As you may already know, Pokémon the Movie 20: I Choose You! was released on July 2017 in Japan to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Pokémon anime. In fact, it’ll be appearing on Malaysian theatres on the 7th December 2017! As the first film in the Sun & Moon series, the entire movie is basically a loose retelling of the first 80 episodes from the original Pokémon: Indigo League, mixing in a new plot featuring the legendary Pokémon, Ho-Oh and Marshadow. To jog your memory, Pokémon: Indigo League was where we follow the adventures of Ash and Pikachu in the Kanto region with his trusty companions: Misty and Brock.
But… Where in the world is Misty and Brock in the 20th Pokémon movie?
Having appeared in the first few anime series as well as several movies, the very first season of the anime is being remade into a movie without Misty and Brock? That is… not okay at all. According to fans that had the chance to watch the 20th Pokémon movie, the duo didn’t even appear as cameos but only appeared in the credits of the movie. Not only that, they’re being replaced by TWO BRAND NEW characters, Souji and Makoto. So why exactly did they choose to add in these two new characters? Maybe they want to draw in younger fans? Or maybe they needed a way to bring in Pokémon from the later generations? As of now, we’ll never know but many fans (especially from the older generation) have been understandably infuriated.
As a long-time Pokémon fan, it was weird and shocking to not have Misty and Brock in a movie that was obviously meant for the older fans with its tremendous amount of nostalgia for the early Pokémon days. Kinda gives the impression that our childhood is being rewritten right in front of our eyes, especially with the good feels when it comes to Pokémon. Even though it’s a retelling of the original anime series (albeit not entirely), the nostalgia factor won’t be as strong without Brock chasing after beautiful women and the easily-frustrated Misty. Not having Misty and Brock in a remake is akin to not having Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger in Harry Potter. That’s just how much impact their absence has on fans aiming to watch the movie with rose-tinted glasses.
This also makes me wonder on how will the two new characters: Souji and Makoto be presented and will they be able to change skeptics’ minds on them replacing Misty and Brock? Probably to compensate for their absence, it was shortly announced that Misty and Brock will end up appearing on the Pokémon Sun and Moon anime instead… for just two episodes when Ash returns to the Kanto region. Well, we’ll take what we can get at this point.
Despite the fact that my original #squadgoals team isn’t around anymore, the movie actually looks pretty promising (and heartwarming too) as there’ll be scenes of fan-favourite episodes from Indigo League such as the ones with Charmander (EP11) and Butterfree (EP21) which most fans still remember till this day. If you’re curious as to how the new movie will be like and don’t mind spoilers, here’s a short review written by GameSpot here.
Don’t forget to check out the amazing, goosebumps-inducing trailer here:
“As long as my buddy’s with me, I can go anywhere.” – Ash Ketchum :’)
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