A Forgotten Plot Amid Seasons

For a while now, there has been some sort of on-going story arc in Pokemon GO. The Season of Mischief introduced us to Hoopa and portals, and that mini plot point somewhat led us to a large door. Season of Heritage gave us a proper idea that something strange is going on. However, none of this plot is particularly… memorable. Nor does it make much sense. And with Season of Heritage leaving and Season of Alola starting, the plot lines just kinda fizzle out.

“Wait there’s a plot?”

So, throughout Season of Heritage, we had some interesting plot threads lying about. The discovery of a massive, ancient door in a mountain that people so far have no idea how to open it. Of course, Professor Willow talks about it a bit then gives us some tasks. For research, of course. That’s one of the reasons why we had so many damn Voltorbs wandering around; the story hinted that we’d need a lot of power to open this magic, ancient door. It also mentioned the Regi-legendaries, and collecting rock and ground types.

We do the tasks and… well, something happens. But of course Team Rocket is here to mess things up. They know something we don’t, and want to find out what’s behind the door for their own nefarious desires. This is also what causes the female Team Rocket Grunt to only use Voltorb and Electrode.

Anyway, Season of Heritage goes through various events, many somewhat related to the ancient door. What is behind it? We don’t know yet. Clearly something special if Team Rocket so desperately want it. But somehow, we don’t get any real answer about the door at all. The only thing that we do know is that, somehow, Arlo, the red Team Rocket leader, is plotting something. Most of the Team Rocket Grunts we fight actually have new lines, all of them pointing directly at Arlo.

Then, of a sudden, the Johto Tour event appears and we are rather abruptly given an idea of what’s going on. Well, not everyone. People who bought the ticket for the Johto Tour ended up discovering that Arlo has managed to harness some energy from the mystery door, and has used it to make Apex Shadow Ho-Oh and Apex Shadow Lugia. I’m not sure if the ancient door actually did open, but this is a rather unexpected turn of events. What makes this weirder though is that, well, the entire setup seemed like it was leading towards a reveal of Regigigas or maybe even Arceus. Except we didn’t get those two, we got Ho-Oh and Lugia, sticking with a Johto theme.

“Still researching”, currently…

After that though? It’s been quiet. Professor Willow’s attention has turned to Alola and the new Pokemon from that region. And the “using the door to create a shadow Ho-Oh but better” thing is mostly exclusive to Johto Tour ticket holders. It felt rather tacked on to the end of the tour, the same way Shiny Mew was, except a little less exciting.

But really, the whole plot is minimal at best. All we ever see is Professor Willow saying that things are happening, standing outside his camper van doing experiments that we don’t really see. He’s not exactly an entertaining figure, nor does he always actually help. And we haven’t heard from Spark, Candela and Ice Bitch in a while too.

It also doesn’t help that you can’t really replay Professor Willow’s monologue-ing. Once you’ve tapped past what he says, that’s it, it’s basically forgotten. I don’t blame people for skipping past Professor Willow’s dialogue stuff either. After all, watching the same guy standing outside his same camp all the time, and being very kid-friendly just doesn’t really gel well alongside the active threats of people like Team Rocket and Legendary Pokemon being boosted by evil shadow energy…

Fun fact: This is the Daily SPUF’s 3333rd article.