Pokémon Season 2: Adventures in the Orange Islands

Quick answers · Story Arcs · Episode Guide · Characters · Pokémon · Gyms & the Orange League · Movies & Specials · Side Stories & Crossovers · Music · TV Broadcasts · Dub Edits & Censorship · DVD & Streaming · Where to Watch · Trading Cards · Firsts & Lasts · Trivia · Reception

Pokémon: Adventures in the Orange Islands is the second season of the Pokémon animated series. On American network Kids’ WB! it was advertised as Pokémon: Orange Island Adventures.

Similar to the situation with Pokémon Indigo League, the subtitle was not added until the VHS/DVD releases when it was added to differentiate it from other releases.

The season follows the adventures of Ash, Misty and their new friend Tracey Sketchit who “replaced” Brock in the majority of their journeys around the Orange Archipelago. Ash’s main goal this season is to take on the Orange Crew and win the Orange League and then bring back the GS Ball to Professor Oak. You can read more about the key events of this season by clicking here.

Interestingly this season was never actually intended to be, it was produced in order to buy more time for Pokémon Gold & Silver to be finished so that its successor season, Pokémon: The Johto Journeys could be introduced.

Dubbed by 4Kids Entertainment, the 36 episodes (EP081–EP116) aired in Japan on TV Tokyo between 28 January and 7 October 1999 and on Kids’ WB! between 4 December 1999 and 14 October 2000. Professor Oak sends Ash to collect a mysterious gold-and-silver Poké Ball from Professor Ivy on Valencia Island; Brock falls for Ivy and stays behind, and Pokémon Watcher Tracey Sketchit takes his place as Ash and Misty island-hop across the tropical archipelago on the back of a rescued Lapras. Ash wins the four badges of the Orange Crew from Cissy, Danny, Rudy and Luana, is humbled by Prima of the Elite Four, finally regains the loyalty of his Charizard and then beats the undefeated Drake in his first six-on-six Full Battle to win the Orange League — his first League title. After a tearful goodbye to Lapras the group sails home to Pallet Town, where Brock is waiting, Gary’s Eevee hands Ash his first defeat by his rival, and the unopenable GS Ball sends Ash, Misty and Brock off to a new region called Johto.

The Orange Islands exist only in the anime — there is no Orange Islands game — yet the season is anything but throwaway: Lapras, Snorlax and Charizard’s change of heart all carry forward, the Orange League’s skill-based Gym challenges look ahead to Alola’s island trials two decades later, and the Japanese opening The Rivals was the first piece of Pokémon animation coloured digitally. Two of its episodes, Stage Fight! and The Mandarin Island Miss Match, were later withdrawn from English-language rotation because of Jynx. Our complete episode guide below preserves the original synopses written for Pokémon Dungeon, now with Japanese titles, air dates and the Who’s That Pokémon? answers for every episode.

• 36episodes — EP081 to EP116
• 4Orange Crew badges, plus the Winner’s Trophy
• 1stLeague title of Ash’s career
• 6-on-6Ash’s first Full Battle, against Drake
• 4new captures: Lapras, Snorlax, Scyther & Poliwag
• 2episodes later withdrawn over Jynx

Quick Answers

Story Arcs

Adventures in the Orange Islands runs for 36 episodes and, island-hopping filler aside, follows one clear quest — four Orange Crew badges and a shot at the undefeated Drake — bookended by two trips home to Pallet Town; here is how the season breaks down, with stills from our episode guide below.

Pallet Town & the GS Ball errandEP081–EP083

Pallet Town throws Ash a homecoming party for his Top 16 finish at the Indigo Plateau, Team Rocket spike the food and grab Pikachu, and a still-disobedient Charizard torches them anyway. Professor Oak has a job for Ash: collect a mysterious Poké Ball from his colleague Professor Ivy on Valencia Island, far to the south in the Orange Islands. In Viridian Forest the Spearow Ash angered in episode one returns as a Fearow at the head of its flock, and Pidgeotto evolves into Pidgeot to defend a family of Pidgey — so Ash leaves it behind as their guardian. A blimp ride won in a store lottery (really a Team Rocket write-off that Giovanni wants rid of) crash-lands the group on Valencia, where Ivy hands over the gold-and-silver GS Ball that nobody can open, and Brock, smitten, stays on as her assistant.

• 
• 
• 

Tracey, Lapras & the first Orange Crew badgeEP084–EP085

Stranded on Tangelo Island, Ash and Misty rescue a baby Lapras from three bullies and meet Tracey Sketchit, a Pokémon Watcher who invites himself along the moment he hears they know Professor Oak. Ash learns about the Orange League — four Gyms run by the Orange Crew, then a single match against its head — catches Lapras and promises to find its family, and Lapras ferries the group from island to island for the rest of the season. On Mikan Island Cissy shows that Orange Crew Gyms test skills rather than straight battles: Squirtle ties her Seadra in a Water Gun target shoot, and Lapras wins the Wave Ride race against Blastoise by freezing a tidal wave with Ice Beam to earn the Coral-Eye Badge.

• 
• 

Island-hoppingEP086–EP092

Butch and Cassidy, bailed out by Giovanni, use a Drowzee and an antenna to turn Mandarin Island’s Pokémon — Pikachu and Togepi included — against their Trainers until Togepi’s first Metronome blows the operation sky-high. A run of stand-alone adventures follows: the Crystal Onix of Sunburst Island and the glassmaker Mateo (an episode that finally reveals Tracey’s Marill), the pink Pokémon of Pinkan Island, Kabuto fossils that wake under a blood-red moon and sink their island, Kay’s stage-shy Raichu aboard a Pokémon showboat, Psyduck’s apparent evolution into Golduck during Misty’s battle with Marina, and a kayaking Nurse Joy whose giant Magikarp evolves into Gyarados to save the group — and who points Ash to the next Gym, on Navel Island.

• 
• 
• 
• 

Navel Gym & SnorlaxEP093–EP094

After climbing Navel Island’s snowy peak without any help from his Pokémon, Ash takes on Danny’s three-part challenge. Nidoqueen beats Lapras at freezing a geyser; Charizard, aiming a Flamethrower at Ash, accidentally carves a perfect bobsled out of the ice; and Pikachu, Bulbasaur and Squirtle win a downhill sled race that Team Rocket and an exploding Electrode do their best to spoil. The 2–1 result earns the Sea Ruby Badge. On the Seven Grapefruit Islands a Snorlax swims from island to island stripping the orchards bare, and Jigglypuff’s song and Pikachu’s Thunder let Ash catch it.

• 
• 

Ghost ships, Meowth’s island & ScytherEP095–EP098

A stolen 300-year-old Orange League trophy leads the group onto a fog-bound ghost ship crewed by a long-dead champion’s Gastly and Haunter — an episode the staff have said was inspired by Scooby-Doo — and Ash learns that four badges earn a single match against the Orange Crew’s leader rather than a tournament. On Golden Island Meowth is worshipped as the Great Meowth of Bounty until he admits that he spent so much effort learning to talk that he never learned Pay Day. Tracey makes his only on-screen capture, an ageing, injured Scyther that has lost the leadership of its swarm on Murcott Island, and a fruit-laden island gives everyone a rare day off — until a Charizard–Scyther stand-off and a Team Rocket Sleep Powder ambush.

• 
• 
• 

Prima & the road to TrovitaEP099–EP102

Riding a winning streak on Mandarin Island South, a cocky Ash runs into Prima of the Elite Four — Lorelei in the games — whose Cloyster demolishes Pikachu and whose Slowbro has to Disable a rampaging Charizard; she sends a humbled Ash on to Trovita Island. The road there takes in a Romeo and Juliet romance between two Nidoran owned by feuding Trainers, a cowboy’s Magnemite ranch where Number 6 evolves into Magneton just in time to restore the town’s power, and the sewers of Trovitopolis, where Ash calls Muk back from Professor Oak’s lab to protect a giant Bulbasaur from the mayor’s SWAT team.

• 
• 
• 

Trovita Gym & Charizard’s change of heartEP103–EP105

Rudy, the Trovita Gym Leader, falls for Misty after she rescues his sister Mahri, then sets Ash a target test from a moving boat and a three-on-three same-type battle on a pillar in the sea: Electabuzz beats Pikachu, Bulbasaur’s Sleep Powder topples Exeggutor, and Squirtle learns Hydro Pump to beat Starmie for the Spike Shell Badge. Misty turns down Rudy’s invitation to stay. Pikachu and Meowth spend an episode chained together on Fairchild Island, and then comes the turning point of the season: sailor Tad’s Poliwrath freezes Charizard solid, Ash spends the night rubbing it warm, and Charizard finally starts obeying — rescuing Pikachu, learning Dragon Rage and winning the rematch.

