Tantrumio
This is a sleepy, drooling blueberry with four Whoppers™ Chocolate Candies forming a crown on its head, I guess? I would say it would be a really tasty treat, but that drool — gosh — not only is it gross on its face, but it sort of makes me think it’s a toddler. I bet the source of its powers is the same thing that powers the rage you see in children who are tired and need to sleep but are still hopped up on sugar.
Powers
Coats enemies in chocolate, Stays up way past bedtime
Cursotter
When an otter turns to evil and is punished by a just and righteous god of the waters, it is forced to live an unholy life under the sea. Bereft of its cute little otter hands and the ability to breathe the sweet air, it beseechingly seeks redemption from Poseidon. But those eyes won’t work, because it is marked with the same spiral tattoo it once placed upon its innocent victims.
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Hypnotism, Underwater drop-kick
Bananananaa
Look, Andrew, I know you’re trying to bait me with this one. I know you want me to talk about how this thing looks like the kind of device a lonely man with few inhibitions might keep in his nightstand. But I will not take the bait. This is merely a surprised banana, shocked because it just saw its bottom half across the room after years of painful separation.
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Potassium overdose, Flight
Punchastone
This Pokémon is a badass. Have you seen those “don’t forget leg day” memes? Screw leg day. Who needs leg day when you don’t have legs? When you can so obviously get around with just your rocky, beefy arms. And unlike most ripped arms, this dude doesn’t bother working the biceps; instead he just hits the flexor pollicis longus over and over.
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Punching, Glaring, Flexing
Piña Donklada
Let me be clear. If I were one of the three heads attached to a pineapple with no arms and weird two-clawed slipper feet, I would also get donked on everything I could convince the other two heads to help me stick my face into. I would not engage in some kind of comedic argument routine with the other heads. I would calmly and rationally explain that this situation is untenable and unfixable and the only solution is to find a way to become blazed and then never, ever stop.
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Getting caught in the rain, Making love at midnight
Tryhardion
Let’s just say this Pokémon is really just a guy, you know, but he’s really into horror movies and has learned that people are afraid of clowns and marionettes. So he figures, hey why not, I’m going to go all-in on that and scare the hell out of everybody. Except, well, he’s just too cute to pull off the kind of wild-eyed cheerfulness you expect from an evil clown, nor the uncanny valley jerkiness you expect from an ominous marionette. Points for effort, but I just want to give you a hug, pal.
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Adorable cackle, Finding quarters behind ears
Sadhomer
If you were Homer Simpson and that half-spent nuclear rod that has fallen down the back of your shirt nearly 600 times finally turned you into a pink-and-white mushroom, you too would make precisely the face you see above. You would waddle back and forth and try to use your cap hands, but nevertheless you would be unable to move. And then, only then, would you realize that you will never eat another donut nor quaff another Duff. You would try desperately to exclaim “D’OH!” but that, too, has been stolen from you. Your last happiness, gone, forever.
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Spits spores, Silently weeps without tears
Negachu
You can’t fool me. This is Pikachu. It shoots lightning when it gets adorably angry and says “Pika.” Wait, is this a trick? Is there too much black on its ears. Is this like an evil Pikachu? I bet it’s evil Pikachu. I bet it says “Akip” and when you turn your head away and look again, it’s suddenly right there in front of you, smiling with dead eyes, waiting for you to turn away again before it devours your very soul.
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Instills self-doubt about the things you think you know
Giraffidaemon
On the arid steppes of Pokéland strides this majestic creature, whose nobility is unmatched in the Pokékingdom. It paws its mighty hoofs at the ground before raising its proud head to the skies and lets out… a bleat. It’s just a bleat, not all that majestic. The jerk attached to its tail swivels its spherical head and says something frankly mean and inappropriate. It’s hard out there for a giraffe Pokémon whose hindquarters were cursed by a nine-year-old wizard with a sick sense of humor.
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Bestriding the grasslands, Bleats, Snide comments from the rear
Dishwashstik
Hey there buddy. It must be nice to be upright instead of upside down, hanging next to my sink. I bet you’re super glad you’re no longer attached to that long plastic handle either. Nice work getting all that dish soap off your head, too. I am happy for you now that you’re not being used to scrub day-old dried milk out of the bottom of a very tall glass. Everybody hates doing the dishes, but I can’t imagine what it’s like being the tool that we use to do them.
