A report my friend did for school.......
Alina Hicks
English 21*
3/7/01
Whats a Pokémon?

In the past few years, Japanese animation, or anime, has become increasingly popular in the United States, especially with the creation of Pocket Monsters, more well known to screaming children and tired parents as Pokémon (pronounced poh-key-mon). This animated phenomenon, also known as poh-key-man to news reporters who know as much about anime as a rock, became popular literary overnight.
After just one episode aired on TV and before people even knew what the series was about, one could walk into any nearby department store, mall, grocery store, Dunkin Doughnuts, Gap, hospital cafeteria, local rectory, etc. and find it transformed. The stores now harbored a collection of strange creatures and a common yellow rabbit whos only vocabulary consists of Pikachu, or some form of the word. (Warning: walking into such stores without knowledge of pokémon may cause seizures) The stores merchandise which once only consisted of perhaps, clothes or food or tires, now held stock in an empire in the making! Pokémon tee shirts, figures, electronic games, dolls, posters, videos, key chains, and one cant forget the all-famous Pokémon Trading Card Game, were some of the few items that were sold out by the next day.
Like baseball cards in the good old days, children spent their days wholesomely trading their bulbasaur cards and rattata cards to try to find that one treasured and valuable card, or even strike gold and come across a coveted holographic charizard. If a kid politely refused to trade his or her rare charizard for an unworthy slowpoke, the two traders came to a mutual agreement after kid 1 beat the spit out of kid 2 and stole all his cards. It was a great way to make new friends!
The cards were also used to play a game in which the cards got up and attacked each other by flipping coins and tried to make the opponent faint because they never actually die. The pokémon in the television show fight too, because it is a pokémons lot in life to fight when its master makes it. To downplay the violence of the poor pokémon biting and shooting each other with magic beams at their masters whim, it was emphasized that pokémon never died from these fights, they merely fainted, and could be taken to a pokémon center hospital and get all better! Because of this, many dedicated six-year-olds could be found pretending they were a pokémon and battling with their friends and passing out on the floor. Dont worry, theyll be taken to the pokémon center and get all better!
The whole concept of pokémon revolves around the idea of ten-year-old children receiving their first pokémon from a local professor as a rite of passage to adulthood. The kids leave home to go on pokémon journeys to capture all the pokémon they can with capture devices known as pokeballs which due to some incomprehensible technology, shrink the pokémon to a sphere of red light and store them inside the pokeballs. There are now over 250 known species of pokémon, and everyone in the show has their life revolving around pokémon, everyones out to catch em all! ©.
Incredibly, all the characters on the show can understand their pet-like pokémon because they have such a bond with them, even though all pokémon of the same type can only say their names. Especially Ash Ketchum, the main character of the show, who can tell the difference between when his main pokémon, Pikachu, says Pi-Pikachu! (Im hungry) and Pika-Pi! (Misty is drowning in the well! Get help quick!)
The mastermind behind pokémon, Satoshi Tajiri, held many goals in his creation of Pokémon. He said, I wished to create a show in which I could vent my creativity and express my love for animals [beating each other up as a symbol of anarchy in the world] and to teach [those American fools a thing or too about dominating the economic empire]. I also hoped to [control the world using my scheme of subliminal messages and flashing lights in many scenes]. I named the main character, who the American dub named Ash, Satoshi, after myself because he and I have the same aspiring hopes for our futures. He hopes to catch all the pocket monsters, and I hope to [rule the world]. Indeed with my team of skilled animators, I knew we could succeed! I thank everyone for all their help, and for American children for helping me reach my goals, they are fantastically [stupid. BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!].
Pokémon brought only good to our children, teaching them to be good sports, and to have a hobby. And although parents, weary from the trend that lasted longer than beanie babies, waited, determined, in lines for the new shipment of pokémon items, at least they knew their children were safe at home. Safe, and listening to the pokemon theme song backward on the computer and learning about drug users in the drug world, just as the Japanese [God] intended.