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"A Chansey Operation"
April 22nd, 2017

Dogasu @ 15:43 JST -- The fourth episode of #Kanto2017 is "A Chansey Operation", aka that weird hospital episode with the weird COTD in it.


I think this one has some really interesting information in it so I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I had writing it!

Next week's episode will be a recheck of "Holy Matrimony!" The new content will be light since it's not going to be a complete revamp the way the last four have been so I'll be posting other updates throughout the week to try to make up for that.


Pocket Monsters The Movie "I Choose You!" Manga Adaptation
April 17th, 2017

Dogasu @ 07:17 JST -- A 32-page manga adaptation of this year's movie, Pocket Monsters The Movie "I Choose You!", was printed in the issue of CoroCoro Comics that came out this weekend. And, as I do every year, I've created a section for the manga in the Manga Guide which includes a plot synopsis as well as a list of the differences between the movie and the manga adaptation we're able to make out so far.


A few quick things about this. One, the majority of this chapter is a fairly straightforward retelling of the first episode of the TV series, so yawn. Two, it doesn't seem like there will be any other chapters after the one in this month's issue of CoroCoro Comics, meaning it probably won't end up getting a graphic novel release and therefore won't end up being translated by Viz. Three, it omits pretty much all the humans who we know will appear in the movie so it's probably not all that accurate an adaptation.

Pocket Monsters The Movie "I Choose You!" hits Japanese theaters on Saturday, July 15th. It is the 20th movie in the franchise.


"Attack of the Prehistoric Pokémon"
April 15th, 2017

Dogasu @ 22:19 JST -- Today I have the revised comparison for "Attack of the Prehistoric Pokémon" ready for you guys!


This is a pretty decent episode that has some issues *cough Lizardon evolving way too soon cough* but still manages to be a lot of fun despite that. Don't forget to check out the Paint Edits for this episode as well!

(And, because I know a bunch of you are asking, I will be posting a summary of the Movie 20 manga soon)


Pocket Monsters The Movie "I Choose You!"
April 13th, 2017

Dogasu @ 7:45 JST -- I know this week is almost a week old at this point but I've added the summary / character bios that was posted on the official site for this year's movie, Pocket Monsters The Movie "I Choose You!".


The big thing everyone's talking about with this latest reveal is how it seems like Kasumi and Takeshi have been replaced with two newcomers, Souji and Makoto. I figured there was a 50/50 chance this kind of thing would happen and don't really care one way or the other but I know a lot of other people are really upset about this.

The way I see it, there are two ways to look at what's going on here. One way is to think that the producers of this movie wanted to include the older characters, because why wouldn't they?, but then couldn't for one reason or the other. Maybe there was some kind of scheduling conflict with Takeshi's and Kasumi's original voice actors? Or maybe some executives somewhere demanded this movie not use so many old characters to avoid what they believed would be alienating the little kids who will make up this film's core audience? It's possible the producers of this film were told that they had to include characters to promote future Generation IV remakes but couldn't use Kasumi and Takeshi for that because they're Generation I characters? There are lots of possibilities here.

The other way to look at it is that, well, they just didn't want to use them. There's no law saying that they have to use old characters for old stories, after all, and it's entirely possible that the writer of this film just felt more comfortable making a story with (mostly) brand new characters than he would if he was trying to write for Kasumi and Takeshi. And it's not like having Kasumi and Takeshi in the film, by itself, will suddenly make it a huge box office hit. So why not replace them? I know that's not a satisfying answer but it's also a very real possibility.

Either way, it seems like Satoshi will spend this movie traveling from place to place with characters other than Kasumi and Takeshi. It is what it is. They might have small cameos somewhere in the film but we probably won't know about that until we start getting reports back from the early showings of the film in late June.


"The Song of Jigglypuff"
April 8th, 2017

Dogasu @ 14:15 JST -- I'll get to the new Movie 20 reveals later but for now I want to focus on my totally-not-an-April-Fool's-prank, Kanto2017. Because today I have the revamped comparison for "The Song of Jigglypuff"!


This episode's a great one for a number of reasons but one of the big ones is the performance of Rocket-Dan yo Eien ni. Today is the 20th anniversary of the debut of the second episode and so that makes today the 20th anniversary of the Rocket trio's debut in the TV series!!! And since today's Kanto2017 episode features the debut of what would essentially become their theme song for many, many years so I think the timing is kind of perfect.

Anyway, this week's episode doesn't have a ton of script changes but there are a bajillion paint edits so be sure to check out the Paint Edits page for screenshots of every edit made to this episode.


The Pocket Monsters TV Series Turns 20, Kanto2017 starts
April 1st, 2017

Dogasu @ 21:13 JST -- On Tuesday, April 1st, 1997 at 6:30 Japan Standard Time, the first episode of a brand new TV series called Pocket Monsters made its deubt on TV-Tokyo.


Anyone who's seen...well, anything I've done in the past 17 years or so knows that the TV series is the main pillar of Dogasu's fandom. I enjoy the video games, sure, and I like to read some of the manga from time to time. But for me, the thing that drew me into this franchise in the first place, and the thing that continues to keep me coming back week after week, is the animated TV series. Without it I wouldn't be nearly as into Pokemon as I am now.

So obviously the 20th anniversary of the TV series is going to be a big deal for me. So how should I celebrate it? What could I possibly do to give it justice?

The other main thing I'm known for is this site's Episode Comparisons section, where I look at the English dub of the various Pocket Monsters TV series and document what changes were made during the localization process. It's the main reason people bother coming here and is probably how most of you first heard of me. It's also a section that has been unfortunately neglected over the last few years. It's the year 2017 and there are still Kanto episodes that haven't been compared, and that, to me, is just ridiculous.

So to celebrate the show's 20th anniversary, I will be posting one new episode comparison every Saturday from now until the end of 2017. I stopped doing Kanto comparisons regularly after "The March of the Exeggutor Squad" back in November 2010 so I'm starting this new project off with the next episode in line, "The Problem with Paras." Next Saturday, I'll be doing "The Song of Jigglypuff." The Saturday after that, "Attack of the Prehistoric Pokémon." And so on and so on. Here's what the full schedule will look like...by my calculations I'll be done with Kanto on December 23rd, 2017. Accordingly, I will be referring to this project as Kanto2017.


I know you're probably thinking there's absolutely no way I can keep up with a weekly schedule like this. But what if I told you that all those months where I wasn't updating this site last year were spent working on these comparisons? And that most of the work for this project is actually already done?

This was the big announcement I teased at the end of my 17th anniversary write-up earlier this year: I'll finally finish comparing all the Kanto episodes of the original Pocket Monsters series by the end of the year. I think that's pretty much the most Dogasu's Backpack way to celebrate the show's anniversary there is, wouldn't you say?