Image: Warner Bros./Legendary Pictures/The Pokémon Company
Nintendo’s Pokémon series has had a powerful grip on pop culture for decades, and it’s doubtful to change anytime soon. The bulk of that power comes from the video and trading card games, along with the eternally ongoing anime and the movies and shows that’ve spun out of that. So how do you make one of the biggest video game properties even bigger? You take the big, bold jump to Hollywood.
First released in Japan on May 3, 2019 and then the following week in the US, Detective Pikachu was the first ever live-action Pokémon movie, and also Nintendo’s first video game movie since Super Mario Bros. If anyone ever thought Pokémon would get a big budget flick, they probably didn’t think it’d come courtesy of Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures, let alone based off a 2016 spinoff game where brand mascot Pikachu is a private eye with the voice of Ryan Reynolds. Yeah, the monsters all looked impressively real and tangible in ways fans had always dreamed, but having Deadpool as the leading ‘mon could’ve undercut everything. Was this going to work?
Image: Warner Bros./Legendary Pictures/The Pokémon Company
The
answer
turned
out
to
be
“yes”:
Detective
Pikachu
netted
fairly
positive
reviews
and
made
$450.1
million
worldwide.
Back
then,
it’d
been
the
highest-grossing
video
game
movie
of
its
time,
at
least
until
the
Super
Mario
movie
knocked
it
off
its
pedestal
last
year.
If
the
world
hadn’t
been
hit
with
the
pandemic
and
Hollywood
strikes
in
the
2020s
so
far,
we’d
likely
have
a
sequel
by
now;
Portlandia
co-creator
Jonathan
Krisel
was
tapped
to
direct
it
last
year
working
off
a
script
by
Chris
Galetta,
but
it
seems
at
least
two
years
off,
minimum.
(Coming
out
as
Avengers:
Endgame
was
still
in
theaters
probably
wasn’t
right
move,
either.)
As
is,
it’s
a
well-regarded
movie
that
made
a
decent
impression
in
the
video
game
movie
space
whose
future
got
buried
underneath
some
bad
luck.
At the same time, it appears to have made a decent impact when it comes to Pokémon’s transmedia output. The anime was always going to persist whether it did well or not, but the film’s success has certainly helped open Nintendo’s mind to the possibilities of what this franchise could be. Without it, we likely wouldn’t have Pokémon Concierge or the original drama series Pocket ni Bōken wo Tsumekonde, which is about the reach and impact of Pokémon rather than being set in its world. And this is just what we know about—a Pokémon Direct or two from now, we may learn that Nintendo’s got plans of doing up a movie universe in the vein of what Paramount’s doing with Sonic the Hedgehog.
Image: Warner Bros./Legendary Pictures/The Pokémon Company
Compared to other video game adaptations like Fallout and The Last of Us, or even Arcane, it wouldn’t be wrong to feel like Detective Pikachu has gotten overlooked. Its time in the sun will surely come whenever that sequel rolls around. In that way, it’s like the anime: whatever comes next will hopefully be an evolution that buils upon the winning formula of its predecessor. And if not, well, at least we’ve got a video of Pikachu dancing to brighten the day.
Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.
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