22 Deleted Pokemon Scenes That Never Made It To America

[Music] Pokemon has been on the air and beloved by fans since it first came out in 1997 well fans in North America might think they know everything about their favorite animated franchise they might be surprised to learn that there are actually a ton of deleted scenes that never made it from overseas and to their living rooms anime has never been as squeamish about things like showing a little extra skin in the same way that American TV shows often have to be to get past censors which often results in shows having to be altered from their original versions before making it to the US the Pokemon episode beauty in the beach is one episode in particular that had to be seriously edited before it was given the okay to air mostly because of a scene where and once the gang makes it to the port of Vista Beach and are enjoying some fun in the Sun we see Team Rocket's James like we've never seen him before he crossed dresses in the episode frog in a bikini and a pair of inflatable protests to fill in the material add in a couple jokes to his female friends about the two round balloons and this is the reason Americans sensors gave a hard pass years later in these scenes were caught and beauty and the beach was eventually released as a lost episode we're sensing a bit of a pattern here and you'll soon understand what we mean another scene that was deemed too scandalous for American eyes was from an episode titled God miltank that aired in the States in 2002 in the episode we see cyndaquil and Meowth wind up lost in the desert badly heard and separated from the rest of the group in order to survive they're taken to a miltank who was able to heal them if they drink it's healing milk drink ability only in the original Japanese version the to drink from it like a baby calf night which proved just a little too raunchy for American sensibilities soap the scene was chopped from the dubbed version remember that pattern we mentioned just a moment ago well we've got another one for you coming right up only with this one we kind of understand why the sensors weren't so keen to have it air on American TV in the episode D Kangaskhan kid misty ash and Brock meet a young boy who was raised by kangaskhan Hollow the jungle book only instead of some fun songs about the bare necessities and all that this episode took a bit of a creepy turn and the scene that was deleted the young boy asks misty if he can well drink from her you get the picture the camera zooms in on her chest as she smacks the boy out of the way rightly so we might add it's not just the TV show and movies that were causing problems for an American audience either the video games were often found to be a little more saucy than was appreciated in more ways than one take pokemon gold and silver for instance and that game the beauty trainer was depicted in a blue and white outfit that included a pair of shorts for the american release the makers of the game actually had to add a few inches onto the length taking them from mid thigh to knee level as her shorts were deemed just a little too scandalous it might seem like a lot of work for a tiny detail and it is all American movies are pretty done happy these days usually they come with at least a pg-13 rating well the creators of Pokemon felt that it wasn't such a big deal to feature an episode packed full of guns most of the time being pointed at kids so you know what happened there the episode The Legend of drayton tirely because there was just so much gun brandishing that they couldn't edit it out with any episode left to spare particularly a moment in which the game warden of a safari zone points a gun squarely between Ash's eyes at point-blank range while we never fired it we can see how this might have set off a couple of alarm bells while we totally understand why having a gun directly pointed at your preteen protagonist maybe isn't the best influence sometimes these edits become a little bit silly take for example a scene that was changed in the episode snow way out during the episode we see Meowth and Team Rocket struggling to survive inside a freezing igloo while James Ponder's what the crew are going to do to survive health takes out a couple of matches and lights one to keep warm and the American version his match was changed to a birthday candle in an effort to discourage children from using matches but sure is a good thing to do but it's also a tiny bit of an overreaction if you ask us no one really anticipated what a huge phenomenon Pokemon cards were going to become in North America so when they became the most coveted item on the planet American distributors became extra diligent about making sure the images of the cards were family-friendly the original versions of some were definitely not like in the case of the Grimer card in the Japanese version he is seen peeking out from under a manhole cover and directly epic girls start who appears to be in a school uniform and everything well that definitely didn't fly and his eyes were changed into a much friendlier cross-eyed expression before it was released in the good ol US of A if there's one thing a children's TV show shouldn't have its references to one of the most horrifying Wars of all time right that's not such a crazy idea is it you think so but in the case of Pokemon that was apparently not so obvious in the episode All Things Bright and Beautiful there is a seam that features mouth James and Jessie talking to a big group of Team Rocket grunts all in their standard uniform then in one very startling moment everyone does the exact same salute that the German army made infamous during World War Two in terrifying unison it was obviously cut for American audiences and we have no questions as to why another thing that the censors wanted to avoid when dealing with the children's cartoon was alcohol well it's always hard to tell what an animated character is eating or drinking they took no chances with the possibility that they might be making drinking look glamorous or appealing to the younger set so in the episode a critical situation Bok Quang versus Chuck tile they made a very subtle switch Giovani the leader of Team Rocket is seen sipping on wine out of a standard long-stemmed wine glass for broadcast in the States the stem was removed to make it more ambiguous it's not hard to understand why the episode the Tower of Terror was altered for American broadcast after the events of 9/11 or why the network would no longer want an episode airing with a title like that well it did originally air in the States in 1998 immediately after the national tragedy the episode was removed they also pulled the episode from broadcast entirely after September 11 only choosing to put it back into rotation over a year later funny enough the United States is the only place where the episode has this title it's otherwise known as capture at the pokemon tower and if they had stuck with that it might not have had to be pulled out of the lineup in the first place almost cartoon violence is acceptable on TV these days cartoon nudity is still pretty taboo in America it is a kids show after all so in order for the opening song to be appropriate for western audiences there was actually a lyric that had to be edited out from the original version while the song remains completely epic and one of the best anthems ever at once contained a lyric that might make some parents squirm it used to go all get you Pokemon even and fire and gray and forests and ground and clouds and that girl's skirt followed by a little stream huh not all changes and cuts are made because they're deemed too offensive or inappropriate sometimes it's just a matter of translation between cultures the episode