SM025

A Team-on-Team Tussle!

SM025   EP964 クリスタル争奪戦！ロケット団対スカル団！！ Fighting for a Crystal! Rocket Gang VS Skull Gang!!

First broadcast Japan May 4, 2017 United States July 29, 2017

English themes Opening Under The Alolan Sun Ending

Japanese themes Opening アローラ!! Ending ポーズ

Credits Animation Team Kato Screenplay 冨岡淳広 Atsuhiro Tomioka Storyboard 飯島正勝 Masakatsu Iijima Assistant director 渡辺正彦 Masahiko Watanabe Animation director 篠原隆 Takashi Shinohara No additional credits are available at this time.

Screenshots on Filb.de Preview thread on BMGf Closed Original review thread on BMGf Dub review thread on BMGf

A Team-on-Team Tussle! (Japanese: クリスタル争奪戦！ロケット団対スカル団！！ Fighting for a Crystal! Rocket Gang VS Skull Gang!!) is the 25th episode of the Sun & Moon series, and the 964th episode of the Pokémon anime. It first aired in Japan on May 4, 2017 and in the United States on July 29, 2017.

Spoiler warning: this article may contain major plot or ending details.

Blurb

Team Rocket hatches a new evil scheme after spying on Ash and his friends practicing their Z-Moves at the Pokémon School. They’ll need a Z-Crystal to pull off those special moves, and they’ve discovered one! But it’s guarded by an enormous Alolan Raticate, and Team Skull’s interest in the same Z-Crystal complicates matters further…

Plot

This plot summary is incomplete. Please feel free to edit this plot summary to add missing sections and complete it.

When Team Rocket spy on Ash and Kiawe demonstrating their Z-moves, they're determined to find their own Z-crystals. But Team Skull wants them too!

Major events

• Team Rocket learns about Z-Moves and Z-Crystals.
• Team Rocket encounters Team Skull for the first time.
• Team Rocket and Team Skull fight for a Darkinium Z, which Team Rocket take for themselves.

For a list of all major events in the anime, please see the history page.

Debuts

Pokémon debuts

Characters

Humans

Dare da?

• Ash
• Lana
• Kiawe
• Lillie
• Sophocles
• Mallow
• Jessie
• James
• Professor Kukui
• Tupp
• Zipp
• Rapp

Pokémon

Who's That Pokémon?: Raticate (Alola Form) (US and international), Garbodor (Japan)

• Pikachu (Ash's)
• Meowth (Team Rocket)
• Wobbuffet (Jessie's)
• Rotom (Rotom Pokédex)
• Popplio (Lana's)
• Charizard (Kiawe's; Ride Pokémon)
• Turtonator (Kiawe's)
• Vulpix (Lillie's; Alola Form; Snowy)
• Togedemaru (Sophocles's)
• Steenee (Mallow's)
• Mimikyu (Jessie's)
• Mareanie (James's)
• Komala (Samson Oak's)
• Zubat (Rapp's)
• Salandit (Tupp's)
• Garbodor (Zipp's)
• Bewear (anime)
• Rattata (Alola Form; multiple)
• Raticate (Alola Form; multiple; one Totem)
• Wingull (×3)

Trivia

• Poké Problem: What Totem Pokémon will appear in today's episode?
  • Host: James
  • Choices: Gumshoos, Alolan Raticate, Toucannon, Bewear
  • Answer: Alolan Raticate
• Rotom sings a part of Pose while listing the types of each Z-Crystal replica presented by Professor Kukui.
• TRMeowth ([[{{{2}}} (move)|{{{2}}}]]) tries to perform Iyami's "Shesh" pose from Osomatsu-kun near the end of the episode.
• Ash, Mallow, Kiawe, Lillie, Lana, and Sophocles, and Sophocles's Togedemaru narrate the preview for the next episode.

Errors

Dub edits

• The Japanese text depicting Inferno Overdrive and Gigavolt Havoc's names are edited out in the dub.

In other languages

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