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The first pokemon movie, especially the japanese version, is a masterpiece

yamibakura95

Shadow Gamer
87
Posts
2
Years
  • Age 28
  • Seen Apr 11, 2022
The animation, the soundtrack, the character development, surpassed the anime. It was a legit movie, where the main character was actually Mewtwo. In other anime, like DBZ, movies are basically Goku beating up a bad guy. But in pokemon, it was different. Half of the movie is told from Mewtwo's perspective.

And Mewtwo was an amazing character, in the japanese version. He was angry and that made sense considering they atificailly supressed his emotions and kept him dormant for years. He was bound to retaliate at some point. And i have been thinking about it, was it really necessary to use serum to calm him down? What would have happened if they let his sadness increase? Would he die? I doubt it since his brain waves, his vital sings essentially, were getting stronger and stronger.

The tragedy of Mewtwo is that, despite all his amazing powers like telekinesis, mind control, memory manipulation, flight, there is nothing he can do to bring Amber back. He is the strongest pokemon and all but he will never get back what he had. He is alive and on top of the world but it all amounts to nothing compared to his bond with Amber.

Because Amber was in a sense, his whole family. His mother, his stister, it was the first person he met when he was born (if you can call an ambiguous form of light a person). He was a normal baby in the beggining, but he experienced loss at a very early point of his life.

Also, i like how they pulled a genocyber for the first movie: a lab experiment with psychic powers that detroys everything. Pokemon had guts back in the day.
 
41,094
Posts
17
Years
Moved this over to the Pokémon Anime forum! This is the best place for PokeAni talk, including movies.

I really liked this movie, even if I primarily watched it in English. Nowadays (or, well, since 2006 or so lol) I watch the anime exclusively in Japanese and have seen some clips of movie 1 in the original language since then, but never actually watched it all in jp yet. But I absolutely loved the backstory with Amber... that was painful. :( It definitely lessened the impact for me by not being able to watch that scene when I was a kid since it was removed for English audiences. The whole thing was just so well done, and it's hard to top how emotional it was. The Japanese ending song also made me cry - I love it.
 
853
Posts
3
Years
  • Age 33
  • Seen Nov 9, 2023
don't know the japanese version, but I can't find it in me to disagree regardless, that was just a great movie.

huh, sounds like another case of america getting the worst version of a animated series, dang, I'll have to check out the original version then.
 

yamibakura95

Shadow Gamer
87
Posts
2
Years
  • Age 28
  • Seen Apr 11, 2022
don't know the japanese version, but I can't find it in me to disagree regardless, that was just a great movie.

huh, sounds like another case of america getting the worst version of a animated series, dang, I'll have to check out the original version then.


its been years since i last saw the subbed version but i cant seem to find it anywhere now.

the american version wasnt a bad movie but this is one of the very few cases where i actually prefer the japanese version. the music is better imho and i prefer mewtwo's voice because he sounds younger in it. It suits him better since he isnt really that old (i think he is technically 12 years old though im not sure about his biological age).

Moved this over to the Pokémon Anime forum! This is the best place for PokeAni talk, including movies.

I really liked this movie, even if I primarily watched it in English. Nowadays (or, well, since 2006 or so lol) I watch the anime exclusively in Japanese and have seen some clips of movie 1 in the original language since then, but never actually watched it all in jp yet. But I absolutely loved the backstory with Amber... that was painful. :( It definitely lessened the impact for me by not being able to watch that scene when I was a kid since it was removed for English audiences. The whole thing was just so well done, and it's hard to top how emotional it was. The Japanese ending song also made me cry - I love it.

the first pokemon movie was intended to be a pretty ambitious endeavor. if you watch the very first trailer in japanese, the movie was very different from its final release. Because originally this movie was gonna be the ending to the anime, so it had to be good in every aspect.

But due to pokemon's populatiry the anime was gonna keep going so the movie's purpose was changed but maintained its quality nonetheless. pokemon movies are quite underrated in terms of animation, everything was actually hand drawn and the animation was very fluid.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
41,094
Posts
17
Years
pokemon movies are quite underrated in terms of animation, everything was actually hand drawn and the animation was very fluid.

Yeah, it was very good. I have an attachment to the first three movies that probably can't ever be replicated. That old school style and feel of Pokémon is just very charming, even if I still like the anime today. Are there any other Pokémon movies you like a lot? What do you think of the newer ones?
 

yamibakura95

Shadow Gamer
87
Posts
2
Years
  • Age 28
  • Seen Apr 11, 2022
Yeah, it was very good. I have an attachment to the first three movies that probably can't ever be replicated. That old school style and feel of Pokémon is just very charming, even if I still like the anime today. Are there any other Pokémon movies you like a lot? What do you think of the newer ones?

tbh i kinda lost track of the pokemon movies over the years haha. last one i watched was latias and latios which was pretty amazing. i also liked how it was setted in Johto, it was a nice bridge between gen 2 and gen 3. But i agree on te first three movies, they were something else. I liked how there were some final fantasy elements in them (mewtwo's castle, the giant airship used by the second movie's antagonist, the illusion castle in the third). the designers definately werent scared of getting out of the comfort zone back in the day. the movies were so unstrained and uninhibited.
 

Palamon

Silence is Purple
8,106
Posts
15
Years
I really wish I could watch the Japanese version of the first Pokemon movie. A shame I don't have a vpn, lmfao.

Netflix should just put all the Pokemon movies up on there in Japanese as well, but I won't hold my breath. I did know about the "birth of Mewtwo(?) special that was never dubbed, and still want to see it through Mewtwo's point of view. Too bad that's a hard thing to do...
 

yamibakura95

Shadow Gamer
87
Posts
2
Years
  • Age 28
  • Seen Apr 11, 2022
I really wish I could watch the Japanese version of the first Pokemon movie. A shame I don't have a vpn, lmfao.

Netflix should just put all the Pokemon movies up on there in Japanese as well, but I won't hold my breath. I did know about the "birth of Mewtwo(?) special that was never dubbed, and still want to see it through Mewtwo's point of view. Too bad that's a hard thing to do...

actually, the birth of mewtwo was dubbed. and its a good dub but i prefer the japanese version . Also i like the OST in the subbed version more.
 
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