TalkativeBryan
New Member
Dear Stranger,
Hi! This post is a compilation of my thoughts, experiences, and light research regarding the canon of Pokemon. It's way more in depth then I ever thought and is actually pretty meta, which isn't really something you'd expect from a game about little creatures slapping each other. To start, I want you to imagine something. You just got a brand new Pokemon game from the store, and boot it up for the first time. It asks you to name your character, so you figure you'll just look up the characters canonical name and use that instead of your own. This... is wrong. That's right, according to the lore of Pokemon doing this isn't really "canonical" at all. I'll get into why in a little bit, but just keep that in mind. Next, the game asks you to name your rival. You do the same and look up his name of the internet and punch it in. This, on the other hand, is perfectly fine. Using the canonical name of your rival is great, especially if you don't have friends, and is also canonically correct.
Now, I'm sure all this talk about weather things are canon or not is a bit silly. I mean, who really cares what they name their Pokemon or rivals? Me. I have nothing better to do. I'm sure it's getting a bit redundant though, especially without an explanation, so I'll shed some light on what I mean by all this. To summarize, each cartridge of any Pokemon game is an alternate universe. I know some of you just had your mind blown, but to others it's pretty common knowledge. This means that each main character of any Pokemon game isn't actually the "canonical" main character, and is instead a totally different character with a different name, different aspersions, and a different team of Pokemon.
That also means that naming your character "Red" in any of the Kanto games isn't necessary. I know some people who would do this so that it sets up Red as an appearing character in future games, but what's funny is that each reappearing Red is a completely different Red from one another, so that's pointless too. That raises the question: is there a cartridge of Pokemon Red or FireRed that contains this "canonical Red?" Well... no. The closest thing to a canonical Red there is is the Red from Pokemon Origins, a short mini series about his journey through Kanto.
Since every Red, professor, gym leader, and rival we come across is different, there is no canon version of that character. Instead, they're OUR versions of that character, and we should embrace that fact. Don't worry about cannon when playing Pokemon, don't worry about the order you play the games in, don't worry about any of it, because it's all irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. All you need to worry about is having fun and loving your Pokemon, because that's who YOU are and that's exactly what the Pokemon games encourage.
Thanks for reading all of this, and I hope you enjoyed. If there's anything I missed or forgot to talk about, let me know and I might add it in! Feel free to discuss your thoughts in the comments, but please make sure to follow community guidelines.
Thanks again,
Bryan
Hi! This post is a compilation of my thoughts, experiences, and light research regarding the canon of Pokemon. It's way more in depth then I ever thought and is actually pretty meta, which isn't really something you'd expect from a game about little creatures slapping each other. To start, I want you to imagine something. You just got a brand new Pokemon game from the store, and boot it up for the first time. It asks you to name your character, so you figure you'll just look up the characters canonical name and use that instead of your own. This... is wrong. That's right, according to the lore of Pokemon doing this isn't really "canonical" at all. I'll get into why in a little bit, but just keep that in mind. Next, the game asks you to name your rival. You do the same and look up his name of the internet and punch it in. This, on the other hand, is perfectly fine. Using the canonical name of your rival is great, especially if you don't have friends, and is also canonically correct.
Now, I'm sure all this talk about weather things are canon or not is a bit silly. I mean, who really cares what they name their Pokemon or rivals? Me. I have nothing better to do. I'm sure it's getting a bit redundant though, especially without an explanation, so I'll shed some light on what I mean by all this. To summarize, each cartridge of any Pokemon game is an alternate universe. I know some of you just had your mind blown, but to others it's pretty common knowledge. This means that each main character of any Pokemon game isn't actually the "canonical" main character, and is instead a totally different character with a different name, different aspersions, and a different team of Pokemon.
That also means that naming your character "Red" in any of the Kanto games isn't necessary. I know some people who would do this so that it sets up Red as an appearing character in future games, but what's funny is that each reappearing Red is a completely different Red from one another, so that's pointless too. That raises the question: is there a cartridge of Pokemon Red or FireRed that contains this "canonical Red?" Well... no. The closest thing to a canonical Red there is is the Red from Pokemon Origins, a short mini series about his journey through Kanto.
Since every Red, professor, gym leader, and rival we come across is different, there is no canon version of that character. Instead, they're OUR versions of that character, and we should embrace that fact. Don't worry about cannon when playing Pokemon, don't worry about the order you play the games in, don't worry about any of it, because it's all irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. All you need to worry about is having fun and loving your Pokemon, because that's who YOU are and that's exactly what the Pokemon games encourage.
Thanks for reading all of this, and I hope you enjoyed. If there's anything I missed or forgot to talk about, let me know and I might add it in! Feel free to discuss your thoughts in the comments, but please make sure to follow community guidelines.
Thanks again,
Bryan
