What if James never got engaged to Jessebelle?

ash may be a trainer many of us have grown up with he may fight hard dream big and befriend his pokemon but you know who else does that james the purple-haired costume-loving team rocket member catches all of his pokemon without battling showcases a ton of random skill and knowledge like when he won the pokemon orienteering contest and was a runner-up in the poker ringer and consistently surprises jesse and meowth with his ability such as winning the first contest he ever entered in lilypad you have to wonder what kind of trainer would james be if his life had gone a little differently such as his parents not forcing him to marry a girl he didn't even like causing him to run away and join team rocket that's right james's childhood just like jesse and meowth's was less than ideal the only son of a wealthy aristocratic family james was taught the ways of high society but all he ever wanted was the freedom to study pokemon and play with his best friend growly but his parents only wanted him to marry into another rich family and become a classy gentleman at a very young age they forced him to become engaged to a girl named jezebel rude demanding and controlling jezebel tried to change everything about james rather than live with parents who don't respect his wishes and allow him to be who he is he runs away after this the timeline is a little foggy but we know james meets jesse they enter and flunk out of pokemon tech and then head to sunny town to join a biker gang it seems like they went their separate ways for a while before coming together again to join team rocket and they blasted off into the future with meowth by their sides we see his parents in the anime for the first time when they fake their deaths to get james to come home so they can kidnap him and force him to marry jezebel parents of the century james's parents decision to raise him according to their wishes not his ultimately forced him down a tough road though he found friends and travels the world i often wonder what could have been what if james had good parents who cared about him and let him pursue his dreams rather than force him to become engaged to someone he doesn't even like so today i'm gonna try and answer that what if james had never gotten engaged to jezebel to begin let's set the stage in this reality james's parents are still rich aristocrats and while they might encourage james to learn of high society they're good parents and let him explore his interests freely jezebel is still a part of a rich family wanting to merge with james's she sometimes sneaks into james's estate to convince him to marry her his parents are nicer but jezebel is still jezebel despite her attempts to get him to reconsider at the age of 10 with his parents blessing james decides to go on a pokemon adventure which is where our story begins we awake on a chill morning approximately five to ten years before ash wakes up late gets pikachu and goes on his own pokemon journey there are conflicting sources on james's age so we're approximating here kanto is a bit of a different place during this time but the one thing that never changes is the presence of pokemon james is woken up by the perfect alarm clock growly licking his face and wanting to play but there's no time for games with growly by his side james leaves his parents home to take the pokemon league challenge now before we get into james's adventure itself there's one thing we need to establish where is the mansion located it's seen in the episode holy matrimony which takes place between ash receiving the soul badge from koga and the volcano badge from blaine however the anime doesn't completely follow the maps we know of in the games during these episodes we see several towns and landmarks none of which are featured in pokemon red blue yellow or any others so while i'm using the game map as a guide we will be featuring numerous locations and details only seen in the anime in relation to the game maps i'm placing the mansion east of fuchsia city around where route 14 and 15 are okay with that out of the way let's get on to the adventure james starts with growly and travels west to the relatively close facility that administers the pokemon league admissions exam a place where a trainer can take a few tests to be entered automatically into the pokemon league after studying for so many years and already having a great relationship with his first pokemon james believes he can pass this with ease and he is dead wrong despite all of his knowledge and enthusiasm james doesn't have a lot of experience with other pokemon or with people living on the mansion was often a little sheltered his closest friends being growly and jezebel kind of not really he buckles under the pressure of the exams and can't adapt well during the test battles james feels humiliated having pictured this day for so long to start off so excited only to fail right off the bat he runs back home with tears in his eyes and tail between his legs after being gone for not even a single day his parents are more than a little surprised to see him home already they had intended to leave to go to their summer home in sinnoh where james grandparents are but delay their trip to help comfort james his father gets a brilliant idea and the next day returns home with a gift for james we know it isn't christmas and we were going to wait a few years to do this but we don't want you to give up son his supportive father tells him and hands him a pokeball