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Pokémon 2013 theatrical movie coming October 19 to Cartoon Network

Edited by GreenReaper
Your rating: None Average: 4.5 (4 votes)

Pokémon: Genesect and the Legend Awakened poster Love it or hate it, you gotta admit that Pocket Monsters, a.k.a. Pokémon, are anthropomorphic. In Japan, “monsters” are any fantasy animals; “pocket monsters”, like Pikachu, are monsters small enough to fit into your pocket – although since they were introduced almost twenty years ago, there have been some giant Pokémon as well.

The annual Pokémon theatrical movies started in Japan 16 years ago and are still being churned out, but in America they have gone direct to TV for the last few years. This year’s, Pokémon the Movie: Genesect and the Legend Awakened (96 minutes), will premiere in English on the Cartoon Network on October 19, at 12:30 p.m., Eastern Standard Time. It will follow last year’s movie, Pokémon the Movie: Kyurem vs. the Sword of Justice at 11:00 a.m., if you haven’t seen that yet.

When big trouble threatens the big city, it’s up to Ash, Pikachu, and their friends to stop it!

A vast Pokémon habitat amid the hustle and bustle of the big city seems like the perfect new home for a group of five Genesect. The arrival of these Mythical Pokémon quickly becomes a problem, though: their nest threatens the city’s power supply, and they keep attacking anyone who approaches it. On top of that, they’ve attracted the attention of the Legendary Pokémon Mewtwo, who sympathizes with them because its own origins also involve human tampering. The group’s leader, known as Red Genesect, doesn’t trust Mewtwo, and their confrontation quickly rages out of control! Can Ash and friends stop these two powerful Pokémon before they destroy the city? [“The city” is specifically NYC.]

Here are the Pokémon website with a trailer in English, two theatrical trailers (one just in Japanese and one in Japanese with English subtitles), Nintendo’s announcement of the Cartoon Network broadcast with an English poster, and the movie’s Wikipedia and Bulbapedia entries.

Comments

Your rating: None Average: 3 (1 vote)

As someone who cares little for humans and high drama, I'm more interested in the short - Pikachu and Eievui Friends. I wonder if that, too, will be shown . . . probably not, if it's not been dubbed.

The video games Pokémon X and Y are also being released tomorrow (though I doubt this is news to anyone who cares).

Your rating: None Average: 2 (1 vote)

Forgive me for being harsh, but is there anything that isn't commercial filler about this franchise? Makes me think of forgotten fizzled fads of the 90's like Pogs

Your rating: None Average: 3 (1 vote)

The games have pretty deep strategy if you put some minor restraints in... so deep that I don't really have time to do it as when I was a kid, so kind of fell out of the loop.

One could say that about all mainstream things I suppose. Once they become mainstream that's what happens.

Your rating: None Average: 3 (1 vote)

Strategy games are pretty fun. A night of Settlers of Catan is a night well spent!

Your rating: None Average: 5 (1 vote)

Heck yeah... but with Settlers you don't have to spend 40+ hours going through what is essential a long 'tutorial', EVERY time a new version of the game comes out.

Your rating: None Average: 5 (1 vote)

I'm not quite sure what you would view as commercial non-filler, but if you want non-commercial Pokémon material, just look to fandom. Plenty out there, though I daresay much of it has little claim to artistic merit.

At the end of the day, it's an entertainment franchise. These movies are still being produced because they make money, which suggests that people want to see them. I don't see a problem with that.

Your rating: None Average: 1 (1 vote)

Ha, you defined the wrong reason to care about even light pop entertainment... "because it makes money". I can't sense any substance besides that here. I'd rather nap or yell at kids to get off my lawn than watch one. I get the feeling that if pokemon was an FA account, it would be nothing but YCH auctions, forever.

Your rating: None Average: 5 (1 vote)

You know I always joked that Mew Two looked like Freeza, but now that the new forms of Mew Two have came out I gotta say-- my mind has not changed one iota, in fact they probably made it worse.

