One Piece 1026 Review: Splitting the Sky

One Piece, Chapter 1026: Pivotal Clash

Okay, this one is a pretty hype one! It starts off with a brief check-in with the civilians in the Flower Capital, before cutting away to the rooftop battle. It's pretty interesting that at some point, a random Mary got to the rooftop and started giving commentary on the dragon battle to the rest of the combatants. 

I do like that the exchange of attacks at this point isn't anything quite as action-packed as the previous chapter, but it's more about Luffy motivating Momonosuke to get over his fear. In-between Elephant Guns, Luffy manages to convince Momo to do just one thing -- bite Kaidou. After a flashback to his dead parents and how Kaidou strangled him back in the past, Momonosuke decides to fly in and chomp down on Kaidou. It really doesn't look like anything too damaging -- Kaidou really is someone who makes the 'surprised when someone lands a hit' face a lot of times. But I do really like the growing character growth for Momonosuke over this arc, and I really cannot believe I'm saying this considering how much I was irritated by this brat in the Punk Hazard and Dressrosa arcs. Between the huge 'sunacchi' chapter and this moment of him glaring at Kaidou through his fear, good old Momonosuke has grown so much. 

All of this turns out to just be Luffy trying to get Momonosuke to have enough of a confidence to use the storm-clouds to lift up Onigashima. After all, if Momonosuke already has the balls to bite down on the scariest person in the world -- a Yonkou -- surely he wouldn't be afraid of something like this? 

Meanwhile, as all of this is going on, we cut away to two of the secondary fights that we haven't dealt with yet, and as I noted in the previous chapter, looks like we're wrapping all of these up. Both Jack and Perospero have the advantage against Inuarashi and Nekomamushi respectively, because the moon gets covered and the Minks were knocked out of their Sulong transformations.

Meanwhile, as Luffy is giving his dramatic speech that all of his allies in Onigashima can hear, we get him clashing with Kaidou, fist-against-fist with the Haki lightning all around them, we get this glorious two-page-spread of the heavens parting, a huge, badass moment that actually took me by surprise because I really didn't expect this to happen in this fight. It's the same thing that happened when Shanks faced off against Whitebeard so many chapters ago, and... it is pretty badass. 

Just to add even more impact, the parting clouds in the sky reveal the moon long enough for Inuarashi and Nekomamushi to go Sulong one last time, and then one-shot Jack and Perospero respectively. The chapter ends with Orochi (who's of course alive) witnessing this from behind a sliding door. 

So... yeah. Pretty hype stuff, and I really do like that Luffy's cloud-splitting act is tied into the victories of his allies. I still do find Luffy's newfound moxie a bit questionable -- probably the only weak link in this whole Onigashima Raid arc, I feel. In-between Kaidou tossing Luffy off of Onigashima and him getting ready to fight Kaidou again, I feel like we're kind of missing a character beat between the two? Unless the idea is just that 'Luffy never gives up' like what he says in this chapter and that's the simple answer. I don't know -- I really kind of felt like whether it's from an anime-superpower standpoint or from a personality standpoint, this could've been smoothed up a bit better with a better transition. Still, overall a pretty fun chapter!

Random Notes:

• Yeah, the manga is pretty much telegraphing that we're getting a parallel of Oden lifting the giant bowl with his Scabbards, with whatever Momo is going to do with Onigashima, so I'm definitely looking forward to it. 
• I, for one, am very happy that Momonosuke doesn't have instant mastery of all his dragon abilities, and that his child mind is still coming to grips with all that's happening to him. 
• It gets a bit lost with all the dragon-wars stuff going on, but Jack's hybrid form is actually a mammoth-centaur! That's actually pretty damn cool, shame it only shows up for like, three panels. 
• Perospero's candy arm gets absolutely shattered by Nekomamushi's blow. Actually, speaking of him, Perospero has been around for far, far longer than I would've thought him possible. I know he's not the villain trope that most people find to be cool, but I do respect him for lasting this long. 
• My guess is that Denjirou's going to be the one that deals with Orochi. In an ideal world, Hiyori or Momonosuke would be the best ones to do this, but other than them, Denjirou's probably the one with the biggest narrative connection with Orochi. 

