Who is Giovanni?

A couple years ago, for the spooky season, I spotlighted Team Rocket’s Jessie, James, and Meowth. Since I try to do as many villain related posts as I can each October, this year I’m moving on to spotlight the Team Rocket boss: Giovanni. 

Main Series Game Giovanni

In the original Gen I games (and their remakes) Giovanni led Team Rocket to catch and collect rare and powerful Pokemon (but somehow most grunts only had the likes of Zubat and/or Raticate). At some point he fathered the rival character known as Silver. During the course of the game, the protagonist Red faced off against Giovanni’s grunts in Lavender Town and against Giovanni himself at the Celadon Game Corner and Silph Co.

After Red stopped Giovanni from obtaining the Master Ball (maybe to reclaim Mewtwo?), the Rocket leader retreated to the Viridian City Gym, as the gym leader. Naturally that put him inadvertently in Red’s crosshairs again. Once the protagonist won his Earth Badge, the humbled Giovanni disbanded Team Rocket. A group of Rocket executives tried to convince him to return a few years later, but thankfully he didn’t respond to the call. 

During the events of Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon, an alternate version of Giovanni formed Team Rainbow Rocket. Having come through an Ultra Wormhole, this version of the Rocket boss wasn’t thwarted by Red and proceeded to recruit the boss villains from the other preceding games. 

Anime Giovanni

Similar to the video game version, in the anime Giovanni was the boss of Team Rocket. For a long while his character was literally shrouded in shadow. Like in the video games, he was the gym leader in Viridian City. However, in the anime, he had control of Mewtwo for a time after commissioning his creation, leading into the first theatrical Pokemon movie. He definitely wasn’t a fair gym leader, throwing out Mewtwo against challengers on his whim; Gary Oak had two Pokemon fighting Mewtwo and he still lost. 

Things differed somewhat from season to season, but generally Giovanni was exasperated by Jessie, James, and Meowth. At the beginning of the series, he seemed to trust them and act like they were confident. Things probably started to go downhill for them when they fixated on capturing Pikachu (Did Giovanni ever actually want Ash’s Pikachu or was that just part of the trio’s fantasy?). Sometimes he seemed to trust the trio with later assignments… other times their assignments were to get them out of his way…. There was literally an episode about giving them some vacation time to get them out of his way… Somehow they still got in the way. 

Despite his incompetent lackeys, Giovanni was the mastermind behind many (almost) successful Team Rocket ventures, like commandeering the St. Anne, commissioning and controlling Mewtwo, and trying to reclaim Mewtwo later on. In the end, he wasn’t much more successful than Jessie, James, and Meowth. The bigger the scheme, the bigger the failure. 

Pokémon Go Giovanni

In the world of Pokemon Go, Giovanni is the boss of Team Go Rocket. His subordinates include the Team Go Rocket Leaders Arlo, Cliff, and Sierra and an abundance of grunts (including the special appearances by Jessie and James in their Meowth balloon). He can only be found with a Super Rocket Radar, which can only be obtained after defeating the three leaders during Team Go Rocket Special Research. His location may be masked by grunts pretending to be him. He’s definitely a level above the leaders, as his shadow Pokemon include his Persian, some tank usually, and a legendary Pokemon (which are killer hard to purify, in my opinion). 

I’m far from being caught up on the Pokemon anime and video games, but I’d always appreciate a Giovanni cameo. “Where are they now? The Team Rocket boss.” Enjoy the rest of your spooky season with some villains and baddies. I’ll be back next week with one more big bad for Halloween.

Pokemon Go Unova Tour

(Guest post by Tyler)

This last weekend was the Unova Tour in Pokemon Go. As normal, there were multiple in person events leading up to it. For the event this last weekend, our raid group had planned to meet on campus when the event began. The night before, a few of us went to grab snacks for the event. While shopping, I got invited to a raid in South Korea and since I had a few remote passes, I joined. From my first raid of the event, I got a perfect IV Kyurem. A great start.

Because of a class I was teaching, I showed up an hour late but still had plenty of time for raids. We spent the day raiding and in between we did some trades. The event gave us 6 special trades (special trades include: legendary Pokemon, shiny Pokemon or a form that the other player had not caught before). From the trades, I got another perfect IV Kyurem. The reaction the group had was hilarious from the disbelief. Between the two days of the event, we did around 50 raids. 