Your rating: None Average: 5 (1 vote)

I liked the response from Lunamew's creator. (Potentially NSFW for language)

Your rating: None Average: 5 (2 votes)

Some inspiration from Game Grumps I see

Your rating: None Average: 5 (1 vote)

That Japanese poster is one of the most crowded pieces of art that I have ever seen.

Fred Patten

Your rating: None Average: 5 (2 votes)

Well you gotta frame em' all.

Your rating: None Average: 3 (1 vote)

Well, Weasel Wordsmith was right; Fennekin the fire starter eventually evolves into a psychic/fire fox in a dress, so furries are going to like that one when X and Y hits tomorrow.

I do hope that Fennekin bucks the trend and you are more likely to gain a female starter than a male, because otherwise that would be weird.

I don't think anyone who is over the age of 12 (at least mentally) cares about the anime series, at least in America, though maybe out of nostalgia. The games are pretty decent RPGs, and the "gotta catch'em all" element, annoying catchphrase aside, really adds replay value to the series if you're not a competitive player vs. player type.

Your rating: None Average: 5 (1 vote)

Speaking of, Weasel Wordsmith seems to have dropped off the net. Their last post was six months ago, so perhaps it's not a surprise . . . but still, unfortunate.

I wish I were a Pokémon starter. Then I'd have nice things.

Your rating: None Average: 3 (1 vote)

Oh, it has, hasn't it ... well, crap.

Your rating: None Average: 5 (1 vote)

Was he like the Snowden of the Pokemon world or something?

Your rating: None Average: 2 (1 vote)

Umm, no.

Just a furry with a blog that reviewed things, with a few announcements; Weasel Wordsmith did manage to be the first furry site to announce X and Y, but Pokémon was hardly the main topic. Heck, that might have been the only Pokémon article on the site (and I guess I can't look it up to check). The article was entitled, roughly from memory, "New Pokémon announced: Fennekin is your favorite," though picking the fox Pokémon as furries' favorite was kinda duh.

Also, early Saturday morning, I realized I have no idea where I put my 3DS, and I still haven't found it, so I haven't even bothered to pick up my copy yet (I think I reserved X).

Your rating: None Average: 2 (1 vote)

I may see him tonight, he seems like a busy weasel but he comes to local meets sometimes.

Your rating: None Average: 3 (1 vote)

He said he will be contributing to claw and quill!

Your rating: None Average: 5 (1 vote)

It may not be as advertised or hyped like it used to be back in 98' and 99', but Pokemon is still a huge cash cow for Nintendo. If you go to almost any general gaming site (GameFAQs etc) it's one of the few Nintendo franchises that gets into the top 10 list for newly released games. I myself know several furry friends that plan on getting one or both of the X and Y games that are coming out. On the other hand, I dont know anyone that still watches the anime except maybe the first few seasons for nostalgic purposes.

Your rating: None Average: 4.7 (3 votes)

I was going to review "Pokémon the Movie: Genesect and the Legend Awakened", but frankly I got bored and stopped watching after about a half-hour. The Cartoon Network's policy of stopping the movie every five minutes for ten minutes of commercials (it felt like) didn't make it any easier to get into the story. I did not have this problem with last year's Pokémon feature.

Basically, the story seemed to be about the prehistoric Pokémon Genesect and his half-dozen minions from 300,000,000 years in the past coming into the modern world, finding that everything has evolved into unrecognizability, and being so traumatized that they (especially Genesect, with the others following his orders) attack all the humans that they see. Explosions, explosions, and more explosions, with Ash asking, "WHY!?" over and over, and Mewtwo trying to stop them for mysterious reasons.

I had a problem with the animation from the beginning. The Pokémon animation studio has gotten better and better with its CGI until today the backgrounds -- the landscapes and cityscapes -- are beautiful and very convincing. Overlaying the cartoony human and fantasy animals on top of the realistic backgrounds is very unconvincing. Genesect and the other 300,000,000-year-old Pokémon look more like mecha than animals. Mewtwo has a translucent outline that is supposed to represent a power aura, but that makes him really look like he is superimposed badly on the background.

That's where I stopped watching it.

Fred Patten

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About the author

Fred Pattenread storiescontact (login required)

a retired former librarian from North Hollywood, California, interested in general anthropomorphics