Series Review: Kamen Rider Gaim

Kamen Rider Gaim [2013-2014]

I finished writing the reviews for Ex-Aid and Build recently, and this is the final show in the Heisei Kamen Rider series that I have yet to review. It's also the first Kamen Rider show I've watched. Which is why I know this review will be a bit shorter than the rest. 

Back when I first did full series reviews for the various Kamen Rider shows, it's also because I was thinking of picking one of the shows I really liked and doing episode-by-episode reviews. It was around the time that I was doing Kiva and Zero-One simultaneously, and I thought that once I was done with Kiva and the handful of other shows that I haven't watched at the time (Hibiki, Kuuga, Agito and I believe half of Blade) I could sit down and pick one of my favourite shows and really dig into it. On top of the contenders were Gaim, Ex-Aid, Build and Double, all of which being my favourites and having enough variety on an episode-to-episode basis that I felt would allow me to avoid the burnout that plagued me when I reviewed Kiva.

Kamen Rider Gaim is such a weird Kamen Rider show, though, when I sit down and think of all the other shows in the Heisei era. It was my first Kamen Rider show, so I just sat back and accepted everything that was tossed at me. I mean, I've seen other animes with concepts similar or weirder than this, so yeah. The main characters of the show are groups of street dancers. Zawame City has a gigantic tower called Yggdrasil Corporation that oversaw almost everything. People tune in on web videos to look at street gangs fight with monsters called Pokemon "Inves". There's this bizarre foray into godhood, and vague flashbacks to either an alternate universe, a possible future or the past. 

Basically, it didn't take me until my third or fourth Rider show to realize that for the most part, Kamen Rider tended to operate on a more 'Japan, but with monsters' quasi-urban-fantasy setting. All I'm saying is that when the show was pitched to me by my friends, it was basically "hey, look at this, it's like Power Rangers, but they transform into fruit samurai, while the belts scream English words". I thought it was the stupidest thing ever. And then I proceeded to finish the entire show in under a week. 

Written by famous anime writer Gen Urobuchi, even after giving Gaim several years of breathing time, I did feel like it's still ultimately a very solid show. As mentioned before, the setting is initially something rather simple -- youthful street gangs that call themselves 'Beat Riders' that roam the streets of Zawame City. Our hero Kazuraba Kouta is a former member of the group Team Gaim, and initially he tries his best to divorce himself from the dance group and find a proper job. But when the team's captain goes missing, Kouta helps out only to find himself face-to-face with bizarre monsters, and ends up in possession of a Sengoku Driver, allowing himself to transform into a fruit samurai. By, naturally, creating a giant zipper portal in the sky and summoning a giant CGI fruit to unfold into armour. And his finisher skill is called 'Orange Squash'. As you do. 

Thanks to a mysterious guy with a fancy hat called Lock Dealer Sid, the Sengoku Drivers quickly find themselves spread across the Beat Riders, who view them as basically the next big thing to compete with each other after the (still bizarre) quasi-Pokemon Inves game. It is violent, yes, but it's treated as basically just gang fighting with some extra steps. Kumon Kaito of Team Bravo becomes Armoured Rider Baron (he's a banana!), essentially becoming the abrasive rival to Kouta. One of the main members of Team Gaim, Kureshima "Micchy" Mitsuzane, who has a bit of a hero worship on Kouta, becomes Armoured Rider Ryugen (he's a grape!). There's also the enigmatic Armoured Rider Zangetsu (he's a melon!). And two minor characters become Armoured Riders Kurokage and Gridon (they're nuts!). Rounding up the initial cast is Oren Pierre Alfonso, an over-the-top flamboyant mercenary patisserie who becomes Armoured Rider Bravo (he's a durian!).

While the show initially seems to revolve around wacky dance teams and a mysterious organization Yggdrasil that's trying to get back their stolen devices (hence Oren the mercenary), the show quickly delves into a bit of a mystery in regards to the mysterious dimension later revealed to be called Helheim, an otherworldly forest where the Inves and Lockseeds come from. All of this is compounded to Kouta receiving enigmatic visions from a mysterious white-robed girl who looks like his good friend Mai. As the conflict escalates, so does Yggdrasil's role, where it's revealed that they're collecting data on the youth recklessly using the drivers. The middle part of the show revolves around well-meaning extremist Takatora (Zangetsu the melon), hammy mad scientist Sengoku Ryouma (Duke the lemon), badass lady bodyguard Minato Yoko (Marika the peach) and shifty hat-toting Sid (Sigurd the cherry) as a set of antagonists in the show. Every single one of these characters end up being developed to some degree, and while there's a lot of backstabbing and team-ups going on among the various organizations, all of them felt natural. 

