Dawn (anime): Difference between revisions

Dawn (Japanese: ヒカリ Hikari) is a ten-year-old Pokémon Coordinator currently traveling through Sinnoh with Ash and Brock. Her goal is to become a great Pokémon Coordinator like her mother, Johanna. Her first Pokémon was a Piplup that she received from Professor Rowan in the first Diamond & Pearl series episode.

Character

Dawn is notable for her confidence, since she is always looking towards the future rather than dwelling on her mistakes, although she has learned that this is not always enough. In the Japanese version, her catchphrase is, "Daijōbu!" Although not consistently translated in the English dub at first, she began to regularly use "No need to worry!" In stark contrast to May's inexperience and self-doubt at the start of the Advanced Generation series, Dawn was overly confident and assured in her own strength in the beginning.

She began her journey with her Piplup. Unlike May, she knew from the beginning that she wanted to be a Coordinator. After meeting Ash and Brock, she decided to journey with them, as their experience would likely be helpful to her. Like Ash, she is lucky enough to have seen a legendary Pokémon at the start of her journey, the projected soul of Mesprit in Following A Maiden's Voyage!. She lost her first Contest in Arrival of a Rival! and ended up getting support from her mother who told her to rely on her friends. Eventually, in her second official Contest, Dawn narrowly beat her childhood rival Kenny to gain her first ribbon.

She had a bicycle, but like Misty's and May's bikes, Ash's Pikachu destroyed it with its Thunderbolt. However, she did not mention this to Ash until more than 30 episodes after it happened. She also had a large suitcase full of dresses, but her mother made her leave it at home due to its impracticality. She also has a Contest Pass for the Sinnoh region, and her Contest cry is "Spotlight!" (English) or "Charm up!" (Japanese). Johanna gave Dawn one of her old ribbons from her days as a Coordinator as a gift for luck. Dawn returned the ribbon after she battled Zoey in the Grand Festival.

In Dawn's Early Night!, when she competed in the Hearthome City Contest, she lost in the Appeal Round, making her the first of the main characters to lose a Contest by losing the appeal round. In Team Shocker!, she lost the Appeal Round for second time in a row. This marked a notable change in Dawn's character. Previously, she had only occasionally been seen training for Contests. After the second blow to her self-esteem, she didn't know what to do and was still very upset throughout Tanks for the Memories!. After this, she began to become more focused and regained her confidence after battling Maylene in Crossing the Battle Line!. Dawn began to practice in earnest and eventually was able to break her losing streak in Strategy With a Smile! and was able to win the Wallace Cup after narrowly defeating May in the final round. Dawn has since maintained her newfound focus and humility. After learning of the next Contest in Celestic Town, she became very dedicated in her training, and actually overworked her Pokémon in A Lean Mean Team Rocket Machine!. Due to her hard work, she managed to win the Contest in Battling The Generation Gap!. In A Breed Stampede!, her Mamoswine began to disobey her after evolving. Despite this, she is still eager to train it well.

Dawn is also known to be very upset when losing Contests, specifically when not getting through the Appeal round. This was proved in the Hearthome City Contest, and later the Solaceon Town Contest.

Dawn entered the Sinnoh Grand Festival in DP174, using her Buneary and Cyndaquil in the Appeals Round. She progressed through the round and battled Ursula first in the next episode. With Mamoswine and Pachirisu and a new combination, she was able to defeat her rival's Gabite and Flareon. The following episode, she defeated Jessilina and progressed to the finals to fight Zoey. After a very close fight between her Piplup and Togekiss and Zoey's Glameow and Gallade, however, she lost. After the competition, Zoey told Dawn that Candice was throwing a victory party for her in Snowpoint City and that Dawn was also welcome ; however, Dawn declined the invitation, stating that she still wants to support Ash in his upcoming battle at Sunyshore Gym and in the Sinnoh League. She then thanked all the Pokémon that had traveled with her through Sinnoh for their hard work and pledged to not give up her dream of being a Top Coordinator.

Over the course of her journey in Sinnoh, Dawn was able to come up with various combinations to show up her Pokémon's looks and strength. This began with something as simple as making her Piplup's beak grow longer, when using Peck, a combination she used even until the end of the Grand Festival. She later followed with simple spinning, a technique her Piplup and Buneary practiced for a while in Oreburgh City. The way it was used was adapted by Ash in his first Gym battle in Sinnoh. Later on, Dawn began with more complex combinations, such as Flame-Ice and Ice Chandelier, moves that were both powerful and beautiful. After a lot of practice, Dawn's Pokémon were able to master these combinations in battle. Coincidentally, both of these were used to defeat Ursula.

Young Dawn

While she is the only female main character not to have a sibling, she has two childhood friends that appeared in the anime, Kenny and Leona, both of whom call her Dee Dee (Japanese: ピカリ Pikari) sometimes. Dawn has prevented them from telling Ash and Brock about the reason why she has this nickname, but in Yes, in Dee Dee It's Dawn! it was revealed that the reason for the name was due to her hair glittering (ピカピカ pikapika) after being shocked by the class pets in her kindergarten, Plusle and Minun, making it appear that she had Diamond Dandruff. Due to the trauma from being teased by her entire class with the nickname, she is very reluctant to let others know the origin of the name. She seems to be closer to Leona than to Kenny. Kenny functions as a rival for Dawn alongside Zoey. Zoey also functions as a semi-mentor to Dawn and helped her recover from her second loss. All three are competing for their first time in the regional Contests. Leona, however, challenges Gyms. She also seemed to be childhood friends with Barry when she was little, and was very upset that he didn't remember who she was.