• 
• 
• 

The last badge & the Winner’s CupEP106–EP112

Squirtle trains with Captain Aidan’s firefighting Team Wartortle, a broken Poké Ball leaves the group hauling a sleeping Snorlax over a mountain until it wakes with Hyper Beam, and on Kumquat Island hotelier Luana stages the anime’s first Double Battle: Pikachu and Charizard bicker their way into trouble against Alakazam and Marowak before a deflected Bonemerang turns Alakazam’s Hyper Beam on its own partner, and the Jade Star Badge completes the set. After Quincy T. Quackenpoker’s Magikarp mania and Misty’s single-handed rescue of the Stun Spore-paralysed Ash and Tracey (which wins her a Poliwag), Ash swaps Snorlax for a Tauros and challenges Drake, the undefeated head of the Orange Crew, to a six-on-six Full Battle at Pummelo Stadium. It ends with Pikachu clinging to Dragonite’s head and firing Thunder at point-blank range: Ash wins the Winner’s Trophy and the first League title of his career.

• 
• 
• 
• 

Goodbye, LaprasEP113–EP114

Near Tarroco Island Ash’s Lapras finds its herd being bullied by Captain Crook’s Tentacruel pirates. It draws them away, the herd’s combined Ice Beams freeze the Tentacruel, Officer Jenny arrests pirates and Team Rocket alike, and Ash releases Lapras to be with its mother in one of the most emotional farewells of the original series. One last Orange Islands adventure — a Voltorb and Electrode stampede on Hamlin Island, a Diglett-herding cowboy called Poncho and a Togepi chain reaction — ends with the group boarding the ferry for home.

• 
• 

Pallet Town, Gary & the road to JohtoEP115–EP116

Back in Pallet Town Misty finds Brock doing Delia’s housework — he has left Professor Ivy for reasons he flatly refuses to discuss (“Don’t mention that name!”) — while Ash hands the GS Ball to Professor Oak, returns Tauros to the herd and watches Gary’s new Nidoqueen rout Team Rocket. The next day the rivals finally battle, with Brock as referee: Gary’s Eevee beats Pikachu with Skull Bash. Oak cannot open the GS Ball and asks Ash to take it to Kurt in Azalea Town, in a region called Johto; Gary sets off for the Johto League first, Tracey stays behind as Oak’s assistant, and Ash, Misty and a reinstated Brock head for New Bark Town.

• 
• 

Episode Guide

All 36 Orange Islands episodes are listed below in broadcast order. Every episode has its own page with our full synopsis, both titles, air dates, major events, Pokémon debuts, trivia, dub changes and the Who’s That Pokémon? answers — click the title or the screenshot. The # column is the episode’s number within the season and the orange code is the Bulbapedia EP number used by most fan sites; Japanese sources number the same episodes 83–118 because they count the two 1998 specials, Holiday Hi-Jynx and Snow Way Out!. Kids’ WB! counted EP106–EP116 as the start of Season 3, and in the US several episodes premiered out of order (see TV Broadcasts).

	#	Episode	First aired	In short
	1EP081	Pallet Party Panicマサラタウン! あらたなるたびだち!	Japan 28 Jan 1999 US 4 Dec 1999	Ash and friends return to Pallet Town to find a party being thrown to celebrate Ash’s Top 16 placing in the Indigo Plateau Pokemon League Tournament. · Pidgeotto evolves & is released Episode guide →
	2EP082	A Scare in the Airひこうせんはふこうせん!?	Japan 4 Feb 1999 US 8 Jan 2000	Ash and friends stock up on groceries and snacks for the journey ahead, which could take up to a month and a half if they have to walk, Brock… · To the Orange Islands Episode guide →
	3EP083	Poké Ball PerilなんごくポケモンとGSボール	Japan 11 Feb 1999 US 15 Jan 2000	Our heroes are walking around Valencia Island looking for Professor Ivy’s lab, when they realise no one actually knows where it is, they then come… · Ash receives the GS Ball Episode guide →
	4EP084	The Lost Laprasラプラスをたすけろ!	Japan 18 Feb 1999 US 22 Jan 2000	Ash and Misty are still stuck in a cage on an unpiloted Blimp which has headed rather badly off course, they come crashing down on an unknown island,… · Tracey joins Episode guide →
	5EP085	Fit to Be Tideオレンジリーグ! ナツカンジム!	Japan 25 Feb 1999 US 5 Feb 2000	Today our heroes are on a new adventure exploring the Orange Islands, as Ash sets out to qualify for the Orange league. · Coral-Eye Badge Episode guide →
	6EP086	Pikachu Re-Voltsきえたポケモンたちのナゾ!	Japan 4 Mar 1999 US 5 Feb 2000	After his victory over the Mikan gym leader Ash is searching for his next challenge with the burning question of a true adventurer in his heart and… · Butch & Cassidy Episode guide →
	7EP087	The Crystal Onixクリスタルのイワーク	Japan 11 Mar 1999 US 5 Feb 2000	Once again we find our heroes sailing through the sunny surf, they didn’t know it yet but a new adventure was drifting their way; they discover a… · Marill debut Episode guide →
	8EP088	In the Pinkピンクのポケモンじま	Japan 18 Mar 1999 US 12 Feb 2000	Today our friends are enjoying another day on the tropical seas as they continue to explore the Orange islands with their friend Lapras. · Pinkan Island Episode guide →
	9EP089	Shell Shockカブトのかせきのひみつ!	Japan 25 Mar 1999 US 4 Mar 2000	Our heroes are once more drifting toward another tropical adventure in the Orange Islands when two ships rush past aggressively, coming quite close… · Kabuto fossils Episode guide →
	10EP090	Stage Fightおどる! ポケモンショーボート!	Japan 1 Apr 1999 US 12 Feb 2000	Ash and friends are watching a Pokemon stage production all about a Hitmonchan defeating his rival, Machoke in boxing and its partner, Clefable… · Withdrawn from rotation (Jynx) Episode guide →
	11EP091	Bye Bye Psyduckさよならコダック! またきてゴルダック?	Japan 8 Apr 1999 US 26 Feb 2000	Our heroes are headed back to Pallet Town to bring Professor Oak the mysterious G.S ball, but decided to stop at an Island for some rest and… · Golduck debut Episode guide →
	12EP092	The Joy of Pokémonセイリングジョーイ! あらなみをこえて!	Japan 15 Apr 1999 US 4 Mar 2000	Our heroes are aboard Lapras, sailing the peaceful sea when they see splashing in the distance that looks a little like a motorboat, it zips past so… · Magikarp evolves into Gyarados Episode guide →
	13EP093	Navel Maneuversネーブルジム! ゆきやまのたたかい!	Japan 22 Apr 1999 US 11 Mar 2000	Today our heroes are travelling with new purpose; they’re heading to Navel Island where Ash intends on battling for his second Orange League badge. · Sea Ruby Badge Episode guide →
	14EP094	Snack Attackおおぐいカビゴン! だいパニック!	Japan 29 Apr 1999 US 25 Mar 2000	Ash and friends are sailing with Lapras, when they happen upon a group of Islands which Tracey tells them are called the Grapefruit Islands, so they… · Ash catches Snorlax Episode guide →
	15EP095	A Shipful of Shiversゆうれいせんとゆうれいポケモン!	Japan 6 May 1999 US 25 Mar 2000	As our heroes are sailing the seas, Ash is admiring his two Orange Island gym badges wondering how many more he’ll need to get into the Orange… · Ghost ship Episode guide →
	16EP096	Meowth Rules!おニャースさまのしま!?	Japan 13 May 1999 US 25 Mar 2000	Our heroes are continuing their journey through the Orange Islands as always, and as usual they’re being pursued by Team Rocket. · Meowth can’t learn Pay Day Episode guide →
	17EP097	Tracey Gets Buggedストライクせんしのほこり	Japan 20 May 1999 US 1 Apr 2000	Our heroes next stop is Murcott Island, which on the surface looks pretty peaceful! · Tracey catches Scyther Episode guide →
	18EP098	A Way Off Day Offみなみのしまだよ! ぜんいんしゅうごう!	Japan 27 May 1999 US 8 Apr 2000	Ash and friends are sailing Lapras across the seas once more when Pikachu spots an island in the distance, Ash decides it might be a good place to… · Charizard vs Scyther Episode guide →
	19EP099	The Mandarin Island Miss Matchしてんのうカンナ! こおりのたたかい!!	Japan 3 Jun 1999 US 15 Apr 2000	Ash is just finishing a battle against another trainer on the pier of Mandarin Island, infact it’s the third straight victory he’s won since he got… · Ash loses to Prima Episode guide →
	20EP100	Wherefore Art Thou, Pokémon?ニドランのこいものがたり	Japan 10 Jun 1999 US 22 Apr 2000	We find our heroes passing through a quaint little village as they head toward their next Orange League gym. · Nidoran evolve Episode guide →
	21EP101	Get Along, Little Pokémonだいへいげんのコイルたち!	Japan 17 Jun 1999 US 29 Apr 2000	Bound for the next Orange League gym in Trovita Ash and friends find themselves trekking across the rugged landscape of Trovita. · Magnemite evolves into Magneton Episode guide →
	22EP102	The Mystery Menaceちかどうのかいぶつ!?	Japan 24 Jun 1999 US 6 May 2000	Our heroes have finally arrived at the city of Trovitopolis, everything seems normal but beneath the surface a secret looms. · Muk returns Episode guide →
	23EP103	Misty Meets Her Matchユズジム! タイプバトル3VS3!!	Japan 1 Jul 1999 US 9 Sep 2000	Today we find our heroes on a ferry bound for Trovita Island, Ash is intent on challenging the Trovita Gym and winning his third Orange Islands gym… · Spike Shell Badge Episode guide →
	24EP104	Bound for TroubleピカチュウVSニャース!?	Japan 15 Jul 1999 US 15 Sep 2000	After earning his third Orange League badge on Trovita Island Ash and his friends have stopped at a place renound for super sized Pokémon. · Pikachu & Meowth chained together Episode guide →
	25EP105	Charizard Chillsリザードン! きみにきめた!!	Japan 22 Jul 1999 US 2 Sep 2000	Today our friends enjoy smooth sailing and Ash is glad he only needs one more badge to get into the Orange League. · Charizard obeys Ash Episode guide →
	26EP106	The Pokémon Water Warひけしたいけつ! ゼニガメVSカメール	Japan 29 Jul 1999 US 26 Aug 2000	Today our heroes have decided to take a detour and do some big city exploring. · Team Wartortle Episode guide →
	27EP107	Pokémon Food Fightもえよ! カビゴン!!	Japan 5 Aug 1999 US 19 Aug 2000	A storm far out at sea has made the sea too dangerous to sail and our heroes have been stranded on a small Island for a week now with their food… · Snorlax learns Hyper Beam Episode guide →
	28EP108	Pokémon Double Troubleタッグバトル! さいごのジム!!	Japan 12 Aug 1999 US 9 Sep 2000	Our heroes have reached Kumquat Island, a well known luxury resort that’s also the home of the fourth and final member of the Orange Crew who Ash… · Jade Star Badge Episode guide →
	29EP109	The Wacky Watcherコイキング! しんかのひみつ!!	Japan 19 Aug 1999 US 16 Sep 2000	After an exciting battle at the Kumquat gym, Ash earned his fourth and final Orange League badge. · Magikarp evolves into Gyarados Episode guide →
	30EP110	The Stun Spore Detourニョロモとカスミ	Japan 26 Aug 1999 US 16 Sep 2000	Our heroes have stopped at a tiny Island so that Ash can prepare for the long awaited Orange League competition. · Misty catches Poliwag Episode guide →
	31EP111	Hello Pummeloウィナーズカップ! フルバトル6VS6!!	Japan 2 Sep 1999 US 23 Sep 2000	After earning four Orange League badges, Ash and his friends are heading for the Orange League where he’s confident that he’ll capture the winners… · Winner’s Cup begins Episode guide →
	32EP112	Enter the Dragoniteファイナルバトル! カイリューとうじょう!!	Japan 9 Sep 1999 US 23 Sep 2000	Last time our hero Ash finally arrived at Pummelo stadium to challenge the reigning Orange League champion and battle for the coveted winner’s trophy. · Ash wins the Orange League Episode guide →
	33EP113	Viva Las Laprasさよならラプラス!	Japan 16 Sep 1999 US 30 Sep 2000	As Ash and friends are sailing along on Lapras, Ash is admiring his trophy when suddenly Lapras jolts and changes direction, soon revealing a whole… · Lapras released Episode guide →
	34EP114	The Underground Round-Upマルマインだいばくは!?	Japan 23 Sep 1999 US 30 Sep 2000	After saying goodbye to Lapras our heroes arrive at Hamlin Island, as luck would have it just across a bridge is a ferry line which runs straight to… · Leaving the Orange Islands Episode guide →
	35EP115	A Tent Situationかえってきたマサラタウン!	Japan 30 Sep 1999 US 7 Oct 2000	With his adventures in the Orange Islands behind him, Ash has returned to the place where his Pokémon Journey began, Pallet Town. · Brock returns Episode guide →
	36EP116	The Rivalry Revivalライバルたいけつ! サトシVSシゲル!!	Japan 7 Oct 1999 US 14 Oct 2000	After Gary Oak turned up to rescue Ash & friends as well as Prof. · Gary beats Ash Episode guide →

