Opal: 88 years old, the Fairy type and a quiz for a Gym challenge

An 88-year-old Gym Leader who opens with a questionnaire. Opal runs the Ballonlea Gym, in the Galar region, and champions the Fairy type. She openly considers retiring, and her challenge looks less like a battle than a job interview: the one for the Trainer meant to take her place.

Contents

• Ballonlea, a Fairy-Type Gym Inherited from Her Mother
• A Gym Leader Mostly Looking for Her Replacement
• The Quiz, and Lots of Pink Clothes
• The Ballonlea Stadium Baking Contest
• A Gigantamax Cut Short by Sugar
• Opal at a Glance
• Frequently Asked Questions

Ballonlea, a Fairy-Type Gym Inherited from Her Mother

Opal is the Gym Leader of Ballonlea, in the Galar region. Her specialty never changes: the Fairy type, and it's the thread running through every one of her appearances, from the main games to the anime by way of the card game.

First quirk: the title came to her through her family. Her League Card notes that she inherited the title from her mother and has held it for seventy years, to the point that she's now looking for a successor.

Two records set her even further apart. She's 88 years old at the time of the game's events, which makes her the oldest Gym Leader the franchise has fielded to date, and she's the only Gym Leader in these games the player can't battle again once the first match is won.

A Gym Leader Mostly Looking for Her Replacement

The character isn't there to defend her title but to pass it on. Opal wants to retire, so the Ballonlea Gym works less as an obstacle along the way than as a position to fill.

Hence a challenge unlike any other in the region. Her test consists of answering questions, and it's the answers given that decide whether or not she recruits the candidate. Demanding as she is, she isn't satisfied with a Trainer who can merely rack up wins.

She eventually finds what she's looking for in Hammerlocke, where she takes Bede under her wing. What clinches it is a matter of style more than track record: she finds something fairy-like about him, with his pink coat and big purple eyes.

The Quiz, and Lots of Pink Clothes

The anime brings her in without revealing her role. In an episode of Pokémon Journeys, Ash and Goh come across an eccentric old lady in Ballonlea who loves quizzes and questioning people; her first remark is that everyone around her is lacking in pink.

The two boys are looking for their friend Chloe, who went off with her Eevee, and Opal agrees to point them in the right direction on one condition: they have to pass her quiz. The game is rigged from the start — her favorite color isn't pink but mauve, which she keeps for herself, and saying she's 88 is accurate but judged tactless.

Mistakes are paid for in fabric. Each wrong answer means putting on a piece of pink clothing, and both Trainers and their Pokémon end up dressed in pink from head to toe. The last question settles the matter: Chloe arrives at that very moment, carried back to town by a Galarian Ponyta and a Galarian Rapidash, and the right answer was to wait where they were rather than search blindly.

The Ballonlea Stadium Baking Contest

Opal returns later, this time introducing herself for who she really is. She contacts the group at the Cerise Laboratory and reveals her status as a Gym Leader, then invites everyone to a contest held at her town's Stadium, pointing out that Leon will be taking part too.

The welcome is thoughtful: she leads her guests onto the field and takes the time to reassure Chloe that the Galarian Ponyta and Rapidash they met earlier are doing well. The Galar League Champion turns up late once again — Leon arrives after everyone else.

The contest isn't really a contest. The task is to decorate a cake, each Trainer teamed up with an Alcremie, and the reasoning is as indulgent as it is methodical: the taste of an Alcremie's cream varies depending on its partner, and Opal wants to compare what five different Trainers come up with.

🧁 An Alcremie gets hugged far more often than it battles: check out our Pokémon plushies.

A Gigantamax Cut Short by Sugar

Once the cakes are done, she tastes them all and compliments everyone. Ash's cake intrigues her with a flavor she can't identify, and she draws a conclusion nobody saw coming: she wants to battle him.

The battle pits her Alcremie against Pikachu, and it goes badly for the challenger. Alcremie absorbs and turns back every attack without ever giving an opening, so much so that Opal decides to raise the stakes even further by Gigantamaxing her Pokémon.

Things end abruptly. Gigantamax Alcremie unleashes G-Max Finale, but the sugar it spreads makes Pikachu balloon so much that the battle has to be stopped, and everyone settles for a group snack served with the contest cakes.

She's seen one last time far from any battlefield, in Twilight Wings, the short series devoted to Galar. Sitting on the couch in her living room, she gives a TV interview and shares her take on Leon: she admits she doesn't always know whether he's trying to win or lose his battles.

Opal at a Glance

Frequently Asked Questions

• What is Opal's specialty?
  The Fairy type. She runs the Ballonlea Gym, in the Galar region, and that specialty is behind every one of her appearances.
• Which version is Opal in?
  Both: she runs the Ballonlea Gym in Sword and Shield alike.
• How old is Opal?
  88 at the time of the events of Sword and Shield, which makes her the oldest Gym Leader in the entire franchise to date.
• Who takes over Opal's Gym?
  Bede. Opal wants to retire and uses a questionnaire to choose her replacement; she finds him in Hammerlocke, spotting something fairy-like about him — a pink coat and big purple eyes.
• Which Pokémon does Opal use in the anime?
  Alcremie. Against Ash, she Gigantamaxes it and uses G-Max Finale, but the sugar it spreads makes Pikachu balloon so much that the battle is called off.

In short

Opal brings together in a single character the most unusual things Galar has to offer when it comes to Gyms: a Fairy-type specialist whose challenge comes down to a questionnaire, an 88-year-old incumbent openly preparing her succession, and an anime battle that ends with a snack rather than a KO. The card game captured her from the same angle, adding her in the Sword & Shield—Vivid Voltage expansion, released in France on November 13, 2020. A Gym Leader remembered for her questions as much as for her Alcremie.