Episode 71: Pokémon

met Matt um who's also a host there. He's a host in producer. It's Matt Asservato. Hey, yeah, thanks for having me. And I gotta say I love the main boo. It looks real good, looks really good. If he yeah, I don't even know what you would call this, but I am color coordinated and in magenta nice and yeah, and I'm in a common huh, a unique low Pokemon shirt.

So yeah. So we normally start a podcast with what we're seeking out about, but since we're covering Pokemon and it's such a huge topic, I thought we would dive right into it. But I do know that when we asked for Pokemon people, like, so many people tagged you and it made sense. I think you were supposed to come on our Nintendo episode, but you couldn't because you're also a big Nintendo head. Yeah. Nintendo. It is like my is my forte. It's what. It's literally the thing

I'm most passionate about of anything. I don't know if I'd ever want to work for Nintendo because I love it so much. That's hilarious. We've done hosting for them. I've like hosted for them, like that's like about the extent of oh yeah you have Yeah, yeah, that was really fun. But I just they're just I know, I feel I love about this is that company is that

they just focus. It's just so positive. I feel like like all their content and all their their game is all about bringing people together and I just really latch onto that. Yeah, so is that something? I mean, I assume that's how you got introduced to Pokemon was from the games? Yeah, it was the games and I was really young man, I was I was in uh I think first grade when the game came out, Pokemon Red, and I got it for Christmas along with the game Boy Color, and I just I know was before the

show I think. I think the show came came after, but the game was what got me hooked on it. And I just remember like that, that's the feeling of opening up on Christmas morning and you know, putting it in here, that the ding, you know, and and just the dune, like the dunt, the dunt dunt, and just the sense of adventure that's happening. And from the moment Professor Oh asked me like what my name was, I was like, that was the name part of what are you a boy or girls? Oh customization. I think our

friend Kylie Bear is the voice of Professor Oak. No, Oh, you would know, because he's a voice of adult go on. That's right. Yeah, he stoke too. Yeah, well he's got a great voice he does. Yeah, it's done so many world the Pokemon Oh, that's totally him. It was wild because Pokemon was like kind of, at least for our generation, this like smash hit and it was like everyone was

poking crazy. You know. We ended up leading up to having a movie and it just kind of took over everywhere, and it was a thing that we thought would eventually grow away with the nineties, and it stood. The anime kept running. They kept coming out with new versions after and it seems like there's a whole new generation of

poke It fans. Yeah, and I feel like what they've been doing, it's been so great because you know, they had the games, you have the expement from the games, and the show comes out and it's like, oh, like, are we done with the game? Oh, here's a new game like that. I feel like they're pacing with releasing content.

It's just so dang good. Well, you know, Digimon kind of came out around like a little bit after, but kind of around the same time, and it just hasn't definitely still has its fans and it still has you know, things that are coming out, Um, I know Digimon Adventure. Uh uh huh. Yeah, Well it hasn't latched on the same way or has it been blown up the same way that Pokemon has. Yeah, I think, uh, I love Digimon.

I think what happened was to uh, you know, American audiences at least because it came out around the same time Pokemon came out, and it has a similar name. It kind of like became oh it's just a copycat of this, but did you want it's like a completely different thing. Which is like, you know, it's and I don't think it latchunks. I don't think the games are nearly as good as Pokemon. You know, yeah, they're more traditional JRPG style kind of games. Yeah yeah, well Pokemon

is a little more user friendly, I think. Yeah, oh yeah. Well. Also, you know, I feel like I've said this before, the Digimon anime is way more solid than the Pokemon anime. Like the Pokemon anime, you know, there are some stands for it, but I feel like, you know, Digimon had to beat every time. The design was cooler. But thus a last Pokemon is the one that I mean, it's got one of the best dub theme songs ever made. Yeah,

that's true. I can't I will say that because you know, it was just Digimon Digital Monsters, Digimon the Champions did Ultimate Digital Monsters, and then we have Pocket Monsters. So let's just hop into the history of Pokemon. So it was created by Satashi Tajii, and he actually when he was growing up, he had a fondness of catching insects and tadpoles uh near his home in suburban Tokyo, So he essentially wanted to make a game. He actually had a magazine. I don't know if you know. He actually

had a magazine that he made. It was a gaming one called game Freak that he did with the help of Ken Sugumori. So they did that, and then when Tajii discovered the game Boy, then he had this idea to to move. Essentially, he actually was inspired by ultraman an Ultra seven, which is a fantasy television show in which the protagonists used giant monsters contained with small capsules. That sounds familiar, and so when he made this new game.

When they made the new game, they called it Capsule Monsters, but then due to trademarking issues, they ended up changing it to Pocket Monsters or as we know now, Pokemon, which is so awesome. I love that even represented in the game to see like not only is you know, the element of catching, but also like you know, he liked to catch bugs, and in all of the Pokemon games are the trainers like I'm book catcher, you know, I'm fisherman. I'm definitely shouting out those bug catchers throughout

the whole thing. Yeah, don't sleep on the bug catchers, man, I know they keep popping off, but yeah, we're talking

about you popping in the first one. And as you know, the franchise began as Pokemon Red and Green, which was in Japan, but we knew it and Pokemon Red and Blue, and it was a pair of video games for the original game Boy that we're developed by game Freak and published a Nintendo in February, which was my birthday, which is probably why I was able to get it in nineteen ninety six, making that um eight years after me

and Danny. Oh my gosh. Well well, well yeah, the game came out in Japan and then was so popular they were able to have it come out in right.

