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Electric Soldier Porygon

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“Porygon did nothing wrong.”
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"Dennō Senshi Porygon" (lit. "Computer Warrior Porygon", although more commonly "Electric Soldier Porygon" or "Cyber Soldier Porygon") is the 38th episode of Pokémon the Series. Its sole broadcast was in Japan on December 16, 1997, but never aired outside Japan. In the episode, Ash Ketchum and his friends find at the local Pokémon Center that there is something wrong with the Poké Ball transmitting device. To find out what is wrong, they must go inside the machine. This episode is the most controversial and infamous banned episode of the entire anime. Due to this, the episode has never been rebroadcast worldwide and is one of the very few episodes of the show to be banned globally, along with Shaking Island Battle! Barboach vs. Whiscash!! and the two parts Team Rocket vs. Team Plasma!, which were banned out of respect for the victims of the 2004 Chūetsu earthquake and the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami.

The episode contained repetitive visual effects that induced photosensitive epileptic seizures in a substantial number of Japanese viewers, an incident referred to as the Pokémon Shock by the Japanese press. The frames which caused the seizures are a four-second section in which Pikachu uses Thunderbolt on a group of vaccine missiles. 685 children across Japan were taken to hospitals; two remained hospitalized for more than two weeks. The shares of Nintendo, the company that produced the games they were based on, fell by about 3.2%. As a result of this incident, Nintendo ordered the episode pulled from rotation and it has not aired in any country since. After the incident, the anime went into a four-month hiatus, removing the TV Tokyo red circle "チュッ!" logo from the Japanese anime, and it returned on TV Tokyo on April 16, 1998, with Pikachu's Goodbye and The Battling Eevee Brothers. After that, the time slot changed from Tuesday to Thursday while Porygon and its two evolved forms would later appear in minor cameos in later episodes and several movies. Since then, the episode has been parodied and referenced in cultural media, including The Simpsons episode "Thirty Minutes over Tokyo" and the South Park episode "Chinpokomon".

Plot[]

Ash Ketchum and his friends arrive at Pokémon Center where the Poké Ball transfer machine has been causing problems, as the transferred Pokémon never end up at the other side. Ash and his friends decide to accompany Porygon, a computerized Pokémon, used by Professor Akihabara to investigate the problem, only to discover that Team Rocket and another Porygon are to blame.

Broadcast[]

Electric Senshi Porygon had its sole broadcast in Japan on Tuesday, December 16, 1997, at 6:30 PM Japan Standard Time (09:30 UTC). It was broadcast over 37 TV stations that Tuesday night. It held the highest ratings for its time slot, and was watched by approximately 4.6 million households.

Strobe lights[]

Twenty minutes into the episode, Pikachu stops "vaccine" missiles with his Thunderbolt attack, resulting in an explosion that flashes red and blue lights[1]. Although there were similar parts in the episode with red and blue flashes, two anime techniques, called "paka paka" and "flash", made the scene particularly intense. These flashes were bright strobe lights, with blinks at a rate of about 12 Hz for approximately six seconds.

At this point, some of the viewers experienced blurred vision, headaches, dizziness and nausea. Some suffered seizures, blindness, convulsions and loss of consciousness. Japan's Fire Defense Agency reported that 685 viewers – 310 boys and 375 girls – were taken to hospitals by ambulances. Although many victims recovered during the ambulance trip, more than 150 were admitted to hospitals. Two were hospitalized for more than two weeks. Some had seizures when parts of the scene were rebroadcast during news reports on the seizures. The incident was referred to as "Pokémon Shock" by the Japanese press.

Later studies showed that 5–10% of the viewers had mild symptoms that did not need hospital treatment. Twelve thousand children who were not sent to hospital reported mild symptoms of illness; however, their symptoms more closely resembled mass hysteria than a seizure. A study following 103 patients over three years after the event found that most had no further seizures. Although approximately 1 in 4,000 people are susceptible to these types of seizures, the number of people affected by the Pokémon episode was unprecedented.

