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"The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo" - Week Two
July 24th, 2013

Dogasu @ 19:10 JST -- The box office figures for the newest movie's second week are now in!


In its second week, The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo dropped to third place after Studio Ghibli's The Wind Has Risen and Monsters University, according to Cinema Today.  Studio Ghibli's newest film, by the way, made 960,885,850 yen in just two days, which is almost as much as this year's Pocket Monsters movie has been able to make in two weeks.  The Genosect movie has earned 1,007,267,050 yen since its debut, putting it just past the one billion yen mark.

In other movie news, the cover for the soundtrack to The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo has also been revealed!


The CD goes on sale July 31st for 2,625 yen (about US $26) for the regular version and 3,360 yen (about US $34...yeah, the current exchange rate makes these conversions super easy, doesn't it?) for the version that comes with a DVD.  There's still no word on what's actually on that DVD, but I'll be sure to post here as soon as that information becomes available.  The CD Guide has been updated accordingly.

Finally, I've updated the List of TV Episodes with a new episode title.

"The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo" Opening Weekend
July 17th, 2013

Dogasu @ 20:11 JST -- The box office figures for the newest movie's first weekend are in!

Cinema Today reports that The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo opened in second place at the box office.  It was shown in 345 screens nationwide and made 486,293,500 yen over Saturday and Sunday.  Cinema Today breaks down the audience attendance by saying that 62% of the audience was male and 38% were female, adding that 37% of that overall audience were elementary school kids, 28.2% were those over 30, and 17.6% were people in their 20s.  The site estimates that a lot of those older audience members were parents chaperoning their kids. The film was beaten at the box office by Monsters University (nailed it!), now in its second week.  Rounding out the top three is the Japanese film Galileo [sic] Project.


Rank-wise it did very well - number two! - but money-wise?  When you compare it to 2012's Kyurem vs. The Sacred Swordsman Keldeo, which made 753,760,100 yen in its first weekend, it's hard to look at the Genosect numbers without feeling disappointed.  Now, it's important to note that the numbers we're getting for the Genosect movie are just for the Saturday and Sunday while the numbers we got for the Keldeo movie were for the Saturday, Sunday, and Monday.  Also, the last movies of a generation (in this case, Generation V) generally tend to do worse than their predecessors.  Still, though...while these numbers are in no way bad or indicate that the movie is a failure (also, approximately 0% of the elementary school kids give a shit about there being two Mewtwo now), the fact remains that this year's movie made quite a bit less in its opening weekend than last year's movie did.

I'll definitely continue to keep an eye on these box office figures as the weeks go by.


"Pikachu and Its Eevee Friends" Notes
July 16th, 2013

Dogasu @ 23:14 JST -- Did you know that, in addition to the Genosect movie that's out now, that there's also a Pikachu short in theaters? 


You wouldn't know it just by looking around the Internet, though - nobody seems to care enough about the short to give it the time of day.  It's all Mewtwo this, Genosect that, who gives a shit about the Pikachu short, amirite?  I think that's kind of lame, so I'm going to post some notes about Pikachu and Its Eevee Friends right here.  They're going to be more detailed than the ones I wrote for The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo because we know way, way more about the main movie than we do about this short.

• Maeda Atsuko has a ton of lines in this short, way more than most of the other narrators of these things have had in the past.  Thanks, AKB.
  
• Pikachu, Mijumaru, Kibago, and Yannap are walking along one day when, all of a sudden, they hear a cute voice.  When they turn around to see who it is, they see a Nymphia prancing around in the flowers!  Nymphia guides Pikachu and the others to the "Eevee House" where a sleepover is about to take place.  Mijumaru quickly falls heads over heels for Nymphia.
• Eevee House, by the way, is more like a giant tree house than any sort of man-made structure.
  
• Also, holy crap, Nymphia's dead, blue eyes crept me the eff out throughout the entire short.  Like, it seriously makes the VIllager from Animal Crossing look cute and cuddly.
  
