Pikachu in Pictures Chapter 1: To Build a Franchise

Welcome to “Pikachu in Pictures,” where Wolfman explores the insanity of the Pokémon anime and its corresponding films. Remember, this is five episodes to a movie, in this case the first movie. And I’ll be playing with a new format than “Dispatch from the Dive,” to better suit the subject matter. I might play with it some more. We’ll see.

Episodes reviewed:

EP001: “Pokémon – I Choose You!” (April 1, 1997). Ten-year-old Ash Ketchum starts his journey as a Pokémon Trainer and is gifted the ornery electric mouse Pikachu. After suffering humiliations on his first day, Ash finally earns Pikachu’s respect by protecting it from a flock of Spearow.
EP011: “Charmander – The Stray Pokémon” (June 10, 1997). Ash, Pikachu, and their friends Misty and Brock find a Charmander abandoned by its trainer. After they save it from a storm, and it saves Pikachu from the villainous Team Rocket, Charmander rejects its abusive owner and joins Ash’s team.
EP014: “Electric Shock Showdown” (July 1, 1997). Pikachu is demolished in Ash’s first fight against Gym Leader Lt. Surge and his equally imperious Raichu. Instead of forcibly evolving Pikachu against its wishes, they win in a rematch by exploiting its unique talents.
EP020: “The Ghost of Maiden’s Peak” (August 12, 1997): While traveling through a port town, Brock and Team Rocket’s James are seduced by a ghost that turns out to be a Gastly. Hijinks and “Venustoise” ensue.
EP043: “The March of the Exeggutor Squad” (May 7, 1998). While visiting a carnival, a deeply creepy magician coerces Misty into helping his act and hypnotizes Ash into capturing a colony of Exeggutor… only for them to go berserk under mass hypnosis.

I don’t remember when Pokémon came to America. I was seven at the time. But I felt it happen. In 1996 Japan, Pokémon Red & Green were a sort of light sleeper hit; after years of troubled development their sales kept climbing on word of mouth and strong reviews. The anime, the merchandising, all of that was built off the success of the games. But when it was localized, all of that dropped at once like a bomb. Pokémon came here a ready-made fad that was written up in TIME Magazine and castigated by politicians. It was inescapable whether you were a gamer, a kid, and especially a parent. And the cartoon, which I saw largely in full, was the most visible part. You didn’t have to own a Game Boy to watch it, and the merchandising tended to draw from it over the weird and bizarre sprites of the original games.

It’s a weird show, Pokémon (later renamed Pokémon: Indigo League and Pokémon the Series: The Beginning to differentiate it from the many shows that succeeded it). While developer Game Freak had done an extensive amount of largely unreleased world-building, the nature of the “world of Pokémon” was still very nebulous. Were there other animals, or were Pocket Monsters the only fauna? Was there more to the world than this one loose take on Japan’s Kantō region, and was it actual Kantō or a fictional setting? And how could we as viewers understand the relationship between man and ‘Mon? Largely, the first era of the anime was spent finding the edges. The illusion of a “real world” mongoose attacks the cartoon snake Ekans, Pocket Monsters are part of every aspect of the world, and the realities of living with them are poked at and explored.

Image: Bulbapedia. For instance: swarms of Spearow (and Beedrill, and Ursaring) are TERRIFYING.

Our guide is Ash. He’s a perfectly serviceable shōnen protagonist (though this show’s age rating technically disqualifies it from being proper shōnen, which is the most pedantic thing I’ve ever said for this site): loud, dumb, nice, and invested in the world. Pokémon’s inherently problematic premise, where you catch instantly loyal animals and pit them fight each other, was always obvious. Even if it wasn’t, it’d be a fool’s errand to replicate the experience of dutifully catching every monster on every route as a television drama. So after his embarrassing outing in the premiere—you know, where he shouts “enjoy your last moments of freedom, Pidgey!”—we see Ash as someone who’s obsessed with Pokémon but also protective of them. He doesn’t force Pikachu to evolve like I did with my Hisuian Voltorb, he mostly catches creatures that want to be caught, and he talks about the right way to train. Ash ain’t exactly Ben Sisko, but he is what this series needs to prove it can exist beyond a Game Boy screen.

