Pokémon Season 25: Ultimate Journeys — the Masters Eight Tournament and Ash's farewell

Season 25, Ultimate Journeys, is the final season of " Pokémon the Series " — the one that closes out twenty-five years of adventures alongside Ash and his Pikachu. It unfolds in two very different movements: first the Masters Eight Tournament, where a world champion title is decided; then eleven farewell episodes that reunite the Trainer from Pallet Town with Misty and Brock. Fifty-seven episodes to wrap up a story that began in 1997, and then pass the torch.

Contents

• Where season 25 fits in "Pokémon the Series"
• Airing and episode count: three timelines not to be confused
• A season with no home region, three quests in parallel
• Ash and his companions: two casts in a single season
• The Masters Eight Tournament, match by match
• The season's standout Pokémon
• The opponents, and a Team Rocket nearing the end of the road
• The eleven farewell episodes of "Pokémon: To Be a Pokémon Master"
• The French broadcast, a special case
• What season 25 leaves behind
• Season 25 at a glance
• Frequently Asked Questions

Where season 25 fits in "Pokémon the Series"

Its full official title is Pokémon Ultimate Journeys: The Series, and it most often goes by the shorter name "Ultimate Journeys." It is the twenty-fifth and final season of "Pokémon the Series", the long-running animated saga that has followed Ash since 1997. Everything the character has built up — his Pokémon, his friends, his rivals, his League defeats — comes together here, and our feature on Ash Ketchum traces that journey from start to finish.

The season belongs to cycle 7, known as Pokémon Journeys, which groups together seasons 23, 24 and 25. This cycle is the one tied to the eighth generation and the Galar region, which comes from the games covered in our feature on Pokémon Sword and Shield. It broke with the series' usual pattern: Ash no longer follows a regional League; instead he lives at Professor Cerise's lab in Kanto and heads out from there all over the world.

One point is worth making right away, because it explains a lot of confusion. Splitting the show into seasons is an international convention, not a Japanese one: in Japan, the anime airs continuously and is divided into series and arcs that don't line up with Western seasons. The fifty-seven episodes of our season 25 actually come from two separate Japanese series, and the second is not simply a continuation of the first.

You also need to keep the season separate from the feature films. The Pokémon movies follow their own schedule and don't fit into the season numbering; our complete guide to the Pokémon movies puts them back in order. In the same way, the special episodes attached to this season don't count toward its total of numbered episodes.

Airing and episode count: three timelines not to be confused

Season 25 has 57 episodes, numbered JN091 to JN147 in the cycle 7 numbering, but four of them — JN119, JN121, JN126 and JN128, clip shows edited entirely from existing footage — were never dubbed or aired outside Japan: French-speaking audiences therefore only got to see 53 of them. It's the longest season of the cycle, ahead of the 48 episodes of season 23 and the 42 of season 24. That length comes down to its dual nature: a long competition block, followed by an epilogue block.

On the Japanese side, the episodes that make up the season aired from December 17, 2021 to March 24, 2023. That period straddles two successive Japanese series: the anime series that had been running since 2019 ended on December 16, 2022 with the episode corresponding to JN136, then a short set of eleven episodes took over from January 13 to March 24, 2023 on TV Tokyo. International distributors merged the two into a single season 25, while keeping separate branding for the second.

In France, the season was first made available online starting July 9, 2022, before reaching TV on September 3, 2022. The French TV broadcast stretched all the way to November 12, 2023, and it didn't always follow episode order: JN136 aired on October 11, 2023, even though JN130 to JN135 had been shown the previous spring, and the JN147 finale aired on October 31, 2023. Belgium and Quebec followed their own schedules, often several weeks ahead of or behind France.

In the United States, the season was released in quarterly batches on Netflix, from October 21, 2022 to September 8, 2023. None of the three schedules can be worked out from the other two: the same scene could be seen by a Japanese viewer in late 2021, by a French viewer in summer 2022 and by an American viewer in fall 2022.

Two sets of special episodes revolve around this season. The four parts of Pokémon: The Arceus Chronicles arrived in France on September 23, 2022, and the episode Distant Blue Sky! aired on October 31, 2023. These five episodes are extras, not episodes of the season, even if some platforms file them alongside it.

A season with no home region, three quests in parallel

Ultimate Journeys doesn't explore a single region the way earlier cycles did. Its home base is still Professor Cerise's lab, in Kanto, but the group branches out to Galar, Kalos, Hoenn, Alola and several places in between. If the names of these regions escape you, our overview of the regions of the Pokémon world sets them straight.

