Professor Popinjay's Compendium of Perspicacity

A Non-Review by Professor Popinjay

Considering this film was made on a 5 million dollar budget and generated 175.7 million at the box office, it’s probably an unpopular opinion when I say, “This was mind-numbing drivel.”

But I’m not really into Pokémon so what do I know? This obviously appealed to the very forgiving fan-base who happily turned over wads of their parent’s hard earned moola to see this. I got it on vhs for half off at a secondhand store. I may have even used a coupon.

It starts with a 21 minute “short” called Pikachu’s Vacation and let me tell you, the dialogue in this short rivals the collected works of Shakespeare. The battle of wit that ensues between these perpetual personal pronoun pronouncing pea-brains is positively prolific! I jest. It’s like watching the un-subtitled Wookiee dialogue from the Star Wars Christmas Special.

The next part is a ten-minute prologue which basically works as part of the movie but I understand this section wasn’t included in the original Japan theatrical release. That means without the short and the extra prologue this film was only 54 minutes long! People paid full price to see this!

The bulk of the film was interesting and humorous. I loved it when the protagonists missed transport to the island and some Vikings just happen to show up (the bumbling bad guys in disguise) and the heroes are just like “Vikings? Yeah that’s not weird at all. Let’s go!”

Maurice LeMarche does the voice of Mew and sounds like Brain from Pinky and the Brain. That’s a choice he made and I stand by him. I shan’t criticize Maurice LeMarche. He’s a master of his craft.

Where it all unraveled for me is after the Pokémon are all fighting their clones and sad music was playing and the main character Pokémon trainer is watching the scene in horror and says “Pokémon shouldn’t be fighting each other like this!?!”

Really? You realize you’re basically a dog fighter. Some of these Pokémon are really REALLY cute and you make them immolate and electrocute each other! So when you say they shouldn’t be fighting like this what you mean is they shouldn’t be fighting of their own recognizance without master’s whip at their backs? What exactly is the message we’re conveying here? It’s no wonder so many kids these days get into cock fighting tournaments with this kind of gateway drug so readily available.

Well, this was an experience and I’m sure I’ll trudge through more. I hear it gets better.