• Both Eevee and Thunders meet Pikachu and the others at the entrance.  Thunders is a really cuddly type and snuggles up to Mijumaru, but when it does it accidentally electrocutes the poor otter!  The angry Water-Type pokemon chases Thunders, Kibago, Eevee, and the others into the house.
• Eventually, the pokemon are led into Glacia's room, a big arena covered in ice.  Mijumaru breaks some of the ice sculptures in the room, prompting Glacia to attack it with its ice attacks.
  
• Next up is Leafia's room.  Mijumaru accidentally wrecks things in that room too, causing Leafia (who actually does speak despite not being listed in the credits) to cover Mijumaru in leaves. 
  
• Kibago and the others continue to run further into the house.  Blackee hides in the shadows with only the yellow marks on its body visible, scaring Iris' pokemon into running back the way it came.  But when it does that, it runs into Mijumaru, who's still covered in leaves, and mistakes it for a monster!
• Kibago runs into Booster's room.  Booster gets agitated whenever it sees pokemon it doesn't know so its body temperature starts to climb.  This causes the room to heat up until the leaves on Mijumaru's body catch fire!  Mijumaru rushes to a water slide that just happens to be nearby and, after putting the fire out, happily slides the rest of the way down to the bottom.  The other pokemon follow it.
• (As you can probably tell, a good 50% of the comedy in this short comes from Mijumaru being attacked)
  
• The water slide spits out heroes out into a pool where both Eifee and Showers are relaxing.  Eifee is admiring its face in the pool while Showers swims around. 
  
• At this point, Maeda Atsuko goes through all the Eevee evolutions, one by one, and says that, yes, all of them live at the Eevee house.
  
• Meanwhile, Nyasu and Sonansu are getting back from collecting ingredients for the big dinner that's planned for that night.  Nyasu looks up and sees Pikachu and the others and angrily complains about them suddenly having all these new pokemon sprung on them at the last minute to have to cook for.  He then spots Eifee, Leafia, and Glacia and suddenly changes his tone - they're so cute that he'll do whatever they want!
• As the sun sets, dinner is put out on the tables.  Nyasu and Sonansu have been hard at work!  As the pokemon enjoy all the food, several of the other pokemon put on a show on a stage nearby.  For one performance, Yanapp paints half its body to look like Hiyapp and the other half to look like Baopp and kind of switches back and forth to give the illusion that both pokemon are walking. 
  
  
  
  
  
  In another performance, Nyasu and Sonansu dress up like Leafia and Glacia, respectively.  This pisses off the real Leafia and Glacia, unfortunately, so they attack the two and send them blasting off.
  
• Suddenly, Blackee runs off with some watermelons (wow, when I type that out that actually sounds super racist, doesn't it?), so all the other pokemon decide to follow it.  They're eventually led to a cliff where a Gothilselle, Gothemelle, Gothemme, Manyula, and Fukamaru are all waiting.  Nyasu and Sonansu reappear and see these scary looking pokemon as a threat to their beloved Leafia-tachi so they leap forward to attack.  Nymphia extends its ribbons to stop them, sending them blasting off for a second time.
• This is as good a time as any to say that Nymphia doesn't really use any attacks that can be identified at any point in the short.  It just sort of twirls its ribbons around a bunch.
  
• What comes next is this super acid trippy show where Gothilselle makes the sky turn into this celestial show with CG planets and galaxies swirling around.  This psychedelic show seriously goes on for like five minutes. 
  
• Once the show's finished, the pokemon all return to the Eevee House where, after a long and eventful day, they all go back to sleep.  Mijumaru sleeps next to Thunders and, predictably, gets electrocuted in its sleep.
  
