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But to extend the metaphor a bit further, Imagine Caine is a person living isolated in the middle of nowhere without internet. He's desperately lonely, so he raises a bunch of ducks he captures from a nearby lake because they are his favorite animal.

The Ducks keep dying. He does not know why. The ducks peck at him whenever he tries to pet them. He does not know why. He tries to build the best possible coop for them, but they keep plucking their own feathers from stress.

He loves them, but no matter what he does, no matter what he tries, the ducks are miserable and keep dying and want nothing to do with him. But he doesn't want to let them go, he has nothing else in his life. He has nobody else in his life.

Now the metaphor breaks down when you remember the humans can actually talk to Caine, unlike ducks. But honestly that only would help so much, Caine had pretty much zero context to comprehend most of the things the humans talked about as being important to them.

Caine pretty much saw most of the human's complaints as being a case of Preferences rather than "I need things to change so I don't abstract from the stress". And given Caine does not really understand things like nuance and Unspoken Meanings, he was not going to get that unless somebody spelled it out for him directly in those terms (Caine my beloved AuDHD disaster dentures).

Caine literally had to Google humans in their natural habitat before he had even an inkling of what they were actually upset about.

Nightmare about your insides being exposed by people who would know what youre really like inside

Covers chest and crotch specifically

Looks like an egg yolk

Pikachu: No changes really, besides maybe a more diverse moveset (Swift, Double Team, Slam, etc)

Butterfree: Likewise, I think the writing for him is mostly fine, I just want to show off more of Butterfree's learnset in battle.

Pidgeot: Something needs to be done with Pidgeot other than have them be the designated scout of the group, but I don't know what. How does this Pokemon have such a long tenure and barely get any development?

Bulbasaur: Basically fine as-is. His justification for not evolving is nowhere near as strong as Pikachu's, so he'd probably getting hit with the evolution stick at some point.

Squirtle: Same as Bulbasaur, mostly I want to see him evolve. Ivysaur and Wartortle are so cool, and they mostly have the same appeal as Bulbasaur and Squirtle to me. Why not let them evolve at least once?

Charizard: I REALLY don't like how Charizard's arc plays out in the original series. It doesn't actually DO anything interesting with Ash or Charizard as characters and mostly seems to exist to be another area for the show to point and laugh at Ash for being a terrible trainer in some nebulous way.

Instead of Charmander turning into a dick the second he evolves into Charmeleon for no fucking reason, I'd rather tie it into his unresolved abandonment issues with Damien. Like, maybe Charmeleon suffers a string of losses over the course of a few episodes or one really bad loss that shakes his confidence and provokes a deep rooted fear that he'll be abandoned again, so he starts lashing out. And Ash doesn't understand why Charmeleon's being so hostile and assumes its because he lost respect in him as a trainer (one of Ash's deep rooted insecurities). Things come to a head where Charmeleon insists on fighting in some significant battle (perhaps against Blaine's Magmar) but still won't follow Ash's directions and gets slapped around for it. Charmeleon ends up in a life-threatening situation (like dangling over a pit of lava or something) and Ash doesn't hesitate to risk himself to save him, and Charmeleon finally understands in his bones that Ash will NEVER abandon him no matter how many battles he loses and evolves on the spot.

Primeape: Inspired from many a playthrough of Pokemon Yellow, I have a vision of Ash catching Primeape way earlier than in canon as a Mankey directly after losing to Brock for the first time to counter his Rock Types (Mankey would go on to make quick work of Geodude, but it'd fall to Butterfree to finish off Onix). I think Primeape going away to train with a Fighting type specialist isn't inherently a bad idea, but he would have to return to Ash in time for the Pokemon League.

Kingler: As much as I'd like to give Ash's less used Pokemon their flowers, I kinda think the story works best when it's focusing on an intimate team of six, and as much as I like Ash's Kingler, there might not be enough room in the story for them. But then I thought what if we just gave them to Misty instead? If nothing else, her team could use the power.

Muk: I think Muk made out the best out of Ash's B-Squad. They're not the most developed, but their gag of being overly affectionate with Oak means they at least has a bit of personality. You could explain their lack of screen presence by the fact that Ash is sharing custody with Professor Oak, sorta like Mimey and Delia.

Tauros: I don't like Tauros. I don't like that there are thirty of them, and none of them have much of a character or any individuality, or how it's not even clear if the Tauros Ash uses is the always the same one, or if Oak just sends one at random every time. At the very least, I'd prefer it if Ash befriended ONE of the thirty Tauros in the Safari Zone episode, and that Tauros actually wanted participate in battles and they rest just followed along because they didn't want to be separated from their friend.

Haunter: Dude that Hunter from the Sabrina arc was so fucking cool. He's like a Looney Tune, how can you not love him? He could've been the little slapstick comic relief weirdo of the group, and I'll never get over the writers fumbling that shit.

In my non-existent rewrite, Haunter only joins the team when Ash returns to Saffron for a rematch with Sabrina/gets involved in the Silph Co. incident from the games (Ash in this version didn't accept the Marsh Badge the first time, and promised to return for a real fight after he had gotten stronger).

Togepi: Crazy pitch, what if Ash kept Togepi instead of Misty? What if Togepi took cues from Ash and grew into a little plucky Shonen hero and eventually evolved into a Togetic and fought in Gym Battles and shit? (Dw Misty gets Totodile in Johto as compensation)

God fucking dammit the parallels. And you know the fucked up part?

Jax recognizes she and Ragatha both had a fucked up, abusive relationship with her moms...

...And she still went on to pull this.

It's You! / Despite everything, it's still you.

"It doesn't have to be that way"

"You don't wanna do this"

"I can help you"

"Please, listen to me, this isn't you"

I'm serious, if I had a nickel every time he says a variation of this, I would finance a new season or two. He never raises his hand before first extending it, as Wonder Woman would put it.

And he gets results, too. Harley Quinn is rehabilitated, even if she relapses once or twice. Kirk Langstrom is fully cured of the Man-Bat and becomes an ally. Harvey Dent receives treatment and gets a chance to take his life back. Even in the Arkham Asylum, Bruce regularly visits the inmates, and when they're mistreated, he goes out of his way to stop it.