Again, I'm trying to be as vague as possible, especially what happens in the second half of the show where we get fun characters like Demushu and Redyue tossed into the mix. Trying to condense the show into several short paragraphs would be an exercise in confusion, but suffice to say that in-between the colourful characters and the fruit-themed action scenes, the writers have crafted a great world with a rich backstory that didn't feel force-fed to the audience. And all the betrayals done by the characters -- both antagonists that decide to join up with the good guys for their own vague reasons, or good guys that take a turn for the sinister because of their personal circumstances... a lot of these felt organic and not blatantly telegraphed. 

And, yes, despite its large cast, the strength of the writing means that every single Rider (not counting the many, many epilogue and movie exclusive ones) does end up feeling like they are all characters. Each of these Riders end up feeling like they are important to the narrative, even more minor ones like Armoured Riders Knuckle (who debuted relatively late into the show). The show itself does focus primarily on Kouta/Gaim, Kaito/Baron and Micchy/Ryugen, but everybody else does have their own share in the spotlight. It's really a bit hard to talk about this show without being super-vague or spoiling about the admittedly somewhat convoluted backstory involving the characters, but I really did feel that by the end of the 47-episode run, all the main characters have had their share of character growth and side-plot. (There's also that rather random Kikaider-crossover episode in the middle of the show, and a bunch of interesting but ultimately unnecessary side-material.)

And, yes. The ending with the whole god thing is... a bit of a contentious one. But honestly, with the themes that Gaim explores, do you really expect anything less? 

Ultimately I feel like Gaim is a show that's special to me, but has something interesting for everyone. It breaks the mould of what a Kamen Rider show can do (I don't think the term 'Kamen Rider' even gets used anywhere in the show) and gives us a show with complex characters and a rather interestingly anime-esque plot. While some might describe Gaim as being a bit too cosmic or overwrought by the end, I did feel like I still enjoyed the show for what it is, and while it's different, it's at least very solid all the way to its conclusion. 

...and that does it for all my coverage of the Heisei Kamen Rider shows! Maybe next year I'll actually finally sit down and pick one of the older shows to do episodic reviews of? We'll see!

Reviewing Fanmade Pokemon: Quarantine Crystal, Part 6

Our final batch of Quarantine Crystal Pokemon. This final segment took a bit longer for me to publish, because of some real-life distractions. And because I was trying (and failing) to find out the specific extinct creatures that some of these fan-made Pokemon are based on. Regardless, it has been a blast to do!

Once more, with thanks to commenter Heckbot, who provided all of the screenshots for the dex entries. 

Continuing off of the last batch of alien or space-themed Pokemon, we get Plantenna here, who is an antenna! It transmits signals into the night sky, and causes some alien plants to grow around it. Absolutely adorable, and I love that Plantenna is basically an alien device that terraforms the planet. I do like just how... simultaneously harmless and sinister the idea of a tiny little alien invader who doesn't try to abduct humans or whatever. It just... causes alien plants to grow. It's so innocuous, but also sounds like the herald of some Color Out of Space shit. 

I love the design here, too -- are Plantenna's eyes the two dots on the base of the antenna, or are those the two slug-like eyestalks on the dish? Or are those just bug antennae? Or are both pairs eyes, just ones that function differently? Regardless, a very fun concept. 

Since I'm guessing the types without actually seeing the game, probably Steel-type, Steel/Grass or Steel/Psychic?

Plantenna evolves into Habble, who is a fun little beetle-like creature. It still has a radar dish jutting out from the side of its body. Notably, despite being partially based on an insect, Habble doesn't have traditional insectoid antennae -- it has mechanical antennae instead! Instead of just causing alien plants to grow, Habble's signals now summon bugs into it. Kind of sinister, but I'm not sure how it works into the whole terraforming agenda. Unless the bugs that get attracted to Habble get transformed into alien bugs instead? That'd be awesome. All hail our Zerg overlords!

Does Habble turn into Steel/Bug, then? 

