'Pokemon' Animator Shares New Look at Ash, Pikachu

Pokemon: Everyone's Story has just released in Japan, and along with some great new visuals, the [...]

By Nick Valdez

Pokemon: Everyone's Story has just released in Japan, and along with some great new visuals, the film also featured a major redesign of main duo of Ash and Pikachu.

Masaaki Tanaka, an animator from WIT Studio who worked on the newest film, celebrated the release of the film with a new look at Ash and Pikachu's design in a cool new sketch.

Pokemon: Everyone's Story released today in Japan with an international release likely following later in the year. The synopsis for the film reads as such:

"In a town where people live with the wind, the legendary Pokemon Lugia appears on the final day of an event that is held once a year known as the Wind Festival, and people enjoy the wind's grace just like a promise received long ago. Coincidentally, Satoshi and Pikachu, who were participating in the Wind Festival, meet five people. Is this the promise Lugia preserved? And what is the identity of the Phantom Pokemon Zeraora? Now, people and Pokemon, everyone's bond can create a miracle."

Pokemon: Everyone's Story includes new characters like Risa, a trainer with an Eevee, Kagachi and his Sudowoodo, the researcher Torito and his Chansey, mysterious girl Rarugo, and old woman Hisui. The returning cast includes Rica Matsumoto as Ash, Ikue Otani as Pikachu, Megumi Hayashibara as Jesse, Shinichiro Miki as James, Inuko Inuyama as Meowth, and Unsho Izhizuka as the film's narrator. The film made major waves as the premiere featured a teaser for the next film, that's offering a new take on the classic Mewtwo Strikes Back.

The previous film, Pokemon the Movie: I Choose You!, was directed by Shoji Yonemura, and is the twentieth film in the series. It was first released in Japan in July 2017 with a limited theatrical run worldwide November 5. It then had its English language broadcast premiere on Disney XD November 25. It is currently streaming for free over on Nintendo's official Pokemon website.

Pokemon fans are no stranger to great fan-art work as one fan recently uploaded an impressively huge poster featuring 1100 different Pokemon, including all of their various forms. The fandom has also brought up intriguing theories about the series' films as one fan imagined that the entire series was a story a mother told her daughter thanks to an Easter egg put into the films by the staff, and a strange mod resulting in the strangest Jigglypuff ever.

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