I was so interesting too because it was two separate games but the same game, which I mean now Fire Emblem is kind of doing that with the houses, but they had Fates and birthright the one before that, and and that is like a different energy to kind of capitalize on a craze because not only do you customize your character in the game the names of your Pokemon, but also you can have a choice of which version you want to have and the Pokemon you're able to

catch changes between that and there are you know, as you said, there were there are exclusive to each game, and back then it was like a way bigger deal because you want to catch them all. You either needed the link cable, which I feel like no one happened, or you needed to just get both copies of the game. You needed a friend with rich parents who bought them every accessory for the thing. But like even that weird reading light that would plug I had the reading light. Man, Okay,

so you're the rich I guess so heard it here first. Yeah, man, Like, I don't know. It was just like and now it's it's just easier with with online, everything is just so much. You don't I don't feel like you need to get the other ones. I think if you were talking about fire mb them, like at least with each house it's like different stories a little bit like you're getting different

sides of it. But at least like nowadays, if we do Pokemon, you can just trade, Like I can just trade with Iffy's Like, oh, like if you have an exclusive, but mankey on your I need to make you so I'll go to you and we'll trade. So yeah, yeah, can you walk people through what those first games were like? Oh? Man, so the first games, well, it's what it was like. The just the overall experience, yeah, or like you know, playing them on the game Boy essentially was your goal

and the characters that you ran into. I'm gonna transform myself. I'm gonna go back into the shoes of seven year old Matt and my experiencing it. It was the first time for me that I was the one. It was like my journey. It was like Matt is in this game.

I named him Matt, and you know, I was going on this journey and I got to go and you know, make new friends and allies and rivals, and it was just this discovery and growing not only with myself, with my Pokemon who became my friends, who had name after my friends back in you know, first grade. I would name him like, oh, this one's Patrick and this one's like just even or whatever. But it was like my

party of friends that we like we grew together. Um. But at the same we're not just only not only are we like just trying to be the best, we're also like uncovering like a mafia plot going on and

like thwarting like bad guys at the same time. Um, because you know, in the first game, there's Team Rocket and Team Rocket is doing this whole thing where they're trying to you know, replicate you, which is the first ancient Pokemon, and so they created me two and they did a bunch of shady stuff and like you're just this ten year old kid going around busting their chops. Uh. And that was like real, real cool. So I don't know, man, it's just I just get so happy thinking about it.

I know. It's what's cool too, is you know it's a solid formula because it's kind of repeated in every game, and there's minor tweaks here and there, but you know, you have your hero character, which is you. You have the Professor, You always have a um what is whether they called at the Pokemon Center, is it nurse Nurse Joyce and Officer Jenny's. Yeah, Nurse Joy's, Officer Jenny's you

haven't him. Leaders and you have the eleait for and you have your team Rocket or it's changed over the years, but you're your antagonist Gang and then of course your rival. And now they've kind of added a buddy to take that like last Pokemon. Yeah, I Do'm not you know, the buddy. He's cute. The buddy's usually cute. Well, I'm like, all right, get out of here kids, let me get my rival there, let me be him. Yeah, show Who's boss. Yeah.

But you know, even though in the first game, because like I wasn't aware, like I think the main weakness has made sense, like fire beats you know, grass, grass uh beats uh you know, water, water beats fire. But like outside of that, it was a lot of discovering of like, oh my gosh, like what defeats rock and what defeat the psychic you know, and it was just this like water biting. Yeah, So like that, especially that first time through, it was just like really just figuring

it out, you know. I know, it is funny the the types and the weaknesses because it all starts. I feel like it was pretty like I can see why water would beat rock, I can see why fighting might defeats kick. But now we've got we got very right. Very is good against dragons because dragons were repie for a long time. They were very They were only week to drag. Yeah, I mean, and Lance was the guy. You know, Lance was super cool man. I loved Lance.

He was the dragon elite. But it was like, it's so cool and I wanted to punch his face and I was like, I have you keep beating me and I'm going to end you. Yeah, you know, and like talking going back and talking about like our first time through, I'm remembering like every like now it's just kind of the subconscious that I know all these Pokemon they could they bring him back, you know, but the first time I every single time you see a new Pokemon, you'd

be like, oh my gosh, what is this thing? You know I used I used to masterball the first time on a Ditto because in the show that was like, oh wow, Dido can transform into anything. And I was like, I have to catch that Ditto, and I was just so excited the first time I saw I was like, oh my gosh, this is so rare, Like I've never seen ditto again. So I just I didn't even tried

a weekend. I just threw my mask ball. I got silf Coo and on this ditto and I had when I got to mewtwo, I was just using like ultra balls. I did it backwards, man. Yeah, but you still caught me too, so there you go. Yeah. So this year the games came out also saw the release of the trading card game, which was huge. By the way, it had a hundred and two cards and was super popular.