Holy shit, it's robo-Heliolisk! Satelisk works off of the same idea of using a frilled lizard's frill as something resembling a parabola. Except where Heliolisk just uses it as a solar-generator, Satelisk continues with the whole radio-dish parabola theme from its pre-evolutions. I love how the extendable lizard tongue is taking the place of a parabola dish's feed-horn. Also love its adorable pudgy little arms and legs. Unlike its two pre-evolutions, Satelisk is a bit more aggressive in changing the ecosystem to its liking.

Again, I wonder if all these different extraterrestrial-themed Pokemon are all creatures from the same source, or if they arrived independently? Are the invading Plantennas trying to terraform Johto from the same aliens that left behind the Junobes in the ocean? Are the Junobes the prototypes of the invading Plantennas? Are the Navigazers also from the same planet? Which one of these aliens kidnapped the Shabbycats and turned them into Odditens? 

Ooh, interesting! I'm not entirely sure what Kordiena is, or if it's connected to the two reptile-themed monsters that's placed after it in the Pokedex. But I think Kordiena is meant to be simultaneously a coral stem and also an analogy of stem cells? Like, all that stuff about its 'potential to change'? I kind of see Kordiena as a coral reef creature with so many little holes on the tips of its 'fins' and 'tail'. That said, considering its dex talks about how it left its puddle, maybe it's also based on fish walking out of a puddle to become land-dwelling creatures? I'm not really sure, but I really like how Kordiena looks!

Sordraena is a pretty cool reptile monster! I do like my reptiles, and Sordraena is noted to basically bask under the sun, which is pretty much basic reptile stuff. Sordraena itself isn't the most interesting Pokemon design, but looking at what I assume to be a branching evolution*, that aspect is really cool:

*Someone correct me in the comments if I'm wrong

The first evolution for Sordraena is a dinosaur! Tyrdraga is a pretty damn cool bipedal dinosaur, although not obviously based on any dinosaur I could think of. It's got Sordraena's somewhat bone-mask-like face as a head, and I really like its huge arms. I do like the description, too, noting that simple basking in the sun isn't enough to power up Tydraga's massive body, so it instead 'boils its own blood'. Since this is a Pokemon world, it translates into Tyrdraga being a fire-breathing monster. But it's not too far from the evolution of cold-blooded reptiles into warm-blooded dinosaurs either -- dinosaur bodies are, after all, way too big for traditional basking-in-the-sun to warm themselves up!

Presumably Fire/Dragon, from its typing. Does that make Sordraena pure-Dragon? 

I don't know if Aefaedra is just the evolution of Tyrdraga, or if it's a branched evolution. Either way would definitely make sense. Or maybe I'm looking at all this wrong, and Aerfaedra is just a standalone Pokemon? Either way, a pretty cool-looking bird monster. I like that it's got a bony head-crest, and it's got four wings. I do like the pretty flavourful dex entry of how it 'seeks to get closer to the sun', which is why it developed wings. Pretty neat!

I'm not as well-versed in prehistoric mammals as I am about dinosaurs, but Kitsyna is definitely inspired by one of those tiny extinct mammal-precursors that I always kind of gloss over in those giant dinosaur picture-books. Something like the Morganucodonts and the like. These sort of extinct creatures is the type of animals that I really wished the official Pokemon games would spotlight more -- it's the sort of companion monsters to the likes of Omanytes and Anorith that I would definitely appreciate. 

Pretty cool sprite all around, I do like the large tusks and the bony skull that Kitsyna uses to burrow into the ground. Ground-type, obviously. 

Kitsyna's evolutino is Cerkitaysa. Cerkit, like 'circuit'. I get it! It's a prehistoric ungulate, a precursor to horses (or Zebstrikas, in the case of the Pokemon world). I do really like that it has the fun lumpiness of how we think ancient prehistoric ungulates look, and the fact that it's probably a nod to how the Pokemon world has a modern-day electric zebra means that of course there's an electric-type equivalent of a Perissodactyl precursor -- the tapir-esque skull shape of Cerkitaysa is presumably a nod to that fact. Real-life horses evolved and diverged from the same common ancestors with tapirs and rhinos. 

GIANT MONKI. I'm not sure if Gigasynapa is part of the same batch of ancient prehistoric-themed Pokemon as the past couple of entries (and the next one, too), but it sure is a happy monkey. It's got a star-shaped nose, and its mouth seems to be a giant set of teeth embedded in a furry mouth. Maybe it's meant to be a Gigantopithecus, based on its name? Or maybe it's just a Pokemon version of ancient proto-humans because it fears fire? Pretty neat. 