the ghosts of maidens peak is a perfect example of that in the episode we see the characters using something called Oh food ax in order to protect themselves from ghastly Oh food ax is a Shinto talisman that is common and would be well known in Japanese culture but would be difficult to explain to American children in a short amount of time so for the West Oh food though has changed to anti ghost stickers which well not really the same thing did the job kids love stickers or if they did before they all had iPads man sometimes it's not just a scene or a lyric that needs to be changed up for a different audience but a big part of the design of a character entirely this didn't happen much but one character in particular proved a little bit problematic to say the least we all know jinx a purple skin blond-haired humanoid who resembles a woman sort of well in jinxes original design she looked a little different instead of purple her skin was black which immediately set off alarm bells as she looked way too much like an old racist stereotype that has long been considered very offensive after some serious backlash her skin color was changed into the purple we know and love today remember the episode the Tower of Terror that we mentioned earlier well it turns out it wasn't the only episode of Pokemon that had to be taken off the air surrounding the events of 9/11 another one titled tend to cool and tend to cruel that originally aired in 98 was removed from broadcasting entirely after the September 11th attacks it wasn't directly insensitive towards the tragedy but was just a little too close to home to be comfortable in the episode we see tend to cruel on a rampage in destroying a bunch of skyscrapers in its wake one of them happened to look just like the World Trade Center so you can see why the television network wouldn't want this episode on the air no body part seems to cause quite as many problems with the sensors as a woman's chest even if that chest in question actually belongs to a cartoon dinosaur we're talking about Nidoqueen whose battle cry had to be changed for American audiences in the game Pokemon Stadium and yes we know she's not actually a dinosaur but let's be real here and she could totally pass one anyway originally when a user selected Nidoqueen for battle she would grab her a repect oral area for emphasis this of course was deemed inappropriate and her battle cry was changed for the American version of the game so was not to make anyone uncomfortable another big change that was made from the original version came from the pokemon black and white era video games and then we were introduced to a character named Leonora a gym leader whose costume featured a pink apron well that might not sound like a big deal Leonora is one of the only black characters in the pokemon universe and to make her a maid was just well not it wasn't the best originally in the game the user was required to answer a bunch of cooking quizzes before the battle as well the American version menorahs apron was removed and the coding challenges were replaced with trivia so as not to pigeonhole this character as a stereotype sometimes it feels like the creators of Pokemon often forget that their main characters are actual children specifically when it comes to misty while she has mostly been treated with care every now and then something that verged on creepy had to be adjusted before it could make it to North America like one of her trading cards and the original version of a trainer card called Misty's tears misty is actually portrayed totally nude this clearly did not fly in the West so the image was changed to feature squirtle wiping away the tears on Misty's cheek while a strap from her shirt can clearly be seen just to make absolutely clear that she was in fact clothed while so far it has mostly been the women who have taken the brunt of the censorship there is actually one case in which male characters outfit was seen as too racy for Western eyes as well and pokemon gold and silver there was the male swimmer trainer characters along with some female ones as well originally in his design the male trainer wore a teeny Olympic style speedo for all the international versions of the game it was altered to a pair of more acceptable trunks what's funny is that the female trainers are still pictured in bikinis whose bottoms are not unlike a speedo themselves and remained uncensored for the game's release things like violence and underage nudity we can understand censoring but when it comes to food get a little bit more confused specifically rice one of the most common and absolutely essential foods in Japanese cuisine so much so that children will often pack a ball of rice held together with seaweed known as onigiri and our lunches well when the American Network began dubbing Pokemon in English they bizarrely had a huge problem with rice they even went so far as to have Brock referred to his onigiri as delicious jelly doughnuts and later would actually edit out the rice and replace it with hamburgers when it came out in 1999 Pokemon the first movie was a massive success what you might not have realized is that there was actually a pretty big difference between the Japanese and American versions of the film apparently after the movie was released in Japan an American distributor had some thoughts about how American audiences would relate better to an altered version of the story in the original version Mewtwo was less of a straightforward bad guy and was given a scene at the beginning that detailed his backstory into motivations but according to the American notes Western audiences needed a more black into white villain for the good guys to defeat so the scene was removed and his story changed forever everything has an ending and even Pokemon was supposed to conclude eventually and actually the anime was supposed to end after the release of the very first movie but it was so successful and made so much money internationally that the studio's felt they had to keep going we know it was supposed to end because in early Japanese trailers for the film there is a shot of an older miss T next to a young girl whom she seems quite close with Ash's Pikachu is also very comfortable in clothes with a child which led most to believe that this was part of a flash bored into ash and Misty's future as parents of course this was changed and Ash and Misty have remained his preteens for now of course we couldn't finish without mentioning the most infamous Pokemon episode that was pulled from broadcast in entirely yeah we're talking about cyber soldier porygon the episode with animations so flashy and vibrant that it actually caused thousands of children in Japan to succumb to seizures the episode aired only one time in Japan and was never seen again but the incident was heard around the world and would even go on to be parodied by The Simpsons with a joke featuring his show called battling seizure robots and the official web sites didn't even mention its existence but unfortunately for them fans remember everything what you love to go back and check out all of the uncensored Japanese originals or what or if do you think that these changes were a good thing for American audiences let us know down below and we hope you enjoyed the video [Music]

Channel: Screen Rant

Views: 1,390,809

Rating: 4.7750797 out of 5

Keywords: Pokemon, Pokemon cartoon, Ash Pokemon, Pokemon opening titles, Pokemon theme song, best Pokemon fights, awesome Pokemon moments, best Misty moments Pokemon, best Pokemon battles, epic Pokemon battles, Pokemon original japanese, Pokemon english dub, Pokemon gold and silver, Screen Rant, ScreenRant

Id: MYsEsap71ac

Length: 13min 32sec (812 seconds)

Published: Sun May 26 2019