We may finally see a Kadabra on a Pokemon Trading Card in the near future, as a 20-year long dispute seems to finally be over. One of the more bizarre bits of trivia about the Pokemon franchise is that Kadabra has not appeared on a Pokemon trading card in nearly 20 years due to a public dispute with the mesmerist Uri Geller. However, Geller recently confirmed to The Gamer that he had given the Pokemon Company permission to use Kadabra on Pokemon cards once again. “Due to the tremendous volume of emails I am still getting begging me to allow Nintendo to bring back Kadabra/Yungeller, I sent […] a letter to the chairman of Nintendo giving them permission to relaunch the Uri Geller Kadabra/Yungeller worldwide,” Geller told The Gamer via email.
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In 2000, Geller sued the Pokemon Company over Kadabra, which is known as Yungerer in Japan. Because other Pokemon in Kadabra’s line are named after magicians (Abra is called Casey in Japan after Edgar Cayce and Alakazam is named Foodin after Harry Houdini) and because Geller’s stage act also involves bending spoons, Geller claimed that the Pokemon was based on him without his permission.
As a result of the lawsuit, the Pokemon Company stopped printing cards featuring Kadabra, resulting in the Pokemon having the fewest number of cards out of any original Pokemon. Abra was similarly affected by the lawsuit, although the Pokemon Company has occasionally given Abra the ability to evolve straight to Alakazam, skipping over the middle evolution entirely. Thanks to cards like EX cards or the more recent V cards, The Pokemon Company has published several Alakazam cards that bypass the traditional evolution mechanics of the game. For instance, the recently released “Vivid Voltage” expansion features Alakazam as a V card, which counts as a “Basic” Pokemon and can be played without the need to evolve it.
Neither Nintendo nor The Pokemon Company has not commented on the Geller’s claim that his dispute over Kadabra is over.
