Sleepless In Pre-Battle! – Pokémon Season 11 Episode 52


Season	Pokémon DP: Battle Dimension (Season 11) · Grotle, Barry, the Relic Badge & Canalave arc (DP098–DP104)
Episode	Season 11, episode 52 · English episode 567 · Japanese episode 571 · Bulbapedia code DP104
English title	Sleepless In Pre-Battle!
Japanese title	クレセリアＶＳダークライ！ Kureseria Tai Dākurai! — “Cresselia VS Darkrai!”
First aired (Japan)	4 December 2008 · TV Tokyo
First aired (US)	2 May 2009 · Cartoon Network
Screenplay	Junki Takegami
Opening / ending (Japan)	Hai Tatchi! (High Touch!) – Satoshi (Rica Matsumoto) & Hikari (Megumi Toyoguchi) · Ashita wa Kitto (Surely Tomorrow) – Kanako
English opening	We Will Be Heroes – Kirsten Price
Previous episode	Jumping Rocket Ship! (DP103)

Plot episodeSeason finaleSwinub evolves into Piloswine

Sleepless In Pre-Battle! is the 52nd episode of Pokémon DP: Battle Dimension, the eleventh season of the Pokémon anime, and the 567th episode of the English dub overall (Japanese episode 571, Bulbapedia code DP104). It first aired in Japan on 4 December 2008 and in the United States on 2 May 2009. It falls within the season’s Grotle, Barry, the Relic Badge & Canalave stretch (EP98–EP104).

The season finale aired in the UK on 17 April 2009 and on Cartoon Network on 2 May 2009; Galactic Battles followed a week later with DP105, which had aired in Japan in the same one-hour slot as this episode.

Synopsis

Arriving at the Canalave Gym, Ash learns from a distressed referee that the Gym Leader is away training on Iron Island and that everyone in town is suffering from nightmares. Dawn suggests shopping to lift Ash’s spirits, but the normally bustling shopping district is deserted. At the police station, an exhausted Officer Jenny explains that the nightmares are caused by Darkrai, which visits every year until Cresselia drives it away. She shows the friends a Lunar Wing charm she bought to ward off bad dreams, but Brock quickly identifies it as a lacquered Pidgey feather, and Jenny rushes off to arrest the counterfeiters. They turn out to be Team Rocket, preparing more fake charms in a tent alongside a “Nightmare Machine”; Jenny overhears their confession, and after they drop their disguises for the motto, Pikachu’s Thunderbolt blasts them off and destroys the machine.

Grateful, Jenny feeds the group dinner and lets them stay at the station, but that night the nightmares return: the real Darkrai is near, and only Cresselia can stop it. Jenny leads the friends to Fullmoon Island to summon it, while Team Rocket follow in their Magikarp submarine, hoping to capture both Cresselia and Pikachu. On the island the group find a genuine Lunar Wing. Piplup picks up a scent that turns out to belong to a Psyduck, so Dawn sends out Swinub, whose nose leads them to a shrine on a cliff, where Cresselia appears in a flash of light. At that moment Team Rocket fire a missile net from their submarine, trapping Cresselia and everyone except Swinub. Swinub charges the net again and again with Take Down, only to be knocked back each time, and Pikachu’s attempt at Thunderbolt shocks Ash instead.

Swinub refuses to give up, and its determination makes it glow and evolve into Piloswine, whose Take Down smashes the submarine and sends Team Rocket blasting off. Freed, Cresselia flies to Canalave City to confront Darkrai, which had been drawn there by the electromagnetic pulses from Team Rocket’s machine. Cresselia’s brilliant light drives Darkrai away, and Cresselia vanishes into the night sky. At last the town can sleep peacefully, and Ash turns his thoughts to his upcoming battle at the Canalave Gym. Dawn shows the Lunar Wing she bought during the events of The Rise of Darkrai, the first time the TV series refers to that film, and Ash’s nightmare closely resembles one from it. The episode, the finale of the Battle Dimension season, gives Piloswine its first anime Pokédex entry 333 episodes after the species debuted, and in the United Kingdom it aired about two weeks before its American premiere.