Something new that they did during the event was a reward point system. Leading up to the event you would get points for each egg hatched, Pokemon caught and Legendary Pokemon caught. During the event itself, points were doubled and unrestricted. There were two sides to the system, a free one and a $15 premium. Rewards in the free version included: encounters with various Pokemon (ex:Snivy, Tepig, Oshawott, Pawniard, Sandile), candy for Legendary Pokemon, premium items (ex: lures, incense, star piece, lucky egg), regular items (ex: Pokeballs), stardust and fusion energy. The premium pass included more encounters of the Pokemon, increased regular items (5 vs 25 balls), and many more premium items, but most importantly it came with two unique rewards. The first was an encounter with Victini, a Mythical Pokemon that had been released once before in a special research. The other is a new item: the Lucky Trinket. The Lucky Trinket is a limited use item that automatically makes you and another trainer Lucky Friends.

Being Lucky Friends means that the next time you trade with that trainer, the traded Pokemon are guaranteed to be Lucky. This means that you are guaranteed 12 IVs in each stat and it takes half the stardust to power up. It’s pretty typical to use these guaranteed results to trade Legendary Pokemon and Shiny Pokemon. 

Overall the event went very well. There was a positive reception all around to the points and reward system with many of us hoping to see it return for larger events such as this again. 

Why Dynamax Matters (or Doesn't)

(Guest post by Tyler)

What is Dynamax?

Dynamaxing is the generational gimmick introduced in the Generation 8 games, Sword and Shield. The previous gimmicks introduced (and then discarded) were Mega Evolution in Generation 6 (XY) and Z-Moves in Generation 7 (Sun/Moon/Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon). Generation 9 (Scarlet and Violet) would introduce Teralistilization for its gimmick. Dynamx is by far the least utilized of them. When dynamaxed, the dynamaxed pokemon gains more HP and all of its moves are turned into Max Moves. The strength and type of the move is determined by the original move. A player’s dynamaxed Pokemon remains dynamaxed for 3 turns. 

Main-Game Lore

Thousands of years before the events of Sword and Shield, Zacian and Zamazenta defeated Eternatus and during the time that it was in hibernation its energy leaked into Galar and created locations referred to as Power Spots. Some of these Power Spots became Max Raid Dens, where players can fight dynamaxed Pokemon that they can capture after defeating. Other spots had gyms created or other stadiums built over them. Items known as Wishing Stars rained across Galar which allowed a trainer to dynamax their Pokemon at a Power Spot. 

In Pokemon Go

Dynamax was released in Pokemon Go back in September. Like the regular games, Pokemon dynamaxed will be able to dynamax during Max Raid and gain access to Max Moves. However, unlike in Sword and Shield, only Pokemon caught Dynamaxed or in Max Raids are able to dynamax. In a similar vein to raid passes, the barrier to participation is Max Particles. These are gained for free at Power Spots. A player can gather up to 800 particles a day. The only Pokemon that can participate in Power Spots are Pokemon with the Dynamax Factor.

Here’s the thing. Dynamax is a decent gimmick in Sword and Shield primarily because the story of the game is focused around Eternatus and there are good lore reasons behind the mechanic. The same can’t be said about the Pokemon Go version. While it may be fun to go out and do regular raids with friends, there isn’t much excitement or reason to go out to do Max Raids.

Dynamax is by far the weakest of the gimmicks largely because the usage of it is so heavily restricted. You can only do it in specific areas of the game (gym leader battles, specific story battles) and not on a regular or consistent basis. A lot of people disliked Z-Moves but at least they were usable in a wide variety of locations. Odds are we won’t be seeing Dynamax in any of the main games again till we return to Galar but in the meantime, it isn’t the worst use of time in Pokemon Go but it is not worth the time to go and seek it out. 

Gigantamax: It's essentially a Mega Evolution vs. Primal Reversion situation.
Just semantics and aesthetics.

Pink Pokemon for Breast Cancer Awareness

The basis of this blog post started as my preschooler discovered a certain pink balloon Pokémon. Since her favorite color is pink, I started wondering if I could make a completely pink Pokémon team for her that was still competent. My ADHD brain jumped to “Island of the Pink Pokémon” but eventually landed on Breast Cancer Awareness Month. I’ve taken a particular interest in breast cancer this year, so I thought this post was only too appropriate. So here are some of my picks for the most notable pink Pokemon.

