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Legendaries that aren't unique

C

charmander4

Fire Master
Most legendary pokemon, there is only one of. But a few of them aren't really legendary. In Entei's pokedex entry, it says an entei is born every time a volcano erupts. Mewtwo is powerful, but is just a clone, so couldn't he be recreated? Also, I'm not sure if Latias and Latios are unique. And I doubt Phione would be classed a legendary, as you can obtain more than one of them per game.

Finally, in HeartGold and SoulSilver, if you trade over an Arceus you can activate an event that lets you recreate either Dialga, Palkia or Giratina.

What do you think?
 
C

ChedWick

Well-Known Member
I think Legendary doesn't mean one of a kind.
 
E

Ememew

Emerald Mew
Well, Latias's Emerald Dex entry states:
They make a small herd of only several members. They rarely make contact with people or other POKéMON. They disappear if they sense enemies.
Click to expand...
Likewise, as you point out, there is an in-game event in which Arceus can make a new Dialga/Palkia/Giratina, which does not erase the existing one from existence. So yeah, the games have pretty much established that there is more than one of legendary species. They are just "unique" in-game to simulate their relative rarity. I figure if something on as high a tier in the Pokemon creation myth as Dialga, Palkia, and Giratina can have multiples in game canon, just about any of the legendaries can.

In fact, that event even implies the existence of multiple Arceus. According to the Bulbapedia article, the unreleased Azure Flute Arceus would allow the trainer to return to have that Arceus create a second Dialga/Palkia/Giratina after the movie one unlocked the area, signifying that the game canon recognizes the existence of more than one Arceus.
Bulbapedia said:
Later, after the player visited the Sinjoh Ruins with an event Arceus, they can take the Arceus from the Hall of Origin to one of the ruins in the Ruins of Alph and be transported back to the Sinjoh Ruins. In the revisit, Cynthia has returned to Sinnoh, and the player can go to the Mystri Stage to obtain one of the dragons they didn't obtain before.
Click to expand...
If you extend this to include the anime (which can be considered separate from game-canon), there was also the baby Lugia in the Johto saga, as well as Latios and Latias's father, also a Latios, in the 5th movie, among other examples.

They're still "legendary" in the sense that they're so rarely seen that most people think they're just myths, or that they're powerful enough that there are legends about them, even if they're not one-of-a-kind.
 
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Kutie Pie

Kutie Pie

"It is my destiny."
"Unique" means "having no like or equal", but it can also mean "limited in occurrence to a given class, situation, or area" and "unusual". To be "unique" doesn't always mean you have to be "one-of-a-kind", like Mewtwo is.

Every region has their own unique Legendary that other regions don't. Doesn't mean that Legendary can't travel on their own to a different region. They are unique in ways that differentiate them from regular Pokémon. When you put it in that context, there isn't a single Legendary that isn't unique. You can say the same with all kinds of Pokémon: they're all unique in their own way.

And who's to say a Legendary can only have one of each at a time? Some, like Manaphy and Ho-oh (I'm sure), are justified. However, there are hints that go to show Legendaries are breedable, they just don't breed in the games. Remember the baby Lugia? The mother wasn't the same Lugia from the Orange Islands (most likely, though I like to joke that the Orange Islands Lugia fathered the baby, hurr hurr). And like the above poster said: Latios and Latias live in small herds. And in the fifth movie, we do clearly see a father Latios with his two children flying to Altomare. People may speculate they're just hallucinations of the movie Latias and her brother as younglings, but I really, really doubt it. And then there's the Darkrai Tobias has. Is that the same Darkrai from the movie? Highly unlikely. Some of these Pokémon we just don't really have the answers for.

There's also the whole "a" and "the" issue, or just a lack of the two. In the anime, characters have said "a insert-Legendary-here", hinting that there is more than one. If you say "the", or the two words are absent, then we can safely assume the Legendary in question is one-of-a-kind.

So, you're asking for something that hasn't yet existed, for all Legendaries are unique. Unless someone can come forward with evidence to show there's a Legendary that has the qualities of a common Rattata, then there's nothing to compare.
 
R

Rey Alejandro

GOKAI CHANGE!
According to various articles I have read, the only legendaries that are confirmed to be unique (as in, one of a kind) in the canon are Mewtwo, Arceus, and the Lake Trio. The main thing I got it from was from Gen. IV, but if I had to hazard a guess I'd say that every legendary pokemon (save for Victini, maybe) in Gen. V would be one of a kind as well.

Just to throw some non-unique evidence out there, the Gen. II games (and their remakes) happen contemporaneously with the Gen. IV games. Meaning that D/P/Pt/HG/SS all occur at the same time. Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres are roaming Sinnoh at the same time as they're chilling in Kanto/Johto. Also in HG/SS, Latios and Latias are roaming around Johto, but you can get the counterpart in each game with the Engima Stone event. Also, in FR/LG, which clearly takes place prior to HG/SS, Raikou, Entei, and Suicune are running around Kanto, even though they haven't been revived yet in Johto. And the Legendary Golems should be sealed up in Hoenn for Gen. III, but they're also sealed in Sinnoh for Pt.
 