I was like the person that had all of my cards in the little card holder and then I would just like take them to school and I just like looking. I just thought they were so pretty. I did that with like all of my anime trading cards. I just thought I just didn't want to give them up. I totally. I'm totally with you on that though. I don't want anything to happen to them. Same and for me, you know, it's weird. Me and my cousins we didn't play the

card game until later. We just collected the cards. It was just weird, should not be doing that. I was thinking, I had a set of Pikachu and um, it was this Pikachu toy. I think it was like the Here No Evil c No Evil or something. I don't know, it was something like that, and I literally did not take it out of the box. I did not. I was that kid, and I just left. I thought my Pikachu was so pretty and I didn't want anything to

happen to it, and I just left it. So in the starter set where you can where it has the window so you can see the card in there. Yeah, see, I never had that. My parents would never invest that much money into a thing I liked, so I always bought boosters, And if you aren't aware, boosters don't come with energy cards, they just have other Pokemon card. Uh. So what that means is I had a whole bunch of Pokemon but no way to play him, so I

never was able to play the game. Meanwhile, my best friend Welton, his parents were taking them to Walden's Book to compete in the Pokemonage because they had the local Pokemon leagues where you would play against people and then when you would win, you'd get a badge, a physical. If you actually got badges, that's like a drink of true man missed out on it. They still have them that you could go to. I mean they're the league is still going strong. They go live on Twitch quite

often for the championships. But that you know, we'll get to this later. But even like watching like pro Pokemon fight, like it really seems like the stratus to one shot every Poke, so like it's never that exciting to watch because it's like, all right, this guy has the thing to one shot. Yeah. I never got into the competitive aspect of the of the game like that because of that I'm like, well, we're just gonna keep you know, trading in like you know, returning Pokemon and sending out

the ones that's gonna match that type, you know. But it's kind of like a gamble. It's like, oh, I hope he throws out this. But there are crazy combos that you can't do. Like there's there's moves that like can you can like I forgot the name of this move, but it was like returned to other person's Pokemon to the pokemall and they have to put through in the next one other party, and there's like, you know, there's

combos you can do and stuff. But I never got that deep into that because it was it was mostly just for me, you know. Yeah, same same here. Yeah. Was a huge year because after so they have the game release, they have the trading card release, then they have the manga release, you know, then and then finally this is when I really got into it. Finally the

following year, April is when the anime series premiered. We had Pokemon Trader Satashi, who was later dubbed as we know Um as ash Catchum, who was named after Satashi, the creator Um based on Red and another character introduced in the first episode was his rival, who was later Gary Oak based on Blue Gary Guy. So yeah, the the anime is I mean, I will be the best no one ever was catch them. So yeah, that's so iconic. Gotta catch up. You teach me. We might not have

gotten to that park, Danny. We don't know how much we can easily played because it could have been. It's back to us the first ten seconds. Okay, so talk us through some of the main characters here. Team Rockets, so you touched on them, but we didn't really talk about you know who they are. Yeah. So Team Rocket is, uh, this corporation that basically they're trying to take capture strong

Pokemon for their own purposes. And the ones that we see primarily it's it's ran by the eighth gym leader spoiler, which is Giovanni UM and he uses normal type Pokemon

to fight. But Giovann is like a mob guy and like and the people that we see all the time, or two people, one named Jesse and one named James in the American version, um because they're thieves and you know, like Jesse James, uh, and they have their me that talks that's talking to me outright, that's right, um, and they're just trying they see the speaking tune and Ashes speaking to is pretty special. It's kind of I like to think of it as like a shiny Pikachu because

is is very powerful. And they're always trying to capture this Pikachu for the boss because they're Jesse and James were there like meant to be like someone like, you know, one of the top grunts, but like they kept getting thwarted by like Ash. Now they're kind of like fools because of it. And I think there's like a vendetta because of that. That's why they want to catch the Pikachu to like get there, get it. Yeah, that's always been funny because like Pikachu is such a whatever pokemon. Yeah,

but you know, it's cute, it's yellow, it's a mascot. Yeah. But yeah. One of the mottoes of Team Rocket that you can see on the walls of one of their facility in the game is steal Pokemon for profit, Exploit Pokemon for profit. All Pokemon exists for the glory of Team Rocket. Yeah. Yeah, it's not funny that they would just put that weird bad boy in case you were

wondering who stole it? We did? It was me Team Rocket Yeah, um, yes, so, I mean it feels weird like being like playing Pikachu, who's like the you know, the most famous ever. But let's dive into some of the Pokemon. So Pikachu arguably one of the most famous the mascot iconic Pokemon we had. I can say that officially because we have Detective Pikachu. So yeah, he's his

name was on it, so he is the goat. I mean they created a whole version for Pikachu because there was red, blue, and then we had yellow, which copied the uh anime, and you were able to walk around with Pikachu at your side, and there was a big surf mini game that I was never able to reach. Everyone talked about it. I could not find the surf mini game. Where was that? That's a rule that was I don't remember. That was I don't know, Matt, remember how I said, I didn't. You're like, oh man, that

wasn't It was a little fun. That was such a fun mini game. Whoa well do you remember playing it? Like nine hours? He didn't get there? Yeah, no, I did not. Can you describe like starter Pokemon and then how they level up. So every game has there's three starter Pokemon. The standard is fire, grass and water um and so and there's and for every generation of Pokemon, there are different types. You know. There's literally a new generation of Pokemon and the original we have Charmander, Squirrel

and bobble Star um and those evolved. You know, as as you train them, you get to a certain level UM and they gain XP and you can kind of like focus that XP if you want to like gain you know, maybe you want this one to be like have higher speed. Like it's told evy training, which we've always skip that because that's very deep. Yeah, that's super deep, but we we can essentially, uh, just if you're curious.

