Ranked #1898

Pokemon: Arceus and the Jewel of Life

I don't know how many people have actually been able to stick with this franchise until the 12th movie, and according to the stats page at the time of this writing, it's not many. I won't go into the franchise as a whole, but I can't say that's surprising.

And neither was this movie. This movie is another helping of everything you've come to expect from the series; a mediocre, thrown-together plot with predictable characters.There's a "legend" and "ruins" relating to it, and these are key plot points. Sound original yet? Yep, same.

Anyway, the point is that Ash and co. end up actually going into the past to stop something terrible from happening so that the legendary Pokemon Arceus will stop destroying buildings and killing...er, hurting people (Bad boy Ash, you said DIE!). To do this, they must give Arceus back the Jewel of Life, which was originally kept from him, making Arceus think he had been betrayed.

And that's about it. We see some of the cute little critters running around, get a couple battle scenes, get some of Brock hitting on the main chick (Who's about as stale character-wise as everyone else), an almost-death scene, and a happy resolution. Nothing special happens in terms of plot development, it's all very predictable, of course there's no character development when there's already a 600+ episode series, the art is fine, the sound, with the exception of the nostalgically awesome theme, is nothing special, and there's not a whole lot to look forward to.

Fan of the franchise? Go ahead, give it a spin. Gave up on it after three movies? You don't need me to tell you what to do. read more

I cannot help but feel a little disappointed. While this movie was another decent Pokémon film, it falls short when compared to the others.

To understand some of the images and references in this movie, I suggest you watch the two previous Pokémon movies first: "The Rise of Darkrai" and "Giratina and the Sky Warrior". You will better understand where those other legendary Pokémon are coming from.

As a rule, Pokémon movies aim to touch the audience and make them sympathize with the cause presented in the film. While I could understand Arceus' anguish, that was about it on an emotional level. This movie just didn't do anything for me.

They assumed too much, not bothering to work for it. Team Rocket was just tossed around for a few brief comical moments. Our heroes did nothing overly spectacular. The new characters remained empty and uninteresting. I'm not sure if I liked Arceus' voice, either (although that isn't relevant to the story, right?).

I guess after making 11 movies prior to this one made them a bit lazy and they didn't bother making this as sharp and dazzling as some of the other movies are. A shame, because there was potential in this. It was very nice to see Dialga and Giratina again, though. read more