One thing that is common to all children born in the 90s in 2020 is that we all grew up in a relatively strange environment. The so-called development before the emergence of their toys, technology, food and furniture city of the post-90s generation allowed the post-90s generation’s wisdom to develop and enter the next absurd fashion. There are also some ordinary people who cannot understand the weird behaviors and things of the post-90s generation, and after writing, the children will do better in their next childhood.
Yes, Pokemon is still around and yes, it’s only getting bigger in a lot of ways. But when writing about the bizarre creations of the 90s, you can’t not include its most famous sci-fi anime dogfighting card game/RPG. Love it or kind of love it (because how can you hate Pokemon?) you have to admit that the premise is just insane.
The Pokemon story goes like this: at age 10, Ash, a child whose father is being cuckolded by a Mr. Mime, leaves home alone. He travels the world, sleeping in bushes and blindly trusting every adult he meets in any old dark forest. His goal: find every animal in the world, force it to fight another animal until it loses consciousness, and then capture it inside a Matrix-like digital prison forever. He will periodically let the animals loose for ‘bonding,’ but this is just so they can recover in time for the next fight. After all, the ultimate plan is to catch ’em all, i.e., force the entirety of the natural world into captivity, and that takes capable combatants.
And yes, maybe the franchise has some good qualities, too. Maybe I cried when Ash gave up Butterfree, maybe I still have my first holographic Haunter, and maybe when my little nephew asks me to tell him about all the old Pokemon, my heart explodes. Maybe. But that doesn’t make this franchise any less bizarre as a multi-billion dollar kids’ show and game.