Ev training is basically essentially hunting for specific Pokemon with like these hidden stats and you have to uh and there's like certain like qualifiers you have to do to train each of those stats. It's very very deep in the game. And yeah, I remember it was explained to me, and it was explained how to do it, and I

was like, yeah, I ain't doing all that. Yeah. So with with your starter, you choose one uh and you get to name it, you know, name you your best friend, or just leave it as you know, or you can name it something funny, so it's every time you're throwing

it out and says something funny. Uh. But you as you go on your journey, you battle a wild Pokemon that you encounter UM, and you battle trainers and they gain experience, and when they get at a certain amount of experience, they level up UM and when they get to certain levels, they then they evolve into their next forum. Traditionally there are three forms that they are two other forms that they evolved to UM. So usually it's like

level starters. Usually I think it's eighteen they evolve into the next form, so like char Mander will Ulttermelion and they believe it's thirty two they evolved to chars ard Um. But you can hold off on that if you want, if you hold the B button when they're dropout to evolve, because if they actually learned moves a little faster and game with more XP if they stay in like that form longer, So like it might be a strategy to hold the B button and and like level up and

learn some more moves before you evolved. But let us not forget in Pokemon Yellow, if you evolved, your Pikachu it can no longer follow you. And I had so many friends. I was like, well, you're shout Pikachi walking around. I'm on Bolba PDA, which is Pikachi Pikachi, which is Pokemon's Wikipedia, And yeah it is, and it says Pikachu is a short, chubby rodent Pokemon. It has a small mouth. I love how the descriptive they are with this. Uh yeah, one thing to know is that um ashes Pikachu stays

outside of his poke bon. Yeah, it's probably why it's so fit, because all normal Pikachus are really really cute and like a chubby, you know, so cute. I'm just looking at it, and my little girl's self is like, knows why I didn't take it out of its box. Yeah, we have to take a really quick break and then we're gonna hop back into Pokemon right after this and we're back. Matt, who are what are some of your favorite Pokemon? Oh man, okay, uh this is a great question.

I think this is a lot about people's personalities. Um, you know, but for me, my favorite pokem I have a few. I have a lot, actually, but my all time favorite I'll start there. My altime favorite is this

giant sleeping Pokemon named Snorlax. Yeah, yeah, and and and when you encounter it in the game, it's literally a roadblock in the game where you need to wake it up with an item you collect from the Lavender Town cemetery like tower cemetery tower called a pokey fluid, and then you need to play the poke flu to wake it up. And it's it's cute, just like I don't really know how to like a bear, like like a

half panda looking giant like green and white bear. It looks like, yeah, completely green, and its stomach is white. I love it because he just wants to sleep and like, just let him sleep, you know. And I totally get it. I feel like I relate to him so much. Yeah, and he regains health while he sleeps, so that is real cool. And he has the psychology effect where he yawns and makes other people sleepy. You want to know one of my favorites, I would love to. Yes, now

you gotta chime in Iffy with yours. Oh man, all time favorite. It's always gonna be toxic. Baby Nice is top to your Pokemon. Poisonous has blades on his hand looks brawlic you know, definitely looking. But you know who's that like Buff Cloud dude, It's he's like a legendary now right, I'm talking about Thunderous Oh gotcha? Yeah, you know if he this brought up some bad um freaking

DVI and art for me. This is uh he said, buff I've typed in buff Pokemon who and it's like a thick Pikachu and a SWEETO who is he with? Oh that was great. I'm so glad I had you searched that just for that reason. Oh my god, this is rough, baby, that's amazing. That that's gotta be That's that's one of the best. There's like a twelve pack. Oh man, it was Yeah. I wish you could just have seen what Danny was forced to see. It was like, it's not going to be in the footnotes. So I'll

let you know that I've stumbled on something. Back. You're you're that you're walking a path when you look up those problems walking a path? Okay, anyways, but yeah, I don't feel good. Sorry, I can't look away. Yeah, I have seen the magic harp that one I saw the dude where like they just wear the little fish head and it's like they're super buff. I've seen that cause play. Yeah, yeah, that's a character in the game. It's like, isn't like a Magic Harp fan. It's a fan and you can

find him and he's just so weird. He literally wears like a carp like mask thing with big old eyes and shirtless above and you item and that was one of the most fun. That's also, like we talked about being excited about seeing the different Pokemon, but the different trainers you encounter are super fun too. Yeah. Yeah. And then in the different gyms, you know, well, I love about the gym's that there. For those who don't know,

we didn't don't think we mentioned this. But you're on this journey, you're trying to collect you're trying to be the Pokemon Champion in this region. So in every every game there's different regions. Why they're different Pokemon, right exactly.