Dawn in her winter clothes

Dawn is much more different than any of Ash's other friends. Dawn has more concern about her appearance, as she will not show herself to Ash or Brock until she feels that her appearance is perfect. That may be a reason why she decides to sleep inside a tent while the others sleep outside. However, she has recently been seen sleeping outside with the others, such as in Tears for Fears!. Every time she's going to be on camera, she needs to take a moment to brush her hair before going on, such as in DP174. In The Bells Are Singing!, Dawn revealed that she was the one to design Buneary's vest (but also admitted that her mother was the one to sew it). In Arriving in Style!, she demonstrated her talent for designing again, sketching many different dresses for the Hearthome Collection, though she rejected all of them.

Also unlike Ash's other friends, Dawn has already crossed a lot of boundaries that have previously only been held by Ash. She saw the aforementioned legendary Pokémon prior to meeting Ash, and is the first main character to own an Template:Type2 Pokémon besides Ash. Having caught Buneary, Pachirisu, and Buizel, Dawn has captured more Pokémon in her first 35 episodes that any of the other main characters, aside from Ash. She is also the first main character besides Ash to have battled a member of the Elite Four, and the first of Ash's friends to have defeated a legendary Pokémon in battle. The latter, however, may still be arguable.

Pokémon

Dawn's current party

Since catching her first Pokémon, the Pokémon that Dawn acquire tend to be cute and small like her starter, Piplup. Similar to many Trainers they have met, Dawn also does not have any preference towards the type of the Pokémon she trains, despite having multiple Template:Type2s.

Because of her lack of experience, she may have some rough spots on how to deal with her Pokémon properly, as seen when she bickers with Piplup sometimes. This lack of experience also reflects her Pachirisu and Mamoswine. Pachirisu occasionally hits unwanted targets with its Discharge while Mamoswine may easily be angered and disobey Dawn in the process. Despite all these issues she faces some times, Dawn still deeply cares for all her Pokémon, especially her starter, Piplup.

As a Coordinator who is willing to win the Grand Festival, Dawn has trained her Pokémon in the art of Appeals, as well as battles. She is able to fully utilize her Pokémon capabilities. A commonly-seen example would be her Buneary's capability to use Ice Beam, which was used in various ways in the Contests Dawn participated in. She was also able to use her Togekiss in the finals of the Grand Festival to help her almost defeat Zoey, despite the lack of experience with it when compared to her other Pokémon, most especially Piplup, who was also used in the finals.

This listing is of Dawn's Pokémon as of the most recent Japanese episode:

On hand

File:Dawn's Piplup.png Piplup ♂	Buneary ♀	Pachirisu
Swinub → Piloswine → Mamoswine	Egg → Cyndaquil	Togekiss ♀

In training

Aipom → Ambipom ♀

Traded away

Buizel ♂

Temporary

Grimer

Dodrio

Sharpedo

• Grimer: Trained during Camping It Up!.
• Dodrio and Sharpedo: Used in the triathlon in One Team, Two Team, Red Team, Blue Team!.

Contests

Ribbons obtained

Sinnoh ribbons

• Floaroma Ribbon (Settling a Not-So-Old Score!)
• Aqua Ribbon (Strategy with a Smile!)
• Celestic Ribbon (Battling The Generation Gap!)
• Chocovine Ribbon (Another One Gabites the Dust!)
• Daybreak Ribbon (Playing the Performance Encore!)

Outfits

• Dawn's different outfits seen in the anime

Achievements

• Unofficial Contest in Borrowing on Bad Faith! - Runner-Up
• Hearthome City Tag Battle Competition (Runner-up - with Conway) (Smells Like Team Spirit!)
• Hearthome Collection - Winner (Arriving in Style!)
• Sinnoh Grand Festival - Runner-up (DP177)

Voice actors

In the TCG

This listing is of cards mentioning or featuring Dawn or her Pokémon in the Pokémon Trading Card Game.

Name	Type	Level	Rarity	Set	Set no.
Piplup M		39	-	Movie Commemoration Random Pack (no English release)	007/022
Buneary M		33	-	Movie Commemoration Random Pack (no English release)	019/022

Trivia

• Dawn's name is a reference to Diamond, as Paul references Pearl. "Dawn" may also be a reference to "Hikari," which means "light"--dawn is essentially the day's first light.