Not sure about the type. Pure-Normal? Pure-Dark? 

Therazor is based on one of the coolest dinosaurs out there, Therizinosaurus. Its name literally means "Scythe Lizard", and its best-known for having giant, 50-centimeter-long murder-claws. Therazor is essentially just an exaggerated version of the real-life dinosaur, with giant claws and a mostly theropodal stance. I like how the expression of Therazor does fit with the rather fun description -- it's powerful, but it's also slow and dumb, which is why it was driven to extinction. I, for one, am definitely a huge, huge fan of the large amount of Pokemon based on extinct animals. That's definitely something that appeals a lot to me, personally. 

Also not sure about the type. Normal? Rock/Normal or pure Rock if it's a fossil?

What a great pun! KRAKENTOA! Like, a cross between the Kraken and the Krakatoa! I love that it's simultaneously in the shape of a volcano, but also somewhat resembles a prehistoric cephalopod. Cephalopods used to have shells of all shapes and sizes, and some of them, like the genus Orthoceras, have a cone-shaped shell. I really like the idea that the volcanic current from the 'tip' of the volcano-shell also doubles as trailing tendrils of the squid/octopus part. Pretty cool! Also love the fact that the eyes are also rocks. 

Probably Fire/Rock or Fire/Water. 

Oh, I know this one! Wiwaxia! Yea! See, this is exactly the reason I thought why all the previous creatures are based on a specific extinct animal. Anyone who knows what I missed out, please tell me below! Wiwaxia is a genus of Cambrian-era maybe-mollusk, and Wiwright is essentially a Pokemon-ification of the commonly-accepted look of this creature. And Wiwright is basically... well, it's like someone took a sea slug, a porcupine and mushed them together in the Zelda aesthetic. Wiwaxia is so weird!

All Wiwright really adds is that absolutely glorious smug grin. How can a prehistoric maybe-slug look so smug? Look at that grin. Wiwright is so happy that it's a herbivore but it can bite people. I love that apparently it's smart (and smug) enough to 'defy scientists who doubted its existence'. The real-life Wiwaxia actually is noted to have 'rows of conical teeth', and while I'm not sure if the teeth led to the massive debate about Wiwaxia's classification, the real-life genus definitely caused a lot of paleontological debates. 

Wirigible is the evolution of Wiwright, and... oh, I get it. Wiwright is because it's a Wright Brothers reference. Wirigible evolves into a float, and I love how the dex entry just goes and shrugs. Wirigible can fly with its spines, but scientists simply cannot explain why. I love it. I love the idea that the Pokemon equivalent of Wiwaxia evolves into something even more baffling and ridiculous, and science cannot explain it. 

Presumably, Wiwright is Water-type, and Wirigible is Water/Flying. 

Oh no, this poor, poor creature! I love it. Anomully looks like one of those monsters in older D&D modules that are obviously just 'hey, draw the weirdest thing you can think of, and we'll make it into a monster'. This creature gives me heavy 3.5E Tojanida vibes. Anomully is apparently a 'fish who tried to become a dragon before it was ready'. Because all fishes evolve into dragons in the Pokemon world, apparently? And it got warped into some strange, eldritch form as a consequence. 

And what a bizarre form! You can still see what used to be a fish's main body underneath it all, but its fins have grown into long, leathery wing-fins, and it's got two eyestalks with adorable googly-eyes attached to the wings. Where a normal head should be, Anomully has a craning, limb-like claw that ends in a massive venus flytrap mouth. What a bizarre monster! And despite it all, I kind of think that Anomully is having a good time. Its 'mouth' seems to be grinning, and those googly-eyes seem to be more adorable than in constant pain. Or maybe that's just what I tell myself, while Anomully is begging to be put out of its misery.

As a commenter had noted, Anomully is an adaptation of the Tully Monster, otherwise known as the extinct genus of creatures called Tullimonstrum. Which... yeah, it looks like someone's Spore creation! Anyone remember that game, Spore? But man, Anomully doesn't even look too different from a stylized depiction of the Tully Monster -- two googly eyes, a body vaguely like a squid, and a weird proboscis-claw-mouth thing. Obviously, the Tully Monster has been the subject of many, many debates on its classification, whether it's a vertebrate precursor, or if it's related to worms, molluscs, arthropods or any other group of animals. A bizarre creature and an appropriately bizarre Pokemon version of it!