james opens it and lets out coughing seeing how much his parents want him to keep going and not to give up james decides to try again he's gonna have to get to the pokemon league the old-fashioned way by winning eight badges james leaves home once more this time determined to not come home a quitter ever again the nearest gym is fuchsia city to the west but on the way james makes camp in the woods of route 15. leaving growly to watch the fire james heads out to collect more wood while gathering he sees something odd in the trees it looks like a giant yellow fruit and james immediately recognizes it as a weepinbell just as he's about to call growly to help him catch the wild pokemon it falls from the tree and transforms into james this is no weepinbell this is a ditto the transforming pokemon mirrors james's movement exactly and he decides to try and stump it he pulls out some costumes from his bag because of course james would travel with costumes and the ditto copies him perfectly each time once they stop laughing james asks ditto if it wants to come back to camp to have dinner with him and growly and it runs ahead excited to sit by a cozy fire but his ditto still disguised as james enters the clearing he's trapped in a net jezebel appears having followed james to route 15. james it's time for the win her and oddish capture ditto thinking it's james saying i'll only let you go if you agree to marry me and then the real james enters the clearing behind her jezebel and oddish have a few double takes before ditto transforms into oddish and sprays them both with stunspore ditto gets free of the net and with a powerful flamethrower growly is able to send jezebel and oddish blasting off again with jezebel screaming that james hasn't seen the last of her yet ditto and james have a good laugh and he asks if it wants to come along on his journey with him ditto agrees excited for what fun it can have with his new costume loving friend passing through grandpa canyon and neon city james enters fuchsia city and is told the gym is hidden in the woods and led by a ninja master named koga just like in the pokemon orienteering contest in advanced generations james is able to follow hidden clues to find the secret fuchsia gym at this time koga is using a venonat and a scyther as seen in otoshi's flashback from the episode bad to the bone growly's flamethrower is able to take out venonat with ease but he falls to the quick movements of scyther however when ditto matches scyther move for move james is just able to win and earns his first badge ever the soul badge shortly after this james finds himself in the nearby safari zone deciding to enter james finds a ton of pokemon he's never seen in person before and a lot of them look very strong one group of pokemon however seem almost too strong a group of nidorina are bullying a lone nidoran the smallest pokemon james has seen in the entire safari zone he does what he can to chase off the much larger need arena though he's injured slightly the nidoran is saved james decides not to catch any pokemon here but when he turns to leave the nitoran follows him worried about leaving her in such a dangerous place james asks if she wants to come with him to which she jumps in his arms though her poison barbs poke into james he suffers through it and hugs her with a new pokemon in his party james leaves the safari zone and heads up cycling road towards celadon city he rents a bike with training wheels and though some bikers make fun of him he ignores it moves on before entering celadon he passes through gringy city which is constructing a new power plant using many electric pokemon like magnemite to help cycling past he sees a single grimer in the river making itself comfy in the half-finished factory finding the gym in celadon is much easier than back in fuchsia but the battles they're even easier with nidoran's poison sting coughing smog and growly's flamethrower erika's grass pokemon are no match good boy james leaves with his second badge the rainbow badge however in the nearby city of saffron james has a much harder time his mostly poisoned pokemon lose handily to the psychic gym leader sabrina's father it stings to lose and though he considers quitting james remembers what he learned back in the admissions exam and tells the gym leader he will try again with a new strategy his tenacity impresses sabrina's father and he suggests that james head to lavender town to find a ghost pokemon just as he did for ash and the anime his young daughter with eyes like ice gets mad at her father saying he shouldn't be so kind to his opponents james is happy he didn't have to battle her even if she is just a little girl with an oddly life-like doll he takes the advice and goes to lavender town james heads to the tower of terror then when his day trip at disney is over he looks for ghost pokemon james hears of a tower that was recently abandoned after ghost pokemon moved on in when james arrives there he meets three ghastly intending to catch one james sees that they're more interested in having fun than battling james decides to play with them dressing up in silly ghost costumes which again of course james has and they scare each other ultimately one of the ghastly decide to go with james excited for what fun the two can have and what pranks they can pull out in the world heading back to saffron his newly caught gastly defeats the gym leader's abra using a combination of hypnosis and a super effective lick attack in celebration for