Characters & Travelling Companions

Ash is accompanied by Misty as well as his new friend Tracey as the group travels around the Orange Islands. The vast majority of their transit around the Islands is done on the back of Lapras; who says goodbye to Ash and friends toward the end of the season when it gets reunited with its family in Episode 113 “Viva Las Lapras”.

Right at the end of our heroes’ adventures in the Orange Islands Episode 115 “A Tent Situation” gave us the surprise return of Brock, who had previously parted from the group when he decided to stay on at Valencia Island and help Professor Ivy with her research as well as doing her and her assistants’ cooking and cleaning, it’s unknown exactly why he returned, and he refuses to talk about it.

Shortly after the reintroduction of Brock, Tracey announced in Episode 116 “The Rivalry Revival” that he would not be going with the group on their journey to Johto and he would instead be staying on as Professor Oak’s lab assistant.

Ash wins all four Orange Crew badges and the Winner’s Trophy, catches Lapras and Snorlax, finally earns Charizard’s obedience and suffers his first-ever defeat by Gary in the season finale. Misty, still carrying Togepi, gets her own spotlight episodes — a Water-type duel with Marina, two would-be suitors in Danny and Rudy, and the solo rescue in The Stun Spore Detour that earns her a Poliwag. Tracey, the only main character introduced outside the first five episodes of his series, swaps Brock’s cooking and girl-chasing for a sketchbook: his Venonat, Marill and Scyther give the group a radar, an ear and a bodyguard. Series director Masamitsu Hidaka later explained that Tracey was created because the staff worried American viewers might read Brock’s eyes as a racial stereotype — and that Brock was brought back once it became clear nobody really cared what he looked like.

• Ash KetchumThe would-be Pokémon Master from Pallet Town
• MistyCerulean City Gym Leader, travelling with Ash
• Tracey SketchitPokémon Watcher and sketch artist
• BrockPewter City Gym Leader and would-be Pokémon Breeder
• BrockBrock stays behind with Professor Ivy (EP083)
• Ash KetchumAsh catches Lapras on Tangelo Island (EP084)
• Tracey’s ScytherHis only on-screen capture (caught in EP097)
• Misty’s Poliwag(caught in EP110)

Team Rocket

Jessie, James and Meowth follow the group across the archipelago in their Magikarp submarine, first seen in Fit To Be Tide, and get some of their best material of the original series. Giovanni lands them with a blimp he wants written off for the insurance (EP082); Meowth is worshipped as a god on Golden Island and confesses that he cannot learn Pay Day (EP096), spends an episode chained to Pikachu (EP104), climbs into the “Mecha-Meowthinator” armour (EP107) and fills in for Jessie in the motto when she is paralysed by Stun Spore (EP110). Jessie’s Lickitung finally reappears in EP086, 34 episodes after its capture, and James’s Victreebel continues to greet its Trainer head-first.

Butch and Cassidy, bailed out of jail by Giovanni, return in Pikachu Re-Volts with a Drowzee and an antenna that hypnotise every Pokémon on Mandarin Island; Jessie and James briefly side with the heroes, the running gag of Butch’s name being mangled (“Botch”) begins here, and the pair are re-arrested once Togepi’s Metronome blows up their base. It is their only appearance of the season.

• JessieTeam Rocket
• JamesTeam Rocket
• MeowthTeam Rocket’s talking Meowth

The Orange Crew, rivals & recurring characters

The Orange Crew are four Gym Leaders who test skills rather than raw battling: Cissy of Mikan Island (Water Gun target shooting and a Wave Ride race), Danny of Navel Island (a mountain climb, a geyser freeze, sled carving and a sled race), Rudy of Trovita Island (a target test and a same-type three-on-three on a sea pillar — and a marriage-minded crush on Misty) and Luana of Kumquat Island (the anime’s first Double Battle). Above them sits Drake, the Orange Crew’s undefeated Supreme Gym Leader, whose Dragonite anchors the six-on-six Winner’s Cup at Pummelo Stadium. Prima (Lorelei of the Elite Four in the games and in Japanese) turns up on Mandarin Island South to teach Ash a lesson in humility; the dub removed every reference to the Elite Four.

Professor Oak sends Ash on the GS Ball errand, keeps Muk, Snorlax and the Tauros herd at his lab and finally takes on Tracey as his assistant. Professor Philena Ivy, the Valencia Island researcher whose Orange Islands variants of Butterfree, Vileplume, Raticate, Nidoran, Paras and Weepinbell hint at regional forms decades early, is the reason Brock leaves — and, judging by “Don’t mention that name!”, the reason he comes back. Delia Ketchum and Mr. Mime host the opening party and the closing homecoming, and Gary Oak, absent for almost the whole season, returns in the last two episodes with a Nidoqueen and the Eevee that beats Ash. Ritchie and his Pikachu Sparky appear only in the openings, in a duel that never happens on screen. The characters of the day include Quincy T. Quackenpoker, the Groucho Marx-voiced Magikarp expert (EP109), sailor Tad and his Poliwrath (EP105), Captain Aidan’s fire crew (EP106), the pirate Captain Crook (EP113) and the cowboy Poncho (EP114).

