Pokémon Heroes

At 70 minutes (as timed at a press screening), POKÉMON HEROES is the shortest Pokémon movie yet. This may be a relief to parents and Pokémon-haters everywhere, but it leaves Pokémon's target audience hungering for more. The big action climax never quite delivers and the great triumphal note the earlier films ended on never quite comes. This is especially disappointing because the film's first half offered a most exciting build-up involving two spectacular new Water Pokémon and two clever and attractive new villains. Thanks to these elements, the film is still worth seeing but you may want to wait until the DVD release, when it will be accompanied by the Pikachu short that played with it when it ran in Japanese theaters last summer.

The film does at least make its new Pokémon characters, Latios and Latias, a little more powerful and more layered than most Pokémon get the chance to be. Shaped somewhat like dinosaurs and able to both fly at high speeds and swim underwater, they're colorful, graceful creatures, a brother-and-sister team who are thoroughly devoted to each other. Aside from Ash's faithful Pikachu, they get the most screen time of any Pokémon in the film.

Annie and Oakley are the new bad girls in town and they completely blow their colleagues, Team Rocket, out of the water (well, actually, INTO the water--a running gag throughout the film). They're fashionable, if somewhat snobby, teen villainesses with eye-catching outfits and hairdos who get ample opportunity to wrap the audience (at least the older male part) around their little fingers before their ill-fated (and somewhat rushed) attempt to take over Alto Mare, an island city that hosts the annual Water Pokémon Festival (the draw for our heroes, Ash, Misty and Brock). As master thieves, Annie and Oakley seem to be a lot more efficient than Team Rocket and should be given more to do in future Pokémon entries.

The design of Alto Mare deserves note for being the most extensively detailed urban setting yet seen in the entire Pokémon series. Largely created by CGI, and modeled after Venice, Italy, it's quite visually stunning and deserves greater attention from anime fans than it's likely to get.

The big mystery surrounding this film (and the previous one, POKÉMON 4EVER) is why Miramax has chosen to distribute it in theaters without the 23-minute Pikachu short that normally accompanies each Pokémon movie (and did so for the first three Pokémon movies when they were released by Warner Bros.). Certainly, given the short running time of this one, the addition of the delightful "Pika Pika Starlight Camp" (as it was called in Japan) would have gone a long way to giving fans their money's worth.

As it should be. This movie continues along the concept of the original movies: to further the sales of the games by expanding upon their concepts. For those of you who actually play the game, this movie makes complete sense. For everyone else, I suggest you start by playing the game to get some background before delving into the Pokémon Universe (and giving this movie a one).

I don't see why this movie didn't get tens across the board. I loved the bond that Latios and Latias share with Ash. I also love how Pikachu zaps the crap out of the bad guys (girls, really) with thunderbolt ( ow). I came close to crying when they caught Latios. It also makes all the other movies shrink in comparison. The Pikachu movie was also very good (only topped by Pikachu's Rescue adventure.) It was without a doubt one of the best Japanese animation I have ever seen. Come on, people! Why don't you get up and give this movie a ten. The graphics have also gone vastly up from the last film. And the music is also so much better. Also notice, Ash and Misty will always have that little bond that no one talks about. The voices are also major parts of the rolls. If you had Jude Law do Lorenzo, yuck!

I enjoyed this one. Better than the 6th Jirachi movie.

From the start you could see the villains were much smarter and well prepared, their pokemon quite strong. You still see the other two Team Rocket members Jesse and James who are useless.

I had to rewind the part I thought Latias got captured, after a few rewinds Latios got in front of her otherwise it didn't make any sense. It was a bit hard to make out it definitely looked like she was captured.

The ending was sad, a bit confusing to see 3 latios. If you're going to see a poké movie this is the one.

Woooaaahh!!! wonderful...This movie is awesome, adorable. Every scene, smells "design". I adored the creativity of the design of the atmosphere, from city to weather. It really makes the audiences feel that city and event. The computer graphics brought a new level to Pokemon. I couldn't even imagine how it could fit perfectly to Pokemon. Every details in the city worked incredibly well and well-thought. Beside, just establishing a movie, artists, it seems, revealed their creativity and design talents onto this movie. Thats why it seems different than others. City is so beautiful, so mysterious. Sceneraio is well settled. It has some resembled issues to Disney's Atlantis such as Latios' having sacrificed for the city, but it is perfect idea for this movie. Action, is at the high level that this movie seems like it goes forward and back between limited animation and full animation. Tsunami at the end was the highest level that prove this. Musics are the best. If this movie had soundtrack, it would be the best. I really need it. Especially the one that was done via accordion. It really gives the atmosphere of the city and properly fit. Whatever they say about this movie -though I don't believe they understand anything about animation art or even Pokémon- this movie is one of the bests with its everything. This movie must have been the first Pokémon movie since the first one is terrible -although I like mew-two so much.

Me, as an animation artist and designer, I am thanking to the animators and director and everyone that helped to create this movie. Thank you all.... you created the best...