The season pushes three quests forward at once, and that's its real signature. Ash climbs the ranks of the World Coronation Series, the worldwide Trainer ranking that structures all of cycle 7. He starts the season in Ultra Class, in Stow-on-Side, where Galar's Ghost-type Gym Leader teaches him a roundabout way to get his Gengar to its Gigantamax form.

That power boost lets him keep the wins coming. He beats Drasna, a member of the Kalos Elite Four — a battle that brings a brief reunion with Clemont and Bonnie — then, having climbed to ninth place in the world, he earns his promotion to Master Class against Raihan, the Hammerlocke Gym Leader. That victory qualifies him for the final stage of the rankings: the Masters Eight Tournament.

Meanwhile, Goh keeps working toward a place in Project Mew, an expedition program open to only a handful of Trainers. His trial missions take him to the Seafoam Islands, where he reunites with his childhood friend Horace, and leave him stuck with a mediocre ranking among the other candidates. He finally stands out by catching the Legendary Regieleki , which earns him his place as a Chaser alongside Gary Oak and Horace.

🧢 Project Mew's trial missions take Goh all the way to the Seafoam Islands before catching Regieleki earns him his place as a Chaser; our Pokémon caps go along on your own field trips, even the ones that end at the park down the street.

The third quest is the most personal. Chloe and her Eevee explore the possible Eeveelutions one by one, from the Celadon City Gym to Serena's Sylveon, met in Lilycove City. This thread wraps up with the young Trainer's first Pokémon Contest, and our feature on Eevee and its eight evolutions explains why this choice is so hard to make.

Ash and his companions: two casts in a single season

It's the classic trap of this season: the cast changes along the way, and the second half looks nothing like the first. From JN091 to JN136, Ash travels with Goh and Chloe, under Professor Cerise's wing, in the setup in place since season 23. Cycle 7's traveling group is also the only one in the whole series built around two boys, since Chloe only joined their travels after becoming a Trainer in the first episode of season 24.

Then comes the split. After the tournament and the Project Mew expedition, Ash and Goh meet up again in Vermilion City and realize they each want to set off on their own. They part ways after a farewell evening at the Cerise Laboratory, while Chloe, for her part, takes the vacant spot as a research assistant alongside her father.

The season then switches to an entirely different cast. Misty joins Ash from JN138, Brock from JN139: the original trio from the first season reunites for the epilogue, more than twenty years after it began. Misty has left the Cerulean City Gym in her sisters' hands and catches a Clauncher along the way; Brock travels with Steelix, Forretress, Croagunk, Marshtomp and Ludicolo.

Along the way, the group crosses paths with other faces from the past, including Cilan, and Ash sees several Pokémon he had once let go. This parade is more than a wink to fans: it serves as a retrospective, with each reunion recalling a stage of the journey. Mixing up this cast with that of seasons 23 and 24 is the most common mistake about Ultimate Journeys.

The Masters Eight Tournament, match by match

The Masters Eight Tournament is held in Wyndon and brings together the eight best Trainers in the world rankings. There, Ash meets Iris, Alain, Diantha, Lance, Steven Stone, Cynthia and Leon, though he will only face the last three: faces from different cycles, including several League Champions and Elite Four members. Our feature on Gym Leaders and the Elite Four helps place each of them in their region.

The quarterfinals are settled quickly. Leon knocks out Alain, Diantha gets past Lance, Cynthia beats Iris with her Garchomp after Mega Evolving it, and Ash snatches a narrow win against the Mega Metagross of Steven Stone, the Hoenn Champion. Mega Evolutions are everywhere in this stage, and our Mega Evolution guide details the mechanic on display here.

In the semifinals, Leon makes short work of Diantha while Ash runs up against Cynthia. The Sinnoh Champion's strategies quickly put him on the ropes, and in the end it's Mega Lucario that turns things around after a hard-fought battle. Ash is through to the final.

The final pits him against Leon, Champion of the Galar League, and his meticulously prepared team. So much power is unleashed that an Eternatus appears in the sky above the stadium — the Pokémon that, as our Eternatus entry points out, plays a central role in the Galar games. The battle narrows down to a face-off between Pikachu on Ash's side and Charizard on Leon's.

After one final attack from each side, it's Charizard that goes down. Ash is declared the winner, crowned Monarch of the World Coronation Series and world champion: the culmination of a goal he has been chasing since the very first episode of the series. The four episodes of this final aired in Japan from October 21 to November 11, 2022.

⌨️ Wyndon ends with one last exchange between Ash's Pikachu and Leon's Charizard; two Pokémon keycaps are all it takes to bring that battle back under your fingertips with every keystroke.