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T

Tyranitarquake

HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAX!!!
Rey Alejandro said:
According to various articles I have read, the only legendaries that are confirmed to be unique (as in, one of a kind) in the canon are Mewtwo, Arceus, and the Lake Trio. The main thing I got it from was from Gen. IV, but if I had to hazard a guess I'd say that every legendary pokemon (save for Victini, maybe) in Gen. V would be one of a kind as well.

Just to throw some non-unique evidence out there, the Gen. II games (and their remakes) happen contemporaneously with the Gen. IV games. Meaning that D/P/Pt/HG/SS all occur at the same time. Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres are roaming Sinnoh at the same time as they're chilling in Kanto/Johto. Also in HG/SS, Latios and Latias are roaming around Johto, but you can get the counterpart in each game with the Engima Stone event. Also, in FR/LG, which clearly takes place prior to HG/SS, Raikou, Entei, and Suicune are running around Kanto, even though they haven't been revived yet in Johto. And the Legendary Golems should be sealed up in Hoenn for Gen. III, but they're also sealed in Sinnoh for Pt.
Click to expand...

There are also many Regis in Movie 8. But yes, the lake trio, arceus and mewtwo are the only confirmed to be unique.
 
M

MugoUrth

Bibarel's adorable.
Remember Emerald. If you beat the pyramid a third time, you fight the brain, who uses LEGENDARY MONSTERS. Chances are, you might already have the Regis, yet he has them too.
 
R

Rey Alejandro

GOKAI CHANGE!
Tyranitarquake said:
There are also many Regis in Movie 8. But yes, the lake trio, arceus and mewtwo are the only confirmed to be unique.
Click to expand...

We'll, I'm only talking game canon.
 
C

charmander4

Fire Master
I always thought the games happened at different times. Like, the birds got bored of sitting in Kanto, so went to Sinnoh. The dogs run around in Kanto, then move to Johto. Guess that doesn't make sense with what Rey Alejandro said.
 
Wilderness

Wilderness

Well-Known Member
Mewtwo isn't unique. There were other failed experiments which also were technically Mewtwo's. They just... wasn't born alive... Grim.
 
H

Honeyichigo

The manliest
I always thought that at least some legendaries were just really rare and powerful species that ended up figuring in the mythologies of the regions because they're do rare and powerful, but that they could reproduce like any other Pokemon species, just a lot more slowly due to being longer-lived (as explained here). The reason you can't breed them in-game is because that would let the player obtain as many ridiculously powerful Pokemon as they wanted in one game, which would be probably not a good idea.
 
sAv1Or)

sAv1Or)

_
In the show back in the day, they talked about Clefairy as if it were a legendary.

I think all legendaries are unique, which is what makes them legendaries. They have a quality, feature, or background story about them doing something great or grand or just something that separates them from all other "normal" pokemon.
 
Kutie Pie

Kutie Pie

"It is my destiny."
Tyranitarquake said:
There are also many Regis in Movie 8.
Click to expand...

I figured the Regis were there because the Tree created them as bodyguards. I remember reading/hearing that somewhere. *shrugs*

Wilderness said:
Mewtwo isn't unique. There were other failed experiments which also were technically Mewtwo's. They just... wasn't born alive... Grim.
Click to expand...

Tyranitarquake said:
But they weren't alive, like you said. Therefore Mewtwo is unique.
Click to expand...

It's not known how many Mew clones were created, if any. Dr. Fuji from the movie may have said "many attempts failed" (in the dub, I'm not sure about the original versino), but it's not known what they were doing prior to making Mewtwo's body.

About the whole "two" thing: Mewtwo is called that because he is the clone of Mew, or a second Mew. Amber in both the anime short and Birth of Mewtwo CD Drama (this is canon) said she is called "Ambertwo" ("Aitwo" in Japan), and if if there were more clones of her ("Aithree, or even Aifour"), she is still "Amber". However, it goes further in the drama in that Dr. Fuji explicitly implies that he would continue making more clones of Amber until one of them survives, though it's not known if they would be called "Aitwo" or if the number keeps going up. Dr. Fuji had been trying to clone his daughter before Mewtwo was even created, and she was alive and conscious the entire time. It took a month, but they made Mewtwo, and Amber wanted to be his mother or sister.

So it's safe to assume that Mewtwo was the only Mew clone there is. Whether-or-not Dr. Fuji continued cloning Amber and failing every time wasn't made clear. It's possible he halted the work so he could focus on keeping Mewtwo alive, because he was getting funds from Giovanni for this, and if experiments were to fail, he'd lose the funding.
 
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M

Moonlight_Tails

Nocturnal Trainer
I don't put much stock in the word Legendary. Arcanine is fairly common and it's description reads, 'Legendary Pokemon"
 
G

gliscor&yanmega

Well-Known Member
charmander4 said:
Most legendary pokemon, there is only one of. But a few of them aren't really legendary. In Entei's pokedex entry, it says an entei is born every time a volcano erupts. Mewtwo is powerful, but is just a clone, so couldn't he be recreated? Also, I'm not sure if Latias and Latios are unique. And I doubt Phione would be classed a legendary, as you can obtain more than one of them per game.

Finally, in HeartGold and SoulSilver, if you trade over an Arceus you can activate an event that lets you recreate either Dialga, Palkia or Giratina.

What do you think?
Click to expand...

I don't think there has been any kind of guideline to what classifieds a Pokemon to be Legendary.

Personally, I don't consider having multiplies of a Pokemon to have any part in it.
 
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