Back
"The Legend of Dratini" tells the tale of a trigger-happy, grouchy old warden of the Safari Zone and the Pokémon he loved as a child. When Ash, Misty, Brock and Pikachu come across him, they get the legal permission they need to catch Pokémon in the Safari Zone. Oh goody! Will Ash finally get a new Pokémon? As a matter of fact, he does. Ash catches a Tauros! And another! And another! Finally he gets about twenty of these bull-like Pokémon, which are then sent to Professor Oak of course. See what we miss!
Anyway, while Ash and his friends are out searching the Safari Zone, Team Rocket wants that mysterious Pokémon that only the warden knows the whereabouts of, the one he's kept secret since his childhood. This is because the Pokémon is none other than the rare dragon Dratini! Using such hideous torture devices as Meowth's singing and a tickle machine, Team Rocket learns of the secret pool hidden in the Safari Zone where Dratini is hiding. They leave the warden tied up in the tickle machine and take off.
When Ash and his friends return to the warden's cabin, they free him and find out about Team Rocket's devious plot. They have to do something! So the warden leads them to the pool deep in the Zone, where Team Rocket is just about to use explosives to knock out all the water Pokémon in the pool. Ash bravely dives in to stop the bomb, but runs out of air. Suddenly he's rescued by Dragonair!
The bomb sends Team Rocket blasting off again, and it is revealed that it isn't the Dratini in the pool that the warden loved as a child, it's the Dragonair! It has grown up, and the Dratini is its offspring. Once again, Ash and friends have managed to save the day, see new Pokémon, and even catch some we didn't know about!
Now, why did this wonderful episode fail to be translated? The answer lies in the Safari Zone warden. He is actually quite trigger-happy, taking some shots at Team Rocket. The translators felt that this was too violent for Pokémon viewers. This makes me so mad! We, living in the time of Power Rangers, Big Bad Beetleborgs and many more, can't take one guy shooting a gun! What an outrage! So because of this, we missed out on "The Legend of Dratini."