Okay, well, apologies for the double-post.

As promised, here are my thoughts about the second season of The Eon Academy. In short, I loved it, and am very excited to see what comes next!

I mentioned earlier that Justin is my favorite character this season, and the big contributing factor to that is that he has grown out of the role of Chris’s sidekick to someone with his own accomplishments and ambitions. His desire to become a police officer, his relationship with Candice, and, of course, his capture and taming of Regieleki are all things which have helped him make an impact, but more than that it feels as though he is displaying his thoughts more frequently than he was able to during Season One. Justin went from being the student least deserving of the Eon Academy to a deserving poster child and an inspiration for other campers (with the most impressive introduction from Jon to the new campers), and Jon’s nephew, to boot! His growth had a lot of effects on the other characters, changing the dynamic of his relationships with Chris, Dylan, Jon, and Abbee most notably. The explanation of Justin’s battle style was wonderful (as were all of Jon’s analyses), but it made me think that I would love to see more of this. I wish that there was some more of that present in the animated series or other fictional works. Battling style seems like such a great and underutilized tool of characterization.

Speaking of Chris, he got some good developments over this season as well. Starting off the season with his rivalry with Charlotte getting stuck in a rut was an interesting concept, and I was waiting for them to get advice from Jon and Steven with their own long-running rivalry. Chris catching feelings for Abbee also was a curveball in this season. I thought that him and Charlotte would gravitate towards each other, but now that looks like it has gone up in smoke. Throughout the season, I kept a chart going in my head that I dubbed the “lust dodecahedron” and actually thought about making it into a graphic. The foreshadowing of his catching Lugia with the “what number am I thinking of” game paid off faster than I thought it would, and it will be fun to see if a baby Lugia will let Chris show a more tender side. Along with his new Bagon and Deino as well, Chris will be coming back next season with a much different team.

Despite the changes over the break, the students largely are able to get back into their old routines. Chris and Justin get back to bantering right away and Charlotte and Abbee renew their mutually supportive relationship quickly as well. There are enough hiccoughs from the interim, and over the course of the season, which alter the relationships, but it captures the sheer comfort of reuniting with camp friends even after a long time away. It did feel a little strange at first that Chris and Justin did not invite Dylan to play video games with them (even after Dylan stepped in after Justin got his nose broken), but it helped to illustrate Dylan as a separate creature from the rest of the interns. It is something which will be interesting to see develop in future seasons. Is Dylan’s isolation due to his older age, and will it be mended as more interns cross the threshold into adulthood?

Dylan seemed more like a staff member than one of the group during this season, which is not a bad thing and it added a different dynamic to the group. Dylan’s maturity comes out throughout the story in little ways, such as his insight into Jon’s battling style during the first chapter and his working with Alyssa to help Jon keep his cool during the second epilogue. Because of that maturity, it hurt that he initially kept his investigation into Charlotte’s bad dreams secret from Jon. While Dylan was forgiven, it still struck me as a betrayal of trust to use Jon’s pokémon and have Latios keep the secret as well from a surrogate sibling and parent figure. It will be interesting to see how he continues to grow and develop. Dylan’s ambition for changing the culture around raising pokémon is a bold one and I would love to see how much he can pull off. What does he think about Team Plasma? It would be interesting to see this story take a measured look at Plasma’s goals and methods. I thought that things might get desperate against for the interns to try and use the recently-caught Hydreigon against Deoxys but (un)fortunately it didn’t come to that. If Dylan can pull off taming that wild Hydreigon, it would be a more impressive feat than Justin’s taming Regieleki in my book!

I thought that Abbee shone most in this season through her relationships with other characters. Her friendship with Jack Mason seemed to develop very naturally, and it felt like a real treat to get these two well-developed characters interacting with one another. If Justin had my favorite of Jon’s analyses, Abbee had my favorite battle between an intern and a camper. Rose had a great team of quirky pokémon, and it was really fun to watch the lessons Jon taught play out.

Charlotte turned out to be my least favorite character from this season, a shocking fall from the last season. This was not because she was a bad character, necessarily, but rather because she did not seem to be so much of an actor as a reactor to a lot of the events and situations going on around her. Compelling things were happening, with Deoxys and relationships, but it felt as though Charlotte lacked the initiative this season.

It is exciting to see the Eon Academy developing into a real educational institution, the efforts of the Minister of Defense notwithstanding. The new facilities at the start of the summer certainly got built quickly. When will it get a pool? Regarding the curriculum, it is great to see Dylan take to the role of a teacher and develop his lesson plans and pedagogy. The addition of rental pokémon should be a great boon for the academy as well, and maybe will help some less experienced or well-traveled trainers to get more out of the academy. Jon’s teaching the campers how to defeat their absent team leaders also provided a great look at what the new campers are learning, and I think that he could partner more with the interns to illuminate other concepts, such as using Chris to teach about the benefits and challenges of using a team centered around a single type of Pokémon. After everything which happened this season, especially in the epilogues, I have to ask when self-defense is getting added to the curriculum.

You also put a lot of fun ideas into this season, some of which I would love to see expanded upon or revisited. Dividing the campers up into teams offers potential for some Hogwarts-style team spirit, and the capture the flag game between Chris and Charlotte’s teams also had potential for fun. I thought that we would see more of the new students, and while there were a few nice moments, especially around the intern and camper battles, but this was not yet fulfilled. It would have been challenging to pull off introducing and incorporating a lot of new characters into an already expansive main cast, so I much prefer that it not be attempted yet than it be attempted to early and fail. This meant that there was no big finale to the summer (aside from Deoxys, of course), and the end of the season (not counting the epilogues) felt anti-climactic. The Pokémon characters also could have gotten some more screentime, as I mentioned already. The legendary pokémon got some good moments with Latios training as a spy and Victini insisting on going toe-to-toe with Deoxys. It turns out that Rayquaza can learn V-Create, so that would be an exciting scene of Victini teaching the big green guy his signature attack. Outside of these examples, and the taming of Chris’s new Lugia, as well, the Pokémon as characters were not really present. There were missed opportunities like where Chris could have brought out one of his Pokémon to keep him company while keeping watch in the Whirl Islands that passed. I won’t belabor the point, but it is something that I noticed.

Writing-wise, I think that the variety of situations and genres that this season touched on highlights your talents as a writer. The courtroom drama and the tension in the second and first epilogues respectively were wonderful, as were the science-fiction, travelogue, and slice of life educational institution elements. Each change in genre was telegraphed well and transition between them seemed relatively seamless to my eyes. There were little touches like Candice picking Justin’s old room during her stay at the Academy, and the foreshadowing of trouble in Meteor Falls were both appreciated. The effect used for Deoxys’ alien speech, while cool, was also a huge headache to try and decipher!

There were a few world-building moments which I thought were worth noting. The example of Abbee and Victini communicating psychically while delivering a false order verbally should be a game-changer. Calling moves is now an antiquated way of battling, and I hope that Jon will work more to pass on his philosophy of the pokémon trainer as a coach rather than a director, in part as a counter to this kind of deception. Candice’s career advice to Abbee about becoming a gym leader and the timeline that she lays out for accomplishing that goal seems to be the premise for a great story in and of itself. Lastly, $90 for a Master Ball in Chapter Ten seems unbelievably cheap!

And one last question, is Alyssa Drake related to the Hoenn Elite Four member?

Favorite Lines
  1. “I’m glad you couldn’t wait.” – Candice
  2. “Chris, I would go swimming with Justin’s Regieleki before I let you drive this thing…” – Dylan
  3. “If her first word is f**k, both you and Jon will have me to answer to…” – Alyssa


Now, onto Season Three!