Dawn (Pokémon)

Dawn (Japanese: ヒカリ Hikari) is a ten-year-old Pokémon Coordinator and a former traveling companion of Ash and Brock. Her goal is to become a great Pokémon Coordinator just like her mother, Johanna. Her first Pokémon was a Piplup that she received from Professor Rowan in the first Diamond & Pearl series episode. She lives in Twinleaf Town.

She is based off of the same named playable character from the Diamond, Pearl and Platinum games. Her manga counterpart is Platinum Berlitz.

Appearance
Dawn is shown to be very beautiful, wears a black V-neck tanktop with a white undershirt and a pink skirt. On her head, she wears a white beanie with a pink Poké Ball print on it. She also wears yellow hair clips that hold up her hair in front. On her feet, she wears pink knee-high boots with black socks underneath. She also wears a long red (short pink in the anime) scarf.

Formal clothes
Formal clothes are a key part of Dawn's wardrobe, since she dresses up nicely for all her Pokémon Contests:
 * In her debut appearance, she was shown to be wearing three different formal outfits when imagining herself in Contests with each of the Sinnoh starters. In her Chimchar fantasy, she was seen wearing a red dress; and in the Turtwig fantasy she was wearing a lavender suit with a top hat; and in the Piplup fantasy, she was wearing a light green dress.

Swimwear
Like May in the Advanced Generation series, Dawn is shown to wear different swimwear throughout her appearance in the anime:
 * In "Sandshrew's Locker!", "Hot Springing a Leak!" and "Up Close and Personable!", Dawn's swimwear is a yellow and orange bikini.
 * In Arceus and the Jewel of Life, Dawn wore a pink one-piece swimsuit with a short skirt around the waist in, along with some kind of white undershirt with horizontal black stripes on it.
 * In the ending In Your Heart, LaLaLa, Dawn wore a light pink one-piece swimsuit with two white stripes at the bottom.
 * In the Best Wishes series, Dawn wore a two-piece swimsuit that consists of a light green top with vertical dark green stripes and a light green piece of cloth wrapped around her waist.

Other

 * Whenever she's sleeping, Dawn wears pink pajamas.
 * In "O'er the Rampardos we Watched", "A Triple Fighting Chance!" and "The Eighth Wonder of the Sinnoh World!", Dawn wore a pink cheerleading outfit. Her Pokémon have similar outfits. The purpose of the outfit was to support Ash Ketchum in his Gym battles with Roark, Maylene and Volkner.
 * In "Tanks for the Memories!", Dawn wore a French maid's outfit to help out at the Café Cabin.
 * From "Battling a Cute Drama!" to "Pillars of Friendship!", Dawn wears a red winter jacket with a white scarf, white socks and pink winter boots.

In the games
Dawn is the female player in Diamond, Pearl and Platinum. Her male counterpart is Lucas.

As the Player
She lives in Twinleaf Town with her mother, Johanna, and her best friend (and soon-to-be rival), Barry. She recieves her first Pokemon from Professor Rowan's briefcase and begins her journey across Sinnoh. In Platinum, she recieves her first Pokemon in Route 201 instead of Lake Verity and she battles Barry after Prof. Rowan goes back to Sandgem Town with his assistant, Lucas.

As NPC
When she is not chosen as the player, she is Prof. Rowan's assistant. She lives in Sandgem Town with her father, who is also one of Prof. Rowan's assistants, her little sister and her grandfather. She shows Lucas, the player, the Pokemon Center and the PokeMart and teaches him how to catch a Pokemon.

Trivia

 * Dawn shares some characteristics with Serena from the XY series:
 * Their starter Pokémon defended them from wild Bug-type Pokémon (Piplup defended Dawn from Ariados and Fennekin defended Serena from Vespiquen).
 * They both become renowned through media (The Wallace Cup for Dawn and PokéVision and Showcases for Serena).
 * They both had a large number of rivals in their professions for the the top spot.
 * Since the beginning (especially when they first meet), they both had great admiration for Ash and his actions out of love for Pokémon (when Ash rescued Pikachu by climbing one of Team Rocket's mecha for Dawn and when he helped an agitated Garchomp on Prism Tower on live TV for Serena), and are never judgmental of and very kind to him, even going as far as always believing in Ash to win his battles.