Pokemon finally gets a live-action adaptation and it’s of the spin-off Detective Pikachu sub-franchise. Starring Ryan Reynolds as the titular lead and Justice Smith as his human partner in detecting crime, the duo must solve the mysteries surrounding the supposed death of the latter’s father.

Pokemon: Detective Pikachu is a 2019 urban fantasy, mystery film. It is produced by Legendary Pictures & Toho Pictures, and distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures. It is currently in theaters now. 

Editor’s Note: Near complete to complete spoilers for Pokemon: Detective Pikachu may be present within this review. 

Upon it’s initial reveal in 2016 many weren’t sure what to think about a live-action adaptation of the beloved video game & anime franchise Pokemon, but as the creatures themselves got revealed overtime things started to look up for Detective Pikachu. With the film now out in theaters if you go and see it you can tell the producers and all involved tried their damnedest to make one of the greatest adaptations out there and in a lot of ways they succeed in just that. The main things hurting Detective Pikachu is the predictable story and the fact that it doesn’t go all in with it’s own concept.

THE GOOD: Pokemon: Detective Pikachu is an highly above average first attempt at bringing Pokemon to life on the big screen. The world breathes what you’d hope for in a live-action adaption with perfectly blended 3D renders of the capturable creatures and they behave as you’d expect them to when shown on camera. Surprisingly there is a bit of a dark tone for this film, but given it’s PG rating rather than G like the previous animated films I suppose it was to be expected to a degree. And as such there is some adult humor sprinkled throughout such as Pikachu’s “taking someone up to his room” and ” birth canal” jokes. I liked the explanation as to why there’s no full on Pokemon battles in the film with the setting of Rym City being meant to be a utopia where human and Pokemon live & work together in harmony. It’s a simple enough reason to give viewers an idea of what to ultimately expect with the film.

The star of the film performance wise here is obviously Ryan Reynolds who effortlessly brings new life into Pokemon mascot Pikachu with with his usual sense of wit and charm. Co-lead Justice Smith’s performance is fine for what it is. I mean he’s no where near as annoying as he was in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, but it wasn’t exactly The Get Down either in terms of acting. Admittedly he does shine a lot better around the second and third acts of the film. The story is actually rather faithful to the game with the core concept of Tim Goodman and his father’s now talking Pikachu looking for him after he goes missing being here. There are some changes here and there, but things such as the R drug causing Pokemon to rampage, and the involvement of Mewtwo remain intact. It’s revealed that Howard Clifford; the founder of Rym City was actually behind not only the disappearance of Tim’s father, but also responsible for the rampaging Pokemon and experiments on Pokemon through use of Mewtwo’s DNA (earlier in the film it was suggested that Howard’s son Rodger was responsible). His goal was to use Mewtwo’s powers to transfer human consciousness into the bodies of Pokemon. 

THE BAD: Detective Pikachu tends to be a bit predictable a quarter or so in and the writers unfortunately don’t take full advantage of the initial selling point of Pikachu conversing and interacting with multiple Pokemon (he really only speaks with a small few throughout the film’s near two hour run). 

OVERALL THOUGHTS: Pokemon: Detective Pikachu is a film meant for fans of the franchise and it works fairly well for what it is. However, a lack of use for it’s concept including the Pokemon themselves and a weak story holds it back from it’s utmost potential. Though, it does build an excellent foundation for future live-adaptations of the series which people will undoubtedly want more of after seeing this initial effort. Otaku Dome gives Pokemon: Detective Pikachu a 75 out of 100.