Pokemon: Detective Pikachu (2019)
 

Oh boy. :ohwell:

Sony, Warner Bros., and Legendary are currently engaging in a "top-secret auction" for the rights to make a Live-Action film based on the Pokémon franchise: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/new...ing-war-884207

So live action actors with CGI Pokemon. K then.

Why do I sense it will be like the way off from source material joke that Dragonball:Revolution was?

NOOOOOOOOOOO. Don't do this.

God, I just know they're going to do disgusting hyper realistic designs. Hopefully if something comes out of it, they keep the pokemon designs identical to the games.

I would love to see this if they didn't change too much. It's already elaborate enough to make a good movie out of.

The pokemon themselves would vary. I mean there's no way they can all be cute and they shouldn't. They're not anyway. A lot are based on wild and mythical animals. Pikachu and some of the smaller ones could remain cute.

April Fools was fourteen days ago, guys!

Let me guess, they'll base it on the anime with Ash/Misty/Brock and have them as teenagers or 20 year olds instead of 10 year olds, and have Mewtwo as the antagonist...so loosely based on the first movie from 20 years ago.

Ash won't be Asian but instead some white boy, Misty will be played by Megan Fox, and Brock's eyes obviously won't look like the anime.

Its whitewashing at its finest, especially since the cast is meant to be Japanese.

hahaha wow

we have yet to get an RPG style 3d open world game...

but a movie will have to do for now???

dragon ball z the movie 2.0

I'd watch it.

I don't understand why Nintendo is pushing for this either, this obviously isn't something the Japanese want because annual Pokemon movies still release in theaters over there. The 19th pokemon movie about Volcanion is coming this July for example.

Plus since it will be made for Americans, you can tell they'll go full nostalgia mode with it and base it on the anime with Ash/Misty/Brock. You guys know good and well they would try to reap 90's nostalgia with it as much as possible.

Watch Ash not be Japanese and be a white boy. Also since don't know how they're going to do it since Ash and co. are 10 years old with Brock only a teenager...are they going to cast actual 10 year olds or just make them in their teens or 20's? I think they'd probably do the latter. *shudders*

If they go the Kanto route, we might get a nostalgia-based filler season for the anime where Misty and Brock return so Japan can cash in.

Ash and Misty will be white, and Brock will be black. You just know it, did you really think there could be any other option?

If they're gonna turn them into teenagers or young adults... then you can bet that Ash and Misty will make out near the end of the film.

Just another thing to pretend it never existed, if it sees the light of the day, that is. I know that DBZ fans like to ignore that live action movie existence.

I don't know why people would wanna see this, though. I guess many are gullible thinking it looks good on paper. That or they like to see very different interpretations of their favorite franchises. I mean, if all you do is want a nostalgia flashback then watch a couple of early Pokémon episodes or buy RBY in the Nintendo eShop. It's not exactly a non-accessible franchise we're talking about here.

That being said, Misty hasn't been a main character since what? 2002? It seems to me that the Pokémon anime changes the main girl character every generation. That seems to be its formula. And while RBY is still the highest selling generation, it's not like DP or or BW have sold poorly.

I don't think the anime writers would remotely care what an American based live-action pokemon movie will do.

Man you care way too much about whether or not Ash will be white...

Because Ash is supposed to be Japanese. They'll probably cast a white boy though.

More people should, don't shame the guy who speaks against white-washing.

The kid's name is Satoshi...

I seem to remember something about Michael Bay being called to direct this movie. Hope it isn't true, but I wouldn't be surprised if that happens.

Considering a studio hasn't even been announced to produce this, I find that bit of news highly doubtful.

And even if Michael Bay directed this, it's a lot harder to permanently damage a property like Pokémon in the public eye than a property like TMNT. It would be forgotten quickly like that infamous live action DBZ movie that came out some years ago was.


You're right, but considering he's known as Ash Ketchum outside of Japan... don't be surprised that some not so smart people will have always assumed he to be a white guy. I can also see many "If Misty is Japanese than why is she a blue eyed redhead?!" comments of the sort from the general audience now. :lol:

I don't see what it matters. If the movie looks somewhat decent and the acting is good, who cares what color the skin of the actor is.

Either way, whatever real life actors they cast will look nothing like the anime characters. There's no way they can duplicate Brock's eyes in live-action, etc.

I mean they could base it off the games with, "Red" but since they'll likely go for 90's nostalgia it'll probably be based on the anime.

To be honest, Hollywood could possibly get away with turning those characters white or black easily since Pokémon, despite being a Japanese product, doesn't really have a setting that immediately tells you that it's Japanese. It's a fictional world(well there is also a region in Japan called Kanto...) with fictional creatures. And also, Pokémon has been localized to death that no one in North America or Europe knows the original names of the characters or many Pokémon. They only know their English names. Pokémon had to localize a lot of its naming due to all the puns, in order to make them understandable. In countries like Germany and France, they translate a lot of Pokémon names as well.

And considering this would be made by Americans, you know there'd be an outrage if everyone would be of the same race in this movie. It's like an unwritten rule that every American made stuff needs to have a representative or two of every major ethnic group residing in the country.

Its weird Nintendo of America even wants this. Pokemon anime movies still come out annually in theaters in Japan, this year is the 19th movie about Volcanion.

Why would Nintendo even want a live-action movie? Certainly the Japanese don't want it which is why they've never done a live-action themselves over there.

And they no longer get released outside of Japan?