Presumably Dragon/Flying? Water/Dragon? Water/Flying, since it failed to become a dragon? Shit, if Water/Flying is right, that makes this even closer to Gyarados, which I appreciate. 

And this one is a Hallucigenia! Although a bit more of a stylized one compared to Wiwright. Halloallo has the same weird set of appendages as its real-life counterpart -- one side is all spikes, and the other side are rounded-tip tentacles. For years, paleontologists are not sure if Hallucigenia stood on the spiky side or on the non-spiky side. Did we ever get an answer to which side is the real 'bottom part' of the organism? I don't think we ever did. 

Halloallo reflects this, and I love that the dex notes that "it likes to do handstands", a neat nod to the paleontological debate. Halloallo is also an 'endling', the last known individual member of a species... which, uh, means it's maybe a one-off Pokemon? Someone get a bunch of Dittos and have them breed with Halloallo!

Fueghast is... uh... it's... a noodly monster. Apparently the scientists that studied Fueghast thought once thought that it's a dog. And I guess it's quadruped, but look at that face! That's some Junji Ito monster face right there, and I think the eyes are on either side of the jaw. Pretty creepy! And then I read the rest of the dex entry. It 'flops hollowly in the wind, leaking a trail of ashes'. Yeah, that's definitely not a dog. Dogs don't flop hollowly in the wind. A gloriously creepy monster despite having a pretty short description. 

I don't know about the type. Normal? Ghost? 

Look at the cute baby rhino! Belloceros is an adorable little baby rock rhino! It's a baby rhino, with a rock as the nub of its horn! I love it. It's adorable. The dex entry is likewise pretty cute. Not much else I can say here, it's a cute baby rock rhino. 

Probably a Rock-type that evolved into a Rock/Ice. 

Belloceros evolves into Subceros, another Pokemon based on an extinct creature. Presumably it's the woolly rhinoceros, Coelodonta antiquitatis. It's a rhino that's furry! Just like Therazor up above, Subceros's reason for extinction is also noted here, and it went extinct due to over-predation and vulnerability. I don't have a whole ton to say, it's an pretty cool Pokemon version of a pretty neat animal. 

Oh, okay! This one is an interesting one. Mammothra! The designers of this game decided to combine a mammoth with Mothra, the famous giant-moth kaiju from the Godzilla franchise. Which, not going to lie, isn't something that I would ever have thought to do. Mammothra is based on Mothra's larval form, being an adorable fuzzy caterpillar. But since it's also a mammoth, it's got a curled-up trunk! Look at those eyes. Look at those adorable eyes. I don't remember if any of the movies with Mothra that I've watched actually has an origin about its species becoming extinct, but hey!

Presumably Bug... something? Bug/Ice or Bug/Flying?

Behemothra is such an interesting take on how to combine a moth and an elephantine creature. Moths have those curled-up proboscis, and the creator of this game decided to combine that with a mammoth's trunk. And since both mammoths and moths are naturally fuzzy, it makes a pretty good segue for the rest of Behemothra's body. Moth wings replace the mammoth tusks, and I love the pudgy moth-feet. Behemothra, just like Mothra, are ancient beings that hibernate and slumber, but will awaken in times of strife to defend mankind. Presumably from that Destoroyah-based Pokemon we saw a couple dozen entries back. 

Pretty cool, and I am tickled to note that all of this is probably because they wanted to make a pun between 'moth' and 'mammoth'. 

Okay, okay, this one is kind of an interesting concept! Ambionic took me a while to figure out, but it's one of those 'insects trapped in amber' that got popularized by Jurassic Park. But instead of just being there to be used by scientists to make dinosaurs and Aerodactyls, the bug-in-amber actually ends up becoming a Pokemon of its own. It's the central body of this glorious mecha-like being made up of petrified wood, so Ambionic is just essentially the immobile core of a much larger walking tree golem. I love this so much! The fact that they went the extra mile and gave Ambionic a suit made up of fossilized, petrified wood is really what sells this whole design for me. 

Bug/Grass, probably? It's tough competition, but Ambionic is probably one of my favourite concepts full-stop from this dex. 

