Plot: On the night of Christmas Eve, Pikachu and the other Pokemon find an old man tending to his sick Stantler in the woods. He desperately needs some berries to lower its fever and make it feel better, but he can’t find anymore or leave Stantler’s side. Pikachu and the others offer to find some berries, and, with some teamwork, they manage to get a whole bunch.
After feeding the berries to Stantler, it starts feeling a lot better. The old man thanks the Pokemon sincerely and rides off on his sleigh. It begins to ascend into the sky.
Could it be…?
Breakdown: This was a very solid short, but nothing that great. It had some cute moments (melt my heart for picking up Togepi to see out the window, Bulbasaur) and some anger inducing moments (Screw off, Chikorita. You have no right to forcibly remove Pikachu from the bed while he’s sleeping so you can creepily cuddle with Ash. And, not anger inducing, but, Heracross, please, I beg you, stop sucking on Bulbasaur.) but I didn’t have any major issues with it. Plus, I was endlessly entertained by Pikachu walking around with a lit-up star tree-topper on his head for some reason.
Problem is, the short goes the same way you’d expect from the very instant you hear the ‘old man’ request the berries. They’ll get the berries, Stantler will get better, the old man was Santa. Sorry, spoiler alert, but they’re not good at hiding it.
Why are they hiding it anyway? Are they forgetting that Pokemon has had an episode where Ash and the others help Santa? Certainly not, considering they are consistent with the character design for Santa. Only now he uses a single Stantler instead of a team of Ponyta because Gen II came out.
He also ‘forgets’ that he is frequently assisted by numerous Jynx who would be useful in such emergency situations, but she’s purple and no one wants to see her now.
Speaking of forgetting things, I do have petty nitpicks like, why did all of the Pokemon, barring some because of course, escape from their Pokeballs in the middle of the night? It’s kinda understandable that Chikorita did, because it’s a creepy asshole, but why everyone else?
Who cares, though? Vulpix got to be useful TWICE in this special! Whoo!
Not to mention that the Japanese version gives us a very nice ending Christmas song with some great visuals of the Pokemon.
Recommended Audience: You should be privy to this by now.
Pikachu’s Winter Vacation Chronicles: Delibird’s Dilemma
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The Anime Madhouse 