Pokemon of the Week #29: Diglett

#50: Diglett, the Mole Pokemon

So for today's random Pokemon, I did something more unconventional. I went to my local game store, bought a booster pack of Pokemon TCGs, and decided to do whoever is on the first card I see. Lo and behold, it is... Diglett! Apparently the pack I bought is some kind of anniversary reprint of the very first set of Pokemon cards, because I totally remember having this Diglett card from the original base set 20+ years ago. (God I'm old)

Diglett (Evolutions, the card
I got for this article)

So Diglett is mostly otherwise known as the 'dick Pokemon'. Because, hey, it's shaped like, y'know, a dong. We'll get that out of the way, so I don't have to snicker about dick jokes the entire article. 

More properly, Diglett's based on a mole... a whack-a-mole. It's just a shame that his design is so, so unfortunate. Four generations later, we'd get a more proper Pokemon based on a real mole, Drillbur and Excavalier (the latter being a personal favourite of the much-maligned fifth generation) but Diglett and his evolution Dugtrio is here to stay.

Now design-wise Diglett isn't honestly very good. It's simple, yes -- a little whack-a-mole with a stupid nose and eyes, popping out of the ground. When he evolves, there are three of him and they get angry eyes. It's similar to other first-generation Pokemon... well, just Magnemite and Magneton, actually, but whereas Magneton has a more clever way of justifying "three of them count as a new stronger form!" bit by the whole magnetism thing, Diglett into Dugtrio... doesn't quite have that.

Also, speaking about design, Nintendo has been really, really coy about just what Diglett looks under the ground. Even with the advent of 3D models, whenever something that involves Diglett getting hit into the air or submerged underground or spun around, the chunk of ground that he's buried in gets thrown around with him. It's going to be an eternal mystery, and I'm fine with it. At this point, any kind of revelation would be disappointing. 

Diglett, despite his simple design, actually has quite a bit of a lore to him beyond being that 'weird mole Pokemon'. We'll talk about the newly-introduced Alolan variant later down the line, and go about the original Diglett first. Most Pokedex entries about Diglett talk about how it's exclusively underground, and how the true shape and size of the rest of his body is a mystery. It also makes the soil of the area that it lives in more fertile, because it basically tills the soil as it moves around it. It eats tree roots, and it's sensitive to the sun, because, as some Pokedex entries so graphically describe, 'its blood heats up'.

Diglett (base set)

In addition to that, Diglett is particularly important in the Kanto and Johto games, because it is one of the few Pokemon to have an entire area dedicated to him... the Diglett Cave. It's a cave that connects Pewter to Vermilion City (and it's a short little cave area with nothing but Digletts and the odd Dugtrio. For whatever reason, I really found Diglett's cave interesting as a kid because it's one of the first non-linear parts of the Kanto region when I was playing my copy of Pokemon Blue, even though there's honestly not much to it. It's so iconic, apparently, that Nintendo brought it back in the Alola region as 'Diglett's Tunnel', although the Digletts in Alola's Diglett Tunnel are considerably more fabulous. 

Oh, and the very first gym grunt in Brock's gym uses a Diglett. Can't forget about that.

Diglett's found in Diglett's Cave throughout the first three generations (no Digletts can be found in Hoenn), Diglett's Tunnel in the seventh and Digletts care rare encounters in Sinnoh -- for every other generation you have to do the fancy transfer stuff or weird hidden Pokemon stuff.

Battle-wise Diglett (both versions) actually have pretty crappy stats. Dugtrio's a little better, but the poor little dude's just so fragile, with so little health that a breeze can knock them over. They have an insane amount of speed for... some reason, though, which is the sole most awesome bit a Dugtrio can do. I used to have a Dugtrio in a FireRed playthrough that was just faster than anything and is the fastest Earthquake-dealing three-headed monstrosity in the world. Oh, and the G1 version of Diglett and Dugtrio had Fissure -- yes, the one-hit-KO move Fissure -- as their signature move. Of course, Diglett is a pure Ground-type, making him... honestly not that useful.

Oh, and I guess this makes Diglett our entry for the 'one Pokemon of all types' for Ground. Ground's a pretty cool type, especially offensively. Be it casual or competitive, Ground's absolutely hard-hitting Earthquake move, as well as its pretty powerful effectiveness towards multiple types, and straight-up immunity aganist Electric moves, makes it pretty awesome. It does tend to lose pretty badly to the common Grass and Water (especially since most Ground-types tend to be weak in special defense, something that is common among Grass and Water users), and Ground-type attacks can't hit Flying types. Back in the older generations I tend to have some trouble telling Rock and Ground type apart, and honestly still do now. It's definitely a pretty cool type, with two of my favourite starters -- Swampert and Torterra -- being partially Ground-types. 

Moveset wise Dugtrio and Diglett are pretty tame. Mostly Ground-type moves, with a couple of Normal-types and a bunch of others thrown in .

Then, seven generations down the line, in Pokemon Sun and Moon Diglett and Dugtrio are the part of the handful of Generation I Pokemon that have a different regional variant in Alola. Meet... Alolan Diglett! He's like Diglett, but with three strands of hair on his back! And a little more sunburned, and because he comes from the volcanic Alolan region, his dirt-piece is black instead of brownish-grey. 

Oh, and he's Ground/Steel. Because fabulous hair (Dugtrio looks fabulous, don't lie) apparently equates Steel-typing? I genuinely forget about this half the time when playing Sun, because being a genwunner I kind of am hardwired to launch Grass or Water attacks at a Diglett and Dugtrio and none of them are really good against Diglett's new Ground/Steel dual typing. Apparently Pokedex entries note that the hairs are like altered whiskers, made of metal, that allows communication, just like some moles have. Except, obviously, less fabulous. 

Oh, and Alolan Diglett, in addition to having the Steel typing and some Steel-type moves, also gets a new signature ability -- Tangling Hair, which decreases the speed of anyone who comes into contact with him. Okaaay? I dunno.

I dunno. Alolan Diglett is something I kinda find weird -- surely they could've done something more interesting than just that? Alolan Dugtrio's hilarious, but Alolan Diglett really makes me feel like they really kind of just shrugged and called it a day. Oh well. Overall, I like Diglett. It's not particularly clever, or super-interesting, but I like it nonetheless, enough to have a Dugtrio hang around in my many FireRed playthroughs.