JN137

The Road Most Traveled! (Japanese: はじまりのかぜ！むげんのみち！！ Winds of Beginning! The Road!!) is the first episode of Pokémon: To Be a Pokémon Master, the 137th episode of Pokémon Journeys: The Series, and the 1,222nd episode of the Pokémon animated series. It first aired in Japan on January 13, 2023, in Canada on May 13, 2023, in South Africa on May 23, 2023, and in the United States on September 8, 2023.
==Blurb==
Ash and Pikachu are on their own, visiting new places and meeting different Pokémon, and their discoveries have them bursting with excitement! Professor Oak and Delia approve, too. The Professor previously loved to wander and discover new things, and Delia is excited about her son’s goal to make more Pokémon friends. While Team Rocket plots to steal Pikachu, Ash comes across the Legendary Pokémon Latias, and it’s injured! Our hero administers first aid, but Latias remains wary. The next day, Team Rocket targets Latias, but Ash and Pikachu put an end to their plan, and the trio blasts off. As Latias departs, Ash wonders if he’ll ever see it again…
==Plot==
 and resume their travels, going where the wind blows with no clear destination. When they reach a crossroads, Ash tosses a twig into the air to decide which way to go. The stick lands and points at one road, but Ash quickly turns around and decides to take the other path instead. Mildly irritated, Pikachu zaps Ash's hat off his head a couple times, while Ash keeps moving ahead until Pikachu catches up with him. With the playful bickering over, they cross a shallow river, but Ash gets startled by a and falls into the water, with a trio of biting down on his rear. After laughing his fill, Pikachu zaps the Magikarp and Ash with , driving the away. Next, Ash tries out swinging on vines, but when he sees a , he gets distracted and hits a tree. The impact causes the Kakuna to fall down and Ash saves it. The next instant, however, it suddenly evolves into a . After a few tense moments, Beedrill flies away without attacking him, much to Ash's relief.
Back in Pallet Town, pays a visit to the Ketchum residence to greet and ask her how Ash is doing. Delia says she hasn't heard of him since he left. Ash's choice to travel without a set goal reminds Professor Oak of his own youth, though Delia does mention that Ash wishes to make new friends, inspiring Professor Oak to recite a about the subject.
Taking a break from walking, Ash and Pikachu rest under a tree while pointing out the wild Pokémon that appear near them. However, when suddenly appears, he does a double-take. The next moment, Jessie and James appear as well and seize Pikachu in a net before reciting their . Pikachu's attempts to break free by using Thunderbolt or fail, with the Team Rocket trio boasting that they've made their net completely Pikachu-proof. Confident of their victory, they turn around to leave, but Ash calls out and has him use . Though uses to send the attack back, Ash quickly blocks it with 's . With the tables having turned on them, the Rocket trio tries to run, but are unable to escape from , whose cuts the net open, allowing Pikachu to blast them off as usual.
While the trio is lamenting their failure to prepare for the twerp's other Pokémon, they end up colliding with an invisible Pokémon mid-air, sending them flying into the distance and causing the Pokémon to crash down through some tree branches and into a nearby lake. Hearing the sound of the crash-landing, Ash rushes to the site. When the invisible Pokémon's wing turns visible before his eyes, he immediately recognizes the Pokémon as a and swims to her to save her. Though distrustful towards Ash, Latias is too weak to muster her strength to fight back, allowing Ash and to bring her to land. Laying her down, Ash sees the full extent of her bruises and injuries, in particular on one of her wings, which he treats with a Potion and bandages before setting up a campsite. At night, Team Rocket stumbles upon the campsite and spots Latias. Their Rotom Phone informs them that Latias is a Legendary Pokémon, making them excited and determined to capture it. Meanwhile, Ash spots that the bandage around Latias's wing has loosened, so he takes it off, applies some more Potion on the wound, and ties another, tighter bandage around it.
The next morning, Latias wakes up before Ash. Startled by the sight of Ash and around her, she takes off, waking Ash up in the process. She starts angrily ripping off the bandage around her wing, despite Ash trying to protest that she has not fully recovered yet. Ash tries to assure Latias that he's trying to help her, but suddenly, a giant vacuum appears and sucks Latias in. Ash jumps after her and is sucked in as well as the vacuum is revealed to be connected to Team Rocket's Meowth balloon. Latias and Ash are both dropped into a glass tank underneath the balloon, which quickly gets filled with cold air to weaken the type. Though capturing Ash was not a part of Team Rocket's plan, they decide to keep him as a hostage to keep his Pokémon from attacking them. Trying to think of a way to escape, Ash comes up with an idea, and Pikachu sends a Thunderbolt at him. The attack succeeds in shattering the tank, causing Ash and Latias to fall, with Ash urging Latias to take his hands. Seeing what lengths Ash is willing to go to save her, Latias finally trusts him and saves him from the fall.