• During the end credits there's a shot of Nyasu and Sonansu making a Manene snowman and OMG IT MADE ME SO HAPPY ;_;
  

Two more things not related to the short:

• The preview for next year's movie didn't reveal anything new.  It basically just consisted of the three starter pokemon jumping out, one by one, and firing off an attack.  We then see shadows of the games' legendary mascots before the logo for Pocket Monsters XY The Movie splashes onto the screen.  It'll come out in Summer 2014.
• I didn't get a Red Genosect Tretta when I got my ticket even though I was supposed to ;_;

I'll start translating the interviews in the pamphlet in the next day or two.

"The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo" Notes
July 16th, 2013

Dogasu @ 00:13 JST -- So I got back from the movies a few hours ago and wanted to do my own little recap of what happened. 


I'll cover the Genosect movie first because that's the one that most of you care about.  But don't worry!  I'll do a write-up for the Eevee short later tonight.

So anyway, I really liked the movie for what it was.  A lot of people hate the whole Mewtwo thing (I personally don't think it's that big a deal but understand why some fans are upset) and I think a lot of them are going into this movie just looking for things to hate about it, and that's a shame.  It's a pretty decent movie and it's really sad to see so many people let the whole Mewtwo thing overshadow everything.  The film's all about the Genosect and their problems, and while Mewtwo does play a pivotal role at several points, that pokemon is not the focus.  Don't let that ruin the movie for you.

• The artwork is kind of hit and miss.  New Tork City looks absolutely gorgeous and the fight scenes between the Red Genosect and Mewtwo look great, but, like in the previous movie, Iris is off-model for a large portion of the movie.  The Rocket-Dan have moments where they're drawn kind of funky as well.  The background music is pretty cool and does a decent job of emphasizing what's going on on-screen, whether it's a peaceful moment in the park or a high-stakes battle above a high-tech city.
  
• The plot is very close to the manga version, so read my summaries of that first.  There are some differences (which I'll get into in a later update), but for the most part the movie played out exactly as it did in the manga.
  
• The producers of the movie played around with the format a bit.  Usually it's Pikachu the Movie logo → World of Pokemon segment → cold opening → Pocket Monsters logo → Movie logo → Satoshi and his friends → opening theme, but this time they rearranged that.  In this year's movie, it goes Pikachu the Movie logo → cold opening → Movie logo → World of Pokemon segment → Satoshi and his friends → opening theme.  It was...kind of weird.
• Mewtwo can transform into its Awakened form at any time, right from the beginning.  Which contradicts what was in the manga, but, like I said, I'll get to that later.  We're never given any explanation about why it can transform, when it was first able to do this, or anything.  It just transforms because it can.
  
• At the beginning, Mewtwo decides to fly up as high as it can to overcome its limits, probably to foreshadow the end of the film where it kind of does the same thing with the Red Genosect.  It gets high enough for frost to start appearing on its body before it reverts back to its regular form and then heads back toward the earth.
  
• The Plasma-Dan is never actually mentioned by name; all we see are a few grunts and the door with the Plasma-Dan logo on it during a flashback sequence early in the movie.
  
• When Satoshi and his friends arrive at Pokemon Hills, Dent talks about how lucky (ラッキー) they are that they get to see this facility before it's opened to the public.  Satoshi gets excited and thinks Dent's saying that there's a Lucky (also ラッキー) in the area, prompting Iris to chastise him for being ridiculous.  And then, as if to make Iris look stupid, an actual Lucky walks by!  The same pun is repeated again with the Rocket-Dan later in the movie.
  
• The opening theme to the movie is Natsu-meku Sakamichi, same as in the TV series.  During this time, everyone lets out their pokemon and lets them get the only screentime a lot of them will have.  Satoshi's team is Pikachu, Mijumaru, Tsutarja, Charbu, Hahakomori, and Lizardon.  Also, a bunch of Ishizumai find Dent's Iwapalace and start to fanboy / fangirl over it, presumably because Iwapalace is this cool evolved pokemon.  They then start to follow Iwapalace around the park.
  