Um so the first game during the Kanto region, uh and in this region, you're you know, in all of them are trying to get to the Pokemon League and in order to which is this top four elite, this Elite four, if you will, literally called the Elite four of trainers in this region and you have to battle in order to become the Pokemon Champion UM. To get there, you need to go through different towns and fight going to gyms that our specific type of gyms like a

rock jam or a water gym, etcetera. And you have to fight the gym leader there and if you beat them, they give you a badge. Um. You know that depicts that you that's shown that you have defeated that gym leader and you're worthy to move on to the next gym. Yeah. And also every gym has a singular Pokemon type, which is very important and interesting because you can scuff your run if you pick uh Pokemon as your starter who

is weak to the first gym. For example, I think the first gym UH was Brock, which is rock uh and it's weak against leaf. So if you picked Bulbastor, you're you're gonna serve that person up. But it's uh. It's strong and water, so Squirrel, you're good, but it's strong against fire, so you're gonna have a tougher time when you rock with the charm nder. Yeah, exactly, man, exactly. So it's especially in the early game, it's like what do I do? What do I do? What have you

done to maple him all? But there's some really great trainers out there man. Yea. The gym leaders too are so cool. Like Lance, he's so cool man, you come back to land, He's got you know, he's great. A. Lance was like one of the cooler designs. I'm excited about all the new new designs too. And then I mean in the new Pokemon h the region is called the Gallery Region and there it's essentially the UK. It's

like the regions similar. It represents like the UK basically, so it's all like it's like like stone and like are not stone like a brick and their giant windmills and it's like it's like the countryside of the UK. It's really cute. But the leaders in this this and this new game Sword and Shield, which is the new Pokemon game coming out the in the November for the switch, like the gyms are giant, like football size stadiums yea,

and they're it's like an event. It's like it's the first time I feel like it's actually like a big, big deal, And I feel like that's kind of just finally taking the note from the anime because I feel like in the anime, the gyms were such a big ordeal in the games, Like it was cool, like you usually every gym starts off with a puzzle you have to figure out before you get to the gym leader. So if you solve the puzzle, most times you fight less trainers. But me, I was like, no, I'm gonna

just fight all of y'all, so mature. I'm like, high enough level. You get more XPT for fighting trainers than wild Pokemon, y'all. Yeah, you gotta beat them up. Yeah. But and I just love in the and this new one, like you were seeing some really cool guys, Like there's this guy who looks like Mario basically or like r G like, but he's like he's they're saying, he looks like he has like a Canadian like yeah, ranger hats and stuff, and uh, he looks really cool. Yeah we

can talk. Oh and this will kind of help us speed along the games. But really for the so that the one other thing we're missing from Pokemon that is across the game is there's usually a legendary and the first Red and Blue and Yellow it was the Three Birds zap does Maltris and Articuno and no matter which game you had, you were able to get all three as if I remember correctly, uh and then with uh and then after blue and you had yellow, which was

just red and blue, but you had Pikachu on your side. Um, I'm trying to see what the next run was, Silver and gold, Silver and gold, And that was the first time they split because if you had silver, you can catch Lugia. You had gold, you can catch ho Ho. And that was a big deal because now it's like you when you choose a game, you're choosing like I know for a fact, I'm going with sword because I want a dog with a sword in his mouth. That's literally dog his huge sword in his mouth. Yeah, just

huge ocamy vibes, you know. So so like that's that's kind of been the real deciding factor going forward after Red and Blue to which game you go with. Yeah,

I like hoh a lot um. If you If you guys have ever seen the first episode of the show, ho is the is the mysterious golden bird like Pokemon on the ash seeds of Pikachu after he says Pikachu from a swarm of like be drills and he sees it fly over a man it's like this the first sign that you know, like it's such a rare sight and that you could catch up Pokemon in the second game. That's a legendary gold uh man. Great. Yeah, So one big thing that Little Danny remembers was Pokemon, the first movie.

So it's had many movies, but I remember the first movie which came out in It actually was released in Japan lightteenth and then I think we got it in nineteen. Oh yeah, I was really stressed, actually November tenth nine. It was really interesting. So in Japan it was me too new, too read that too quickly. YouTube strikes back, which was positive in Japan, but for some reason for US, it says that got largely negative reviews, which Little Danny

does not remember at all. These are these are adults writing this who don't enjoy fun, but it was apparently. Film critics had a lot of criticism pointed at the anti violence message in the film about Pokemon. That's hilarious that Americans would be like, it talks too much about

anti violence. We don't like that. We love violence. And it ended up grossing a hundred and seven two million worldwide at the box office and sold ten million home video units in the United States, it's not actually very much at all. That's probably because kids were streaming. Uh now what I'm trying to think of what I was using at that time, Lime Wire, Lime Wire, another one before that, can't remember listen. I checked it out from Blockbuster. Um.