james's third badge gasly then licks him as well paralyzing him on the spot wouldn't be james if his pokemon didn't hurt him with love james then heads down to vermilion city hoping to battle the gym leader and then board the ssn to take him to cinebar but lieutenant serge is away from the gym his electric pokemon helping to build the power plant james saw back in gringy city when james runs to the docks he just misses the ssn he gets pretty discouraged by this feeling like he came all the way to vermilion for nothing suddenly a salesman who just got off the ship offers him a very interesting opportunity all his money for a rare pokemon cool james thinks this is the perfect pick-me-up he needs after such a bad day and buys magikarp which can only splash around if adult james can be tricked by the magikarp salesman then 10 year old james definitely can be without any money and a new pokemon who can't battle james feels like he needs to take a shortcut to a new city and learns of diglett's cave it's a dangerous path and he's chased out of the area by diglett and doug trio who are migrating to a nearby forest but he ends up very close to pewter city it's here where he enters the pewter gym and battles flint brock's father who was the gym leader here before brock took over the 3 on 3 battle begins with coughing battling flint's geodude though his smoke screen confuses the rock pokemon it's able to take out the poison type with a powerful tackle james then sends out nidoran and flint for rates james for bringing poison pokemon to a gym of rock and ground types geodude avoids all of nidoran's scratch attacks and her poisoned stings don't seem to do anything flint says james is cruel to send in such a small pokemon to battle and how he almost feels sorry for it just when it looks like nidoran is going to lose the same way coffee did she hears flint's words and evolves into nidorina with a newly learned double kick she takes out geodude with ease and not just geodude but graveler and gollum too nidorina fueled by the desire to never be pushed around for being small again is able to sweep flint's entire team flint apologizes to james for what he said and admiring the young trainer's determination gives him something else in addition to the boulder badge a disc saying it will help teach his pokemon to be patient and strong like a mountain passing through sable city james realizes he's close to pokemon tech the trainer school he used to think about attending and decides to stop by to check it out in the outskirts of the school however he finds a red-haired girl crying when he approaches to ask her what's wrong james nearly falls over in shock she looks just like jezebel james my sweet i'll make a gentleman out of you yet he assumes it is her in disguise this being another of her crazy attempts to get him to marry her the girl gets mad at him for this and says her name is jessie not jezebel she just flunked out of pokemon tech and doesn't know what to do next the two spend the day walking around the area james trying to get jessie's mind off of failing at school he tells her about how he failed miserably the first day of his pokemon journey how he imagined this adventure going very differently failing taught him things don't always happen the way you expect so you can't give up when surprises come your way he asks her why she joined pokemon tech to begin with she tells him how she wanted to be famous whether as a dancer model nurse or pokemon trainer she just wanted to be the best so her mother would come home you see jesse's mother miyamoto was a member of team rocket and abandoned jessie at a young age to find the mythical pokemon mew jesse wants to be good enough so her mom will want to come back james looks at her a driven strong person tackling the world on her own and says you should be proud of yourself jesse you're out here trying so hard to be the best it took me years to build up the courage to even try and leave home and here you are already doing it i may not know your mom but if i were her i can't imagine leaving behind someone so amazing jessie blushes and then being jessie hits james for being so sappy she tells him not to pity her because she isn't done dreaming yet hey if james can fight to be a pokemon master then so can she she was thinking of heading to sunnytown to join a biker gang but says she's gonna return to her foster family in the snowy village there she can figure out what her next adventure will be james wishes jesse luck and waves goodbye to his new friend he then continues his journey heading to mount moon on his way to cerulean here he finds a beautiful shimmering stone that would make a perfect gift for his mother he stores it in his bag in cerulean city james challenges daisy misty's eldest sister to a battle the newly appointed gym leader accepts and while visibly nervous she proves to be a very tough opponent she battles with a style and pageantry that is unlike anything james has seen before while he's inspired by the performance-like quality she brings his coughing and need arena are not able to overcome daisy's powerful dugong james loses without beating any of her pokemon he leaves the gym a little discouraged but decides to call his parents who should have just arrived in their sinnoh vacation home and let them know how he's doing he's bummed about losing but they comment on how mature he already seems they remember not too long ago the young kid who came home crying after failing the admissions exam now he shrugs off