Naturally, everyone else, even spunky mascot Pikachu, revolve around him. There’s his caustic friend Misty, with whom he sparked a Shipping war that’s still talked of in legend. There’s Brock, here to be the boring token adult (and thanks to his horniness is the furthest the show gets from its children’s show space). And then there’s glorious Team Rocket. While Ash’s sincerity is fine, Jessie, James, and Meowth are kind of fully formed stars. They were always destined to appeal to an auxiliary older audience—which, hey, just turned 32 here. It’s abundantly clear that 4Kids, the controversial localization studio that dubbed the show for the first decade of its existence, enjoyed writing for them most.

While the episode listing I made cuts a lot of things (the formal debuts of almost every main character, Ash setting off on the path to challenge Kanto’s eight Gyms…), it also shows and expands on a lot of things you see in the games. We have the Pokémon Centers, plenty of captures and interactions, even a Gym battle—one of the few actually good ones of this first season, as I remember. The show recognizes that, perhaps even more than most action-heavy franchises, it often needs to tell its stories through fights. The aspect of catching and training demands it. The unerring turn-based nature of the games’ fights is another aspect that’s smartly ignored in favor of something closer to sports. It’s actually, genuinely interesting. It means that any human with a Pokémon can also take part in these duels just by being a coach.

Image: Wattpad. I guess Gastly also preceded the surprisingly large number of “ghost girls” you find in the games.

Being so many things—adaptation of a new and rapidly growing property, part of a huge boom in anime exports, being from the Nineties—also makes the show deeply odd even apart from its franchise. In “ March of the Exeggutor Squad,” a magician with a Moe Howard haircut and Woody Allen voice browbeats Misty into being his assistant, hypnotizes Ash to help enslave a race of living coconut trees, almost destroys a town, but it’s really just about how he needs to believe in himself. It’s bizarre and awful, and while plenty of cartoons have always been bizarre and awful in their own ways, it’s a kind that’s just so specific to its era. It’s not all bad; a lot of the weirdness in “The Ghost of Maiden’s Peak” is pretty fun (if largely for the clumsy way in which its super-specific Japanese cultural idioms are translated into English). But it’s definitely of its time. The many quirks and odd comedy bits make it feel kinda unreal.

And Pokémon does show its age. The animation is staticy, like a lot of Nineties anime (which is to say it’s still much nicer than a lot of the decade’s American brand extension cartoons). Brock’s skirt-chasing antics were old even then and have aged like day-old sashimi. The dub by 4Kids is… serviceable, and just as indicative of the time, though I do think the cast was stronger in Episodes 20 and 43 than they were in the first three. Again, an issue with how I’m handling this. I wonder if I’d have seen Veronica Taylor (Ash), Rachel Lillis (Misty, Jessie), and Eric Stuart (Brock, James, like a billion Pokémon) settle into their roles more smoothly had I been watching the whole thing.

More than anything, these five episodes were fascinating to watch, even if they were only so representative of a season I’m pretty sure I remember well. They show an imaginative and limited attempt to define a world that calls for definition. The Pokémon franchise lends itself to exciting settings and interpretations, especially with the games only able to do so much. Unfortunately, the show’s interest in what makes its brand tick did not extend well enough into its theatrical debut.

Movie Reviewed: Pokémon: The First Movie – Mewtwo Strikes Back (July 18, 1998)

After killing its creators and breaking free of servitude, the Frankensteinian Mew clone Mewtwo tricks Ash, his friends, and other Trainers in a scheme to clone their Pokémon and remake the world. While their greater martial strength gives the clones an edge in a melee between copy and original that even sucks in Mew, Mewtwo realizes that human Trainers are not evil after Ash sacrifices himself to save Pikachu.

Now, if the TV show was big, this movie—which confidently calls itself The First Movie, as if it knew there’d be twenty more—felt even bigger to kids like me. It was Pokémon on the big screen, in front of the world and able to be shredded by film critics. It kept the promotional engine going with bonus trading cards. That extended to being the debut of Generation II’s Donphan for much of the world, something pretty much every successive film would do. It was, for better and worse, a huge leap.

