Pokemon, I'm Bored Of Pikachu Now

thegamer.com:

There is no Pokemon without Pikachu. The little electric mouse is synonymous with catching 'em all, and Pikachu is the one Pokemon that all grandmothers around the world can name without fail. Pikachu and Ash's bond is the lynchpin of the Pokemon series, which was central in blasting Pokemon to the very stop of our cultural pyramid. Pikachu's great. I'm not here to see Pikachu is trash. But I am here to say I'm done with Pikachu, and we should all move on.

I try to fight the urge in Pokemon to be a hipster and claim that popular Pokemon are bad because I know best. Gengar, Gyarados, and Gardevoir are all in my top six Pokemon dream team, and if I avoided popular picks, the G Squad would miss out for nonsense like Noivern. I'm not ragging on Pikachu because it’s popular, but that's because I would question how popular Pikachu even is. Think of your favourite Pokemon right now. Hell, think of your top ten. Is Pikachu in there? Didn't think so. Pikachu's fine. Good, even. Top half of the Dex for sure. But somewhere along the way it moved from being a mascot to being an icon, and as Pokemon games get more selective, Pikachu's prominence is starting to wear thin.

Related: Revisiting Kanto: Why Pokemon's First Region Is Its Most Special

As a mascot, Pikachu is excellent. There is a rumour that Clefable was originally envisioned as the mascot, and that sort of makes sense. Clefable bears a strong resemblance to Kirby, and it might have been that the developers were banking on Clefable hitting the same notes and becoming a success. In the end, Pikachu turned out to be a stroke of genius. Pikachu is cute, but not to the point where it is unbelievable when it acts tough or performs feats of strength. It’s an incredibly expressive