the loss and is ready to come up with a new strategy suddenly his grandparents arrived to say hi to their grandson after chatting about the difficult water gym they remind james of a little something he left with them last summer the carnivine he caught in the great marsh he sends them his magikarp which his grandparents promise to take care of and adds carnivane to his team who is extremely happy to see him james rebattles daisy and defeats her seal and dugong with just his carnivine the young gym leader is unfamiliar with the sinnoh pokemon and using bullet seeds and vine whips carnevine is able to win with ease with five badges under his belt james makes his way back to vermilion hoping that lieutenant serge is now at the gym and available for a match he passes through a forest where a pokemon sanctuary is being built by a girl named melanie once in vermilion he approaches the gym and sighs with relief serge is finally there james has a one-on-one gym battle with the electric pokemon specialist james battles serge's raichu with his coughing without thinking james uses his normal strategy with the poison pokemon covering the arena with poison gas however just like with pikachu in the anime episode pokemon emergency the gas ignites into a major explosion when exposed to raichu's electric attacks and coughing is defeated easily by surge the gym leader berates james for acting so brashly and telling coughing to attack before he even thought his strategy through james's decision was the reason coffin lost back at the pokemon center james wonders if he should try again with a different pokemon but coughing makes it clear he doesn't want to give up after losing in the last few gym battles coffee wants to win this one for james together they try and think of a new strategy to beat surge while they train james remembers the disc and advice flint gave him back in pewter they need to be patient and focus attacking too quickly with smog was what lost him the battle he teaches coughing the move bide before re-challenging raichu coughing uses bide and takes thunderbolt after thunderbolt from the electric mouse just when it seems like he's taking too much damage he evolves into wheezing and unleashes a devastating bite attack winning james the match and his sixth badge from the vermillion port james takes a boat to puerto vista stopping off at acapulco to win a beauty contest and at harper port which is known for their tentacle from there he finds passage to cinnabar island once a quiet and secluded place sinobar is starting to grow with waves of tourists looking to relax on the beach and in the hot springs the gym leader of the island blaine is clearly not happy with how many tourists there are unlike in the anime however blaine is still in his normal gym location in the city not secluded inside a literal volcano before his match begins james is told he has a telephone call his grandparents in sinnoh call and tell him he should take his magikarp back he replaces ditto with magikarp after his grandparents assure him that he will come in handy as james is only water pokemon in the battle with blaine james is doing terribly blaine's nine tails is able to defeat his ghastly and growly with ease he remembers his grandparents words and sends out his magikarp blaine can't help but laugh at the flailing fish however that laugh is cut short as magikarp uses flail to dodge a fire spin by jumping into the air using gravity's momentum magikarp dives down and hits nine tails with a powerful tackle knocking it out surprising everyone including james upon defeating ninetales magikarp evolves into gyarados gyarados lets out a mighty roar and blaine realizes this isn't going to be the easy battle he thought it was gyarados then defeats blaine's rydon and megmar using a combination of dragon rage and hydro pump earning james his penultimate badge the volcano badge james then takes a ferry past the island of blastoise to pallet town he walks by a house that for some reason he feels is home to a twerp and then meets professor oak who is hosting his first ever summer camp the very same one that will eventually be attended by go ash and serena james tells him about his journey and when he takes his pokeballs out of his bag to show the professor he knocks out the stone he found at mount moon oak identifies it as a moonstone and says it could involve his need arena if it wanted james asks nidorina but she's unsure before she can make up her mind the camp is attacked by a rogue voltorb from oak's lab it became overcharged with electric energy by accident and is on a rampage nidorina touches the stone to save james and as nidoqueen she holds voltorb down long enough for oak to catch him after another day at camp this one a peaceful day james then heads up to viridian where he faces off against the last gym leader agatha in the anime after giovanni is outed as the leader of team rocket agatha is shown to take over the gym temporarily i like to think this was because she used to be the gym leader here before joining the elite four at this time in kanto giovanni's mother is the leader of team rocket madame boss and he is using her wealth to begin construction on his own pokemon theme park pokeworld yes giovanni is creating a pokemon theme park james battles the ghost type specialist with his wheezing nidoqueen and gastly nidoqueen defeats agatha's goal bat with a body slam but then loses to her gengar when it puts her to sleep and uses dream eater wheezing then comes in to fight gengar