Pokémon: Detective Pikachu (2019)

19 years ago, I started my first play-through of Pokémon Silver. I was in second grade, I had an ‘atomic purple’ GameBoy Color, and I chose Cyndaquil as my starter. I saw “Pokemon: The First Movie - Mewtwo Strikes Back” (1998) in theaters when it came out and I was an avid watcher of WB Kids! Saturday morning cartoons where new Pokemon Johto-region episodes aired weekly.
In the intervening years my relationship with the games has waned, but I own Let’s Go Eeveeon the Switch and I have a plush Eevee as my travel buddy. 
So it should come as no surprise to you, dear reader, that I was very excited to watch “Pokemon: Detective Pikachu” (2019). Unfortunately I was in the wrong part of the world to see it in theaters, and Megan had already seen it by the time I got home, but she happily sat on the couch with me to watch the world’s most successful media franchise’s latest movie.

Based on a videogame of the same name, “Detective Pikachu” follows a Pickachu that’s a detective, complete with a Sherlock Holmes deerstalker hat. I never played the game the movie was based on, so I have no basis for comparison in that regard. 
The movie version was voiced by Ryan Reynolds, filled with Reynold’s trademark dry humor and timing. Considering that’s the only way he talks in all of his movies, I wonder if that’s just how Reynolds talks in real life.

Tim (Justice Smith) was summoned to Rhyme City to collect his father’s personal things after he died on the job in service to the police department. Tim was a disaffected adult who has no interest in Pokemon and doesn’t care for them.
When Tim arrived in Rhyme City, he met Detective Pikachu, who had been the dad’s crimefighting partner, and they were off to the races to solve the mystery of the untimely death.

But you’re not here to read about plot points.

This was visually outstanding. Having grown up with the series and playing the games as the simplistic digital sprites progressed into complex digital figurines, it was amazing to see Pokémon come to life and “interact” with human actors.
I don’t think the CGI was quite as refined as the mythical monsters from “Fantastic Beasts” (2016), despite also being from WB, but the pocket monsters still looked incredible.
Pikachu looked adorable, Mr. Mime was as creepy IRL as he was in the game, and Charizard looked appropriately dragony.
With there being some 800+ Pokémon in the games as the series rolls into its third decade, Nintendo and The Pokémon Company couldn’t reasonably expect to cram a render of all of them into a two-hour flick, so some of that was resolved through by a myriad of posters and pictures everywhere, giving a little screen time to creatures that couldn’t actually get front and center.
Alas, no sign of Cyndaquil and barely a glancing shot of Eevee.

Side note: Unfortunately, there was something unsettling about the eyes for most of the Pokémon. I don’t know if that’s because they were all “human” style (round pupil, round iris), or if there was just no good way to translate the giant glassy anime eye to the big screen. It worked for Pikachu and a few others, but not most.

I was a disappointed in the soundtrack. Despite having generations’ worth of videogame music refined with time, and countless theme-songs from the shows, they barely used any of it.
“I Wanna Be” - the tune you’ll recognize as thePokémon theme song - had a few lines sung, but not the whole thing. A few other spots had a few other snippets of classic Pokémon soundtrack, but not nearly enough, considering the surprisingly rich history of  music that the videogames have produced.

The MewTwo in this movie was explained to be the same MewTwo that was captured in the very first Pokémon movie, making this some kind of cinematic sequel/reboot, as WB and Nintendo have apparently already inked a deal for a sequel.

The gimmick of Rhyme City was that it was built to be a place where people and Pokémon worked together to just live life, instead of trainers leading their beasts into battle. Considering how well-rendered the Pokémon were, not showing them beating the snot out of each other was probably a fine choice.
And, as someone who grew up playing the games, I’d loveto live somewhere with a Pokémon by my side daily!

Oddly enough, The Gherkin - one of real-life London’s famous architectural pieces - got multiple shots in Rhyme City. While the shows have generally existed in the standard-anime JapAmerica, and the games have been a hodgepodge of sorta-real-world locales, Rhyme City clearly had a British touch, which was probably a tie-in to the newest games in the series, which will be taking place in an a parallel of England.

All in all, I’m glad I got to see it.
I would have been happier to get to see it in theaters, but sometimes life just doesn’t work out that way.
If you’re a Pokémon fan, this is a must see.
If you’re not, this will probably just strike you as a generic kids movie.
It’s definitely best viewed through nostalgia lenses.