Movie Review: Pokemon the Movie - I Choose You

Pokemon the Movie: I Choose You [2017]

If the amount of Pokemon content in this blog isn't already a clue.... I'm a big Pokemon fan. I grew up with the original first generation, watched the first season of the Pokemon anime every week, and waited with anticipation to see what wacky adventures Ash, Pikachu and their buddies will get to. And like any child that grew up with the anime, the first season's cluster of episodes was imprinted pretty deeply into my mind. When Pokemon's 20th movie was announced to be a retelling/remake of the first season instead of yet-another-standard-meet-a-legendary plot, it's actually a big amount of news to the fandom.

It's just going to be an attempt to cash in into nostalgia, but honestly? As long as it's competently done, I wouldn't mind. And then it's told to us that while retelling the classic moments of the first season, I Choose You is also going to follow the weird Ho-Oh subplot that never got explored in the anime, but also be an alternate continuity that stars two new replacement sidekicks for Ash, as well as feature the seventh generation's newest legendary, Marshadow.

Add that to the huge, huge spoiler that rocked the fandom when the movie came into air and Pikachu speaks to Ash, and by god, that caused a shitstorm.

And let's get that out of the way first... I wouldn't be opposed to Pikachu speaking all that much if it had been foreshadowed in some way at all in the movie. But it didn't. It just happens, seemingly just to elicit a big WHAAAAT plot twist reaction, but it ends up feeling corny, shoehorned and silly. Of course, this isn't actually the biggest problem for this already really problematic movie, honestly.

And let's get this out of the way first. This is a movie that looks prettier than any other previously released Pokemon movie or special. And by god, that opening sequence with the remixed version of "Gotta Catch 'Em All"? (I watched the English dub) That was amazing as we cut through different habitats showing Pokemon from the original 151 just roar and move. The first fight between Gengar, Venusaur and Blastoise on the tournament as Ash watches it on his TV? The remake of the Butterfree valley? Ho-Oh and the cool rainbow effect that they gave him? The swarm of Spearows attacking Ash? The animation behind Marshadow's shadow punches and shadow balls? Entei? Incineroar vs Charmeleon? The movie is an amazing visual delight, and I cannot lie. As a Pokemon fan, that bit was enough to keep me relatively engaged here.

But see, you can't really have your cake and eat it. The first chunk of the movie retells a good chunk of the anime's first season. Ash being late to the Pokemon-giving ceremony, getting a troublesome Pikachu who refuses to get into his ball, getting into hijinks while trying to catch a Pidgey, and then protecting Pikachu from a swarm of feral Spearow, and then Ho-Oh flies past them as the storm clears, only this time Ash sees a feather that drops from Ho-Oh.

Ho-Oh's presence when Ash's journey starts is an iconic moment from the first episode, yet the rainbow legendary bird himself has never actually been the star of any feature movie, nor has he been the actual focus of any plotline in the anime, and his appearances has all amounted to cameos or flashbacks to Ash's encounter. So having Ash follow this mysterious journey of a legend associated with finding a rainbow feather from Ho-Oh, leading to him being called the 'legendary rainbow hero', is neat enough. 

But other than catching Caterpie, Team Rocket skulking around and fighting Erika, the callbacks to the season kind of stop here as we're launched to an all-original plot... with suspiciously similar characters. We're quickly introduced to a tomboy, strong independent little girl, Verity, that squabbles with Ash. We're also introduced to a calmer, older, smarter boy, Sorrel. The trio form an adventuring crew after an encounter with an Entei, a rampaging Onix and saving the Charmander. Charmander's asshole trainer is changed into the hilariously edgy-looking Cross, who fills in Gary and Paul's role as Ash's asshole rival.  They are all flat, honestly, with just enough personality for me not to complain about, but not enough for me to really remember them other than "Piplup girl" and "Lucario boy" and "douchebag"

And I'm not sure what replacing the supporting cast ends up doing if they're trying to hit all the nostalgia buttons. Verity isn't very interesting other than the brief blink-and-miss-it revelation that she's Cynthia's daughter, while Sorrel's best moment is in his genuinely touching moment when he describes how his family's Luxray died protecting him from the snowy cold, what the shit. The two of them also use Generation IV Pokemon, Piplup and Lucario, so... Sinnoh remakes incoming?

In any case, as we journey to Mt. Tensei, the Butterfree storyline, one of the more emotional moments of the first season, happens, and Ash has to releases Butterfree for it to be free and be happy. We also get an abbreviated version of Chimchar's storyline, transplanted into Charmander (none of that "loses respect for Ash after evolving" deal that Charmander used to have) -- evolving and trying to show to its former asshole trainer that his bond with Ash is stronger. It's... it's okay, I guess. The battle with Incineroar, especially the visuals with Seismic Toss and Fire Fang, are both amazing.