An article in USA Today reassured parents that American children were unlikely to suffer seizures provoked by cartoons as U.S. networks at the time rarely aired anime, with its "fast-paced style of animation", though in early January following the incident 4Kids Entertainment announced that they intended to air Pokémon in the U.S., albeit with the seizure-inducing effects removed. It has been suggested that without the publicity around the seizures, Pokémon would most likely never have been localized to the U.S. Pokémon successfully premiered in the U.S. (without this episode) over a year after the incident, with more children's anime airing on broadcast and cable networks in the U.S. immediately afterwards. The incident was included in the 2004 edition and the 2008 Gamer's Edition of the Guinness World Records book, holding the record for "Most Photosensitive Epileptic Seizures Caused by a Television Show".

Gallery[]

Videos[]

Trivia[]

  • Who's That Pokémon?: Porygon
  • Akihabara, the name of the professor, is also the name of a famous electronics district in Tokyo.
  • Jessie and Ash refer to the two Porygon as 零号機 zero-gōki and 初号機 sho-gōki, respectively—a likely reference to Evangelion Units 00 and 01 from Neon Genesis Evangelion.
  • This episode was skipped in the comic adaptation Pocket Monsters Film Comic and the companion book TV Anime Pocket Monsters Big Bite Book. However, the missing episode is acknowledged by the numbering of the other summaries (it skips from Ditto's Mysterious Mansion to Pikachu's Goodbye).
    • This episode is also not included on the Pokémon anime episode guide on the Japanese Pokémon.com website.

Aftermath[]

News of the incident spread quickly through Japan as well as the headquarters of Nintendo, the company that develops the games the anime was based on. The following day the television station that had originated the lone broadcast of that episode, TV Tokyo, issued an apology to the Japanese public, suspended the program, and said it would investigate the cause of the seizures. Officers from Atago police stations were ordered by Japan's National Police Agency to question the anime's producers about the show's contents and production process. An emergency meeting was held by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, in which the case was discussed with experts and information collected from hospitals. Video retailers all over Japan removed the Pokémon anime from their rental shelves.

Reaction was swift on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, and Nintendo's shares fell by 400 yen (almost 3.2%) the following morning to 12,200 yen. The president of Nintendo, Hiroshi Yamauchi, said at a press conference the day after the episode had aired that the video game company was not responsible since the original Pokémon game for its Game Boy product was presented in black and white.

This episode kept the episodes Holiday Hi-Jynx and Snow Way Out! (episodes 65 and 66) off their original broadcast date in Japan following the incident. Those two episodes were about to air after Electric Soldier Porygon on December 23, 1997, and January 6, 1998, respectively. They were eventually only aired on October 5, 1998, as an hour-long special. Airing out of order caused confusion to viewers because Ash still had a Charmander instead of Charizard, and Misty did not have Togepi yet, but Starmie and Horsea. Also, a New Year special was about to air between these episodes on December 30, 1997, but it was cancelled after TV Tokyo pulled any mention of Pokémon from their channel following the incident.

After the airing of Electric Soldier Porygon, the Pokémon anime went into a four-month hiatus and returned in April 1998, with Pikachu's Goodbye and The Battling Eevee Brothers (episodes 39 and 40). To avoid further controversy involving the episode's central plot, Porygon and its evolve forms would later appear rarely been seen in future episodes, with appearances limited to one brief cameo appearance in the movie Pokémon Heroes: Latios and Latias and in one scene-bumper later in season 1. Porygon also debuted in the English dub at A Chansey Operation (episode 47). Its evolutions Porygon2 and Porygon-Z have only appeared in a brief part of the opening sequence of Pokémon the Movie: Kyurem vs. the Sword of Justice, while the former appearing in the Johto PokéRap. Porygon-Z was given an anime voice for its appearance in the games PokéPark Wii: Pikachu's Adventure and Porygon in the Who's That Pokémon? segment of the anime episode A Way Off Day Off (English), but not Porygon2. Porygon's voice has also been heard in several games such as Super Smash Bros., Pokémon Snap, and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. As an indirect result, its signature moves Conversion has never been used in the anime since, and its later-introduced signature move, Conversion 2, has not been seen in the anime at all.