It’s not really… good, though, is it? Perhaps this is a hot take even among my own generation, but I don’t think this stands the test of time. The biggest problem is that it tries to kinda have its cake and eat it with regard to that moral issue of Pokémon ownership. The source of Mewtwo’s hatred of the world (being exploited by humans from even before its birth) is downplayed, and the heavy-handed message about the wrongness of violence feels cheap when this series is built on fantastical cockfighting. Certainly the movie could have done more to differentiate what actually makes Mewtwo’s take on training or battling worse than ours; Surge and Raichu weren’t exactly any gentler on Pikachu than its clone, and Ash straight-up assaulted wild animals in Episode 1. There’s no acknowledgement of fact that Mewtwo’s fundamentally a product of the same world that lets Ash follow his dreams. The franchise needs to ask itself these questions every so often, so it’s frustrating it pulled its punch so early and in such a huge venue.

Image: Bulbapedia. I also think that it’d have been good to do more with Mew, who sort of shows up out of obligation to the plot more than anything else.

I kinda… get the sense that this story was built more around trying to come close to crossing brand lines and throwing out hard pitches than making a substantial point. Just look at all the stuff that would’ve been unacceptable for the show. Murders! A Pokémon who’s a Trainer! A Trainer stealing other Trainers’ Pokémon! Ash dying! Mewtwo Strikes Back pokes at the conventions and makes gestures about upsetting them, but it always folds. Ending it with the cast getting mass amnesia is kind of the cherry on top.

The whole thing’s also structured weirdly. Dramatic beats are immediately followed by Team Rocket schtick, Ash’s death and resurrection is a terrible climax, and the whole Jungian flood is bizarre. It’s also in a weird place where it’s following on from stuff in the show (which had established that Team Rocket boss Giovanni was the financial backing behind Mewtwo’s creation, though delays meant those scenes aired after it left theaters) but doesn’t impact it, something that’s admittedly true of pretty much every anime movie. There was the Mewtwo Returns special years later, but even that doesn’t really matter much. Maybe if there had been some intrigue, or if we got to spend more time with Mewtwo, it’d have worked better.

That’s a sour note, and an earned one, but I shouldn’t end without saying that the film succeeds in one important regard: it feels like a movie. Maybe a cheaper, direct to TV movie, but it is grander than three episodes stapled together. There’s a giant castle and a world-ending threat. Mewtwo’s motivations and role aren’t great, but it feels appropriately big as a villain. Ash even gets to survive an ocean storm, even if his friends are mostly on hand to make declarative statements (which in Misty’s case reflects how more passive she got after taking care of the Gen II mascot Togepi, which happened well after our last episode). So they got that part okay; hopefully Movie 2 will take it further, and do better with the actual meat of its plot this time.

Conclusion:

I’m not really sure how committed I am to having a formal conclusion at the end of these, and I’m still gonna be experimenting with the formula. Anyway, I found this week to be fascinating and compelling, even if I was lowering the volume at the movie’s terrible Minnesota Vikings joke. It’s an unvarnished look at a time when this series wasn’t as big and convoluted as it is now. There were no crazy, multi-hour YouTube videos explaining how one scrap of world-building lore proves that Sun & Moon are totally gonna be the last games in the series. There wasn’t a concrete multiverse with time travel. It was just “a” setting that was begging to be expanded.

And that’s why I’m quite excited to continue further—in fact, what’s most surprising is that my nostalgia for this first season isn’t a part of it. I’m having fun getting a ground floor look at something new, but with the added perspective over two decades brings. Maybe some of that will go away as the show gets more standardized and in line with the games’ vision, but that just means it’ll be different in its own way. And no matter what, we’ll always have Team Rocket.

Errant Thoughts:

I probably should’ve mentioned this in the introduction, but this series isn’t gonna take the many localization changes of the show into account. I’m not Dogasu. The Pokémon Company considers this acceptable, so I will, too. The only times I’ll really cover it are ones I’m more familiar with, or ones large enough to matter. For its part, the overwrought anti-violence message in the movie’s English cut replaced more existential themes that I’d guess were sizably more interesting. I do still think the broader plot doesn’t work under scrutiny, but we’ll just have to see in twenty or whatever weeks when we do the remake, with its more faithful dub.
- On the other hand, Japanese Mew dismisses the clones as illegitimate because of their artificial birth, and that’s really not cool. Anyway, the point being that this picture was kind of a stinker of all fronts; we English language types just got the stinkiest bit.
In the first episode, Ash leashes his Pikachu, smothers a bird in his clothes, hits another bird in the head with a rock, and steals Misty’s bike. He’s a damn juvenile delinquent is what he is, and in a modern Pokémon game we’d spent like ten fights forcing him to learn the error of his ways.
The pilot has our first look at Ash’s rival Gary, who’ll come up a bit in later episodes but is a ghost here. It fits; in the original season, he was never much more than just an idea. That idea being, of course, “Gary was here; Ash is a loser!”
Never noticed it as a child, but there’s a surprising amount of actor switching in these early episodes. The iconic Maddie Blaustein only started regularly playing Meowth in Episode 32 (meaning “March” and the movie were her appearances in the role this week). Eric Stuart only started playing James in his seventh appearance.
- Side note, but f___ you, Bulbapedia for deadnaming Blaustein regularly in the pages for all these characters of the day.
- More positive side note! I only learned about this like just this week, but Maddie worked for Christopher Priest at Marvel? Damn, that’s cool.
I know I was lighter on Pokémon Scarlet & Violet than most, but I’ll admit it should’ve had at least someone say “…or I’ll knock the cholesterol out of you!” You know what, scratch that; so should everything that came out last year. Cobra Kai Season 5, The Northman; just add it in everything.
You can thank, and I can resent, Cart Boy for the inclusion of “March of the Exeggutor Squad.” Hamada suggested the just as terrible “The Kangaskhan Kid” for my requisite “bad Kanto episode,” but he got to choose the final Sun & Moon battle I’ll be watching… and I really didn’t want to watch a whole episode starring a 4Kids-voiced child.
Oh my god, the “Brother my Brother” needledrop in the montage where the originals and clones fight each other. Is this what it was like for CW fans to hear “Somebody Save Me” during Crisis on Infinite Earths? I mean, this one’s at least not a bad song, but…
Galaxy brain fancast idea: Bruce Campbell as Giovanni.

Our next movie: Pokémon 2000: The Power of One

Our next episodes: (again, using Bulbapedia numbers; these don’t necessarily match with the ones you’ll find on a streaming service like Pokémon TV)

EP059: “Volcanic Panic”
EP070: “Go West, Young Meowth!”
EP079: “Friend and Foe Alike”
EP084: “The Lost Lapras”
EP096: “Meowth Rules!”

Other films watched:

The Barbarians (oh my god, this is so much more fun than “Conan ripoff by the Cannibal Holocaust guy” has any right to be)
Dangerous Men
Looney Tunes
- The Dover Boys
- The Hare-Brained Hypnotist
- Porky in Wackyland
- Scaredy Cat
Runaway Train
San Franpsycho
Stranger with my Face
Tàr (though I missed the first 40 minutes, it’s got a killer video game reference)

Other television watched:

The Adventures of Pete and Pete 301, “35 Hours”
The Adventures of Pete and Pete 302, “The Trouble with Teddy”
The Adventures of Pete and Pete 303, “The Good, the Bad and the Lucky”
The Adventures of Pete and Pete 304, “Splashdown!”
Assassination Classroom 201, “Summer Festival Time”
Assassination Classroom 202, “Kaede Time”
Assassination Classroom 203, “Itona Horibe Time”
Assassination Classroom 204, “Spinning Time”
Assassination Classroom 205, “Leader Time”
Regular Show 206, “My Mom”
Regular Show 207, “High Score”
Regular Show 502, “Silver Dude”
Regular Show 623, “Garage Door”
Regular Show 808, “Brain of Evil”
Regular Show 811, “Can You Ear Me Now?”
Regular Show 814, “Operation: Hear No Evil”
The Venture Bros. 401, “Very Venture Halloween”
The Venture Bros. 405, “The Revenge Society”
The Venture Bros. 602, “Hostile Makeover”
The Venture Bros. 706, “The Bellicose Proxy”

Games played:

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night (trying randomizer for the first time, baby!)
Dr. Mario
Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
Metroid Dread
Octopath Traveler
Pokémon Let’s Go, Eevee!

Read all of “Pikachu in Pictures” right here!