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28:04 Sounds like those kids were singing a line from Pokémon Ierukana, which serves as Japanese Pokérap so one can make the argument that they were singing the Pocket Monsters song...at least the song with all the Pocket Monsters? Anyways, it's a shame that the episode caused such a ruckus, because having seen the episode I do feel that it was a very good episode with a fun premise and entertaining action.

thanks for mentioning dogasu, tons of youtubers just leach content from wikis and fansites without giving proper credits.

22:40 that is so touching especially that 22:42

17:36 wait what? i never heard that before

0:51 or you were born more than a few years ago, when that was in the news...

22:10 That's not a 4 that's the Jupiter symbol what's with that Sailor Moon ad

Meh, English dub best way to watch the story anyways, big improvement, makes sense they wouldn't bother since the dub is so big and iconic and good for the brand

Somehow the joke on The Simpsons about Elecrric Soldier Porygon is more tasteful than the YTV promo. I cannot believe that is a real thing.

Great video man!

Great entertaining video! Cant wait for the Tara Sand interview coming up?!

So if they did create an edited version… Does that mean that 4kids did in fact get a tape? I wonder if Eric Stuart or any of the others have that in their own personal collection since they never got around to putting it on the air here. Hopefully one of them are lucky enough to have that tape.

I was a (just turned) 11 year old Animation nerd when I saw a story about this on BBC1's evening news programme. Like most people outside of Japan at the time I had no idea what this "Pocket Monsters" show was, and I honestly didn't have much conception of Japanese animation outside of knowing there was always a shelf of Anime VHS tapes at every Game (the UK equivalent of GameStop). I always remembered the story but didn't remember the name of the show, and as Pokémon took over the world over the following 3 years or so, I didn't make the connection. I actually didn't find out this incident was due to a Pokémon episode until about 6 years ago.

I thought I was the only one who felt sick watching spiderverse.

PORYGON SPOTTED !!!

“He called December 16th the worst day of his life” That was my 5th birthday…

I genuinely said "The fuck, guys?" at that YTV promo.

I love the amount of research that went into this, you weave a really compelling narrative with info I really wish was more accessible ❤ that sailor moon promo is insane btw

23:26 This story is oddly funny to me

For the Sailor Moon YTV promo I brought up, it's very possible that promo was made as a joke among YTV staff members - there's another promo similar in nature (but way more offensive), and I can't imagine that one airing on TV. If you know, you know.

WHAT WAS THAT PORYGON Z VOICE?! It sounds like a confused Tim "The Toolman" Taylor lol

Never knew how much more lively those visual effects were. Like you, I thought it was just a cost-cutting measure.

16:04 it is ironic do you think it's just like rain

15:28 She IS Ash and Misty’s kid.

Poké-Month is back, baby!!! What a way to start this year's Poké-Month off. The letters, faxes, and fan art from the kids at the time (even from some of those who were affected!) was honestly really sweet to see. Even this early on, Pokémon had captured the hearts of thousands of people. This is probably one of your best Poké-Month videos, at least in my eyes. Big ups to you, Dogasu, and everyone else who shared their experiences with the Pokémon Shock.

Dogasu is a MVP in those regards 💪

Finally an english cover

My graduation thesis was on this topic, I spent about 8 months researching about it for work and it was difficult to find information in my language (Portuguese Brazilian), even more so that I am not even intermediate in Japanese. In the end I discovered so much that I had no idea, that it was amazing to see how a single episode has so many nuances and yielded more than 40 pages of analysis. (I studied Linguistics)

It sucks that the Porygon line was pretty much left out of the anime after this incident. I can’t help but wonder what kind of stories we would have gotten if they made episodes based around Porygon-2 during the Gen 2 anime and Porygon-Z for Gen 4.

december 16th 2022 was definitely my pokemon shock, and it doubling as a way to divert attention from the incident was certainly a bold move

I have this porygon episode on vhs. But it’s the kids wb edit

Its so insane finally seeing the whole story could really shows how much power pokemon had in that time and even to this day if it was able to comeback and grow EVEN MORE thanks to us

I'm kind of curious how far along Pokemon Yellow was in terms of debugging. the Porygon episode shuffled episodes around in development, like there's an episode that involved a trainer with a Farfetch'd stealing Pokeballs, yet Jessie had one more pokeball than she should've had (Lickitung), which is highly curious, espcially since Pokemon had a few episodes that alligns with real life holidays in Japan (being March 3rd, despite airing in July). there's also a low chance of baiting a Dragonair in the Safari Zone. it begs to question if the game went gold, but the anime writers backed out of their plan with the Princess episode and slotted in Lickitung instead. Farfetch'd episode aired a few months before Lickitung's. the introduction of Togepi probably also hampered things, presumably the movie and anime teams were isolated from eachover before its egg appeared. Pokemon Snap came out long after the Aerodactyl episode, and Game Freak was still open to the idea of spinoffs at the time, so the development of that game doesn't mean Todd Snap's appearence/Togepi's egg was a pre-development jumping off point. Pokemon Picross was also revealed and in-development to the extent that the furthest episode it referenced was episode 69 (Nov 1998). though concurrent anime references either extends as far as the Pikachu short from the second movie (July 1999), or to the unannounced Snow Way Out episode (october 1998). it only appeared twice in issues April and May 1999 issues of Corocoro. there is an unused Togepi stage which probably alludes how far along they were, at least before the Porygon episode happened. the unpredicted pushback of GS's development, gameboy camera sprite comparisons and the gameboy color's lack of enhancement for JP-Yellow might hint stuff too. Honestly, it's weird how they omit TR's pokemon from the wild roster in the game, yet sticks more in-line with Ash's journey in general. like Weedle was one of the first pokemon he attempted to capture but ran off, and there are lots of Kakuna/Beedrill in an episode.

Excaliburfansubs did nothing wrong

I've heard so much about this over the years, and now I'm gonna see the full story. Thanks bro, you and dogasu are the real MVPs!

Great video. Rental tapes 1 & 2 actually have two releases, only denoted by a warning on the back of the box for the re-release. Those original two volumes released prior to the episode airing contain the original broadcast versions and the re-released versions have the edited versions created after the incident. Sadly, the tapes with the warnings are more common to come across. I've seen Yahoo Auctions listings of the originals cost over $200.

Imagine if the Pokémon franchise ended like, how would the world be? Not one I want to live in that's for sure

I've heard of this from long ago but this beings it in new light

Glad to see more context to the story

Oh we are so back to Poké-Month!!

Poor Porygon got basically banished into obscurity because they couldn’t bear to place blame on Pikachu causing the strobe effects. Porygon and its line have gotten the shaft for too long from the Pokémon Company. Love the video and can’t wait for the rest of Poke-month!

Looks like I'm early

The first episode of Poké-Month has finally arrived. Been waiting for this episode about Electric Soldier Porygon. I'm glad I have a VHS copy of the original Japanese airing of the episode with the commercials intact. 30:19 Funny Mike Lazzo said this and Toonami started shortly after with Sailor Moon, Dragon Ball, and the other early animes on Cartoon Network. Toonami even aired on Kids' WB for a while.

😮

Oooooh I knew this story though the back of my mind I feel sorry to all of those kids who seen it back in 1997

😲😲😲😲😲😲

6:44 I heard Brock say we'll be back after these messages and then I started hearing an ad for a Tic Tac commercial and I couldn't tell if that was your video aren't actual ad until I looked at my phone😂