Jigglypuff 

I honestly don’t even know why Jigglypuff became so iconic. I’m guessing it’s mostly because of the running gag in the anime, in which Jigglypuff puts the characters to sleep repeatedly. But that doesn’t explain why Nintendo decided to add the puff ball to Super Smash Bros. My respect to anyone who plays Jigglypuff as their main character in Smash. But yeah, Jigglypuff’s appearances in their anime are wonderful, especially when I realized she came back into the picture during the Sun/Moon anime.

Milktank

Anyone who’s played through Gold/Silver/Crystal or Heart Gold/Soul Silver will likely remember Whitney’s infamous Miltank. That rollout attack is killer and is nearly unstoppable. I mean I suppose you can use a rock-type Pokemon to limit the damage… but it makes more sense to try to knock it out before it can knock you… But unfortunately, like its name says, it’s a tank. So next time you play through Johto again, may the odds be ever in your favor.

Audino

It’s such an odd Pokemon in many ways. Based on its Pokedex entries, it’s a super-hearing Pokemon that can read emotions and honestly would make a pretty good therapist. Going into the Unova anime, I didn’t know anything about Audino so I was perplexed as to why it replaced Chansey in the Unovan Pokemon Centers. Based on the Pokedex entry, it makes sense that it’s Nurse Joy’s companion. All the same, I think it’s pretty random that Audino has a mega evolution and nothing in the Pokedex entry indicates why Audino gives such a massive payout in stardust on Pokemon Go--not that I'm complaining.

Sylveon

I suppose Sylveon is as much white as it is pink, but it still fits the bill here. Who doesn’t love a good Eeveelution right? Sylveon is the most recently released and that was three generations ago. Appropriately introduced as the fairy type became a thing, Sylveon was a great addition to X/Y. That being said, it’s a weird process to go through to evolve it from an Eevee. For the first two generations it was available, you needed fairy-type moves and “affection”. Not friendship. Affection. Even on Pokemon Go the evolution method was a little weird, compared to Espeon/Umbreon. Thankfully the last couple generations have made it more friendship-related and not so convoluted.

Mew

Though not easily obtained, unless you do the glitch in Red/Blue (No, I’m not talking about moving the truck), Mew is central to Pokemon lore in many ways. The first of the mythical Pokemon, some say it was the first Pokemon of all and that Ditto is a byproduct of trying to clone Mew. It wasn’t until adulthood that I slowed down enough playing Red/Blue/Yellow to realize the mythology of cloning Mew was in the games, just like in the movie. I still remember when I got a Mew card for my birthday as a kid… and made the mistake of trading it. Childhood naivety. 

There are plenty of other pink Pokemon to love and collect (especially if you’re my four-year-old) so let me know which is your favorite. While you’re at it, post your favorite pink Pokemon to your social media for Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

5 Things in Pokemon that Make No Sense

Being a 20+ year franchise, it's inevitable that there are some inconsistencies in the Pokemon world (games, anime, etc). But some of them are funnier than others.

Slow on the Uptake
So it's relatively normal on Pokemon Go for the average Pokemon to run away after failed capture attempts. What doesn't make sense is the super slow ones: Slowpoke and Slakoth. Slowpoke are notoriously slow (hence the name). Blue Version even states that it takes Slowpoke 5 seconds to feel pain. Other Pokedex entries state that it doesn't feel pain when bitten. So if Slowpoke is that slow to respond to pain, how does he run away from a Pokeball? Similarly with Slakoth. The Pokemon can't even attack 50% of the time because it's so slow... so how is this Pokemon able to run away when someone tries to catch it?

Fish Out of Water
This isn't such a big deal in the anime (we even have explicit lines about it) but throughout all the games we get fish Pokemon fight on land. Magikarp, Goldeen, Feebas, etc. Any and all of them fight on land in the games. How is Goldeen supposed to fight any Pokemon when all it can do is bounce and flop?

More Zords than Power Rangers
Late in the Johto series, it's explicit that our Team Rocket trio doesn't have any money. In fact, they are very in debt to to Giovanni (so Delibird comes swooping around every few episodes). So if Team Rocket has so little money, how are they buying brand new Meowth balloons every episodes (sometimes more than once per episode) and new digging/stealing machines every other episode. Those things aren't cheap and yet they never have money to pay back Giovanni or to buy food.

Going on a Walk-ish
In HeartGold/SoulSilver and Pokemon Go you get the chance to walk around with your Pokemon. Funny thing is that you can choose fish Pokemon and chrysalis Pokemon to walk with you. I love the concept, but how exactly does it make sense to drag a Metapod or a Magikarp behind you and call it a "walk"?

