 |
|
| Season | Pokémon: Diamond and Pearl (Season 10) · Floaroma Town: Kenny & Dawn’s first Ribbon arc (DP025–DP029) |
| Episode | Season 10, episode 28 · English episode 492 · Japanese episode 495 · Bulbapedia code DP028 |
| English title | Drifloon On the Wind! |
| Japanese title | フワンテと北風の使い！ Fuwante to Kitakaze no Tsukai! — “Fuwante and the Messenger of the North Wind!” |
| First aired (Japan) | 12 April 2007 · TV Tokyo |
| First aired (US) | 15 September 2007 · Cartoon Network |
| Screenplay | Shōji Yonemura |
| Opening / ending (Japan) | Together – Fumie Akiyoshi · Kimi no Soba de ~Hikari no Tēma~ (By Your Side ~Hikari’s Theme~), Pop-Up Version – Grin |
| English opening | Diamond and Pearl – Chris “Breeze” Barczynski |
| Previous episode | Settling a Not-So-Old Score! (DP027) |
| Next episode | The Champ Twins! (DP029) |
Filler / stand-alone episodeSuicuneValley Windworks
Drifloon On the Wind! is the 28th episode of Pokémon: Diamond and Pearl, the tenth season of the Pokémon anime, and the 492nd episode of the English dub overall (Japanese episode 495, Bulbapedia code DP028). It first aired in Japan on 12 April 2007 and in the United States on 15 September 2007. It falls within the season’s Floaroma Town: Kenny & Dawn’s first Ribbon stretch (EP25–EP29).
Synopsis
At Valley Windworks, the friends find a Pokémon Center that looks old and empty. Opening a door releases a cloud of Gastly, and when Ash reaches for a meal laid out in the kitchen, a little girl whacks him on the head with a broom, mistaking him for a thief. She is Paige, and when Nurse Joy and her elder daughter Marnie come home from shopping, Brock is crushed to learn that this Nurse Joy is married. Both girls dream of becoming Nurse Joys and working with their mother, and the friends pitch in with the chores. When the girls’ father forgets his lunch, Marnie flies it to him at the wind generator on one of their Drifloon. Paige is upset at being left behind until Joy gives her a job of her own, delivering treats to the forest Pokémon, and she takes Ash along.
In the forest Paige confides that she has a secret Pokémon friend, a Suicune, and leads Ash to a misty lake to meet it, though nothing appears. At the windworks, Marnie finds her father Karsten working with his Ampharos as a storm rolls in, and when Team Rocket net Ampharos, its Thunder blasts them off but damages the power lines. The Pokémon Center loses power, Nurse Joy cycles to the plant, and Paige runs after her into the rising wind. Pikachu tries to hold her back, but a violent gust carries both of them into the sky. At the plant the family learn that Paige is missing, and Karsten works out that the gusts are all blowing toward the mountain. Ash borrows one of Marnie’s Drifloon to search from the air, and the others follow in the family car until a fallen boulder blocks the road.
Marnie runs back through the forest to ask Suicune for help. Lightning brings down trees around her and she falls to her knees, but she gets up again, calling on Suicune to carry her on the North Wind, and when no answer comes, she admits that saving her sister is her job and turns to go alone. Only then does Suicune appear and carry her into the mountains. Ash has found Paige and Pikachu, and they shelter in a cave until the storm passes, but as they cross a log bridge on the way back they slip and fall, and Marnie swoops in on Suicune to rescue them. The family are reunited, but Suicune vanishes before Dawn and Brock can ask about it, sharing a look with Ash and Marnie from a clifftop. When Team Rocket try to capture it, its Aurora Beam sends them flying.
Major Events
- A married Nurse Joy and her daughters Marnie and Paige
- Drifloon’s debut
- Marnie rides Suicune
- A homage to My Neighbor Totoro
Pokémon making their anime debut
Drifloon#0425 · DP028
Trivia
- The English title plays on “drifting on the wind”.
- The screenplay is by Shōji Yonemura.
- This is a stand-alone episode: it can be skipped without losing the thread of the Sinnoh story.
Changes in the English Dub
- Bulbapedia calls its cold open the second produced by Pokémon USA, after DP014
- Pocket-ering Monster-ing as background music
- Destiny Deoxys score
Part of our Pokémon: Diamond and Pearl guide. Browse every season of the Pokémon anime.