To prevent any similar incidents from occurring, Yamauchi quickly ordered the episode pulled from circulation, and it has not aired since in any country. After the Pokémon incident, TV broadcasters voluntarily added on-screen warnings to shows targeted at young children encouraging viewers to watch anime in a well-lit room and to sit far away from the television set. When the episode was being banned worldwide, Nintendo quickly decided to ask the crew at OLM, Inc. to edit every rapid flashing scene from the TV series, removing them, and making them darker and slower, to re-edit the earlier episodes, and for future episodes, so the viewers should not have a seizure. For years following the incident, a disclaimer was broadcast at the beginning of all Japanese television shows, cautioning viewers not to sit too close to the television screen and to watch only in a brightly-lit room.

English dub[]

On May 21 and 26, 2006, Maddie Blaustein (Meowth) said on the Serebii.net forum that 4Kids Entertainment did indeed dub this episode, although the validity of this statement has been questioned. On September 23, 2016, Eric Stuart (Brock and James) also said that they did dub the episode. Veronica Taylor (Ash Ketchum), on the other hand, initially claimed they never dubbed the episode, before saying on March 30, 2018, that she was actually unaware at the time as to whether it was dubbed or not, and that Stuart would know more about it being one of the voice directors of the anime at the time. Rachael Lillis (Misty and Jessie) also said she was unaware as to whether or not the episode was dubbed since decisions were made before it would be.

The rumor about the existence of an English dub of this episode actually predates Blaustein's word. For example, the first answer Blaustein gave about this episode was a direct response to a user who mentioned reading on Wikipedia about the episode being dubbed: the line "4Kids Entertainment has actually dubbed Electric Soldier Porygon even though it didn't air" was added to the Wikipedia article currently titled Pokémon episodes removed from rotation on March 15, 2006, and Bulbapedia was used as the source. When this Bulbapedia article was created on February 27, 2005, it had the line "4Kids Entertainment have dubbed this episode and reduced the speed and intensity of the flashing explosion to make it safe, but the episode has still never been shown". The line has been without a source until October 28, 2007, when "According to Maddie Blaustein" was added at the beginning of the line. Contrary to rumors, neither Blaustein nor Stuart said 4Kids reduced the speed and intensity of the flashing explosion to make it safe for viewing.

Cultural impact[]

The "Pokémon Shock" incident has been parodied many times in popular culture, including an episode of The Simpsons, "Thirty Minutes over Tokyo". In the episode, Bart watches an anime entitled Battling Seizure Robots featuring robots with flashing eye lasers, and asks: "Isn't this that cartoon that causes seizures?" The flashing eyes cause him, Marge, Lisa, and Homer to have seizures. The same scene is seen again in the episode's end credits, this time covering the entire screen.

An episode of South Park, "Chinpokomon", revolves around a Pokémon-like phenomenon, called Chinpokomon. Chinpokomon toys and video games are sold to children in South Park by a Japanese company. The company's president, Mr. Hirohito, uses the toys to brainwash the American children, making them into his own army to topple the "evil" American "empire". These toys included a video game in which the player attempts to bomb Pearl Harbor. While playing this game, Kenny has an epileptic seizure and later dies.

In the pilot episode of Drawn Together, Ling-Ling, who is a parody of Pikachu, states that his goal in the Drawn Together house is to "destroy all, and give children seizures". There follows a scene with flashing lights.

In So Yesterday, a novel by Scott Westerfeld, this episode is mentioned and shown to one of the characters. The flashing red light that caused the seizure is also used in the storytelling elements.

On September 19, 2020, the official Pokémon Twitter account referenced the episode, saying "Porygon did nothing wrong", in reference to the resulting explosion from Pikachu's Thunderbolt attack being the in-universe cause of the flashing lights, not Porygon.[2] The tweet was deleted shortly thereafter, speculated to be because of the taboo subject matter.[3][4]

See also[]

References[]

  1. ↑ The Banned Pokémon Episode That Gave Children Seizures. Kotaku; Date: October 20, 2015.
  2. ↑ The Pokémon Company Finally Concedes Porygon's Innocence After 23 Years. Crunchyroll; Date: September 20, 2020.
  3. ↑ "Porygon Did Nothing Wrong" Says Official Pokémon Twitter. BleedingCool; Date: September 23, 2020.
  4. ↑ Pokémon's Official Twitter Jokes About Infamous Seizure Episode. Screenrant; Date: September 20, 2020.

External links[]

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