[Meta thread] Iron's PokeRole Adventure: The Skull Ruins

[Dragonstrike]

....Is that a good or bad thing? I'm familiar with the episode in question, but I'm not entirely sure if the resolution was great or not...

Could be either, really.

Quick Summary: a Charizard like Ash's that shows off all the time and trying to prove how strong they are is typically a weaker one.  Stronger Charizard know how strong they are, and thus don't typically engage in battles they deem pointless.  Charla, a Charizard belonging to the sole trainer who lived in the Charicific Valley, treated Ash's Charizard in a similar way to how Nathan's Charizard is currently treating Arete.

The resolution of the episode was Ash leaving his Charizard in the valley to train and become a truly strong Charizard.  At various points in the anime (movies included), Ash will sometimes reminisce about it, or Charizard will fly in and save the day, definitely much stronger (as evidenced by some of the moves he's learned while training there) and more composed than he used to be in the first few seasons of the anime.  (Ash's Charizard also went on to apparently have a romantic relationship with Charla).

Charizard are a very prideful species as well, and Nathan's Charizard knows he's strong.  On top of that, Nathan just got a Key Stone and has both varieties of Charizardite, which he is fully qualified to use now.  Charizard's spent a long time training and working up to this, and he's got a good idea of the kinds of foes he can handle on his own now.  (similar to Charla)

Arete, by contrast, is still very much growing and learning (similar to Ash's Charizard).  While strong, they still have a long ways to go before they could be considered truly powerful.  And Nathan's Charizard knows this because Arete isn't yet anywhere near as powerful as the Genesect Arete was effectively birthed from.

So in short, Charizard has every reason to think he could reasonably beat Arete in a fight if he absolutely had to.  He's a big, strong, well trained (sorta) Dragon (and an actual Dragon if he's using Charizardite X), and Arete's still little more than a newborn (even as exceptionally powerful as they are for a pokemon that's only a few days old).  He has no reason to fight Arete unless the Bug gives him a reason to do so.  He doesn't have anything he thinks he needs to prove.