Charizard is one of the most popular Pokemon around. A giant dragon that evolved from the much smaller Charmander, prior to Detective Pikachu, it was best known as being a companion to Ash Ketchum from the anime series. In the live action feature film, the Pokemon is seen as an antagonist to Pikachu and Tim Goodman in their quest to find Tim’s father. Omar Chaparro, the actor who plays Charizard‘s trainer Sebastian, was kind enough to sit down with us and discuss what it was like working with this fiery behemoth.
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Sebastian is something of a rotten character in Detective Pikachu, attempting to work his Charizard into a violent frenzy with the help of the “R Chemical”. Chaparro, in real life, however is as nice as nice can be as gave us his thoughts on how he worked with this fictional winged lizard:
“Well I have to use my favorite tool and it’s imagination and you know, I, We had to work with a lot of puppet actors, where you have to do involve the imagination. It was pretty easy to mimic him, I prepared my character, imagining and playing around in my backyard and an idea that like I pick a jail, where I used to have my Charizard and dream and imagination and created all of this stuff so when I was on set in my [inaudible] in London. We shot this filming in London. I just tried to repeat, to recreate what I imagined and a few months I go.”
While Sebastian wasn’t one of the heroes of the film, don’t count him out just yet as actor Chaparro would love to have the chance to return to the role and command his Charizard into action once again. With the studio already signaling that a sequel is in the works, the days are looking brighter and brighter for Charizard and his delinquent trainer.
Pokemon: Detective Pikachu is currently in theaters. The official synopsis for the film reads as such, “The story begins when ace detective Harry Goodman goes mysteriously missing, prompting his 21-year-old son Tim to find out what happened. Aiding in the investigation is Harry’s former Pokémon partner, Detective Pikachu: a hilariously wise-cracking, adorable super-sleuth who is a puzzlement even to himself. Finding that they are uniquely equipped to communicate with one another, Tim and Pikachu join forces on a thrilling adventure to unravel the tangled mystery.
Would you like to see Charizard and his trainer make a return in the sequel of Detective Pikachu? What other dragon type Pokemon would you like to see given a “live action” coat of paint? Let us know in the comments or feel free to hit me up directly on Twitter @EVComedy to talk all things comics and anime.
