Pokemon Finally Gives Ash a Fan-Favorite for the First Time in Nearly 25 Years

By Nick Valdez

Pokemon Journeys' newest episode finally made good on a major promise it made to Ash by finally adding a fan-favorite to his team nearly 25 years after it was first teased! The newest iteration of the anime series has broken major ground for the franchise as rather than limit Ash's newest adventure to just the newest region of Galar from the video games, it has opened itself up to allow Ash to explore every region of the franchise so far. This has filled in some long awaited additions to his Pokedex, but his newest is probably the most surprising yet. 

The newest episodes of the series now airing in Japan recently wrapped up a major two episode event that brought back Dawn, Cynthia, the Sinnoh region and its legendaries back to the anime for a multiverse hopping kind of adventure. The newest episode of the series saw time warping to the point where everyone's Pokemon had de-evolved to their earlier stages, and with it, Ash filled out some of his Pokedex in a unique way as for a moment he finally had a Haunter on his team. 

While Gengar was indeed the big catch for Ash this season (along with Dragonite and Lucario, filling out the major fan favorite rosters), Episode 90 of the series rewinds the clock back so for a bit Ash has both a Haunter and Dragonite (as well as a Gastly and Dratini later) on his team. The Haunter is especially significant given that it's basically a shout out to one of Ash's most notable adventures in the very first season of the series where he befriended a group of ghosts in Lavender Town ahead of his battle with the Gym Leader Sabrina. 

These episodes, "The Tower of Terror" and "Haunter versus Kadabra" first aired in Japan on September 9, 1997 and floated the idea of Haunter joining Ash's team, but it ended up becoming one of the many special Pokemon he'd meet over the course of the series that he did not officially add to his team. But now for a brief moment, it was official. It's such a wild way to do it (in the midst of one of the wildest episodes yet), but it's definitely checking off yet another thing off the long awaited fan checklist. 

What do you think of Haunter finally being a part of Ash's team for a moment? Are you happy to see that now he finally has a Gengar on his side this time around? Let us know all of your thoughts about it in the comments! You can even reach out to me directly about all things animated and other cool stuff @Valdezology on Twitter!

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