Much, much earlier in the dex, we had the hamster-themed Pokemon Nomster and Nomsabre, and now a couple hundred entries down the line, we have... Noomsday! It's the 'Countdown' Pokemon, and it, uh, sure is a giant version of Nomsabre. It's got fangs, demon-like horns, and its tail has blossomed into a gigantic snail-shell-esque growth with a giant skull sigil on it. Adorable, and also unsettling due to its name and species type. 

Yukitten is an interesting one! it's a snow cat ninja! It's holding a giant kunai made out of compact snow. Apparently, there's a whole society of snow-cat ninjas that teach its young how to create giant snow ninja weapons out of compact snow. Pretty simple, but pretty neat!

(We're skipped a Pokemon in-between Noomsday and Yukitten due to the creator's wishes)

Yukitten evolves into Fluriken, and it's got snow shurikens. I love the description about how it leaves no footprints when it moves around. That's such a flavourful detail for a ninja living in snowy areas! Presumably, the Yukitten line is pure-Ice, Ice/Dark or Ice/Fighting, and lives in Quarantine's version of the Ice Path. 

And we finally get to the final form, the Snokage. Taken from the 'Hokage' rank of Naruto fame. Snokage's a humanoid cat-person, and I do really like the flavour text giving us such a neat over-the-top anime martial arts power. When Snokage lowers its heartrate, it doesn't just tighten its focus... even the air around it slows down and freezes! Pretty neat. 

Okay, an interesting creature. Seahem looks like some sort of sea turtle crossed with an underwater mine, but apparently it's a "nuclear" Pokemon. Interesting! Seahem apparently is a scrappy little buddy that stubbornly looks for discarded nuclear waste. Kind of reminds me of the MUTO's in Universal's Godzilla movie, but all the talk about Destoroyah and Mothra has gotten me into a bit of a Godzilla mood. 

Presumably Water/Steel (it's a mine), or Water/Poison (nuclear waste is poisonous, and this game doesn't have a nuclear type like Pokemon Uranium).

Seasar is a basically a bigger Seahem, although there's also a somewhat plesiosaurid-esque vibe to it. It's based on a nuclear bomb, I suppose, especially that marking on its shell-body. Seasar has been hoarding nuclear energy, and while inert, it's obviously risky to be around. 

HOLY SHIT. Okay, Seahem and Seasar are pretty neat, but Seabehem? Look at this thing. It's a full-on giant war submarine. Or, well, a metallic warhead. I love the calm-but-furious face that it has, and I love just how utterly threatening it looks like. There's definitely a heavy old-school Digimon vibe to this one, I feel? Very cool all around, and it's actually a destructive one! It apparently goes around destroying power plants to absorb energy. Gee, I don't know, if power plants will summon the wrath of these living nuclear subs, I really think the people in Johto really should switch to something less environmentally destructive. 

Donukame is, I believe, based on the Taiko drums that the Japanese deity Raijin is often drawn with, which are often arranged in a ring. Donukame is the drum itself, surrounded by three floating smaller drums, and I love how it's so happy. It apparently signals festivities, instead of just weather changes. Pretty cute design! 

Either pure-Electric, Electric/Flying or perhaps even Electric/Fairy?

Ooookay. I'm actually not entirely sure what's going on here, but Illuxury is a "Fellmaiden" Pokemon, and that my good fungus buddy Yuggromi isn't actually the monstrous fiend in the forest. But instead, a silent girl in a white dress is the cause... and, well, Illuxury is probably said maiden? I think Illuxury has the vague appearance of a girl with a bunny hat, but its real body is... some sort of demonic creature with spiky bug legs? Pretty creepy. 

Dark/Fairy? Dark/Ghost? I think we're in that part of the Pokedex where we have a bunch of legendaries, because all of the ones after this all do feel like they are something unique in the setting. 

Okay, pretty creepy description! Andromega is based on the Andromeda galaxy, and it's a massive, swirling vortex. Those spiral arms of the galaxy even look kind of like real arms when the galaxy itself is looking at you. I love that 'face' it has. Those two particularly bright white stars are the eyes, and the yawning hole in the center is the massive, yawning mouth. 

But what I love most is the dex entry. The far-away nebula that astronomers are looking at? It catches their gaze and turns to look back at them. Reminds me of a Junji Ito manga. A very creepy 'stare at the void and it stares back' story, and... well, hopefully Andromega just wants to make friends instead of coming down to investigate our planet and then proceed to consume it. 