• Professor Ivy of Valencia Island(EP083)
• DrakeSupreme Gym Leader of the Orange Crew (EP111)
• Gary OakBack for the season finale (EP115–EP116)

Voice cast

Character	English voice actor	Japanese voice actor
Ash Ketchum	Veronica Taylor	Rica Matsumoto
Pikachu	Ikue Ōtani	Ikue Ōtani
Misty	Rachael Lillis	Mayumi Iizuka
Tracey Sketchit	Ted Lewis	Tomokazu Seki
Brock	Eric Stuart	Yūji Ueda
Togepi	Satomi Kōrogi	Satomi Kōrogi
Jessie	Rachael Lillis	Megumi Hayashibara
James	Eric Stuart	Shin-ichiro Miki
Meowth	Maddie Blaustein	Inuko Inuyama
Gary Oak	Carter Cathcart (as Jimmy Zoppi)	Yūko Kobayashi
Professor Oak	Stuart Zagnit	Unshō Ishizuka
Professor Ivy	Kayzie Rogers	Keiko Han
Cissy	Tara Sands (as Tara Jayne)	Miki Nagasawa
Danny	Jim Malone	Yasunori Matsumoto
Rudy	Matthew Mitler	Ryō Horikawa
Luana	Kayzie Rogers	Mami Koyama
Drake	Scottie Ray	Kōji Yusa
Snorlax	Michael Haigney	Katsuyuki Konishi
Lapras	—	Rikako Aikawa
Butch	Eric Stuart	Takehito Koyasu
Cassidy	Megan Hollingshead	Masako Katsuki
Giovanni	Ted Lewis	Hirotaka Suzuoki
Narrator	Rodger Parsons (credited as Ken Gates)	Unshō Ishizuka

Pokémon: Captures, Changes, Encounters & Evolutions

In brief:

• Ash catches a Lapras on Tangelo Island and a Snorlax on the Seven Grapefruit Islands.
• Tracey catches a Scyther, and Misty catches a Poliwag.
• Pidgeotto evolves into Pidgeot in the very first episode — and Ash leaves it behind to protect a flock of Pidgey.
• Charizard finally starts listening to Ash in Charizard Chills.
• Ash swaps Snorlax for a Tauros before the Winner’s Cup, and returns it to the herd when he gets home.
• Lapras is reunited with its family and released.

New Pokémon captured or hatched

• Lapras#0131 · Ash · rescued on Tangelo Island · EP084
• Snorlax#0143 · Ash · after Jigglypuff’s song · EP094
• Scyther#0123 · Tracey · his only on-screen capture · EP097
• Poliwag#0060 · Misty · EP110

Evolutions

• Pidgeotto → Pidgeot#0018 · Ash · EP081
• Magikarp → Gyarados#0130 · Nurse Joy’s giant Magikarp · EP092
• Nidoran♀ → Nidorina#0030 · Emily · EP100
• Nidoran♂ → Nidorino#0033 · Ralph · EP100
• Magnemite → Magneton#0082 · Ethan’s “Number 6” · EP101
• Magikarp → Gyarados#0130 · Quincy T. Quackenpoker’s · EP109

Releases, departures and returns

There were a number of occasions where either Ash or another character released a captured Pokémon back into the wild, or left with someone else for one reason or another.

Pidgeot is the first to go: hours after evolving it stays in Viridian Forest to guard the Pidgey flock from Fearow, a goodbye the dub softens with a “see you soon”. Lapras follows in EP113, released to its mother after the herd is found near Tarroco Island, and it meets Ash again, leading a herd of its own, in Lapras of Luxury (EP257, Master Quest). Brock takes Onix, Geodude, Zubat and Vulpix with him when he stays with Professor Ivy (EP083) and brings them home in EP115.

Ash’s reserves at Professor Oak’s lab are busier than ever. Muk is called up for the Trovitopolis sewers in EP102 — the only time it is used outside a League — Snorlax goes to the lab in exchange for one of his thirty Tauros just before the Winner’s Cup (EP111), and the Tauros rejoins the herd in EP115 while Snorlax stays at the lab. Snorlax’s Poké Ball breaks in EP107, the only time one of Ash’s has. Misty’s Starmie and Horsea stay at the Cerulean Gym all season, and Tracey’s Venonat and Marill were already his before he met Ash.

New Pokémon captured by Ash & Other Characters

Pokémon	Caught By	Episode	Notes
Lapras	Ash	#E84	After finding some thugs being horrible to an injured Lapras Ash and co cared for it, Ash taking it in a Pokéball to the Pokémon Center before vowing to help it find its group/parents.
Snorlax	Ash	#E94	A wild Snorlax was on a rampage, eating all the fruit from the Grapefruit Islands and Ash captured it to stop it.
Scyther	Tracey	#E97	The group find an injured Scyther who has lost the leadership of its Swarm. Tracey helps it find its self confidence again and it decides to accompany him on his journey.
Poliwag	Misty	#E110	A wild Poliwag helps Misty gather the Salveyo weed she needs to cure the Stun Spore-paralysed Ash and Tracey, then insists on coming along — Misty’s only capture of the season.

Evolution

Pokémon	Evolved into	Episode	Trainer	Notes
Pidgeotto	Pidgeot	#E81 – Pallet Party Panic	Ash	Pidgeotto was trying to protect a family of Pidgey and Pidgeotto from Spearow, prompting its evolution.

Pokémon released

Pokémon	Released by	Episode	Notes
Pidgeot	Ash	#E81 – Pallet Party Panic	In the same episode it evolved, Ash left his Pidgeot to protect the Pidgey and Pidgeotto family in case Fearow returned.
Lapras	Ash	#E113 – Viva Las Lapras	When Ash first caught Lapras he vowed to help it find its family, and in this episode they did. Ash released Lapras to be with its mother and its own kind.

Pokémon caught / owned prior to the events of Pokémon Season 2

Pokémon	Owner	Notes
Venonat	Tracey	Tracey already had this Pokémon prior to #E84 – The Lost Lapras
Marill	Tracey	Tracey already had this Pokémon prior to #E87 – The Crystal Onix

Pokémon making their anime debut this season

Only three species make their main-series debut in the Orange Islands, and all three had already been seen on the big screen: Marill, Tracey’s Pokémon and the only Generation II species to debut in these 36 episodes, first appeared in Pikachu’s Vacation, while Golduck and Nidoqueen had been in Mewtwo Strikes Back. By Navel Maneuvers (EP093) every non-Legendary Generation I Pokémon had appeared in the anime. The new generation was being saved for the cinema: Lugia and Slowking debuted in The Power of One and Elekid, Bellossom, Hoothoot and Ledyba in Pikachu’s Rescue Adventure, both released in Japan between EP104 and EP105 — which is why Professor Oak laughs off Tracey’s sketch of a mysterious new Pokémon (an Elekid) in EP103. The season also has its share of one-off oddities: the Crystal Onix, the pink Pokémon of Pinkan Island, Kabuto’s dormant fossil form and Professor Ivy’s Orange Islands colour variants.

• Marill#0183 · EP087 · Gen II
• Golduck#0055 · EP091
• Nidoqueen#0031 · EP093

Key Events, Gym Battles & Tournaments

The Orange Crew battles in detail

Orange League badges & the Winner’s Trophy

Badge	Gym & Leader	Leader’s Pokémon	Ash’s Pokémon	Result	Episode
Coral-Eye Badge	Mikan Gym · Cissy	Seadra, Blastoise	Squirtle, Lapras	Win — Squirtle ties Seadra in the Water Gun target shoot; Lapras’s Ice Beam wins the Wave Ride race against Blastoise	EP085
Sea Ruby Badge	Navel Gym · Danny	Nidoqueen, Machoke, Scyther, Geodude, Electrode	Lapras, Charizard, Pikachu, Bulbasaur, Squirtle	Win 2–1 — Nidoqueen wins the geyser freeze, Charizard carves the better sled, Ash’s trio wins the downhill race	EP093
Spike Shell Badge	Trovita Gym · Rudy	Electabuzz, Exeggutor, Starmie	Pikachu, Bulbasaur, Squirtle	Win 2–1 — Electabuzz beats Pikachu, Bulbasaur’s Sleep Powder topples Exeggutor, Squirtle learns Hydro Pump to beat Starmie	EP103
Jade Star Badge	Kumquat Gym · Luana	Alakazam, Marowak	Pikachu, Charizard	Win — the anime’s first Double Battle; a deflected Bonemerang turns Alakazam’s Hyper Beam on Marowak	EP108
Winner’s Trophy	Pummelo Stadium · Drake	Ditto, Onix, Gengar, Venusaur, Electabuzz, Dragonite	Pikachu, Squirtle, Tauros, Lapras, Bulbasaur, Charizard	Win, with Pikachu the last Pokémon standing — its point-blank Thunder on Dragonite decides the Full Battle and makes Ash Orange League champion	EP112

The Winner’s Cup: Ash vs Drake, round by round

The Orange League is more than 300 years old and has no conference: a Trainer who collects all four Orange Crew badges earns a single six-on-six Full Battle against the Supreme Gym Leader at Pummelo Stadium, with the arena changing after either side loses three Pokémon. Drake had never been beaten. Before the match Ash trades Snorlax for one of his Tauros, and fields Pikachu, Squirtle, Tauros, Lapras, Bulbasaur and Charizard against Drake’s Ditto, Onix, Gengar, Venusaur, Electabuzz and Dragonite — Ash’s first Full Battle, and the first in the anime shown in full, with all twelve Pokémon and every round (Hello, Pummelo! and Enter The Dragonite, EP111–EP112).

