The Mystery Menace – Pokémon Season 2, Episode 22

Filler / stand-alone episodeMuk returns

The Mystery Menace is the 22nd episode of Pokémon: Adventures in the Orange Islands, the second season of the Pokémon anime, and the 102nd episode of the English dub overall (Japanese episode 104, Bulbapedia code EP102). It first aired in Japan on 24 June 1999 and in the United States on 6 May 2000. It falls within the season’s Prima & the road to Trovita stretch (EP99–EP102).

Synopsis · Major Events · Trivia · Dub Changes · All episodes

Synopsis

Our heroes have finally arrived at the city of Trovitopolis, everything seems normal but beneath the surface a secret looms. As Ash and friends admire the view from a ridge, Team Rocket are on the ridge just behind them stalking them once more with yet another plan devised ready to attempt to steal Pikachu.

They use the device designed to activate the trap that Pikachu is meant to fall into and initially nothing happens, then the ground opens beneath Team Rocket and they all fall into it, a few moments later Ash and gang also fall into the ground below and end up in some dark underground tunnel, spotting a light at the end of it and heading toward it, it seems they’re in some sort of sewer network, they start to look for a manhole cover so that they can climb out.

Ash keeps hearing strange noises and then something taps him on the shoulder, theres some sort of whip coming out of the water , Ash sends Bulbasaur out to battle it but the creature grabs Bulbasaur with its vine whip and pulls him into the water, Ash tries to jump in to help Bulbasaur but is stopped by Tracey, Misty and Pikachu.

Just then Officer Jenny appears peering down from a manhole above them and helps them to climb out with a rope before throwing them in a prison cell. Officer Jenny holds them in the cell for a while and as she is releasing them the Mayor of the town arrives and tells Jenny to hold them in the cell for another week, which the law renders Jenny unable and unwilling to do as they haven’t done anything wrong.

It turns out that the Mayor wants them held there so that Ash and co are unable to tell anyone about the creature in the sewers, which he is very much aware of, apparently a number of people have reported a strange creature reaching out of the sewers stealing food, and nothing serious has happened yet. Jenny goes on to explain that the mayor is worried that people would panic if they heard about the creature and that it would be near impossible to catch it as there are around 500 miles of sewers beneath the city and more than 5000 man holes, the Mayor adds that theres an election next week and if people found out there was a strange creature in the sewers while he is mayor it would be the end of him.

Nurse Joy enters the room and tells the Mayor he can’t go ahead with his plan, which apparently is to send SWAT teams into the sewers to kill the creature, rather than capture it and study and learn more about it. The mayor however is absolutely intent on doing what he needs to do to protect his own political agenda.

Ash and co call Professor Oak, and he too is adamant that the creature should be caught and studied because it could be a new species of Pokémon. Ash and friends have their own agenda, finding Bulbasaur and rescuing it from the creature, as they are about to go into the sewers they overhear the Mayor giving orders to the SWAT Team who themselves are about to embark on their mission to kill the creature.

Nurse Joy shows Ash and co a secret entrance to the sewers and they too start their search. Meanwhile in the sewers Team Rocket are still wandering around trying to find a way out, when they too encounter the creature and run away from it, they then hear footsteps and see a flashlight, they assume it to be a monster but its actually just Ash and friends. James sends out Weezing to use a smokescreen and they flee. The creature then uses its vine whip to grab Togepi who is in Misty’s arms, Misty won’t let go of Togepi and she too is dragged beneath the water.

Ash reveals that he bought his Muk with him to help and sends it out, it seems pleased to see him and immediately jumps on top of him. Team Rocket have been getting chased around the sewers for a long time now and finally decide that its “their turn to do the scaring” so pulling their scariest faces they begin running around the sewers, until they are unfortunately confronted by the SWAT team the mayor sent down. On the instruction of the Mayor the swat team begin firing putty at Team Rocket and chase them off.

Ash, Tracey and Muk find that the sewers underwater tunnel doesn’t end when the corridor does, and they swim underneath it, finding a hidden room where they encounter the sewer monster. Meanwhile the SWAT team is reporting back to the Mayor saying they found three monsters, and that the sewer could infact be packed with freaks. The Mayor states that they have no choice but to seal off every manhole in the city with concrete!

Ash regains consciousness and finds himself alongside Misty, Bulbasaur (who is unharmed) and Tracey, and it turns out the Mysterious creature was none other than a really big Bulbasaur which is wearing a collar. Tracey concludes that the Bulbasaur in the sewers took Ash’s Bulbasaur and Misty’s Togepi because it was lonely down there and just wanted them for company.

Nurse Joy protests to the mayor that his plan to fill up the manholes with concrete is wrong, and tells him that theres three kids down there. The Mayor still insists he’s going ahead with the plan until after the elections which are in a weeks time.

Unfortunately for the mayor a blockage in the sewers caused by the blocked manholes results in Ash and gang, the giant Bulbasaur et al come bursting out of the sewers, the group by now have worked out that the initials on the big Bulbasaurs collar are those of the mayor who it turns out abandoned this Bulbasaur when he was young because it wasn’t evolving.

The Bulbasaur is happy to see the mayor (who is clothed only in a towel) despite this and lifts him into the air. At this point theres a huge crowd of townsfolk gathered watching the situation unfold. The mayors SWAT team arrive and the mayor shamelessly tells them to fire on his old Bulbasaur, Ash commands a thundershock from Pikachu and a vine whip from his own Bulbasaur to send the SWAT team packing, and the mayor is then launched into the sunset.

Officer Jenny thanks Ash and co for what they’ve done, and Nurse Joy vows to take good care of the big Bulbasaur. Ash asks for directions to the Trovita gym, which Jenny points out is on an island nearby, right in their eyeshot, and that theres a ferry out to it once a day.

Ash and his friends set their sights on Trovita Island, and their next adventure. Team Rocket are still trapped in the sewers, and are all washed up.

Major Events

• Muk temporarily rejoins Ash from Oak’s lab
• A giant Bulbasaur in the Trovitopolis sewers
• Surfing Pikachu cameo
• The mayor’s SWAT team blast off instead of Team Rocket
• Oak’s Japanese lecture previews Pikachu’s Rescue Adventure

Trivia

• The English title plays on Bulbasaur’s Japanese name, Fushigidane, means "mysterious".
• The screenplay is by Junki Takegami.
• This is a stand-alone episode: it can be skipped without losing the thread of the Orange Islands story.
• The Who’s That Pokémon? segment features Bulbasaur in Japan, where it almost always matched the episode, but Zapdos in the US, where 4Kids picked the Pokémon at random.

Changes in the English Dub

• Officer Jenny cites “500 miles of sewers”

Part of our Pokémon: Adventures in the Orange Islands guide. Browse every season of the Pokémon anime.