The Ultimate Retcon
In the Pokemon anime we have often have glimpses of the next Generation, especially towards the end of a region. In Kanto/Orange Islands, we saw Togepi, Ho-Oh, Lugia, etc. In Johto, we saw Latias, Latios, and Wynaut. In Hoenn, we got Lucario and Manaphy. In Sinnoh, we saw Zoroark. Unova region saw Genesect. And Kalos had Magearna.
Besides these special circumstances, we don't often see newer Pokemon in older regions. However, we often see older Pokemon in newer generations. For example, May caught a Bulbasaur in Hoenn and Dawn had Cyndaquil/Quilava. To a large extent, we see this in the games too. Even in the remakes, we mostly only see the original Pokemon from that game and the generations before... nothing new. Just seems kind of odd that we'd have so many more Pokemon available in Kalos and Alola than Kanto ever had back in the day.

Pokemon Where They Shouldn't Be

It’s been about a month since Pokemon Go came out. It became a fad, it had more than its fair share of technical problems, and it’s started to slow down a bit. I think the last update annoyed a bunch of players, but I guess I’m ok with that, since there’s more server space for the rest of us true geeks now. Anyway, one of the funnest parts of the game for me has been seeing Pokemon in some of the most random places with the augmented reality feature. Or in the most appropriate places too, I guess (I haven’t played Pokemon Go at the gym much, but I’d love to catch a Machoke there). So here’s a tribute to some of the random places I’ve found Pokemon.

Holy crap! There's a Golbat in my shower

I'm gonna seriously need to sanitize this Goldeen afterwards.

Eevee came to see the Hill Cumorah Pageant!

Ah! There's a girl (Nidoran) in my bed!

Caterpie tried to stow away in my luggage after Pageant.

I made a new friend during Institute.

Who let a dog into the gym?

I think the house that I work in is haunted.

My dad didn't even know he was petting a Pidgey.
(Credit to my brother Brett for this photo)

What are some of the great places you've seen Pokemon during your Pokemon Adventures? Let us know and I'll see you next week for another Disney post.

3 Reasons to Play Pokemon Go

Ah! There's a Golbat in my shower!

So I’m minding my own business, getting ready to perform in the Hill Cumorah Pageant. All of a sudden, I see on Facebook that the long awaited Pokemon Go had been released. Within 24 hours, I downloaded, already putting me way behind other players. Ever since, I’ve been playing it between rehearsals and devotionals and everything. Even though I haven’t become addicted to it yet, it looks like the rest of Facebook has. If you haven’t started playing Pokemon Go yet, here are three reasons you should download it now.

First off, you’ll make friends. I’ve been out here in Palmyra and there have been plenty of other people in the cast who have taken up playing Pokemon Go around the Hill, but even more than here, I’ve seen pictures on Facebook and community building just over this simple game. Even though I’m out here still, I’ve already joined at least three Facebook groups for players of Pokemon Go, including one for all of Utah, one for Southern Utah County, and one for Utah Team Valor. All over the place I’m seeing pictures about people getting together at PokeSpots and making friends by playing Pokemon Go. I even saw one article about a guy getting a date with a girl he met while searching for Pokemon. Imagine meeting your soulmate because of Pokemon!

Someone left the window open.

Second reason to play: Many people weren’t expecting Pokemon Go to be an exercise app. However, I’ve seen many posts already about how much people have been walking for Pokemon Go. Not only are people having to get outside and walk around to find Pokemon, but in order to hatch eggs found at the PokeStops, people have get up and walk up to 10 kilometers. And then there are the PokeStops themselves; sure you can drive to them, but lots of people are walking to PokeStops, so that they can catch all the Pokemon along the way. Next time I go for a run, I’m definitely taking Pokemon Go with me to hatch an egg or two.

Third and most important reason to play: To be the very best, like no one ever was. To catch them is your real test. To train them is your cause. (If you don’t understand all that, you’re probably too young to appreciate Pokemon as a whole) In all seriousness, isn’t the childhood nostalgia the reason this game exists? So many of us played Pokemon in the 90s and wished we could go on a Pokemon journey and collect all 150 (back when there were only 150). Now that is more or less a reality. Now we all have a new goal to catch these people, raise them, and stake our team’s claim at gyms around the country.

So give into your nostalgia and download Pokemon Go. After all, it’s free. What’s the worst that can happen? Happy hunting!

Lots of landmarks and churches and
stuff are PokeSpots and Gyms, like
the Hill Cumorah Visitor Center.