• There's this really funny scene where Satoshi is asking Genosect if it's lost.  He says the word for lost child - maigo (迷子) - but it seems like Genosect doesn't understand what that means.  So, after thinking for a minute, he stands up and shouts ""Mo~m!?  Mo~m!?  Where are you?" - Y'know, someone like that." 
  
  
  
  
  
  It was a really funny moment that only Satoshi can give us.
  
• I've seen people describe Mewtwo as being able to slow down time, but I think those people are misinterpreting things.  The way I see it, those slow motion scenes are just bullet time - that is, slowing everything else down to show how much faster Mewtwo is than everything around it.  I think the idea here is that Mewtwo is moving around so fast that we can't actually see it unless things are slowed down for us.
  
• Satoshi does not indicate that he doesn't know what a Mewtwo is; he simply says omae wa... (おまえは．．．), which is most likely supposed to be "You're..."  Now this can be interpreted as "Who are you?," but even if you did go that route you could easily explain that away by saying that Satoshi recognizes that this isn't the same Mewtwo from the first movie and is therefore asking who this Mewtwo is.
  
• The Rocket trio is in this movie, and they're actually in-character, which is nice.  And, despite what it says in the end credits, their Sonansu does not appear in the main movie.  I guess whoever typed those up was thinking about the Pikachu short at the time?  Anyway, I'm sure it'll be fixed for the DVD / Blu-ray.
  
• So, Mewtwo's origin!  There are reports that Mewtwo kills the scientists who created it, which means the writer of this movie is blatantly ripping off the first movie, and is contradicting the prologue (which would be weird since both this movie and the prologue were written by the same guy) but their death is never 100% confirmed.  We see Mewtwo's eyes glow, an explosion, and then we see one of the glasses the scientists were wearing lying on the floor while flames are reflected in the glass. 
  
  
  
  
  (Click on the image to see a bigger version)
  
  
  It actually reminds me a lot of Hunter J's final scene in Diamond & Pearl, for what that's worth.  The thing is, in both these cases, this isn't definitive proof that the owner of the glasses are dead, and it's still completely plausible that they escaped with their lives and later hired Dunk to go after Mewtwo.  It's also possible that they actually did die, though, and that Mr. Honoda is a really shitty writer.  It could go either way.
  
• The little girl and boy who own the Yoshioka Kiyoe Eevee are Yukino (ユキノ) and Natsuki (ナツキ).
  
• So, about Yamirami...it is the one who tells Satoshi and his friends about the Genosect taking over Pokemon Hills, and it helps create the cushion of water that helps break Mewtwo's and the Red Genosect's fall at the end of the movie, but other than that it just spends the entire movie looking cute.
  
• Contrary to reports online, there are no scenes in the movie reminiscent of the terrorist attacks on the U.S. on 9/11.  There's a single shot of the entire city on fire (Eric's explaining what could happen if the Genosect are allowed to continue running rampant), but that's it.  A 9/11 reference would be two twin towers on fire (not the entire city), or a flying object crashing into a skyscraper and causing it to fall down in a very specific way, or a flying object crashing into a pentagon-shaped building...but this movie doesn't have any of those.  Just a single shot of a city with smoke coming out of it.
• The Tokui Kenta Ishitsubute barely appears in the movie.  Eric, on the other hand, has tons of lines and actually contributes to the plot.  I think it's obvious which member of Heisei Nobushi Kobushi is more popular.
  
• The Genosect end up making their home in a valley somewhere where the Ortus Flowers still bloom, not in New Tork City.  You can see the RV that Eric drove everyone in in the background, and the area is surrounded by canyons, not skyscrapers like it would be if they were still in the city.
  
• The BW rivals, N, and the BW Gym Leaders (including the B2W2 ones) all appear in the movie's end credits.
  