The season's standout Pokémon

Ash starts the season with a team that's already complete: Pikachu, Dragonite, Gengar, Lucario, Sirfetch’d and Dracovish. It's the first time in his career that he heads into a final stage with six partners this seasoned, each with its own specialty in the tournament.

Two of them carry the season. Gengar reaches its Gigantamax form thanks to the Max Soup prepared in Stow-on-Side — a phenomenon unique to Galar, explained in our feature on Dynamax and Gigantamax. Lucario, for its part, becomes Ash's decisive weapon through Mega Evolution, and it's the one that gets the better of Cynthia in the semifinals.

The season also has some great one-off appearances in store. The Greninja that Ash had let go comes back to train with him before the promotion battle, and for a few scenes the duo they formed in Kalos rediscovers its original bond.

On Goh's side, the team centers on Cinderace, Inteleon and Grookey, but it's his haul of catches that stands out: Shedinja, Galarian Corsola, Hoothoot, Lilligant, Slowpoke, Gossifleur, Golbat, Graveler, Cloyster, Froakie, Altaria, and then Regieleki. His final expedition brings him face to face with Mew on Faraway Island, where the Mythical Pokémon unleashes a power it can't even control itself; our guide to Legendary and Mythical Pokémon explains what separates these two categories.

Finally, the epilogue features an injured Latias that Ash nurses back to health and that starts quietly following him, before leading him to a Latios in danger. The very last episode closes on a rainbow, after the return of the Pidgeot that Ash had let go years earlier: a direct echo of the flight of Ho-Oh seen above Kanto in the very first episode, while Lugia had opened cycle 7 by carrying Ash and Goh on its back.

The opponents, and a Team Rocket nearing the end of the road

The real opponents this season aren't villains but elite Trainers: League Champions, Elite Four members, Gym Leaders. It's a complete reversal of the series' usual formula, in which the obstacle usually came from a criminal organization. Here, the threat is competitive, and the suspense hinges on a ranking.

Jessie, James and Meowth are still in the mix all the same, from the first episode to the last. Their story even takes an unexpected turn in JN145, when Jessie retrieves the Pokémon she had left at Team Rocket HQ: Seviper, Yanmega, Woobat, Frillish and Gourgeist. James does the same with Mime Jr., Carnivine, Yamask, Amoonguss and Inkay, alongside his Morpeko.

The trio briefly splits up in the epilogue before getting back together, true to form as always. The very last shots of the series still show them hot on the heels of Ash and Pikachu, which says a lot about the role they play: not so much enemies as a constant. Our feature on Team Rocket looks at the difference between the comic trio and the organization run by Giovanni.

The eleven farewell episodes of "Pokémon: To Be a Pokémon Master"

Once the title is won, the season completely changes pace. The last eleven episodes, from JN137 to JN147, form a sub-arc known as Pokémon: To Be a Pokémon Master, with its own opening theme — in French, "Attrapez-les tous" replaces "Avec toi." This split isn't something the distributors made up: it matches the original Japanese structure, in which these episodes formed a separate series aired from January 13 to March 24, 2023.

The storytelling approach changes too. From JN137 on, Ash rotates his team from one episode to the next, and only Pikachu stays by his side the whole time: each episode becomes a chance to see a specific Pokémon again, often one he had left in Pallet Town or released. Misty follows the same pattern with the Cerulean Gym Pokémon, with Psyduck as the exception.

🔑 From JN137 on, Ash's team changes from one episode to the next and Pikachu is the only one who stays until the very end; our Pokémon keychains play that same role in your pocket: the companion that goes everywhere with you.

What follows is an affectionate retrospective. Ash sees his Lapras, his Squirtle and other former companions again, crosses paths once more with friends from several cycles, and escorts Latias to Latios. None of it has any competitive stakes: the season has already settled that question, and devotes itself entirely to remembering the journey.

The high point is a definition. Back home alone in Pallet Town, Ash finally puts into words what "Pokémon Master" means to him: meeting the Pokémon of the whole world and becoming their friend, rather than collecting titles. He then sets off again with Pikachu, with no announced destination — an open ending rather than a neatly closed one.

The French broadcast, a special case

France discovered this season under unusual conditions. The first episodes were made available online as early as July 9, 2022, nearly two months before they reached TV on September 3, 2022. This gap between online release and TV broadcast recurred over part of the season.

