What Made Both Her Sacrifice For Her Team Mates’ Happiness In Pocket Monsters (2019)/Pokemon Journeys

What made both her sacrifice for her team mates’ happiness in Pocket Monsters (2019)/Pokemon Journeys episode 95 and the fact that she thought this would be her end more poignant for me is that being completely alone is what Musashi hates the most. She lost her (single) mother as a child and was never adopted, going from foster home to foster home... ;_;

After many failures (like being unable to graduate from a school meant to train literal Pokemon Nurses, because she couldn’t do what Chansey do, despite studying hard and being adept at skills like bandaging…) and having her heart broken and being disappointed (she let a boy she loved go alone so she can pursue idol dreams with some friends, who all made it… without her, so she lost a possible love for an impossible dream)…

She couldn’t bond with her partners and left them to be injured, just to save herself, during her training days at Team Rocket. She’d become selfish and self-preserving… in the Japanese version, the others called her “shinigami Musashi” according to Yamato (Cassidy), likening her to a reaper of souls… but James refused to run away, sick of living a life where he ran away from all his problems. He’d sacrifice himself for her and Meowth’s safety, getting badly injured and nearly missing their final exam, hospitalized. The first time they uttered the beginning of their motto was when she believed she was all alone again, much like in this scene… the Rockets in the Japanese version repeat the last thing someone else says as if to answer a question (the “nanda kanda to kikare tara” = “if you ask us about this or that” is mostly filler that could be substituted with anything else.)

Musashi (Jessie): (dejectedly, as she walks away alone as the final exam begins, even being questioned by Nyasu/Meowth where she’s going): Is this all that there is…?

Kojiro (James): (answering while leaning posed against a tree, covered in bandages, but they were only wrapped over his clothes so he could whip them off dramatically) If you ask us 'if this is all that there is,' our answer will be the universe’s compassion!

She’s so moved, she turns away to wipe her tears. “A team mate who won’t run away…”

I think that’s the first time they ever see her cry.

Jessie desperately wants family, belonging, that’s why she falls in love so quickly, she wants a family more than anything—James had everything material growing up, but not love… Musashi had near to nothing material growing up, BUT she had her mother’s love… until she lost her very, very early. They contrast each other! They’re soul mates, eternal partners, whether you ship them or not. Meowth, too, was orphaned as a kitten, never even named, and an outcast his whole life. He's also always falling in love easily, seeking a home... the trio should never be separated, they are each other’s sought-for home.

I think the falling snow in this scene, where she runs off in tears, after wearing a brave smile and telling James it’s okay to stay with Cassidy, is a very deliberate choice, as Jessie loves snow. One of her few happy memories of her depressing childhood is being made treats made of snow to eat. She unknowingly lost her mother in the snowy Andes mountains, seeking Mew, put into foster care, while Miyamoto tried to make money to give her a better life... glittering snow and sparkling tears…

For Meowth too, she lets him go. She just wants everyone to have their chance at love.

So, her believing she’ll end up dying alone, as she’s always feared, Musashi here laments her luck, but also has a beautiful little dream of her friends saving her.

Once again, similarly to the break-up episode of DP, she was the one who calmly and gently encouraged James to pursue a possible love. She also broke Dustox’s pokeball, in tears, not wanting her to make the same mistake she did, giving up on an attainable love for an unattainable goal (and, indeed, Jessie did not win the Grand Festival, despite her skill at Pokemon Contests… she made the right decision for Dustox’s happiness.)

Jessie loves her friends. Sure, she’s caustic, rude, temperamental, bitter, and self-absorbed, but she prioritizes love and their happiness. She doesn’t want them to be alone and abandoned the way she felt as a kid. She loves them so much so, she’s satisfied to die alone and suffer her worst fear if it meant they get to be happy. That’s self-sacrifice.

She doesn’t resent them one bit, saying it’s a nice dream when she thinks she’s imagined them saving her life… she thought it was her mind comforting her before her death, accepting her fate, rather than realizing it’s effectively a premonition of what will be reality… and when she realizes?! She initially reproaches them, looking mad, because she thought they abandoned their happiness for her! But no, things didn’t work out… this is where they’re meant to be: by each other’s side.

James also knows how much marriage means to her, even though he’s so traumatized by it, the word “fiance” triggers literal flashbacks for him and he climbed up a tree to get away from a teenaged girl who called him that. Yet, in XY episode 63, where she fell for Dr. White...

Kojiro: (with head down, eyes shadowed) If Musashi (Jessie) wants to pursue her happiness as a woman, shouldn't we give her our blessing?

Nyasu also had his misfortunes in love... they sympathize and empathize.

"Let's show her we're men and leave without saying anything..."

As Kojiro runs away, he sheds tears, wishing her happiness and bidding her farewell, silently. The scenes in these two episodes are clear parallels.

But in the end (including the final episodes, as rushed as that plotline was although I still loved Wobbuffet acting exactly like a troubled child of parents going through a messy divorce), they’ll always realize their happiness is by each other’s side as a trio.

"Sometimes you get good pulls, sometimes you get bad ones. Sometimes they're good, even if you think they're bad. Sometimes they're bad, even if you think they're good."