Reflections of the Pokémon Anime, Part 5: Difference between revisions

tagline=How to Make a Pokémon: Ghosts, Psychic and Dark |

blurb=ImJessieTR and Serge165's discussion of the Pokémon world continues with their fourth column, discussing the biology of Ghost, Psychic and Dark Pokémon. }}

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However, something isn't quite right about seeing these pokemon as real ghosts. The Ghost of Marowak, for example, was revealed in the game as a marowak, not a gastly or gengar. Supposedly, real ghosts maintain their forms (or have demonic-looking versions of their living bodies): note the Stone Maiden, Ambertwo, and the Ghost of Marowak. I think the real reason ghost pokemon frequent cemeteries and other unpleasant areas is not that they are deceased pokemon but pokemon searching for negative emotions on which to feed, and there will always be plenty to be found in such dreary surroundings.

Finally, ghost pokemon seem to have a wide variety of tricks to pull on others. Most ghost pokemon in the anime at least accomplish the hypnotizing of unwary travelers, creating poltergeist phenomena in buildings, and grossing out people and pokemon with cartoony gross depictions (eyes bulging out, disappearing except for their toothy grin, etc). And yet, some seem very powerful and sophisticated. The Gastly of Stone Maiden’s Peak was able to pose as a human, a human ghost, a ‘real’ animal (a mongoose, if memory serves), and even create a hybridized pokemon that does not exist in either game or anime reality. The ghosts of the pirate ship, meanwhile, appear to share Latios’ sight-sharing ability, allowing others to see events as they remember them in an almost holographic manner. There does not seem to be a limit to a ghost pokemon’s creativity.

Psychic pokemon also seem to share the ability to look into the minds of others, not to feed but to communicate. Possibly the closest descendants of Mew on the evolutionary chain (at least the abra line, since it shares some characteristics with Mew), psychics differentiated over time into a multitude of forms, such as Jirachi, Latios/Latias, and others. It is also possible that only a few psychic pokemon actually share genetic ties with the Origin, since some pokemon, such as Deoxys, presumably came from space and thus is independent of Earth’s evolutionary history. In any case, ghost pokemon can damage psychic pokemon greatly. It must take a considerable amount of concentration to read minds, move objects telekinetically, etc. A ghost pokemon’s ability to prey upon one’s thoughts for nourishment must disrupt a psychic’s command of atomic forces (read The Science of X-Men by Yaco and Haber to get a good grasp of how to be telepathic and telekinetic).

Dark pokemon, too, provide obstacles for psychic pokemon. Apparently evolving around the Saffron City area at first (since that is where you acquire them in Gold/Silver/Crystal) in response to the tremendous psychic presence of Sabrina and her psychic pokemon, dark pokemon developed a means of immunity against psychic attacks. Presumably, dark pokemon disrupt the neural pathways of psychics rendering them ineffective, or they simply lack the neural mechanisms present in all other beings that would put them at psychics’ mercy. As darkness is just the absence of light, this latter explanation seems more reasonable.