angry Ursaring that chases them out of the forest, along with Dawn and Brock when they find Ash. Everyone makes their way out, but so does that Ursaring, but fortunately, Paul is there and has Chimchar attack it, allowing him to catch it. After scanning it with his PokéDex, Paul decides it's strong enough for him to keep. Ash and Paul pick up the battle where they left off and this time, Turtwig has no trouble following Ash's orders to dodge when asked to. Unfortunately, they still lose to Paul and Chimchar, and Paul departs, with his belief stronger than ever that friendship is for weaklings.
Tropes
- Big Ball of Violence: Piplup and Aipom get into this. Turtwig tries to break up the ruckus.
- Call-Back: After scanning the Stantler with his PokéDex and hears that it can cause illusions with their horns, Ash remarks that he remembers that ability referencing his first encounter with Stanler back in the Johto series episode "The Little Big Horn".
- Disney Acid Sequence: Invoked three separate times by the Stantler that Ash runs into. As is the norm for their species, they use the energy waves emitted from their antlers to cause powerful hallucinations for Ash and Turtwig. They don't call it Bewilder Forest for nothing!
- Downer Ending: Ash and Turtwig lose to Paul and Chimchar after putting up a good fight, but the real downer is caused by Paul's attitude. Ash now fully understands how cold Paul is to the idea of friendship and his cruel attitude has really begun to get under his skin.
- Everyone Has Standards: Paul might be alienating to the concept of friendship, and makes his disdain for Ash perfectly clear, but he still helps Ash and his friends when they are in trouble.
- Hilarious in Hindsight: Ash's Turtwig refuses to dodge attacks in the beginning of this episode, but after bonding a little, Ash finally gets it to do so in battle when it's the right move. Fastforward to late next season when Ash's Turtwig evolves into Grotle, and now it can't dodge, so it has to learn to tank enemy hits.
- Jerk with a Heart of Jerk: At the end of the episode, Paul stops the Ursaring that is chasing Ash and his friends, but mainly so he can catch it. That being said, Paul had helped Ash out before, more than once, even when there was nothing for Paul to gain.
- Oh, Crap!:
- Ash when he encounters the Beedrill and an angry, wild Ursaring.
- The Beedrills themselves are implied to experience this when they see an angry, wild Ursaring.
- Pet the Dog:
- Paul helps Ash get rid of Team Rocket.....but it was only because the trio was interrupting their battle.
- Paul willingly helps Ash and Turtwig snap out of their hallucination from Stantler.
- While Paul partly does it to catch the Ursaring afterwards, Paul does still rescue Ash and his friends from said Ursaring’s wrath.
Paul: “Look out!” - Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Combined with Oh, Crap!, this is the Beedrills’ reaction to seeing an angry, wild Ursaring.
- The Stoic: Even when Paul is falling down a cliff, he keeps a stern face and doesn't show any emotion.