and the two poison types have a double knockout james and agatha both send out their last pokemon gastly and haunter gasly tries to use hypnosis and lick but the more evolved ghost pokemon is too fast for him to keep up gastly seems totally outclassed until he evolves into haunter himself using a newly learned nightshade hunter is able to just barely defeat agatha earning james his final badge james has all eight badges he's going to the pokemon league he heads off to the indigo league conference passing through hollywood before stopping at camp pokehurst along the way in camp pokehurst a young james sees the kids training to become baseball players but discovers a lost young meowth it's being strung up by a sadistic coach and james cuts him down he yells at the coach telling him he is literally the worst person he has ever met including jezebel james tells meow if he can come with him promising the young cat pokemon that he will never let a human treat him poorly again the meowth scratches at him still untrustworthy of humans but it does follow james on his way to the indigo plateau eating the food james leaves out for him at the indigo conference his parents and grandparents surprise james as they arrive to come cheer him on you know since they're good parents james tells his grandparents about the young meowth he saved and they're able to coax meowth out of the bushes to eat with the rest of james's pokemon he leaves the young meowth with his grandparents so he can begin training for the league meowth watches how james treats his pokemon and how much they love him and begins to warm up just a little bit to the humans around him when james enters the conference for his first match meowth is with james's family in the stands as they cheer for him his first four matches are on the water rock ice and grass arenas his gyarados sweeps the water arena battle with ease showing off its newly learned hyper beam and nidoqueen shatters the rock arena with a powerful earthquake giving james his first two battles without losing a single pokemon in the ice arena he has more trouble losing with wheezing and then with gyarados for the first time who is frozen by a lapras's blizzard attack growly ultimately secures him a narrow victory but gyarados is still hurt pretty badly james doesn't want to push him too far unless gyarados gets severely injured he chooses to bench his strongest pokemon from future battles so he can recover meowth is surprised to see james care about his pokemon so much more than the tournament he didn't realize humans could care about pokemon like that in the final qualifying round james is battling on the grass arena he goes to the desk and finds out his opponent is end of the earth and jezebel bottom of the sea james dearest he finds her before their battle and asks what she's doing here she tells him her parents bribed the judge at the league admissions exam so she was able to enter the pokemon league without any badges she also got her daddy to buy some powerful pokemon so james won't be any match for her and once she defeats him crushing his dreams for good he will finally have no choice but to marry her james says she is insane which she is and they start their battle in the grass arena the stakes have never been higher james sends out growly and jezebel sends out vileplume having forced her oddish to evolve quickly to its final form james assumes his fire type will win with ease but vileplume overwhelms him with stunsport while growly is paralyzed vileplume uses several takedowns in a row damaging the puppy pokemon even after the referee declares growly unable to battle the audience booze jezebel and james realizes she isn't playing fair she really will do anything to get his parents money feeling more anger than he ever has before james sends out haunter vile plume uses stun spore once again and though it appears to miss haunter he falls to the ground paralyzed vileplume approaches to attack the defenseless pokemon but once it's close enough haunter uses hypnosis the prankster pokemon tricked vileplume by pretending to be paralyzed with vileplume asleep haunter uses a nightmare-inducing dream eater defeating it with ease and avenging growly jezebel then sends out a pokemon even james has never seen before a drapion jezebel tells him she had the strongest pokemon imported from sinnoh the drapion overwhelms haunter with a super effective night slash defeating him with one hit james is down to his last pokemon and sends out nidoqueen drapion and nidoqueen exchange night slashes and double kicks until both are very weak nidoqueen is just able to take out drapion with a powerful earthquake but is looking very weak as jezebel sends out her last pokemon neato king nidoqueen tries to keep up with nito king but it looks like she's gonna be overwhelmed she's just too hurt from her battle with drapion james tells nidoqueen that it's all right he doesn't want to see her injured just for his sake with meowth watching from the stands as james is about to forfeit to protect nidoqueen the poisoned pokemon charges at nidoking becoming engulfed in purple and yellow light nidoqueen unleashes an unexpected giga impact and knocks nito king out and into the arena wall james is declared the winner and neato queen faints james cries telling her she shouldn't have pushed so hard for him and puts her back in her pokeball jezebel is about to charge james and yell at him for winning but he runs past her and takes nidoqueen directly to the pokemon center meowth