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The story
It’s been announced that a new Pokémon animated film, *Pokémon: Wild Card*, will open in 2027. It’s the franchise’s first theatrical film in seven years — since 2020’s *Pokémon the Movie: Coco* — and notably, the lead isn’t Ash, who has driven the series until now, but a Pokémon Card Game player aiming to become champion. The released key visual also features Mimikyu. On 5ch, a thread debated both the discomfort some felt with headlines framing this as a “protagonist swap” and speculation over what a movie built around the Pokémon Card Game could actually be about.
Oricon, 2026-08-31 13:44
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It has been decided that a new Pokémon animated film, *Pokémon: Wild Card*, will be produced, with a 2027 release date announced. It will be the franchise’s first new animated film in seven years since 2020’s *Pokémon the Movie: Coco*, and this time the story is built around the Pokémon Card Game. In addition, the protagonist is changing from Ash — the story’s lead will instead be a Pokémon Card Game player aiming to become champion, and the released key visual depicts the new protagonist alongside Mimikyu.
Source: oricon.co.jp / Read the original article here
What people said
Probably a story about becoming a scalping billionaire…
it's just a Pokémon Card movie.
Pikachu's gotten pretty buff too.
No matter how much you call for it, it's not coming back.
That time is over — it's time for you to face real life too.
Kill Me Baby's second season became a pipe dream because one of the voice actors got arrested for cocaine possession.
There are over 1,025 Pokémon species, you know 💦 so Otani-san's name recognition is lower than that 💦
Doesn't seem like they're summoning cards like in Yu-Gi-Oh! either.
Sounds like Persona.
*Hathaway's Flash 2* —
watched it today, and Amuro did show up.
Wailord fits inside a Poké Ball, so turning Pokémon and trainers into cards should be technically doable too.
The sheer mass problem with Poké Balls was even a running joke in early four-panel comics lol
Do kids actually look up to Pokémon Card players as something to aspire to?
Why change it?
Actually, it doesn't even look like Liko and Roy are the leads of this movie in the first place.
Isn't this basically a promo movie for the Pokémon Card Game?
The setting looks completely different.
Same thing happened with Doraemon's voice actor change — the old guard griped about that forever too.
Ash is still out there adventuring, chasing his dream of becoming a Pokémon Master.
And you, who spent that same stretch of time — what have you been doing? Some unremarkable salaryman?
Then one day, humans showed up.
A startled Pokémon leaps out in front of a human, only to get beaten, drugged with paralysis, or put to sleep — already the doing of some enslaved Pokémon that's been brainwashed and tamed by humans — and then gets a device called a Poké Ball thrown at it and is sealed inside.
This terrifying Poké Ball is actually a powerful brainwashing device, and once sealed inside, you become the slave of whoever threw it.
A Pokémon trapped in a ball and turned into a slave is cruelly torn from its parents, siblings, family, friends, and lovers.
And then it's even forced to breed according to human preference, turning even its own children into slaves too…
And yet people keep calling it the humans' 'companion' or 'friend' — really it's just a brainwashed slave forced into life-or-death battles.
Poor Pokémon.
You're a kind person.
Heh heh.
Don't come all the way here just to brag, Kitani lol (a jab implying the poster is Bushiroad founder Takaaki Kitani)
Background and Talking Points
The Pokémon TV anime already went through a major generational handover back in 2019, so a theatrical film not centered on Ash isn’t unprecedented in itself. What’s new this time is that the film is the franchise’s first theatrical work built around the Pokémon Card Game — and the split in opinion on the thread wasn’t really about ‘Ash being replaced’ so much as differing reactions to the idea that the protagonist might be a Pokémon Card Game player in the first place. How the film will reconcile a setting where Pokémon themselves already exist with a card-game premise is impossible to judge without more details, and comments imagining Yu-Gi-Oh!-style effects remain pure speculation for now. Pokémon cards have also become a red-hot category in recent years, popular enough to fuel high-priced resale both in Japan and abroad, so how the film ties into that popularity will likely be a point of interest heading into release.
※This article is compiled as an excerpt/summary of the 5ch (Geinou/Sports Breaking News+) thread ‘‘Pokémon’ New Movie Also Swaps Protagonists! Ash Absent, Fans Lament — Pokémon Card-Themed Film Releasing 2027‘.
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