After that, the airing order became downright irregular. Episodes JN130 to JN135 aired between May and June 2023, but JN136 had to wait until October 11, 2023, and the final sub-arc aired as a block at the end of October: JN137 and JN138 on October 21, JN145 and JN146 on October 30, and JN147 on October 31, 2023. The season's last French air date is November 12, 2023, for JN144.

The other French-speaking territories had their own schedules. Belgium often aired episodes in blocks of four or five on the same date, while Quebec kept a more regular weekly pace, finishing the season in mid-October 2023. These three French-language schedules almost never line up.

Finally, when it comes to titles, the French version is the reference. The French episode titles are not simple translations of the English ones: "L'arc-en-ciel et le maître Pokémon !" for the finale, or "Le Bon, la Brute et le Veinard !", follow their own logic and deserve to be quoted as they are.

What season 25 leaves behind

On December 16, 2022, it was announced that "Pokémon the Series" would end in 2023, after the episodes that wrapped up season 25. This season is therefore the deliberate final chapter of a twenty-five-season whole, spread across seven cycles, from the Indigo League to Ultimate Journeys. It also closes the only cycle in which Ash operated out of a lab: he had already stayed put in Alola, but based at a school and at Professor Kukui's house.

Its contribution is twofold. It finally resolves the question raised in the very first episode in 1997 — can Ash become the very best? — and it refuses to make that the end of the road, since the character sets out again after redefining his own goal. Many viewers see this as the reason the series didn't need a heavier epilogue.

What comes next is not one more season in this count. "Pokémon Horizons" is an entirely separate anime series, with new protagonists and numbering that starts over at 1: Liko and Roy replace Ash, and the story is not a continuation of his. It premiered on April 14, 2023 in Japan on TV Tokyo, and on December 9, 2023 in France on Canal J.

For anyone discovering the series today, season 25 is a point of arrival before it's a point of entry. It assumes you know at least cycle 7 and, ideally, the broad strokes of the earlier cycles, since it relies so heavily on reunions. Going through Ash's complete journey first is the best way to grasp its full impact.

Season 25 at a glance

Frequently Asked Questions

• How many episodes are in Pokémon season 25?
  Season 25, Pokémon Ultimate Journeys: The Series, has 57 episodes numbered JN091 to JN147, of which only 53 were dubbed and aired in French: JN119, JN121, JN126 and JN128, which are clip shows, were never released outside Japan. The last eleven, from JN137 to JN147, form a separate sub-arc titled Pokémon: To Be a Pokémon Master. Four special episodes of Pokémon: The Arceus Chronicles and the episode Distant Blue Sky! revolve around the season without being counted in that total.
• Is season 25 really the last season with Ash?
  Yes. Season 25 is the twenty-fifth and final season of Pokémon the Series, the saga devoted to Ash since 1997. The end of the series was announced on December 16, 2022, and the season closes with eleven farewell episodes aired in Japan from January 13 to March 24, 2023. Ash is not the hero of the Pokémon anime series that follows it.
• Does Ash win the Masters Eight Tournament?
  Yes. Ash beats Steven Stone in the quarterfinals, then Cynthia in the semifinals thanks to Mega Lucario, and finally Leon in the final, when his Pikachu knocks out the Galar League Champion's Charizard. He is crowned Monarch of the World Coronation Series and world champion, the culmination of a goal he had pursued since the very first episode of the series.
• What is the "Pokémon: To Be a Pokémon Master" sub-arc?
  It's the name given to the last eleven episodes of season 25, from JN137 to JN147. They bring a new opening theme, a new pace and a new cast: Ash rotates his team from one episode to the next, with only Pikachu staying the whole time, and he reunites with Misty and then Brock. This split isn't an international invention; it matches the original Japanese series aired in early 2023.
• Who travels with Ash in season 25?
  The cast changes partway through the season. From JN091 to JN136, Ash travels with Goh and Chloe, under Professor Cerise's supervision. After they part ways, Misty joins him from JN138 and Brock from JN139, reforming the trio of the very first seasons for the epilogue. Jessie, James and Meowth are there from the first episode to the last.
• When did season 25 air in France?
  The first episodes were released online on July 9, 2022, then aired on TV starting September 3, 2022. The French broadcast stretched until November 12, 2023, in an irregular order: the JN147 finale aired on October 31, 2023, before some episodes that come earlier in the numbering. Belgium and Quebec followed different schedules.
• What happens after season 25?
  A new anime series takes over: Pokémon Horizons. It is not a continuation of Ash's adventures but a separate series, with new protagonists, Liko and Roy, and season numbering that starts over at 1. It premiered on April 14, 2023 in Japan on TV Tokyo and on December 9, 2023 in France on Canal J.

In short