First field. (1) Pikachu beats Ditto: Ditto Transforms into a perfect copy and trades Thunderbolts, but loses an Agility race and is floored by Pikachu’s electrified tail. (2) Squirtle beats Onix: Onix Digs away from Water Gun and catches Squirtle in Bind, but Withdraw slips the hold and Hydro Pump and Skull Bash end it. (3) Tauros’s Fissure is useless against the floating Gengar and Confuse Ray sends it crashing into the rocks, so Ash recalls it. (4) Lapras and Gengar knock each other out when Ice Beam and Night Shade collide — the cliffhanger of EP111, and Lapras’s only official battle.

Sand field. (5) Tauros beats Venusaur: Fissure fails again on the soft ground, but Tauros shrugs off Vine Whip and Solar Beam and wins with Take Down. (6) Electabuzz beats Bulbasaur with Thunder Punch after an even exchange of Razor Leaf and Tackle. (7) Charizard beats Electabuzz, sheltering behind a Fire Spin from Thunder Punch and Thunder before a Seismic Toss.

Dragonite. Drake’s ace shows off Water Gun, Ice Beam, Slam, Body Slam, Thunder, Agility and Hyper Beam — and still finds time to Skull Bash Team Rocket’s net and balloon in mid-match. (8) It beats Charizard after their Dragon Rage attacks collide, (9) flattens Squirtle with its tail and (10) is hurled across the arena by Tauros’s horns but finishes it with Thunder. (11) That leaves Pikachu, who dodges a Hyper Beam — the first time the anime shows the recharge turn — leaps onto Dragonite’s head and fires Thunder at point-blank range. Ash wins with one Pokémon standing: he receives the Winner’s Trophy and the title of Honorable Trainer (“Champion” in the dub), and a photo and the footprints of Ash and his six Pokémon are added to the Orange League’s Hall of Fame, the Palace of Victory. It is the first League Ash ever won, and he would not win another until the Manalo Conference in Alola, twenty years later.

Ash vs Prima of the Elite Four (EP099)

On Mandarin Island South a cocky Ash — three wins into his visit in the dub, with Squirtle beating a Persian and Charizard flattening a Tauros — watches Charizard rampage out of control until a Slowbro’s Disable stops it. The Slowbro’s Trainer is Prima, Lorelei of the Elite Four (カンナ Kanna in Japanese), and after an exhibition in which her Cloyster brushes aside Kadabra and Machamp she agrees to battle Ash. Cloyster’s Reflect blunts Pikachu’s electric attacks, Rage and Aurora Beam wear it down, and Ash loses — the anime’s first Elite Four battle, and a lesson in humility that sends him on to the Trovita Gym. Prima also freezes Team Rocket with her Jynx, which is why this episode was later withdrawn from English-language rotation, and the dub removed every mention of the Elite Four — an omission a later Johto episode (EP140) contradicts.

Charizard’s turnaround: Ash vs Tad (EP105)

Charizard has ignored Ash ever since its days as a Charmeleon, obeying only when it fancied a fight against another Fire-type. In Charizard Chills sailor Tad’s Poliwrath beats Pikachu and then freezes the disobedient Charizard solid with Ice Beam. Ash spends the night rubbing his frozen Pokémon warm, and the next morning Charizard repays him by rescuing Pikachu from Team Rocket’s drill, learning Dragon Rage and winning the rematch by dodging Ice Beam and landing a Seismic Toss. From here on Charizard obeys Ash — just in time for the Double Battle against Luana and the Full Battle against Drake. Atsuhiro Tomioka, who wrote the episode, had also written EP044, in which Charmeleon first turned its back on Ash — so a single writer bookends the whole arc.

Ash vs Gary: the first rival battle (EP116)

After a whole season apart, Ash and Gary finally meet in battle in The Rivalry Revival, a one-on-one at Professor Oak’s lab with Brock refereeing. Gary’s newly revealed Eevee blocks Quick Attack with Reflect, avoids Thunderbolt with Double Team, outpaces Take Down with Agility and knocks Pikachu out with Skull Bash. It is the first battle between the rivals ever shown and Ash’s first loss to Gary — a deliberate echo of the Pikachu-versus-Eevee rival battle that opens Pokémon Yellow. Gary leaves for the Johto League the same day, and his Eevee later evolves into Umbreon.

Movies & Specials Released During the Season

The second movie, Pokémon the Movie 2000: The Power of One (Revelation Lugia in Japan), opened in Japanese cinemas on 17 July 1999 — between Bound For Trouble (EP104) and Charizard Chills (EP105) — together with the short Pikachu’s Rescue Adventure. It is the Orange Islands movie: set on Shamouti Island and the Islands of Fire, Ice and Lightning, it gives Tracey his only big-screen outing as a main character, uses The Rivals as its Japanese opening and takes place after EP105, since Charizard already obeys Ash. Lugia, Slowking, Articuno and Zapdos all made their animated debuts in it. Warner Bros. released it in the US on 21 July 2000, during the dub’s summer break, opening with a duet version of Pokémon World by Youngstown and Nobody’s Angel; it reached VHS and DVD on 14 November 2000.

Pokémon: The First Movie – Mewtwo Strikes Back had opened in Japan back in July 1998, but its American release on 10 November 1999 came three weeks before Pallet Party Panic aired, and its VHS and DVD followed on 21 March 2000, in the middle of the season; cues from its score turn up in EP102, EP111, EP112, EP113 and EP116, including the moment Drake’s Dragonite first appears.

Kids’ WB! also used the season to clear its backlog: the two 1998 specials, Holiday Hi-Jynx and Snow Way Out!, premiered on 11 and 18 December 1999 between EP081 and EP082, and the long-unaired Beauty and the Beach (EP018) finally premiered during the summer break on 24 June 2000, complete with the Orange Islands eyecatch — see our Indigo League page. In Japan, the third movie, Spell of the Unown, opened on 8 July 2000, while the dub was still working through the islands.

Side Stories, Specials & Crossovers

Side-story tie-ins

• Pikachu’s Rescue Adventure (PK04), the short shown with the second movie, debuts Elekid, Bellossom, Hoothoot and Ledyba. Professor Oak’s Japanese lecture after The Mystery Menace (EP102) previews it, and in EP103 Tracey sketches an Elekid that Oak dismisses — the short had not yet opened in Japan.
• Holiday Hi-Jynx and Snow Way Out!, the two specials Japan had aired in October 1998, reached Kids’ WB! on the two Saturdays after Pallet Party Panic (11 and 18 December 1999); they belong between EP064 and EP065 in story order, and Holiday Hi-Jynx was later pulled from rotation over Jynx.
• Beauty and the Beach (EP018), the Indigo League episode skipped in 1998, finally premiered as an 18-minute “lost episode” on 24 June 2000 with the Orange Islands eyecatch, during the season’s summer break.
• Pikachu’s Winter Vacation 2000 (PK05–PK06, Winter Games and Stantler’s Little Helpers), a Japanese video release of 22 December 1999, falls between the Japanese and American runs of the season.
• Scholastic chapter books by Tracey West retold most of the season: Journey to the Orange Islands, Secret of the Pink Pokémon, The Four-Star Challenge, Scyther, Heart of a Champion, Psyduck Ducks Out, Prepare for Trouble, Thundershock in Pummelo Stadium and Go West, Young Ash, plus the Pokémon Junior titles Raichu Shows Off, Nidoran’s New Friend, Two of a Kind and Good-Bye, Lapras.
• Pokémon Live!, the stage musical, opened in Albany on 15 September 2000 — the Friday on which Bound For Trouble premiered — before a run at Radio City Music Hall.

Characters from the games, manga and specials

• Prima is Lorelei, the Ice-type opener of the Elite Four in Pokémon Red, Blue and Yellow; her anime Slowbro, Dewgong, Cloyster and Jynx all come from her team in the games. The dub renamed her Prima and removed every reference to the Elite Four.
• The GS Ball was created for the anime as the arc’s MacGuffin and, according to Masamitsu Hidaka, was meant to hold a Celebi for a Johto storyline that was dropped when Celebi became the star of the fourth movie. It did make it into the games: Pokémon Crystal has a GS Ball event in which Kurt examines the Ball and it summons Celebi at the Ilex Forest shrine — a Japan-only Mobile System GB event until the 2018 Virtual Console release.
• Gary’s Eevee and the Pikachu-versus-Eevee rival battle that ends the season mirror the opening battle of Pokémon Yellow, which reached North American shops in October 1999.
• Rudy is the only Orange Crew member to appear in the manga: The Electric Tale of Pikachu chapter 16, “You Bet Your Wife!”, adapts Misty Meets Her Match (Rudy is called Jeremy in the English edition).
• Riding on Lapras made it into the games too: a Swimmer on Route 41 in Gold and Silver asks whether there wasn’t a hit song about a boy riding a Lapras.
• Professor Ivy’s Orange Islands variants — differently coloured Butterfree, Vileplume, Raticate, Nidoran, Paras and Weepinbell — foreshadow the regional forms of Sun and Moon, and the archipelago’s skill-based Gym challenges look a lot like Alola’s island trials.