They do but just direct to DVD. In Japan they all come out in theaters.

Now that I think about it, I only recall hearing about the first two Pokémon films. I guess most of the rest ones never got cinematic released here either. Why does that no longer happen if Pokémon still sells a lot of games? Did the last Pokémon that got an international release have poor ticket sales or something?

I knwo that the highest selling generation was the RBY one, but I've had people aged 18-22 telling me that most of their friends and classmates were crazy about the games when they were little kids. And this is people who grew up with the Ruby and Saphire generation.

Pokemon was a huge fad when it started and it dropped about halfway into Johto circa around 2001/2002. Without the huge fad of kids the franchise sustains itself by either hardcore fans or new younger kids. Obviously the games will always be popular as seen by their sales, but all secondary aspects are just that...secondary.

But surely the anime still has decent enough ratings outside of Japan, right? After all, it was the anime that got kids outside of Japan into Pokémon in the first place. It's an important market tool of the franchise.

Being born in 1990, Pokémon was huge here between 1999 and 2002. Then from 2002-2003 onwards, the kids around my age seem to have stopped caring about it. But I assumed it was because they were burnt out of it or just felt like they were getting too old for it. In that time period I saw my classmates getting temporarily into Yu-Gi-Oh and Beyblade toys. But those didn't last long. Then some got into Magic the Gathering, but they were looked at as nerds by the more "jock" and social types.

The anime is currently in its 19th season. I'm surprised it still runs outside of Japan, even though the current saga XY is one of the best written of the show...just the fact that its still running after 19 years is mind boggling.

Well, the reason I could never get into the Pokémon anime, even back when I was a kid, was because it was repetitive as hell. It takes dedication for some fans to still be watching it after all these years. But there are people nowadays who don't know that Pokémon still exists. At least back in 2007-2010 many people I talked to had no idea it was still around. Then again, the PSP outsold the DS here, meaning we're not much of a Nintendo loving country, so I guess I can see why many people I've met in HS had no idea the series was still around.

I've watched at least 80% of the animes total episodes, so at least around 700ish out of 900ish episodes. I only stopped watching early into the BW arc.

And, in how many of those episodes, Team Rocket try to kidnap Pikachu and then are sent blasting off at the end?

True. Even Satoshi's hometown is probably based on Yamanashi...possibly (just my assumption). Kanto's region consists of places like Tokyo, Yokohama, Saitama, Chiba, etc. That aside, outside of the first series (Kanto) that referenced Japanese culture and things quite a bit, the others really don't so much and I guess that was done to make it easier to adapt or whatever, into other languages without having to change too much.

Orange Island eps I figured were based on the Izu Islands...Cinnabar being the most northern of them. Hoenn was based on Kyushu (ironically, where the two big quakes hit recently). Never mind. Still should be easy to adapt and make an English Pokemon movie given how localized it is.Now this makes sense because the country is made up of many people with different backgrounds. It's annoying how people outside of the US always assume the country have white people only because of how our media is. I'm so sick of people thinking I'm from either South America or Africa as opposed to Canada, US, somewhere in the UK, etc., because I'm not white.

If they do a Pokemon movie, they should base it on X/Y since that was a multinational game.You know, I rewatched some of the first series a while back. It felt more like the Rockets had some kind of scheme going on and would coincidentally come across Satoshi and his friends. It felt more like killing two birds with one stone. They continue whatever their scheme was while trying to get Pikachu too. Of course there were times where they purposely went after the Satoshi and his companions, but there were quite a bit of them that didn't and it was more like an opportunity. Like with the Cerulean ep, for example. They'd gotten to Cerulean way before Satoshi and the others did and they were planning on robbing the gym. Pikachu just happened to be there. Of course they'll get blasted off again or defeated because they're the bad guys...but I do wish they would have it more like what I mentioned. They just happen to run into the twerps and then try to capture their Pokemon.

Of course I'm really no expert in the anime. Aside from Kanto and the Orange Islands, I've never seen a Pokemon series in full because I'd end up losing interest at some point. The new series (X/Y), I just have no interest in since the game's story was kind of....stupid to me.

Huh what? Who doesn't know that there's plenty of people of all origins in the USA? Who thinks Americans are all white?

And about every major American tv show and movie has black people in it. Not to mention all the popular rap music which is mostly made by black people. People around the world know that Kanye West and 50 Cent are American.

I'm in Japan. First thing asked of me is if I'm from Africa or Brazil. I've gotten that with Chinese and Korean tourists here too. Some people here are in a bubble. Most media from the US that's widely viewed is predominantly white.

Hmm aren't there lots of Brazilians of Japanese origin? But those obviously aren't black...

Are there many Africans in Japan? And what about Black Americans? Japan is a very homogeneous country, so there might not be that many immigrants there.

I wonder what kind of American movies and tv shows are Japanese people watching, then. And what kind of music as well, for it to be so rare for them to see Black American people in those products.

They show quite a few things here and some rap music is known, but not everyone would listen to it or know much about it.

Foreigners here are very few and here I'm a minority within a minority, given my dark skin. Black Americans do reside here and stuff. Same with Africans.

When I first read this I thought it was an absolutely terrible idea since Pokemon is just something that doesn't translate well to live action; I'm talking worse than DBEvolution but after reading the comments of Cubed here I warmed up to the idea. If you can have a stupid fun idea it could definitely work as a weird alternative version of Pokemon but we'll see if this ever makes it out of production hell.