Pokemon Journeys Is Setting The Stage For Paul's Return

05/26/2022 10:49 am EDT

Pokemon Journeys has been teasing Paul's major return to the anime for quite a while, and it seems that a future title for an upcoming episode of the series has revealed when one of Ash Ketchum's biggest rivals will actually make their comeback to the series! The newest iteration of the anime has already brought back some of Ash's best friends and foes in the episodes so far, but fans have been holding out to see some of the most favorite rivals returning to the series. With the fourth opening theme sequence for the series, Pokemon has been steadily getting ready for one of these big returns in question.  

As Pokemon Journeys gets ready for the grand finale with its latest slate of episodes, one of the big returns fans had been bracing for was Paul's. Before the Masters Eight lineup was officially revealed it had seemed like Ash's former rival might have worked his way into the top trainers of the world, but with it confirmed to feature a lot of regional champions there was no way to gauge when Paul would actually return. Thankfully, it seems like he's coming in Episode 114 of the series, which is airing on June 10th in Japan. 

Ash has been gearing up for the start of the Masters Tournament in these past few episodes, and according to the title for Episode 112 (as spotted by @AnipokeFandom on Twitter), Ash will be taking on Paul as part of some special training for the final tournament, "Special training: Battle of Flames! [Paul vs. Ash!]" With Ash getting ready to take on some of his toughest challengers yet as he handles the champions from many of the other regions of the series, it only makes sense for him to train for it with one of his most challenging rivals. 

The last time we had seen Paul in action, he was very adamant about his particular way of training and this ultimately led to his big clash with Ash over the course of their series. But as the franchise continues, we'll see whether or not Paul has grown as much as many of the other returning characters have been shown to grow already. What do you think? Are you excited to see Paul come back to the Pokemon anime? What are you hoping to see from his battle with Ash? Let us know all of your thoughts about it in the comments! You can even reach out to me directly about all things animated and other cool stuff @Valdezology on Twitter!

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