Pokémon the Movie: Secrets of the Jungle

Have you ever thought "Tarzan but make it Pokémon?"

I mean I’m hindsight, it makes sense. Telling the story of a human child raised by Pokémon and I‘m quite surprised that hasn’t happened before to be honest. But oh well, here we are.

First off, like any Pokémon movie this one follows a familiar structure: It introduces a new mystical Pokémon, some new characters, a relatively lame villain, some magical whatsoever, Ash gets involved because reasons, Team Rocket show up and some other Legendary makes a cameo. But for all of this, it works quite well.

The Zarude are interesting new Pokémon and the Tarzan plot works really well. The Jungle World is lively and lives by its own rules.

The villain is quite obvious from the beginning and his connection to main character Koko‘s parents also not a twist if you’re over the age of 12 but it still works storyline, though is sudden madness feels a tad too much. We also have an obvious ecological message and the overall Pokémon theme of living together in harmony, which at least every second Pokémon film uses but again, why fix something that ain’t broke?

Like 90% of the Pokémon films by now, this is not Ash‘s story and he serves more or less as an avatar for the audience and plays his part of supporting player. He stumbles into the story by accident and gets heavily involved because he is Ash and his motivation, enthusiasm and believe in the power of friendship are upped to eleven again. Whatever, Ash is a cute doofus and it works. We all know Pikachu is the brain of the operation. I‘m still confused though why Ash never has his other Pokémon with him in these films lately. It was the same in The Power of Us and really, Charizard would come in handy sometimes. Especially when fighting a badly animated CGI machine.

Speaking of, apart from some CGI "missteps" the film looked really gorgeous.

Team Rocket are also there and while forced in like usual, they at least contribute something to the plot. Also, Meowth‘s disguise is hilarious. I have questions though. Why is Jessie suddenly dumbed down to a point of concern? And since when is James a hacker? Also, how the hell did he get a wifi signal in the middle of the Jungle?

I‘m also really surprised they didn’t go with the major Celebi ex machina I expected and kept it more vague. Also, Shiny Celebi.

At the core of the story is however the relationship between Koko and Dad Zarude (Dadrude?) and I admit it made me quite emotional. While not reinventing the wheel or anything the characters played each other of so well that it even made me tears eyed for a second. Their individual character arcs were very strong in itself and their bond was beautiful. This is found family done right.

The one thing that surprised me is that it didn’t go deeper into Ash‘s relationship with his own father or whatever happened to him. While Ash mentions him, which is surprising in itself, it fell a little short and considering this was one of the film‘s biggest points in marketing it was a bit disappointing.

But nevertheless it is sweet film about family and overcoming prejudice and finding your place. It definitely proves that you shouldn’t right off a film just because it comes from a certain franchise.

Not as good as Sun & Moon, better than Tarzan. I'd probably adore this if I was younger, still cute though.

Mogli but with Pokémon, yet they could make it worse and empty for me, somehow.
I guess I'm just tired of Ash... Team Rocket is so empty as well here. They're all so useless to the plot it hurts me.

The animation is pretty tho.

The movie will be available on Netflix on October 8, 2021!