jumps out of the stands and chases after him scratching jezebel with fury swipes first in the pokemon center james is able to get nidoqueen growly and haunter to nurse joy he's visibly shaken by the battle and meowth jumps on his lap to try and comfort him as the two share a moment a trainer approaches them he says he saw the battle and really admires how much james cares for his pokemon he introduces himself as reggie and says that james's pokemon will be fine as nurse joy can fix anything james thanks the trainer and they begin chatting reggie is originally from the sinnoh region and is here with his younger brother paul they travel together to compete in pokemon leagues and reggie says he's battled in sinnoh hoen johto and now kanto they hit it off right away but soon find out that just like ash and richie in the anime james will be battling his new friend reggie in the top 16. paul is in the stands watching his brother battle reggie uses biberel swallot and star raptor against james's carnivine wheezing and ditto carnivane has the advantage over biberol doing a lot of damage with bullet seed but falls to an unexpected ice beam wheezine then takes it out by using smokescreen and tackling it while it can't see reggie sends out swallot and the two poison types face off swallot begins using stockpile to charge a powerful attack and james tells wheezing to use bide the two decide to have a winner-take-all showdown swallowed spit up does a lot of damage but wheezing unleashes it back with by taking swallow it out the damage turns out to be too much for wheezing though and it faint shortly after the two each send out their last pokemon james sends out ditto who transforms into reggie's diraptor the two have a climactic sky battle exchanging steel wings and wing attacks ultimately clashing head-on with two brave birds the impact shakes the arena and when the dust settles one's raptor is knocked out but whose is it suddenly it changes back to ditto and reggie is declared the winner james has flashbacks to all of the losses he faced in his journey in saffron cerulean vermilion and way back in the beginning at the admissions exam though a tear falls down his cheek james looks up at the crowd with a proud smile and wishes reggie best of luck in the tournament when james sees his family after the battle they tell him they're sorry he lost and james says why be sorry i just had an amazing adventure with my pokemon i have no reason to be sad his family gives him a big hug telling him how proud they are of him however reggie does in the rest of the tournament when it ends he meets up with james he tells him he's going to try the battle frontier in kanto and that james should go with him but james declines he says that after having his journey he learned that battling isn't what made the adventure so exciting he was spending time with his pokemon james can tell reggie feels the same and that while he has a passion for pokemon battling may not be his calling either but reggie looks at his younger brother paul and wanting to live up to his expectations he still decides to give the frontier a try james wishes him luck and they part ways unbeknownst to both of them meowth overhears what james says to reggie about how spending time with his pokemon was what he loved more than anything james and his family return to their home james lets all of his pokemon out and they spend the rest of the summer together jezebel stops coming by to harass james so he and his pokemon are able to play outside watch old movies go hiking and even visit laramie ranch outside of fuchsia and maybe even to the humunga dunga beach after a while james decides it's time for a new adventure he's heard about a ton of islands to the south of kanto and wants to explore them with his pokemon james intends to leave meowth with his family and waves goodbye to all of them as james turns around and begins walking down the road meowth jumps out of the mansion and chases after him surprising everyone when he screams out james take me with you that summer with james not only taught me out how to speak from all the movies they watched but it also taught him how to trust humans again and he doesn't want to be alone anymore james leaves kanto with growly by his side meowth on his shoulders and a new goal have fun traveling the world with his pokemon isn't it crazy what can change when you have supportive parents not only is james's life better but meowth and jesse also avoid a lot of heartache in their past too come on you didn't think i could improve james's childhood and leave those two behind did you those three were destined to meet and who knows maybe our favorite trio's brand new adventure is far from over but for now it is i know this video was a bit of a departure from my usual content but i figure if it's answering a random question about cartoons and games it's fair game to me thank you so much for watching and don't forget to subscribe for even more random questions about even more random cartoons

Channel: FiveToedSloth

Views: 1,539,879

Keywords: pokemon what if, pokemon what if james, pokemon what if james never got engaged?, What if James never got engaged?, What if James never got engaged to Jessabelle?, pokemon video essay, pokemon theory, pokemon theory james, pokemon james, pokemon james childhood, pokemon jessebelle, pokemon growlie, james gyarados, team rocket, team rocket anime

Id: JprHgPoPNz4

Length: 32min 11sec (1931 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 07 2021