Like I said before, I liked the movie.  I have issues with the lack of any sort of explanation about what Mewtwo's even doing in the New Tork City area in the first place, or anything about its awakened form, or why the Red Genosect can just control the other Genosect the way it does, or why the Red Genosect can go from "DESTROY ALL ENEMIES" to "EVERYONE'S MY FRIEND" in the space of five minutes, but you know what?  I was still entertained.  The Genosect got a nice and touching story and the producers did a really good job of making us want the pokemon to find a home.  The movie also managed to have a really nice pace - it didn't drag on too long but nothing really felt rushed either - ensuring that we were entertained during the entire runtime. 

So please, go into this movie with an open mind.  Who knows?  You might actually like what you see.

Finally, the new tree pokemon, Ohrot (オーロット) totally reminds me of this Dragon Quest monster:


I'll write about the Pikachu short later today.

"The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo" Cast List
July 14th, 2013

Dogasu @ 09:59 JST -- I still haven't seen the new movie yet, but I did get a chance to swing by a movie theater on my way home from work last night and pick up the pamphlet for the film.  These pamphlets, for those of you who don't know, are these big A4 size booklets that contain a detailed story summary (up until a certain point), tons of pictures from the movie, interviews, and - this is where today's update comes in - a full list of the credits from the end of the movie.


So today's update is the full, final cast list for both the main movie and the Pikachu short as seen in the movie's end credits.  And as I'm going through this, I think a) Why is the Rocket-Dan Sonansu listed as being in the main movie?????????, b) Does Leafia not have a speaking role in the Pikachu short or do the people behind the series just hate it that much?, and c) Oh look, both Shinji's and Shooty's VAs are members of the Genosect army.  That's amusing.

As I mentioned in my previous update, I won't be able to see the movie for myself until tomorrow.  Got anything you want me to look out for when I go to the theaters?  Any questions you want answered?  Let me know!!

Mewtwo Week, Day Five:  Interviews with Yuyama Kunihiko
July 12th, 2013

Dogasu @ 23:45 JST -- My final update before the debut of tomorrow's movie are translations of the three interviews with director Yuyama Kunihiko that were posted on the official website!


The interviews offer some insight into what was going through everyone's heads as they were making the movie and helps explain how the creators feel about the various characters.  It's definitely an interesting read!

I unfortunately have to work tomorrow (!) and have plans to go to the beach on Sunday, meaning I probably won't be able to actually see The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo until Monday.

Mewtwo Week, Day Four:  Egao, a look at this year's competition
July 11th, 2013

Dogasu @ 23:45 JST -- Let's start Day Four of this five day event by taking a look at Egao, the ending theme to this year's movie.


It's a pretty catchy song though, like pretty much all the other movie ending themes, has pretty much next to nothing to do with the film it's attached to.  Oh well!

Now, let's turn our attention over to what The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo will be going up against this year.  I've been doing this for the past few years because I think it's interesting to take a look at what all's coming out, but this year's a bit...boring. 

• Monsters University came out last weekend and topped the Japanese box office.  I honestly don't see that changing for its second weekend. 
• Fast and Furious 6 (titled Wild Speed Euro Mission over here) also came out last weekend.  The Fast and Furious movies are pretty popular in Japan, for some reason, but I still think the newest Pocket Monsters movie will be able to beat it this weekend.
  
• Other than those two...the only other movie I really see that could possibly put up a fight is Texas Chainsaw 3D (or - and I am not making this up - Burst Forth!  The Demonic Sacrifice - The Leatherface Family Strikes Back), which is only just now coming out in Japan. 
  

None of the Japanese offerings look like they'll put up a fight; there's no Umizaru-type series coming along this year.

So there you have it.  I'm thinking that in its opening weekend - which is also a three day weekend - The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo will come in at second place.  I don't see it beating Monsters University at all, but I do think it will be able to top the rest of the competition.

Mewtwo Week, Day Three:  "Save the Amusement Park from the Extreme Speed Genosect!"
July 10th, 2013

Dogasu @ 23:45 JST -- Update #2 for the day is a look at a new theme park attraction coming to Japan this week called "Save the Amusement Park from the Extreme Speed Genosect!"


