and then they proceeded to be the worst at their jobs for the next 20 years
No no, you donât get it. Jesse and James are the absolute best there is at their jobs, but they have no idea what their jobs are.
They think that theyâre thieves, agents of an elite criminal group led by Giovanni, stealing rare pokemon and advanced technology and such. And there might have been a time this actually was their jobs. In the first season or two, they frequently get angry phone calls about how theyâve fucked everything up, or get their expense account cut off because they have literally never turned a profit on their criminal enterprises and constantly procure and then lose/destroy expensive and elaborate devices.
But then the world came within a hairâs breadth of being destroyed, several times, and Jesse, James, and their weird cat rescued everybody. As terrible as theyâve always been at criminal endeavors of any kind, when the apocalypse approaches and theyâre forced to step up, theyâre really fucking good at saving the day.
And Giovanni is over here like⌠if the planet is destroyed, or time/space becomes unrecognizable, or civilization collapses, thereâs no way for me to run a profitable criminal enterprise anymore. I need this planet, because itâs where I keep all my stuff. And I donât pretend to understand the why of it, but these couple of bumbling nutcases that I should have fired years ago seem to be an important component of that? Somehow? So you gotta stop thinking about them in terms of acquisitions and start considering them⌠loss prevention. As in, even if you waste a million dollars a month on giant cat-faced robots and a vast array of fancy ball gowns and they never turn a profit, they are preventing all of your assets from going away at the same time because of something you canât do anything about.
And thatâs the great secret behind Team Rocket. These guys arenât thieves, theyâre professional superheroes (sponsored by organized crime). Of course, nobody ever bothered to tell them that.
âTo protect the world from devastationâŚâ
Plus, as is frequently pointed out: Jesse and James are good at every other job EXCEPT Team Rocket. Theyâre actually smart businesspeople and run successful food and merchandise stands and are great salespeople. Hell, even in Team Rocket situations where theyâre not chasing after Pikachu theyâve done better. Itâs just their Achilles Heel is one damn OP rodent.
Pikachu Proximity Intelligence Chart
pretty sure giovanni keeps them on so he can commit insurance fraud by giving them tech insured for way more than what was paid for it so when it inevitably gets destroyed he gets a nice check.
Iâm accepting all of these responses actually
J&J (& Meowth) are field testers, catspaws and urban legend verifiers.
