Brandon · Silver Tempest (SIT) #151

3 comments

1. 

   Ambassador

   (2 years ago)

   This ‘last resort’ mechanic, appropriately enough, debuted on Blaine’s Last Resort. So here, Brandon joins Blaine, Archie, Maxie, and Mustard in being featured on cards featuring this aspect, and appears to have the best – or at least the most splashable? – twist on it.

   Separate from that, though, the card raises a question similar to an issue asked on LOR Thorton – do most Pokémon fans nowadays even know who Brandon is? I know plenty of people whose first games were Black and White and hadn’t even heard of the Ingo and Emmet until Pokémon Masters and then Pokémon Legends Arceus made one or both of them appear in their main campaigns. I get the sense most new fans never engage with the Battle Facilities, never mind engage with Battle Facilities in games that came out before they might’ve even started playing Pokémon… and, indeed, after this card was revealed on English fansites, I saw a lot of younger and/or newer fans ask “who is Brandon?” I do wonder from a branding perspective why they’re calling back to these very old characters when there appear to be no plans for them to make a return outside of these cards.

   As a counterpoint to this, it’s important to keep in mind that just because the English fanbase isn’t familiar with Brandon doesn’t mean the Japanese fanbase isn’t either, and despite what I read as TPCI’s deliberate efforts to the contrary, the franchise is still first and foremost focused on its domestic Japanese fanbase. So it’s worth taking a look at that. As noted on LOR Thorton, that character’s lack of recognizability/popularity in the English fanbase is completely detached from the fact he’s still fairly popular in Japan. While I don’t want to link to Pixiv because it has a mix of SFW and NSFW artwork, it’s a popular Japanese site for character fanart often used as a barometer of popularity – as of November 2022, a search for ジンダイ pulls up only about 140 relevant pieces of fanart, and that is after this card came out in Japan.

   So it’s a deep cut, and I personally appreciate it, but I wonder what the thought process is. Does it suggest modern games were planned to feature these characters but they got cut? Is it foreshadowing future games bringing these characters back? Is it kind of a ‘brand awareness’ thing to keep these characters alive in people’s memory? Or is it someone at Creatures picking characters they like?

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     TwylisAmbassador

     (2 years ago)

     It’s a very strange choice. I feel Thorton is quite memorable for those who are aware of him, but Brandon is probably the most forgettable member of Hoenn’s Frontier Brains. Lucy and Noland have Masters appearances and seem far more iconic, while Anabel has since reappeared the main series in a plot-relevant role. I think Brandon’s only point of notability is he came back in the gen 4 anime, where he seems to be positioned as the strongest of the Frontier Brains.

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       AmbassadorTwylis

       (2 years ago)

       Oh. I kind of forgot about Brandon’s appearances in the anime, and I guess that could somewhat explain it. If he owns Regirock, Regice, and Registeel in the anime, and also appeared in an episode where Regigigas showed up, his appearing in a set where the two new Regis get fancy VMAX/VSTAR cards is probably not a coincidence. I can’t think of anyone who has much of an association with the Regis other than Brandon. (Still, now I’m wondering if there’s an episode of Journeys with him in it that got scrapped.)

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