'Pokemon' Anime Sees Ash Take On His Newest Rival

Pokemon's Sun & Moon anime finally featured the debut of Hau, the rival trainer from the video games, and this meant that Ash's kooky Rowlet was put up against his toughest foe yet.

Facing off against the evolutionary form Dartrix, Ash and his Rowlet try their best against the familiar foe.

Rowlet vs Dartrix! It has been one of the most exciting fights as of late. Extreme posing, extra use of hand smears and lots of impact frames. It has beeen so much fun pic.twitter.com/v5mnhUiljV

— Ashita (@AshitanoGin) November 18, 2018

Episode 97 of the series is titled "The Master Dartrix!! The Sleeping Rowlet-zzzz," and sees Hau accidentally hit Ash during training. The two then have a friendly battle between Hau's Dartrix and Ash's Rowlet. Ash loses the first confrontation when he makes a mistake, but the two get a second chance much later after launching a successful Bloom Doom.

As noted by @AshitanoGin on Twitter, the fight is incredibly animated with impact frames, smears, and poses. The two of them have several bouts throughout the episode as Ash's shy and kooky Rowlet try and learns a new move in order to take on its evolutionary superior. But like in the classic Pokemon series with Pikachu against Raichu, Ash and Rowlet are able to win out at the end of the day through sheer grit and determination. Fans are hoping more battles like this are to come in future episodes.

If you haven't kept up with the current run of the anime, Pokemon the Series: Sun & Moon is described as such, "What starts as a summer vacation in the tropical Alola region turns into the next exciting chapter in Ash Ketchum's quest to become a Pokémon Master! There's plenty for Ash and Pikachu to explore in this sunny new region, with exciting new Pokémon to discover and interesting people to learn from along the way—including the cool Professor Kukui and the fun-loving Samson Oak.

More new faces will help guide Ash's Alolan adventure, in the form of a group of skilled Trainers—Kiawe, Lana, Mallow, and Sophocles—and a mysterious research assistant called Lillie. Frequent foes Team Rocket have also made the trip to Alola, looking to swipe some high-powered new Pokémon. But they have some heavy competition on the villainy front: the ruffians of Team Skull, who delight in causing chaos and may have more sinister intentions..."