I've collected what little information I was able to find on the attraction and added it to its own page.  The amusement park's only about an hour's train ride away from where I live, so I'm going to have to try to convince some of my friends to take a day to go out there with me to check it out.

Tomorrow I'll be taking a look at the theme song to the movie, Egao.

Mewtwo Week, Day Two:  Distributions
July 10th, 2013

Dogasu @ 11:38 JST -- Sorry this is a day late, but something came up last night that required my immediate attention.  I'll update again later tonight to make up for it.


So today's update looks at all the pre-order bonuses and downloads being made available to promote Saturday's new movie.  Mewtwo, Red Genosect, Sing Eevee...this page details all the promotional downloads for the movie and what all you have to do to get them.

See you later tonight!

Mewtwo Week, Day One:  Mewtwo - The Prologue to Its Awakening
July 8th, 2013

Dogasu @ 23:49 JST -- For my final week of "Mewtwo Mondays," I'll be doing...five days' worth of updates related to The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo!

Tonight's update:  A page for Mewtwo - The Prologue to Its Awakening, the TV special that will be airing this Thursday on TV-Tokyo!


I've also updated the List of TV Episodes.

Come back tomorrow for another update related to this Saturday's new movie!!

Catching up - New pokemon, New episode titles
July 7th, 2013

Dogasu @ 00:15 JST -- So a new pokemon was revealed on the fourth named Hitotsuki (ヒトツキ).  This sword pokemon's name most likely comes from either hito tsuki (一突き), or "to lunge / stab at someone"; and hito tsuki (人憑き), or "to be possessed," which fits since the pokemon's said to have an ancient soul residing in its blade.  The pokemon's name is also similar to Hitomoshi's ("Litwick" in the English versions), though the hito in that comes from a different source.

The List of Pokemon has been updated.

The Movie 16 Soundtrack Basically Spoils the Plot of the Entire Movie
July 5th, 2013

Dogasu @ 00:15 JST -- Amazon Japan's page for the soundtrack to The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo has been updated with the track listing for the CD, so I've added that to the CD Guide.  A few things of interest:

• There are 58 tracks in total; 41 for the main film, 16 for the Pikachu short, and one for the teaser for next year's movie (something that's never been included on these soundtracks before).
  
• Like with most of the other soundtracks, some of the track names on this set are taken from dialogue said in the actual film.  Off the top of my head I recognize the titles for Track 05 ("I WANT...TO GO HOME" - the Genosect say this) and Track 26 ("You Are Not Alone" - Satoshi says this to Mewtwo) from the manga, which in turn was probably taken verbatim from the movie itself.
  
• According to the runtimes listed on Pokemon Memo (no idea where they got those from, by the way, so take those with a grain of salt), Track 57, "Welcome to the Cosmic Show," is the longest track at four minutes and nine seconds.
• No opening theme is listed (so no "Summerly Slope (Movie Version)"), and the movie's ending theme, Egao, does not seem to be on there either.  I'm thinking with the ending theme, it's not included on there because of record label issues; this soundtrack is being released by Sony Music Direct while Ikimono Gakari, the group who performs Egao, belongs to Epic Records Japan.  Daisuke, who performs the current opening theme to the TV series, also belongs to Epic Records Japan.  The ending theme to last year's movie, Memories, wasn't included on the Kyurem vs. The Sacred Swordsman Keldeo soundtrack either.

Go through the entire track listing here, though be warned that it pretty much spoils a lot of the movie for you.  The Extreme Speed Genosect and the Awakening of Mewtwo hits theaters July 13 and the soundtrack will go on sale July 31st.

Mewtwo Monday Week Seven:  "Mewtwo Returns" Comparison
July 1st, 2013

Dogasu @ 23:47 JST -- New comparison time!  Spoiler alert:  The English dub of "Mewtwo Returns" is just as bad as the dub of the first movie!!


Next week is the final week I'll be doing these Mewtwo Mondays.  What will I do?  You'll have to wait and see!