Once the Rocket trio has been dispatched by Noivern's Boomburst, Latias brings Ash back down to the ground. He thanks her for saving him and she flies up, looking at him with a sad expression before turning invisible and disappearing. Looking after her, Ash wonders if he'll ever see her again. As he and Pikachu resume their journey, Latias observes him from the sky.
==Major events==
* is revealed to have begun rotating his team.
* A begins to follow Ash.
===Debuts===
====Pokémon debuts====
=====Main series debuts=====
* ()
==Characters==
===Humans===
* 
* Goh (photo)
* Jessie
* James
* 
* 
* Chloe (photo)
* Professor Cerise (photo)
* Chrysa (photo)
* Ren (photo)
* Talia (photo)
* Parker (photo)
* Halta (photo)
* Camille (photo)
* Walker (photo)
===Pokémon===
Who's That Pokémon?: 
* ()
* ()
* ()
* ('s; Mimey)
* ()
* ()
* ()
* ()
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; ; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (; photo)
* (Team Rocket's; Rotom Phone)
* ()
* 
* (; ×2)
* 
* 
* 
* 
* ()
* 
* 
* (×3)
* (evolves)
* (newly evolved)
* 
* 
* 
* 
* (×2)
* (×2)
* 
* (×2)
* (×4)
* (×3)
* 
* 
==Trivia==
* Team Rocket Expedition which stands by the evils of love and truth: 
* One, Two, Three is replaced by Aim to Be a Pokémon Master -with my friends- as the Japanese opening theme.
* There was no "After the story" artwork posted for this episode, making it the first episode since it started in JN037 to not have any.
* This episode marks the first time that has brought Pokémon from Professor Oak's Laboratory back to his active party since The Semi-Final Frontier!, 567 episodes earlier.
** This is also the first time Ash has rotated his team since Butterfree and Me!, 435 episodes earlier.
* This episode marks the final physical appearances of Ash's Donphan, , and .
* As of this episode, every has appeared in the main series.
* The scene where rides his bike to Ash's house while and Mimey are cleaning resembles a similar looking scene in The Power of One.
* The background music played during 's changes to the song heard during the episode previews they hosted during the Masters Eight Tournament arc.
** This marks the first time the motto music has contained lyrics.
* Despite having made their TV episode debut in DPS02, almost 12 years earlier, this is the first time one has received a Pokédex entry in the .
* This episode marks the first physical appearance of a in the animated series since Genesect and the Legend Awakened, almost 10 years prior.
* This episode marks one of the rare instances of an injury being shown in the animated series.
* The English dub's outro has been updated, featuring the instrumental version of with background clips from the Japanese outro Supereffective Type.
* This is the first episode of the Pokémon: To Be a Pokémon Master arc of Pokémon Journeys: The Series.
* This is the only episode of Pokémon: To Be a Pokémon Master to not use music from any previous series.
* Ash, , and narrate the preview for the next episode.
** The music used for the preview is the same instrumental of Aim to Be a Pokémon Master that was used for previews in the original series. This would also be the case for the preview for JN147.
===Errors===
* The top of Ash’s hat changes from white to red for a frame while he tries to help Latias out of the water.
* In the English dub:
** The answer segment of Who's That Pokémon? is shown before the commercial break instead of after it.
** The subtitles misspell "Journey" as "Jorney".
* In the dub, Team Rocket's Rotom Phone incorrectly refers to Latias as a male.
* In the dub, Latias is referred to as a male throughout the episode.
===Dub edits===
* The Japanese text seen during Professor Oak's senryū is removed.
* Starting with this episode, the "To Be Continued" text is once again removed from the end.
==In other languages==
137
Category:Episodes written by Atsuhiro Tomioka
Category:Episodes storyboarded by Hiromasa Amano
Category:Episodes directed by Fumihiro Ueno
Category:Episodes animated by Takashi Shinohara
Category:Episodes focusing on Ash
Category:Episodes focusing on Pikachu
Category:Episodes in which a Legendary Pokémon appears
Category:Episodes in which an alternately colored Pokémon appears
Category:Episodes which aired in Canada before the United States
Category:Episodes which aired in South Africa before the United States
de:Immer der Nase nach!
es:EP1226
fr:LV137
it:EP137
ja:新無印編第137話
zh:宝可梦 旅途 第133集