One lunatic's love-hate relationship with the Pokémon franchise, and his addled musings on its rights, wrongs, ins and outs. Come one, come all, and indulge my delusions of grandeur as I inflict my opinions on anyone within shouting distance.
Are you a superhero fan at all? Comics, movies, TV series, cartoons, games, anything?
Not particularly. I’ve watched a fair bit of Arrow and The Flash, and some movies here and there (I really enjoyed Guardians of the Galaxy, which… I don’t know, is that still a “superhero” movie because it’s Marvel, or is it sci-fi? What are the boundaries there?) but I don’t go out of my way to engage with superhero stuff, and I wouldn’t have called myself a fan of the genre broadly.
What are your thoughts on each Star Wars film, including Rogue One? Nothing elaborate like your usual posts! Just a few sentences for each film, maybe? And maybe a rating?
wait why is this my job
Thank you for continuing to write on here after all these years, I check your site just about everyday, and you do amazing work.
D’awwww, thank you!
Assuming you’ve met every new pokemon of alola, what do you think of the addition of signature move/ability for each pokemon(evo line) ? I think it’s very cool since it’s a good way to make them more unique
I think I’ve met almost all of them now (I’m further through than my write-up suggests; I’ve actually finished the Elite Four now). I hadn’t realised they all had something like that, but yeah, I like it – I’ve kinda always had a habit of wanting to give signature moves to everything, and I think there is a point at which you just plain run out of unique ideas. One of my old mantras, though, is that Pokémon “should be good at the things they’re good at” – that is, if we’re told a Pokémon has a certain lifestyle and fighting strategy, then those things should actually be a part of what it can do, and do well, and signature moves/abilities are usually a good way of doing that.
Mimikyu’s become the fan favorite breakout star of this batch of Pokemon and I just don’t know why. Also, are you aware it has an official rap? Just google “Mimikyu’s song.”
Mimikyu is also one of Jim the Editor’s favourite Pokémon, and he thinks it is adorable. I… confess the appeal of a horrifying undead Pikachu is a little lost on me, but I can appreciate the concept. Its true form is so viscerally hideous that, in the anime, Meowth literally dies when he catches a glimpse of it, so it dresses up as Pikachu, the most popular Pokémon, because it just wants to be loved, and you can give it that love. It’s a pretty compelling narrative!
If you watch Treesicle’s What Are Pokemon – The Story You Never Knew the archaeologist and pokémon nerd inside of you will die a little. (spoilers: did you know mammals evovled from trilobites? Did you know the earth was once populated by typeless Mews who eventually became all the pokémon we have now? Just a reminder, Mew is the ‘New Species’ pokémon)
…it’s 14 minutes long, do I have to watch it?
Ugh, whatever…
Continue reading “VikingBoyBilly asks:”What if, instead of an EV cap, there was a total stat cap? As in, “some Pokemon are naturally good at fighting, but all can achieve the same level of expertise through training” taken literally?
I think this has consequences beyond what you immediately intend. For one thing, under this system evolution and higher base stats are a bad thing, because they mean less flexibility – more of your stat cap is taken up by things you can’t change. For another, unless you have some sort of equivalent to the EV system – some limit to how far a Pokémon can advance beyond its basic capability in each stat – you’re going to end up eroding the differences between species of Pokémon. What’s the point of Alakazam if it can push its defence just as high as anyone else can, or everyone else can push their special attack just as high as it?
What are you doing at the moment? How are feeling? where is Jim the editor?
Ehhhhhh… Well, I’m in charge of a university-level class for the first time ever, which is a lot of fun but so, so exhausting… and I have to propose a PhD thesis topic in a couple of weeks, and I know I want to work on Roman window glass, but beyond that there are still a bunch of methodological details to work out… So yeah. Fun times all around. As for where Jim is… Rome, as it happens. He’s in Rome, doing some research for his own thesis at the British School.
What’s your favorite Alolan form?
Tricky. I think I’ve met all of them now… Probably the Marowak. I’m not a huge fan of losing the original type completely, but Marowak does at least keep its Electric immunity through Lightning Rod, and the whole dark, mystic aesthetic is a really neat take on Marowak’s design. These Marowak are not f&£#ing around; they’ve straight-up jumped in the deep end of death worship.
oh that’s GOTTA be an Alien reference with Sigourney the Golisopod
Got it in one! Something about
Golisopod’s hulking, chitin-plated form just brings the Alien movies to mind for me.
Pokémaniacal 