But yeah, so we had Pokemon the first movie. Did you watch all of the anime? I watched most of it. Actually, I watched all the way up through. I want to say when May came into that would be it's not Uh, it was Joe too, so like through Joto, I watched like a lot of it. Man, um, And well, I love,

I love. I watched those movies too. And those movies were so cool because, uh, look, ash Ketch him might be the goat because you might say he's a bad trainer, but this guy, this guy, I think it's an amazing trainer. And he stops like world ending like a populist ending stuff. You know, he's a savior. Uh. And do you remember in the first movie, all these movies, you would get a card exclude a Pokemon card, and I would I remember that first was it the first word? Second one

that had the ancient MW card. But one of them. You got the ancient MW card and it was so cool. I was so excited to get that ancient view card and it looked like all like hieroglyphic and stuff like that, and it was awesome. Well, what's I mean, Ash? People might say it's a bad Ash is us. You just need to accept it, Like this is how we would be if we were put into a world where there's

literal monsters that you can capture. Yeah, exactly, Like you're always going to know what to do and you'll probably make best friends with with one that you're supposed to be using, but instead you have him out like a pet dog all the time. And I think a kind

of I love about ashcatch him. First off, he's ten years old, y'all, so I don't know how time works in this universe, but he's ten years old, and he's gone through multiple Pokemon leagues and one he's won the Loland Not it's not a Pokemon league, but it's like their tournament in a Lola, which is uh, the Sun and Moon series, and he's like made to the finals

multiple times. So he's a very good trainer. Um. But what I love about Ashes that he teaches us that you know there's more to Pokemon and just fighting, and that you know it's about the bond, and and he teaches us how to how like he sees his friend, God, I love this show. He sees his friends who and he sees that he that that friend needs to go

in order to grow. And he's okay, being like it's okay, you go, you grow, you do what you have to do, and like the Pokemon remember that even come back, you know what I mean, Like he looks butter free to get let go, and you know you're talking about in a way opposite of most people I know. Everyone was like he's an idiot. Yeah, yeah, that's true. People did say that they give a lot of flak for that. But even his charges are like his charges ared was

like out really cocky. His charge's ard. That the charge's ard was fun because it it really was the show implementing a game mechanic, and it is. And it's a good opportunity to talk about something that we missed because as you notice the link cable, we talked about it. You can trade Pokemon, so you might be asking why don't you got a friend who can just trade you?

All the best Pokemon, and it's because you Your pokemon also for some reason respects the authority of the gyms, and so your Pokemon will only pay attention to you up to a certain level based on the badges you have. And there is an added thing because you might be like, okay, well maybe a few levels higher, traded Pokemon level up way faster than uh normally caught Pokemon, so you are

also racing against the caught Pokemon speed. So anyway, in the anime, Charles are wasn't listening to Ash because he wasn't a high enough badge level exactly, and he lets charge Are go. He let Charge go and then dumb move number two. But it wasn't because Charger got to grow and then charge That was his last evolution. Matt, Well, he got to experience, He got to like find his own journey. He got he didn't have to be encapsulated like in a zoo. You know. Um maybe it was

a social commentary. Yeah, well I'm still catching them all in this world. We gotta catch But Charger comes back. In the show, Charger goes back to Ash and they kicked butt together. Yeah they rock. Yeah, they came back during the Elite four, right, if I remember. No, I was laughing because sorry, I was laughing because I while we're talking about Pikachu, I just wanted to sum up some of his things that he's accomplished. But one of

them he was no. I mean he was listed. I saw that he was listed number eight on i GN top twenty five Anime characters of all time. I'm like, number eight, who's number one? Who in the heck do you think is number one? If he it better be go. Yeah, you're out here, You're on here talking about how Ash is dumb and they listed one of the most naive characters of all time, who we love because he has a big heart, like Ash, catchup. It's one thing to be dumb and strong. Be dumb and you're can't throwing

a white Pokemon. But Goku at least like he's like. Well about Goku is that he never you know, he doesn't change who he is. You know, he's an immigrant and he doesn't change to adapt. He's like who he is, like this is me, deal with it. I love that, you know, I know. Yeah, but also that, uh, if I was Goku, I'd only let my Nigerian friends call me if he shud everyone else. Um yeah, just touching on some more things from from Pikachu. He's appeared in

The Simpsons many times. He's also amazing Thanksgiving Day parade balloon since two thousand and one. Also in Topeka, Kansas, the mayor renamed the town to Pikachu for a day. Uh that's adorable. Um. He is known as Japan's answer to Mickey Mouse. A year and then in two thousand three, Forbes ranked Pikachu as the eighth top earning fictional character of the year. He was also named by Time magazine the second best person of the year. Yeah. Yeah, and now he's in a movie. And now he has a movie.

I don't know if we want to hop in Do we want to hop into that? Um? We can hop into that, I guess. Right after these messages, we're back. We're back. We're talking about Pokemon before we happened in the movie though, because this kind of led up to the movie, we have to talk about the phenomenon that was Pokemon Go. It was kind of cool because it's like so many people, even even people that don't normally play games, got into it, and I think that's really cool.