• Like May, she has her own ending theme song, titled 君のそばで 〜ヒカリのテーマ〜 By Your Side ~Hikari's Theme~. It is the first ending of the Diamond & Pearl series. The song is performed by グリン Grin.
• On the Pokémon Learning League website, her clothing has been altered so that her white undershirt has sleeves and she is wearing black stockings or tights.
• Dawn is the first Pokémon Trainer introduced as a novice to not have a Template:Type2 Pokémon be her first evolution, as Ash's first evolving Pokémon was Caterpie, and May's was Wurmple. Dawn's first evolving Pokémon was Aipom.
  • The only Pokémon on Dawn's team that have evolved so far are part of a Generation II evolution family.
• Dawn's Latin American Spanish dub actress, Gaby Ugarte, is the sister of Xóchitl Ugarte, Misty's Latin American Spanish voice actress. Interestingly, the two characters haven't met yet.
• Megumi Toyoguchi voiced to Ran Kotobuki from Super Gals!. In Spain was voiced for Mar Bordallo, interestingly she later voices Dawn like Toyoguchi.
• Dawn's Japanese name is Hikari, and her rival's is Nozomi. The Hikari and the Nozomi are two Shinkansen "bullet train" lines. The Nozomi is faster than the Hikari, possibly symbolizing that Zoey is farther along in her coordinating skills than Dawn. It should also be noted that they go in opposite directions.
• All of Dawn's Pokémon (and those she has owned in the past) draw parallels with one or more of Ash's or May's Pokémon - excluding Ash's Buizel and Dawn's Ambipom, who are currently owned by Ash or were owned by Ash previously.
  • Dawn's Piplup is similar to Ash's Pikachu in many ways: it was her starter Pokémon, the two bonded after saving each other from wild Pokémon, and Piplup stays outside its Poké Ball and refuses to evolve.
  • Dawn's Buneary is like May's Beautifly in that Dawn had wanted to (and in Dawn's case, actually attempted to) capture one in an episode before they actually managed to. It is also their first capture.
  • Dawn's Pachirisu is a parallel to May's Skitty, in that it is often hyper and needs to be calmed down (with a Poffin or toy respectively). It is also Dawn's second capture.
  • Dawn's Mamoswine draws parallels to both May's Munchlax as a Swinub, in that it lives to eat, and Ash's Charizard in that it was respectful of its Trainer in its basic form, but disobeyed in its second and third form. It is also similar in that it evolved from its second form to its final form within less than five episodes from evolving the first time. Both Ash's Charizard, Dawn's Mamoswine and May's Munchlax were all the Trainer's fifth captures on their journey.
  • Dawn's Cyndaquil is draws parallels to May's Squirtle. Both are starter Pokémon from the region focused on in the remakes of their owner's introductory generation, while their owner is based on the female player character of the main games of their generation. It also draws some similarities to May's Venusaur for some of the same reasons, as both were given to the characters shortly after the release of the starter Pokémon's remake.
• Dawn also shares the same choice for a starter Pokémon as her rival Kenny.
• Dawn has a doppelgänger, Princess Salvia.
• All of Dawn's Normal-type Pokémon are female.

Similarities to Ash

• Out of all of Ash's friends, Dawn is the only one so far to have her debut episode dedicated completely to herself. Unlike other debut episodes, Ash didn't appear until the last minute. Also in that episode, she saw a legendary Pokémon similar to how Ash did at the start of his journey.
• She is the only main character aside from Ash to challenge an official Pokémon Gym from the games, and the first of Ash's friends to compete in an official Gym Battle in the main series since Showdown at Pewter City and The Water Flowers of Cerulean City, where Brock battled Ash and Misty battled Ash respectively.
  • Counting Gym Leaders of any sort (regardless of game appearance), Dawn is only the second main character other than Ash to do this, as Misty challenged Dorian in Just Add Water.
• Dawn is the second main character to have three Pokémon to disobey her: Piplup, Pachirisu and Mamoswine. Ash's were Pikachu, Primeape, and Charizard.
• Like Ash, she has a mother who lives by herself with a Pokémon of her own, with no information whatsoever about her father, mirroring Delia Ketchum and her Mr. Mime.
• Like Ash, Dawn has a childhood rival named Kenny who calls her by the nickname "Dee-dee" (Japanese: ピカリ Pikari). Ash's childhood rival Gary calls him by the nickname "Ashy-boy" (Japanese: サトシくん Satoshi-kun).
• Like Ash, she has an Electric-type Pokémon that is based on a rodent.
  • She also owns a Cyndaquil.
• Like Ash, Dawn imagined each of the Sinnoh starters before her journey began. She selected the Water-type starter (Piplup), which was Ash's original type choice (Squirtle) in Kanto.

Names

Related articles

• Episodes focusing on Dawn
• Dawn (game)

External links

• Daijoubu!, the fanlisting for Dawn
• Hikari's Profile on Pokeani (Japanese)
• Hikari's Pokémon on Pokeani (Japanese)

On Bulbagarden forums

• The Dawn Club

Dawn's Pokémon
On hand:	Piplup	Buneary	Pachirisu	Mamoswine	Quilava	Togekiss
In training:	Ambipom
Traded away:	Buizel
Released:	Oshawott
Temporary:	Pikachu	Croagunk	Chimchar	Staravia	Grimer	Dodrio
	Sharpedo

This article is part of Project Anime, a Bulbapedia project that covers all aspects of the Pokémon anime.