Opening & Ending Themes

The opening theme for Adventures on the Orange Islands (Japanese) is “The Rivals” by Rica Matsumoto, where in the English dub the song used is “Pokémon World” by Russell Velázquez. There were a few different ending themes used:- including “Type: Wild” by Rica Matsumoto, “Pokémon Ondo” by Sachiko Kobayashi (with Koffing and Ekans) as well as “Riding on Lapras” by Mayumi Iizuka. The Rivals (ライバル！ Raibaru!) is the only Japanese opening of the season and the first Pokémon animation coloured digitally; the ending switched from Type: Wild to Riding on Lapras at EP105, with Pokémon Ondo returning for the single mid-summer broadcast of EP104. On Kids’ WB! Pokémon World — lyrics by John Loeffler, arranged by John Siegler — replaced Pokémon Theme from The Lost Lapras (EP084; VIZ’s DVDs use it from EP081), and a shortened edit runs from EP106. Built from The Rivals and EP086 footage, its animation spoils Tracey’s arrival and the captures of Lapras and Scyther, and shows a Pikachu-versus-Sparky duel that never happens and Gary with a Growlithe he never uses.

The dub closed every episode with Pikachu’s Jukebox, a clip from one of the songs on the Pokémon 2.B.A. Master album — “2.B.A. Master” and “Viridian City” most often, then “Together Forever”, “My Best Friends”, “Double Trouble” and “What Kind of Pokémon Are You?” — and EP116 is the segment’s last appearance. The first US airings of EP106 and EP107 ended instead with Meowth’s Party, the Johto-era Japanese ending, first in Japanese and then in English; neither version aired on the network again. Inside the episodes, the showboat finale of Stage Fight! swaps the original Mezase Pokémon Master for a gappy early mix of Pokémon World, Misty Meets Her Match drops in “Pokémon (Dance Mix)” twice, the Charizard–Tad rematch is set to Type: Wild in Japanese and Pokémon World in English, and Lapras’s Japanese farewell montage plays over “Miraculous Tears” from the first movie, replaced in the dub by an instrumental of “The Time Has Come”.

Pokémon World by Russell Velázquez — the English opening of the Orange Islands episodes. Video: The Official Pokémon YouTube channel.

TV Broadcasts & Original Airing Dates

Japan. Pokémon Season 2: Adventures in the Orange Islands was aired for the very first time on Japan’s TV Tokyo network between January 1999 and October 1999. This season was first aired in Japan on January 28th, 1999 opening with episode J#83 “Pallet Party Panic” and concluded in Japan on October 7th, 1999 with the airing of J#118 “The Rivalry Revival”. (Japanese sources number the episodes 83–118 because they count the two 1998 specials; Bulbapedia’s codes are EP081–EP116.) The episodes went out every Thursday with a single week off on 8 July 1999, just before the second movie opened; Bound For Trouble was the last episode before the film, and Stage Fight! aired on 1 April 1999, the series’ second anniversary. Japan has no “season 2”: a week after the finale, on 14 October 1999, Don’t Touch That ’dile opened the Johto chapter, and Pokémon Gold and Silver went on sale on 21 November.

United States. It later followed in the U.S when it was aired by the WB Television Network between December 1999 and October 2000, the U.S rotation of the episodes was a little different to their Japanese counterparts this is because several episodes were held back and shown out of order. The English Dub of Adventures in the Orange Islands also opened its airing with E#81 “Pallet Party Panic” which was aired on December 4th, 1999 with the final episode being E#116 “The Rivalry Revival” which aired on October 14th, 2000.

Kids’ WB! followed Pallet Party Panic with the two 1998 specials and resumed the story with A Scare in the Air on 8 January 2000. New episodes came on Saturday mornings, sometimes in batches — three on 5 February and three more on 25 March — and Shell Shock! (EP089) went out only after EP090–EP092. After The Mystery Menace on 6 May the show took a long summer break, and the late-summer run then began with Pokémon Food Fight! (19 August), The Pokémon Water War (26 August) and Charizard Chills (2 September) — all before Misty Meets Her Match, which did not air until 9 September, so viewers saw Ash with the Spike Shell Badge before they saw him win it. Bound For Trouble followed on Friday 15 September, the opening night of Pokémon Live!, and the finale shared the morning of 14 October 2000 with the first Johto episode — the day before Pokémon Gold and Silver reached American shops.

How many episodes is the Orange Islands season? It depends who is counting. Japan’s Orange Islands chapter, VIZ Media’s DVDs, Pokémon.com and this guide all use the 36 episodes from Pallet Party Panic to The Rivalry Revival. Kids’ WB! counted differently: its 52-episode “Season 2” ran from Princess vs. Princess (EP052, 4 September 1999) to Charizard Chills (EP105, 2 September 2000) — the last third of Indigo League plus most of the Orange Islands — and EP106–EP116, still carrying the Orange Islands title card and Pokémon World, opened its Season 3. The Australian DVDs, Netflix and Toonami Jetstream followed that television definition (49 episodes once the Jynx episodes were dropped), Pokémon TV and the digital stores used a 60-episode version (EP052–EP116 minus EP054–EP057, which had aired in Season 1, and the Jynx episodes), and since 2015 VIZ’s own Complete Collection has just 34.

Elsewhere. In the United Kingdom Sky One held first-run rights to the early seasons, with terrestrial repeats on CITV — mostly inside SM:TV Live — and in GMTV’s Sunday block Up on the Roof; Toonami UK re-ran seasons 1–3 from May 2004. Australia watched on Network Ten’s Cheez TV. Finland skipped the Orange Islands entirely; Russia’s ORT stopped after Charizard Chills and did not air Pokémon again for seven years, and EP105 was also the last Orange Islands episode shown in Denmark, Norway and Sweden. India’s Hungama TV never aired the two Jynx episodes, and the European Portuguese and Arabic dubs kept Pokémon Theme as the opening. In the US the season was later rerun on Cartoon Network and Boomerang from 2006, streamed on Toonami Jetstream, Netflix (2014–16), Pokémon TV (until March 2024) and DisneyNOW, and began appearing on Pokémon’s YouTube channel in February 2025.

Dub Edits & Censorship

What changed in the English version

The Jynx episodes. Nothing in the Orange Islands was banned on its first run, but two episodes have since disappeared from English-language rotation: Stage Fight! (EP090), whose showboat finale includes a dancing Jynx (on screen for around 38 seconds in total), and The Mandarin Island Miss Match (EP099), in which Prima’s Jynx freezes Team Rocket. Both aired normally in 2000 (12 February and 15 April), but after Holiday Hi-Jynx was pulled over the Pokémon’s original black-faced design — criticised by children’s author Carole Boston Weatherford in 2000 — they were quietly withdrawn around 2013–14. Neither was on Netflix or Pokémon TV, both are missing from VIZ’s 2015 Complete Collection (34 episodes) and the post-2014 Australian sets (49), and EP099 was skipped when the season went up on YouTube in 2025. EP099 is the last dubbed episode to show Jynx in its original design: afterwards 4Kids cut or painted out the character — starting with a six-second Gym-tour shot of a Jynx on a treadmill in EP108 — until its purple redesign. Japan’s Prime Video has streamed EP099 with Prima’s Jynx recoloured purple since 2017, but that version has never been dubbed.

A Scare in the Air and September 11. A Scare in the Air (EP082), in which Team Rocket’s sabotaged blimp carries the heroes out of Kanto, is often said to have been pulled from US rotation after the attacks of 11 September 2001. The record is murkier. The Orange Islands’ first run had finished almost a year earlier, and the episodes Kids’ WB! is documented as withdrawing after 9/11 were two Indigo League stories: Tentacool & Tentacruel, in which a giant Tentacruel topples skyscrapers, and The Tower of Terror, apparently for its title. What did happen to EP082 is that newspaper listings for a rerun on 14 March 2002 called it Spirits in the Sky, after the Norman Greenbaum song, without explanation; the on-screen title card never changed and Cartoon Network reruns kept the original name. That unexplained retitling, six months after the attacks, is the most likely source of the story.

Openings, eyecatches and running order. Kids’ WB! kept Pokémon Theme on the first three episodes (VIZ’s DVDs retro-fit Pokémon World), switched to a shortened Pokémon World from EP106 and changed the Who’s That Pokémon? announcer at the same point. The dub’s Who’s That Pokémon? now featured an unrelated Pokémon almost every week, whereas the Japanese segment matched the episode; A Shipful of Shivers (Gastly) is the last episode with the same Pokémon in both versions until Best Wishes, and the Porygon of EP098 is the only time Porygon has spoken English. Japan’s post-episode Professor Oak’s Pokémon Lecture was dropped in favour of Pikachu’s Jukebox. The episodes premiered out of order in the US (see TV Broadcasts); the DVDs restored the correct order.

Cuts and paint. By 4Kids standards the season was lightly edited — Dogasu’s Backpack found no cuts or paint edits at all in more than half of the episodes. The notable changes: a Japanese lottery sign painted out in EP082 (the last Japanese-text edit until EP106); a 38-second stretch of Ash taunting Prima, with her chest in frame, cut from most US airings and the early-2000s DVDs of EP099 (it had been re-edited in Japan after broadcast); two seconds of Meowth clawing Jessie and James replaced by impact stars in EP106, whose Squirtle Squad flashback repeats the paint edits of EP012; three seconds of Luana hugging Ash to her chest and the six-second Gym tour cut from EP108; Jessie and Meowth’s six-second kicking of James cut to a single second in EP110; about five seconds trimmed from the end of EP112; nineteen signs painted over in EP114; and a two-second recap shot removed from EP116.