It came out the week of my birthday, and I remember I was working at the post House as a p A. My friend was an editor there and and like that day was kind of rough for us. And then after, you know, towards the end of the night, he was like, you want to play Pokemon Go at the Santa Monica Pire, and like yes, and we went. It was like the first week we went to Santa Monica Pire, we had ever put phones out and the pier was nuts, but it was just nuts. It was nuts.

Was everyone on their phones playing Pokemon Go. And I'll never forget a war Turtle showed up and uh and everyone was like war Turtle and everyone ran over like to the end of the roller coaster where the war Turtle was and it was like it was like world peace for something. Like it was so yeah, no, it was so I remember it came out like right before

Comic Conto. Remember playing on it at Comic Con um yeah, July, and so like there were things that were popping up at Comic Con that we're so cool, But I just one it was funny that it tricks people into exercising and if I found out hilarious, like I walked, I walked nine miles today. Wow. Um. But also just yeah, it was such a community. It was so cute to see like moms and and teens and people like running

around together and like going in groups and stuff. And uh it also spurred I'm in a Pokemon Go Facebook group. It would be like people would be like, oh, there's one here, and people would you know, for safety and whatever, would like walk together at night all night trying to

find them. I think it's a really good job of their community building because even to this day, the Pokemon Go communities, it might be like it's quite down a bit on like the macro, but if you look at the you know, if you look at it on the inside, it's it's still really well. It's funny because one thing that was uh wild about Pokemon Go is, you know, as much as people want to be like you people, when are people going to sit back and enjoy the moment?

You know? It was creating these moments for people to interact, would never interact. I remember when it first came out, I was at this gym and like I was standing in this place fighting and then like some some kids walked up, and then somebody and then like we didn't say anything for a bit, and then eventually we were like, y'all playing Pokemon ago and then we just had this conversation and it really were these kids who I probably never in my life would have interacted with. We had

this nice experience and went about our day. I had this like so many similar experiences, like it literally brought us together, you know. Uh, and it was cool. It's like Pokemon in the real world, you know. It was like, oh, you can pturn on the a R stuff, And a R is an augmented reality. And that means like when I'm looking at my phone, it'll use the real world picture and then lord be a Pokemon on my phone

like in the world. Yeah. Yeah. The the the argument of VR versus a R. VR is a immersive experience that kind of closes you off and puts you in a specific zone. A R uses the world around you to implement things. Uh you know, uh, we could do a whole episode. I have lots of thoughts on one versus the other, but I think they both can exist. I think one's going to be used more as a tool and the other one will kind of just be entertainment. I'll let you guess which one In which but you

can also check out our VR episode. Oh yeah, we did do a VR weird it was stremely education. We're gonna do for episode. I think we should do a Tree of Life live. Yeah. Um Detective Pikachu. Yeah. Do you remember when Ryan Reynolds was announced as the voice of Pikachu. I did, and I was one of like the only people that actually played the video game, and I was like, that's interesting by really but like but it was a great move though, because it got a

lot of people's attention. It got like a lot of the people who don't know this game to pay attention to someone who didn't play. What was the video game about? Similar premise to the movie? Um? Yeah, the video game is about it's more of a visual novel, kind of

like a very miniscule puzzle. So it's not as you know, strategic as Professor Leyden, but it's like got that same kind of vibe where you're you're going around and interviewing people, but you're this character named Tim Goodman, um, whose father goes missing, uh named Henry Goodman and him Um, all all that Timmer knows is that, you know, he sees his Pikachu and the Pekachu can talk to him and he can only talk to Tim Um. They don't know why um so, and they decided to work together to

try and discover like what happened to his father. By doing so, they meet a couple of friends in the game that have worked at this luh at g n N, which is the news network. Um and like they kind of work together to uncover not only the mystery of of his father, but like also of this uh this drug called R that is making uh you find out that you know makes Pokemon go crazy. It's like a it's like a very jokery like, Oh, we're gonna put it in the balloons and it's gonna make the Pokemon

go crazy. Uh. So you're working together to uncover the mysteries. But in the game there's a bunch of micro mysteries in it, so like each chapter is a different like oh, like like, uh, you know who stole this? And like who are you know? Where did the missing where's the missing cliff Fairy or whatever? Um And I really enjoyed

that aspect of it. So is it similar to the movie in the sense that one, I mean, the movie has been out long enough for spoilers, but yeah, the spoiler has already been said, so you just I was gonna say spoiler, but we already said it. Here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna bleet the spoiler out, and then this isn't going to be a spoiler, but it's

it's it's it's implied but not confirmed in the game. Correct, But there is that the creature if you guys see it does show up and the game gives Pikachu an option to do something you don't know what it was, and he stays a Pikachu. Whatever that means, I guess it's still a spoiler. Ryan Reynolds in Justice Smith, who you would know from the get down and dress a world. It's it's funny because that's the second time that's happened that I'm loving movies using that. But I wonder when

it's finally not gonna work. But it's the the mixed family fake out where they present to you a white person and the child is black, and so you're not You're they're being related is not on your mind, and then they you find out they are, and then you're like, oh yeah, like in Homecoming, like that's the whole Like the only like Vulture for a second wasn't even on my mind being related to MJ at all, not at all, And then you see it and you're like, oh, hey,