Not sure what type a cosmic entity would even be. I'm just going to say Psychic, since that seems to be the default type that Nintendo assigns its extraterrestrial monsters. 

A bunch of these Pokemon don't have dex entries yet since the creators haven't officially released them. But we know what they look like!Goriath is a King Kong! Only it's far larger than King Kong, or even the Kaiju-sized version we recently saw on screen in Godzilla vs. Kong. It's big enough to rip out the Empire State Building and use it as a club! Kong used to climb that building. Now it's just a toy to Kong!

Ooooh, this one is cool. I think it's a pun on terracotta? Terratora is a creature that effects the entire landscape of the world, being this giant, reptilian monster that causes tectonic plates to shift whenever it roars. I love the description of how its core is made up of white fire, and it will boil 'until the world stops spinning'. A core of white fire is also basically what's at the core of our own planet!

But most of all, I really like that Terratora's face isn't a regular draconic face, but is just... a mass of stone with what I assume to be a mouth that opens like a Graboid or something. Love those very unconventional-looking horns. A very cool design for a subterranean dragon monster. Presumably Ground/Dragon or Ground/Fire. 

"Kujira" means whale, I'm pretty sure, and "niku" is meat. So Nikujira is a meat whale. Except... well, the sprite and the dex entry for this thing really ends up sounding very, very ominous! First, that sprite gives the Nikujira such a haunting expression, with hair (algae?) that covers part of its face. It's got teeth, and stubby feet... but its dex entry describe about how Nikujira causes a sweet scent to drift and attract carrion birds, but 'they will go hungry'. The dex doesn't even describe the Nikujira as anything particularly malevolent, but... I don't know. I have a feeling that it's a bit more destructive than just sending out the smells of meat. Or maybe I'm just jumping to conclusions, and the Nikujira is actually extremely friendly. 

Water/Ghost, perhaps? 

Ryunari is a pun on "ryu" (dragon) and "inari" (the god of rice and cultivation, sometimes associated with the fox). So it's a fox dragon god, and... well, it sure is a pretty cool combination of a fox with draconic features. Ryunari is holding an orb like many Eastern Dragons, and it's able to see time itself, learning from the past and seeing the future. A pretty neat legendary Pokemon for sure, I do like the general anatomy of Ryunari! 

An interesting creature? Where Ryunari looks peaceful and dignified, Slaattel (based on Warhammer's Slaanesh?) is an angry monster with an angry dragon face and tentacle-like horns. Its wings look delightfully angular, and it's a creature that's chained up with 'chains beyond our understanding'. Apparently, humanity's ancestors faced Slaattel and failed? So who chained up Slaattel? And I love just how ominous the dex entry is. "Soon, we will face what our ancestors could not."

Drassal is a 'Horde' Pokemon that looks pretty adorable! It's a sleepy dragon with fairy-like bug wings (Fairy/Dragon?) in the place of hands. Love its glowing tail, and I absolutely love how interestingly creepy its dex entry is. It's a kleptomaniac that does not keep its stolen goods. So far kind of charming, that's what fairies do, right? Ravens and crows do that too, steal items. And then come the second page. "Who is it trying to appease... and why aren't we?" Is it Slaattel? Is it Andromega? Is it one of the two below? Amazingly ominous. 

Blazenbull the "Forge" Pokemon is a giant minotaur man! It's also holding a hammer, and it's got some interesting angular horns. I think he also has a forge in his belly! Blazenbull is one of the Pokemon here that hasn't been officially released, but it's probably a legendary involved with forging? Presumably fire/steel?

And we close this dex off with... I think it's "MA-0", with a zero instead of an o. I watched enough Kamen Rider to know that "ma-ou" means "demon king" in Jaapnese, and this guy looks like... well, it looks like a Godzilla-esque giant monster made up of cables. Except instead of a regular dinosaur head, MA-0 has this very cool-looking featureless face that's just an orb with four glowing... eyes? Lights? Very creepy. I wonder if there's a story here, where MA-0 is involved with any of the other legendaries, or any of the other extraterrestrial monsters? 

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And that does it for Quarantine Crystal's pokedex! This last one did come out a bit late, but I hope you guys would enjoy it. I definitely did! Once more, special thanks to Heckbot for providing me with all of these screenshots.