Names, dialogue and music. The Japanese Orange League’s “Southern Cross” became the “Orange Crew”, and most islands were renamed after Western citrus (Natsukan became Mikan, Kinkan became Mandarin, Kankitsu became Pummelo). Lorelei became Prima, with all nine Elite Four references removed; Drake, the Japanese “Head Leader”, is a “Gym Leader” in EP111 and a “Champion” in EP112; and the single-match Winner’s Cup was rewritten as an “Orange League competition”, leaving lines in EP105 and EP108–EP110 that imply a tournament. Characters of the day were renamed (Tsubaki became Marina, Ford became the cowboy Ethan, Midorikawa the Groucho Marx-voiced Dr. Quincy T. Quackenpoker), pomelos became grapefruit, and moves were misnamed — Cut became “Slash”, Fire Spin “Ember”, Thunderbolt “Thunder Shock” and Double-Edge “Body Slam”. 4Kids replaced most of Shinji Miyazaki’s score: Meowth Rules! has the most replacement music of the arc, and in Bound For Trouble 4Kids added music to more than nine minutes of originally silent scenes, about 60 per cent of the episode. Dogasu’s Backpack singles out EP095 and EP110 as unusually faithful translations and EP096, EP099 and EP108 as the heaviest rewrites.

Episode titles explained

Almost every English title is a pun or a reference. The ones worth decoding:

• A Scare in the Air — a rhyme on “in the air”; one 2002 TV listing renamed it Spirits in the Sky, after Norman Greenbaum’s “Spirit in the Sky”
• Fit To Be Tide — “fit to be tied”, for a Gym decided on the waves
• Pikachu Re-Volts — revolts, plus volts
• In The Pink — the idiom for being in perfect health, on an island of pink Pokémon
• Stage Fight! — stage fright
• Bye Bye Psyduck — an echo of Bye Bye Butterfree
• The Joy of Pokémon — The Joy of Cooking, and Nurse Joy
• Navel Maneuvers — naval manoeuvres (the Australian DVD menu actually spells it “Naval Manoeuvres”)
• The Mandarin Island Miss Match — a mismatch, and a match against a “Miss”
• Wherefore Art Thou, Pokémon? — Romeo and Juliet; the comma shows the writers took “wherefore” to mean “where”
• Get Along, Little Pokémon — the cowboy song “Git Along, Little Dogies”
• The Mystery Menace — Bulbasaur’s Japanese name, Fushigidane, means “mysterious”
• Misty Meets Her Match — a match as in a battle, and as in a suitor
• Bound For Trouble — Pikachu and Meowth are literally bound together
• Charizard Chills — frozen solid, and finally calming down
• Pokémon Double Trouble — the first Double Battle, and Team Rocket’s Jukebox song
• Hello, Pummelo! — Hello, Dolly!
• Enter The Dragonite — Bruce Lee’s Enter the Dragon
• Viva Las Lapras — Viva Las Vegas
• A Tent Situation — “a tense situation”, for Team Rocket’s tent-shaped “Super Sucker” heist

DVD & Blu-ray / Streaming

DVD releases for Adventures in the Orange Islands are a little more few and far between compared to Pokémon’s First Season. In North America VIZ Media released the 36-episode arc on three single discs in 2002–03 and as a box set in 2008, then re-issued it in 2015 as a 34-episode Complete Collection without the two Jynx episodes; no Region 1 VHS of these episodes was ever released. Australian discs follow the 52-episode television season (EP052–EP105), so the last eleven Orange Islands episodes are on the Season 3 sets there.

North America (Region 1)

Release	Date	Contents
Pokémon: Adventures on the Orange Islands 1 (DVD, VIZ Video via Pioneer)	12 November 2002	EP081–EP092 (12 episodes) with a Pokémon 4Ever trailer; Pikachu’s Jukebox omitted, Who’s That Pokémon? kept
Pokémon: Adventures on the Orange Islands 2 (DVD, VIZ Video via Ventura)	23 September 2003	EP093–EP104 (12 episodes)
Pokémon: Adventures on the Orange Islands 3 (DVD, VIZ Video via Ventura)	18 November 2003	EP105–EP116 (12 episodes)
Pokémon: Adventures on the Orange Islands box set (3 DVDs, VIZ Media)	20 May 2008	All 36 episodes — the same content as the single volumes, and the only complete Region 1 set
Pokémon: Adventures in the Orange Islands – The Complete Collection (3 DVDs, VIZ Media / Warner Home Video)	5 May 2015	34 episodes — omits Stage Fight! and The Mandarin Island Miss Match; openings and endings on every episode of discs 2–3
VIZ Pokémon All-Stars and Pokémon Elements single DVDs	2000s	All-Stars Vol. 3 Charizard (EP105), Vol. 4 Squirtle (EP085), Vol. 6 Eevee (EP116), Vol. 11 Meowth (EP096), Vol. 13 Psyduck (EP091), Vol. 15 Lapras (EP084, EP113); Elements Vol. 8 Dragon (EP112)

Australia & New Zealand (Region 4)

Release	Date	Notes
Pokémon Season 2 Super Wallet (13 discs + bonus disc, Magna Pacific)	10 May 2006	52 TV episodes (EP052–EP105), four per Great Ball disc, plus four Pokémon Chronicles episodes on a Premier Ball bonus disc
Season 2 DigiPack (6 discs, Magna Pacific / Beyond)	3 March 2010 (NZ 3 November 2010)	Discs themed around Meowth, Jynx, Onix, Pidgeotto, Kabuto and Scyther; reprinted for the 20th anniversary in 2016
MetalPak limited edition (Beyond Home Entertainment)	5 June 2013 (NZ 13 June 2013)	Steelbook-style re-release of the TV season
Slimline re-release (Beyond)	2 April 2014	49 episodes — the Jynx episodes dropped and disc 2 re-themed around Shellder
Alternate-cover release Adventures in the Orange Islands (Beyond)	28 August 2019 (NZ 18 September 2019)	Also bundled in the Kanto and Orange Islands Collection, the Heritage Collection and the multi-season Deluxe, Ultra and Mega box sets

Japan

In Japan Shogakukan released the chapter as the rental-only VHS series Pocket Monsters: Orange Islands (ポケットモンスター オレンジ諸島編), twelve tapes of three episodes each issued between 28 August 1999 and 25 February 2000, in Japanese only. No Japanese retail DVD of the Orange Islands episodes has been traced; Prime Video Japan streams the original series, with Prima’s Jynx recoloured purple in EP099.

Streaming

Pokémon TV carried the season — latterly in its 60-episode digital form, without the Jynx episodes — from 2010 until the service closed on 28 March 2024, and Netflix US had the television season from 1 June 2014 to February 2016. Hulu, iTunes and Prime Video (which sells it as Pokémon the Series: The Beginning in volumes) have all distributed it, and DisneyNOW carried it in the US. Since February 2025 the season has been uploaded free to Pokémon’s YouTube channel, without The Mandarin Island Miss Match and region-locked in several countries. Availability changes frequently, so check your local service.

Covers

• Adventures on the Orange Islands 1 (Region 1, 2002)
• Adventures on the Orange Islands 2 (Region 1, 2003)
• Adventures on the Orange Islands 3 (Region 1, 2003)
• Box set (Region 1, 2008)
• The Complete Collection (Region 1, 2015)
• Season 2 Super Wallet (Region 4, 2006)
• Season 2 DigiPack (Region 4, 2010)
• Alternate-cover release (Region 4, 2019)

Where to Watch & Buy

Availability changes constantly, so treat this as a snapshot (October 2026) and check your local service. Links will be added here once we have settled on referral partners.

• Pokémon on YouTubePokémon’s official YouTube channel has been uploading the early seasons free since December 2024; Season 2 went up from February 2025, without The Mandarin Island Miss Match, and is region-locked in some countries.
• Prime VideoSells the run as Pokémon the Series: The Beginning (Season 2, in volumes) in many territories; the Japanese store streams the original Japanese episodes.
• DVD – North AmericaVIZ’s 2008 box set Pokémon: Adventures on the Orange Islands is the only release with all 36 episodes; the 2015 Complete Collection is easier to find but has 34.
• DVD – Australia & New ZealandBeyond Home Entertainment’s Season 2 sets follow the TV season (EP052–EP105) and are regularly re-issued and bundled into the multi-season box sets.
• Not currently onPokémon TV closed in March 2024 and Netflix dropped the season in 2016.

Trading Cards Released During the Season

The Orange Islands aired in America at the height of the original Pokémon Trading Card Game craze, with Wizards of the Coast releasing a new expansion every few months. If you want to collect the cards that were on shop shelves while these episodes were new, these are the expansions:

• Fossil — October 1999 — on sale when the dub reached the islands, with holo Lapras, Ditto, Gengar and Dragonite
• Base Set 2 — February 2000 — a compilation of Base Set and Jungle reprints
• Team Rocket — 24 April 2000 — the first set with Dark Pokémon
• Gym Heroes — August 2000 — the Kanto Gym Leaders’ own Pokémon, released during the dub’s autumn run
• Gym Challenge — October 2000 — out two days after the season finale

In Japan the run coincided with the second Gym expansion, Challenge from the Darkness (1999), and the Southern Islands promotional collection, which tied in with the second movie’s Orange Islands setting and later reached English-speaking collectors as Southern Islands (2001).