so that's a that's a fun, fun feature. Who are some of the Pokemon that you like seeing in the movie. See, there's so many. And what I love about this movie in particular is that people can leave that movie being like that was my favorite Pokemon, like this poem, like each Pokemon has its own distinct personality and was like that. I feel like that was the obviously the push of it, but every single Pokemon like was so unique to an audience that may never see him before. Um, and I

thought was awesome. So for me, uh in the movie, my favorite Pokemon the movie is gotta be the bulble Sores because they're just so precious and they I've never you know, you see them just like you hear the little you know, you know, like the little like grunts and they help, they help, they help peek at you and you know, and Tim and I just I think they did like they're just so cute. They're so cute

in that movie. My favorite thing about listening you talk about Pokemon is that you talk about them as if they're your children. They're adorable, You're just ceilings, just like I'm just so proud of them. They're getting so big and strong to grow up and they're just gonna forget me, They're gonna leave me. What do you think the future of Pokemon is? I mean you talked about the next

game that's coming up. Yeah, do you see that? I mean this this movie did, uh was four thirty one million worldwide, the tenth highest grossing film of twenty nineteen, second highest grossing video game film adaptation of all time. Yeah. Um, that's a great question. And because like I feel like

pol once. I mean, it's always kind of it's always been so strong, and I think the future of it the movie was a huge It's a huge bookmark in Pokemon history because that I think what's gonna happen is that is like the taste of here's the world, and they put it in this in the city. The setting is Rhyme City, which is the city where Pokemon out of their poke balls and they don't they don't battle.

Battling is illegal and Rhyme City. I think that was a nice way to introduce to everyone what exactly Pokemon are and what does that mean in this world? Um, and and then out of this will actually get a more traditional Pokemon movie. I think I need to tell you all something that I just found. Little Danny was not wrong. Little Danny was not wrong for putting all of her cards in her little collecting um sleeves. Because Mint Conditions set of Pokemon cards sells for over a

hundred thousand dollars. WHOA, maybe my mom, Yeah, maybe, I don't know. That's a lot. I can go there and through. I mean I have to go. My mom has like a storage unit where I'd have to essentially like go through relive the trauma of my parents divorced to like but you know, is it where the hundred grand? Maybe maybe I'll just go back in there. Um, I don't

know if I have them. To be honest, I feel like it was something that I would have given, like sold when I was needing money in high school or something. Holy cow, I hope you find them. Hopefully those pop up when you need it most, you know, well, yeah, and a good friend of when I need him in an hang on, it's going to write the next the cards all run out No, there's so many Pokemon to touch on, and we didn't. Oh, when I was in nanny, I bought one of the kids that I nannied for.

I bought him. This was back in let's see, like it would have been two thousand and five, so there's even newer Pokemon since then. But I got him one of those like posters that's like all of the Pokemon. Nice. Yeah, it was massive and you just like framed it in his room. Um, there's too many, I think, especially with the new game. I think last before the new game was like seven three Pokemon, and now the new game

will be even more so than hundreds. You know, maybe I just gave them the starter one, so probably that was let us know what your favorite Pokemon is. We clearly can't touch on all nine hundred of them. Yeah, there are too many Pokemon to touch on, so let us know your favorites and will judge you based on that. Yeah, I do have to say my favorite is always the video of the Pikachus in their costume dancing. They're so great,

They're so funny. I love it. And oh my mom was really excited because she got a picture with with Pikachu at STCC I brought him for the first time. Well it's not our first time Summer Pikachun. Yeah no, that wasn't it. But that is wild. Yeah, it's funny. You wait, you meet Wait what are you talking about? Pure? Okay? Um, Matt, where can everyone find you? Guys? You can find me at the amount ossiveto on everything that's that's it now and uh can I can I plug a sweet? Um?

We have a show where we talk about like all characters including Pegasu and ash on the Ultimate Fictional Character Podcast, where we you know, pull four characters from a bucket of from everything manga, commercials, TV movies and we it's not a strength battle. It's more of like a discussion on who that's awesome, on who is the who do we think is the best character? What makes them great?

It's more of a celebration of them and we like it's like bracket style, elimination style, and we already have a winner for season one. So check out Ultimate Fictional Character Podcast. It's fun, all right. And you know me if you way on Twitter and Instagram, I f y n W A d I w E. If he's on Twitch, come through, come through and has this been a busy Uh do you I could feel it. The subs dropped. Some of y'all forgot that I'd be streaming. Come in there,

bring those Prime subs. Look, if you've got an Amazon Prime account, you already have a Twitch Prime account, joint Twitch connect your Amazon account coming to my page. Smashed that that sub button and you have to come back every month. Don't forget. I'll keep reminding you. You know I love you. I'm at miss Danny Fernandez, M S d A and I f R n A and d e Z. Thanks to everyone again that's been buying merch and and giving it to your loved ones. We love

seeing you in it. Shout out to Aiden getting Ziggy five for getting a tattoo of Nerdificent. Got a Nerdificent tattoo. It is wild. We appreciate it so much and I shared it on my page. I couldn't find you though on Instagram, so Aidan, if you want me to share it again, let me know what your Instagram handle is. And as always, as we say, stay nerdy, stay net, stay nerdy,