But the rest of the movie with the legendary Pokemon and its conclusion ends up falling short for me. There's this subplot where they briefly encounter Entei, Raikou and Suicune in their journey. While Entei's pretty cool and relevant in letting the three of them meet (and the animation of heat waves and smoke coming off Entei as it walks is pretty amazing), Suicune and Raikou, as well as the retelling of their origin story, feels absolutely pointless here when the focus should've been on Ho-Oh and Marshadow.

Which are apparently connected, because Marshadow is Ho-Oh's... servant? Rival? It's never made clear whether it causes or feeds off of Ash's negative emotions, leading to a bizarre dream where Ash has a dream that he's in the real, depressing Pokemon-less world and going to school and shit. It's a moment that seemed to try to be artsy for artsy's sake and doesn't work for me. And then when they reach the summit of Mt. Tensei, a battle between Ash and jackass rival Cross causes Cross to get soundly defeated by Charizard, and then Cross steals the Rainbow Wing, which turns dark due to his own selfishness, and then... corrupts Marshadow? Is what Marshadow is going for? Marshadow's just such a plot device here that despite the ghostly whispers-of-the-legion deal that the voice acting team does with its voice feels frustratingly oblique. 

Marshadow then causes the assembled gauntlet of wild Pokemon to go feral, attack Ash and his allies, and we get another callback to Ash and Pikachu's battle against the Spearow army... except this time Ash gets disintegrated. Except he doesn't. After hearing Pikachu talk randomly, he just gets send to some weird shadow dimension, and Pikachu's love for him brings him back? Or some shit? And then that breaks Marshadow's plan, he scurries away, Ho-Oh returns, and then after an offscreen battle Ash separates and credits roll?

Oh, and Team Rocket continues to hound our heroes to try and get Ho-Oh, but never actually meets Ash, just showing up to get blasted off three or four times. While I love Team Rocket, the lack of trying to tie this to the main series continuity makes me wonder why they are even in this movie at all. 

It's an absolutely bizarre and insanely off-kilter subplot that sadly ends up disappointing. Telling Ash's story as he goes from "yay friends and Pokemon!", getting frustrated that the "strength matters" Cross beats him, and then reverting back when he realized his bond with Pikachu is what matters is a neat story, but in-between the poorly-told Marshadow/Ho-Oh subplot, the references to season one of the anime and the general oddity of an alternate retelling honestly makes me absolutely confused as to this movie. It's pretty enough, I guess, but ultimately a rather poorly-executed and way-too-long attempt at cashing in at nostalgia that tries way too much to be artsy and too many writing and directional choices that I just didn't really see the point of other than trying too hard to be different.

Pokemon Easter Eggs Corner:

• There are, of course, a lot of main-series references. The sequence of Ash watching a Pokemon tournament, oversleeping, having to pick Pikachu all the way to the encounter with the Spearow horde and Ho-Oh are all lifted from the first episode sans Misty. Ash catching Caterpie, then Caterpie evolving after a battle with Pinsir (a wild one instead of Samurai's), then having to let Butterfree go to join a swarm after Butterfree finds love in a pink female Butterfree, is a condensed version of Butterfree's arc in the first season. Charmander being left behind to die in the rain by an asshole trainer is the backstory of Charmander in the first season, while Ash raising a Fire-type starter to beat the original owner who didn't want him is a parallel to his story with Chimchar in the fourth generation's anime.
• Gary also gets Squirtle from Oak, although his face isn't shown. 
• The way that Team Rocket is introduced -- from a wanted poster in a Pokemon Center -- is reminiscent of their original appearance. 
• All of Ash's major travelling companions -- Brock, Misty, Tracey, Max, May, Dawn, Iris, Cilan, Clemont, Bonnie and Serena -- make cameos in the credits, seemingly reacting to how Ash first meets them.
• The trainers fighting on the televized tournament are Neesha and Corey, two supporting characters from Mewtwo Strikes Back (they also use Blastoise and Venusaur in both appearances).
• The Pink Butterfree, while in the original anime had the same wings with Butterfree, now has the dark spots on its lower wings that differentiates it as a female (this subtle gender difference wasn't added until the fourth generation). 
• Erika notes that she is the third gym leader that Ash defeats. While in both the anime and games Erika is the fourth gym leader, it should be noted that Ash does fight the Kanto gym leaders relatively out of order. 
• Verity's mother is, of course, Sinnoh champion Cynthia, which we saw briefly on her phone. 
• Kanto Elite Four member Agatha appears as the school-teacher in Ash's bizarre dream sequence.
• Bonji wears clothes reminiscent of the in-game protagonist Red of the first generation. 
• The closing narration features the ruins featured in Pokemon 2000, with Lugia bursting out of the water and a Slowking standing in the center of the ruins. We also get to see the city featured in The Rise of Darkrai, with the Baron and his Lickilicky being seen from behind; as well as the city featured in the Black/White movie. 
• Wobbuffet and the Team Rocket air balloon has a cameo during the credits sequence. Ash also encounters a Heracross there, which is one of his main fighters during the Johto arc.