Our TCG section has a full card list, print variations and the most valuable cards for every one of them.

Cards with a link to the season

A few of those cards reach straight into the episodes — and into the film that sits in the middle of the season:

• Ancient Mew · cinema promoGiven to cinema-goers for Pokémon: The Movie 2000 (Japan 17 July 1999, US 21 July 2000), the film that opened in Japan midway through the Orange Islands run.
• Lapras · Fossil 10/62Fossil was on sale when the dub reached the islands; Ash’s Lapras (EP084) is the season’s ferry.
• Misty’s Psyduck · Gym Heroes 54/132August 2000: Misty’s most troublesome Pokémon gets its own card, with Misty herself peering in from the edge of the art.
• Misty’s Tears · Gym Challenge 118/132The English card (October 2000) has Misty crying into a Squirtle…
• Kasumi no Namida · Hanada City Gym (1998)…because the Japanese original showed her apparently undressed with Staryu, and Wizards had the art redrawn.

Firsts & Lasts

• First League title for Ash: the Orange League Winner’s Cup (EP112) — his only one until the Manalo Conference in Alola.
• First Full Battle of Ash’s career, and the first in the anime shown in full: Ash vs Drake (EP111–EP112), which also brings the first on-screen Hyper Beam recharge.
• First official Double Battle and first referee in one of Ash’s Gym battles: Luana’s Gym (EP108).
• First Elite Four member to appear and battle: Prima (Lorelei), in The Mandarin Island Miss Match (EP099).
• First battle between Ash and Gary — and Ash’s first loss to him: The Rivalry Revival (EP116).
• First episode without Brock since EP005 (The Lost Lapras, EP084), and the only time a main character has joined outside the first five episodes of their series (Tracey).
• First Ice-type for Ash (Lapras, EP084) and the first of his Poké Balls to break (Snorlax’s, EP107).
• First mention of Pokémon Contests (EP100) and first time the Johto region is named (EP116).
• First digitally coloured Pokémon animation: the opening The Rivals.
• First Japanese Who’s That Pokémon? with two Pokémon (EP100) and the last matching US/Japanese segment until Best Wishes (Gastly, EP095).
• Last dubbed episode showing Jynx’s original design (EP099), and last episode with Pikachu’s Jukebox (EP116).
• Last episode with Tracey as a travelling companion, and the end of Generation I in the anime: The Rivalry Revival (EP116).
• Only official Gym Leader in the anime who awards no badge: Drake. Only Gym win for Ash’s Squirtle: the Spike Shell Badge (EP103).

Trivia & Facts

• The Orange Islands exist only in the anime: the region was most likely invented as a setting for a filler arc while Gold and Silver were still in development, and its islands are mostly named after citrus fruit — Valencia, Mikan, Navel, Trovita, Kumquat, Pummelo, Tangelo and Hamlin among them.
• Tracey’s name comes from “trace” and “sketch it”; his Japanese name, Kenji, may be a nod to Pokémon artist Ken Sugimori. His hair is black in the cel-painted episodes and olive green once the series went digital.
• The Rivals was the first Pokémon animation coloured digitally and Pokémon World the first English opening made partly with digital effects — but the episodes themselves stayed on hand-painted cels until Here’s Lookin’ at You, Elekid in Master Quest.
• The GS Ball was meant to set up a Celebi storyline in Johto; when Celebi became the star of the fourth movie the idea was dropped, and the Ball was left with Kurt in EP143 “with the hopes that viewers would eventually forget about it”.
• At 28 letters Adventures in the Orange Islands is the longest season name in the English dub, and it has at least four official variants: Orange Island Adventures on Kids’ WB!, Adventures On The Orange Islands and Adventures on the Orange Islands on older DVDs, and Adventures in the Orange Islands today.
• Drake is the only official Gym Leader in the anime who never hands out a badge — and he shares his English name with Hoenn’s Dragon-type Elite Four member in Ruby and Sapphire.
• Ash’s Lapras uses only two moves on screen all season, Ice Beam and Water Gun, and fights just one official battle (against Drake’s Gengar) — yet it ferries the group across almost the entire archipelago, and returns at the head of its own herd in Lapras of Luxury (EP257).
  

  

• Stage Fight! aired in Japan on 1 April 1999, the second anniversary of the first episode, and A Way Off Day Off is the 100th episode if the two 1998 specials are counted.
• Who’s That Pokémon? oddities: the Gastly of EP095 is the last time the US and Japanese segments match until Best Wishes, the Porygon of EP098 is the only time Porygon has been heard in English, EP100’s Japanese segment is the first to show two Pokémon at once, and EP111’s silhouette is a Ditto pretending to be Pikachu.
• Professor Oak’s Japanese lecture after Meowth Rules! has a Clefairy’s Metronome produce Kinesis — the move’s only appearance in the anime.
• Meowth Rules! and Bound For Trouble were both picked for the Japanese Pocket Monsters Premier 10 selection — the first by Louis Kurihara, the second by Pikachu’s voice actress Ikue Ōtani.
• The staff have said that Scooby-Doo, which was being shown internationally while the arc was in production, was a big influence on the ghost-ship episode A Shipful of Shivers.
  

  

• Several lines from the dub were reused in Super Smash Bros. Melee and Brawl, including Cissy’s Blastoise (EP085), Staryu’s Swift (EP091), Charizard’s roar (EP093) and Misty’s call for Goldeen (EP094).
• Behind the microphone: voice actor Crispin Freeman adapted the English script of Pallet Party Panic, voice director Jim Malone also plays Danny, and the closing credits of EP116 name four voice directors.
• The Pokémon 2.B.A. Master album behind Pikachu’s Jukebox reached No. 90 on the Billboard 200 and No. 1 on the Kid Albums chart and went gold; the Jukebox segment ends with EP116.
• The games of the moment were Pokémon Yellow, Pokémon Stadium (US, March 2000), the Pokémon Trading Card Game for Game Boy Color (US, April 2000) and Pokémon Puzzle League (September 2000). Gold and Silver arrived in Japan six weeks after the Japanese finale and in the US the day after the dubbed one — and Meowth’s Party, the ending that replaced Riding on Lapras, sings about gold and silver crayons.
• Trading cards: the Fossil expansion, on sale when the dub began, has holographic cards of Lapras, Ditto, Gengar, Dragonite, Muk, Magneton and Raichu — a who’s who of the season — and in Japan the Southern Islands promotional collection tied in with the second movie’s Orange Islands setting. See our TCG section.
• Continuity puzzles: Hideki Sonoda’s notes in the Japanese Orange Islands memorial book imply that Pallet Party Panic takes place a year after the very first episode, and A Tent Situation has Tracey meet Professor Oak and Delia “for the first time”, although the second movie had already put all three together on Shamouti Island.

Reception

Ratings. Pokémon went into the season as the No. 5 children’s programme in the US among kids aged 2–11 (Nielsen, October 1998 – March 1999), and Kids’ WB! had a banner year: over the 1999–2000 Saturday-morning season The WB tied Nickelodeon for first place among kids 2–11 (a 4.0 rating and 17 share each), with its audience up 82 per cent on the previous year. The novelty was wearing off by the May 2000 sweep, when Broadcasting & Cable reported that “Chucky and SpongeBob gave the Pokemon gang a shellacking” — Rugrats beat it at 9 a.m. and SpongeBob SquarePants at 10 a.m. — but Kids’ WB! still built its autumn 2000 schedule around Pokémon GS. Japanese ratings for 1999 are not reliably documented in English-language sources.

Fan favourites. On IMDb the Drake finale Enter The Dragonite is the season’s highest-rated episode (8.4/10), followed by Charizard Chills (8.1) and the Gary battle The Rivalry Revival (7.5); Misty Meets Her Match, Viva Las Lapras and A Tent Situation all sit at 7.4. The lowest-rated entries are the Romeo and Juliet filler Wherefore Art Thou, Pokémon? (6.5) and the withdrawn Stage Fight! (6.7).

Critical commentary. Dogasu’s Backpack, which has compared all 36 episodes with the Japanese originals, calls the Drake two-parter “one of the best battles of the Generation One series”, praises the animation of Bound For Trouble and singles out Pikachu Re-Volts, Bye Bye Psyduck, Meowth Rules!, The Stun Spore Detour and the homecoming of A Tent Situation; it rates A Way Off Day Off the weakest of the arc and finds the plain Double Battle against Luana an anticlimactic end to the Gym circuit, but argues that the Orange Islands “shouldn’t be dismissed as filler” given how much Snorlax goes on to matter. It is far harsher on the 4Kids scripts and objects to Tracey himself as a kind of whitewashing for Western audiences. Fans gave the 2008 DVD box set short shrift for its “worse-than-VHS” picture quality and menus.

Continue the journey with Season 3: The Johto Journeys, go back to Season 1: Indigo League, or browse every season of the Pokémon anime.