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Getting grease out of your way
Heartmoji
Just keep swimming. But I’m a heart emoji cruelly given life as a fish by a millennial Pokémon coach. Just keep swimming. But without pectoral or pelvic fins I have a very difficult time navigating through the water. Just keep swimming. But instead of proper gills I have this beauty spot on the side of my body and I’m literally drowning. Just keep swimming. Help, help me, please, please.
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Sinking
Magnumpi
Tom Selleck kidnapped by The Doctor (in the form of David Tennant, of course). Tom Selleck sent back thousands of years and marooned on Easter Island. Tom Selleck witnessed that the people there live on a fertile and beautiful island, before deforestation ruined the local ecosystem. Tom Selleck rallied the people to him. Tom Selleck became a god. Tom Selleck immortalized as a Moai monolith statue.
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Moustache
Nosferapillar
OH MY GOD IT’S A VAMPIRE CATERPILLAR WITH A DOUBLE BUN HAIRDO. I want to get shrunken down with an Ant-Man ray so that this little bug can bite my neck and I can spend an eternity undeath with it. “Hey little dude, gimme a vampire fistbump,” I’ll say. “I got six feet here can I just use all of them instead?” he’ll say. “You are the best,” I will reply, and we’ll dap six times and then he’ll bite me and turn me into the living dead and together we’ll go and make a werewolf think it has lice but it doesn’t, it has us. You suck, werewolf.
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Sweet leaf cowl, Making Team Jacob super itchy
Akhenatemon
Here’s a thing that I know. When you are burying Pharaoh, you should never, ever include certain things in the sarcophagus. Chief among those things are a set of four cursed sticky hands toys. Because being wrapped in cotton from head to toe and then buried for all of time in a giant tomb built specifically for that purpose is super boring, so naturally Pharaoh is going to be tempted by those rubbery chotskies. Pharaoh will work its way out of its mummy wrap and grab ahold of those things and then BAM — Pharaoh is now a Pokémon.
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Domesticating cats
Singularitie
Spacely Sprockets is in the fight of its corporate life against Cogswell Cogs. Luckily, intrepid engineer George Jetson broke away from his single-button computer desk job to discover a way to make Spacely Sprocket’s spacely sprockets become self-aware. It created a huge competitive advantage for the company, and after running Cogswell out of business, Spacely discovered that the conscious sprockets could not be controlled. In the end, Jetson knew all they really wanted was their freedom. And so, he destroyed them all.
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Grinding gears, Rotating
Squidilear
This thing looks like a pretty ugly chandelier. Maybe it’s an octopus or a squid? That looks like blue fire so I guess it must be methane that it’s burning. I hear natural methane doesn’t actually smell, so this thing probably smells fine. But then again, squids smell terrible.
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Smelly blue fire, Mood lighting
Amphiblade
So if I’m a frog, I dream of being a cat. And if I’m a cat, I dream of being a ninja. And if I’m a ninja, I dream of being a robot. Now what this book presupposes is this: What if all dreams could come true? Wouldn’t the frog-cat-ninja-robot have a long, prehensile frog tongue it could wrap about itself like a dashing aviator scarf? Wouldn’t it make a perfect three-point landing after leaping off the side of a tall building, no need for the fire department to come and save it? And picture this, the best part: it stars Leonardo DiCaprio.
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Climbing walls, Chasing laser pointers
Bugsmuddy
I feel like I’ve done a very good job identifying Pokémon. But this, this is just too much. There is no story that can account for a self-satisfied rabbit with gigantic Popeye arms for ears who enjoys crafting cumberbunds, shoes, and gloves out of chocolate mousse. There is no explanation. There is only the mystery of evolution, which through random variation and natural selection sometimes winds up at a dead end.
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Superior hearing, Unmatched couturier skills
Mobiuskey
Riddle me this: Why does a sentient keyring itself need a keyhole? Is it a living metaphor for how each of us believe that every door before us is locked, but the true barrier is actually ourselves? Who among us can understand the depths of this unfathomable creation? Do not try to unlock the mysteries of this Pokémon. Instead, unlock your own heart — for it only feels cold because you have shut out the warm breeze of friendship and camaraderie. You, and only you, hold the key.
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Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité
Renfaireitan
Oh my god what is this Celtic knot sword thing? This is what happens when somebody won’t let go of Braveheart even though we all know Mel Gibson is the worst. And that tassel is, like, not even physically possible. I understand that social interaction in these present times is very hard — believe me I do — but the past is the past and it wasn’t any better. Braveheart dies, tortured and alone.
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Wearing kilts in socially inappropriate venues