Pokémon "It's New Year's Eve! Pocket Monsters Encore" (lost unaired special of anime series; 1997): Difference between revisions

Revision as of 03:35, 4 March 2015

A young Werner Herzog on the set of his 1970 film Even Dwarfs Started Small.

Status: Lost

Set to air on the morning of December 31, 1997 in Japan was an hour long Pokemon New Year's special titled "Oomisoka da yo! Poketto Monsutaa" or "It's New Year's Eve! Pocket Monsters Encore". The episode was cancelled during the fallout brought on by the infamous "Pokemon seizure incident" that had occurred earlier in the month and that would ultimately lead to Pokemon taking a four month hiatus. As the title suggests, the episode would have been a recap one, going over the previous events of the anime; the special was scheduled to air between episodes 39 and 40.

While this episode was ultimately never aired, a 2 hour New Year's special (with an almost identical title, "It's the New Year! Pocket Monsters Special") did air two years later, and it is largely assumed that material previously created for the intended 1997 episode would have been recycled for the 1999 one.

This episode shares the reputation of being one of four Pokemon episodes to have never been released, the other three being "Battle of the Quaking Island! Barboach VS Whiscash!!" (a 2004 episode that was cancelled as a result of the Chuetsu earthquake of the same year) and "Rocket-dan VS Plasma-dan!" (a two part 2011 episode that was cancelled shortly after the devastating Tohoku earthquake and tsunami).

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-Set to air on the morning of December 31, 1997 in Japan was an hour long Pokemon New Year's special titled "Oomisoka da yo! Poketto Monsutaa" or '''"It's New Year's Eve! Pocket Monsters Encore"'''. The episode was cancelled during the fallout brought on by the infamous "Pokemon seizure incident" that had occurred earlier in the month and that would ultimately lead to Pokemon taking a four month hiatus. As the title suggests, the episode would have been a recap one, going over the previous events of the anime.
+Set to air on the morning of December 31, 1997 in Japan was an hour long Pokemon New Year's special titled "Oomisoka da yo! Poketto Monsutaa" or '''"It's New Year's Eve! Pocket Monsters Encore"'''. The episode was cancelled during the fallout brought on by the infamous "Pokemon seizure incident" that had occurred earlier in the month and that would ultimately lead to Pokemon taking a four month hiatus. As the title suggests, the episode would have been a recap one, going over the previous events of the anime; the special was scheduled to air between episodes 39 and 40.
+While this episode was ultimately never aired, a 2 hour New Year's special (with an almost identical title, "It's the New Year! Pocket Monsters Special") ''did'' air two years later, and it is largely assumed that material previously created for the intended 1997 episode would have been recycled for the 1999 one.
+This episode shares the reputation of being one of four Pokemon episodes to have never been released, the other three being [[Pokemon "Battle of the Quaking Island! Barboach VS Whiscash!!" (partially found episode; 2004)|"Battle of the Quaking Island! Barboach VS Whiscash!!"]] (a 2004 episode that was cancelled as a result of the Chuetsu earthquake of the same year) and "Rocket-dan VS Plasma-dan!" (a two part 2011 episode that was cancelled shortly after the devastating Tohoku earthquake and tsunami).
-Scheduled to air on the morning of December 31, 1997 in Japan, was a one-hour ''Pokémon'' New Year's special. The title (which, unlike other ''Pokémon'' episodes, is written in kanji) was "大晦日だよ！　ポケットモンスターアンコール" (translated as '''"It's New Year's Eve! Pocket Monsters Encore"'''). It was believed by many to be the intended 40th episode of the anime, although these claims have been quashed by a booklet included with the Laserdisc release of ''Mewtwo Strikes Back!'', which listed the episodes thus far (in production order), but didn't include the New Year's special. Other citations proving this are the production numbers seen on several Pokémon episode scripts that were, at one time, available. It was instead intended to air between episodes 39 and 40 as a one-off celebratory special.
-The episode was cancelled before broadcast, during the rescheduling that followed the infamous [[Pokémon "Electric Soldier Porygon" (Unaired 4Kids English Dub and Animation Edit)|"Electric Soldier Porygon"]] incident in which bright pulsating lights caused nearly 700 Japanese children to be hospitalised after suffering epileptic seizures. The infamous "seizure episode" was never broadcast again in any country, but eventually surfaced online. It is considered most likely that the New Year's special was a recap episode, as all other ''Pokémon'' episodes with "Encore" in the title were, and given the fact that it was intended to air as a special ("special" episodes often being recaps); this however has not been officially confirmed.
-years later, in 1999, a 2 hour special titled "お正月だよ！ポケットモンスタースペシャル！" aka "It's the New Year! Pocket Monsters Special" aired, covering the events of the anime up to episode 77. It's likely that the intended 1 hour 1997 special was revamped into a 2 hour special due to the quantity of new episodes that had been produced in the 2 years since the intended 1997 broadcast date.
-The original 1997 episode has never been aired in any country, and no further information, trailers, or screenshots have surfaced.
-This episode is 1 of 4 ''Pokémon'' episodes that have never aired, the other 3 being [[Pokémon "Battle of the Quaking Island! Barboach VS Whiscash!!" (2004 Unaired Episode)|"Battle of the Quaking Island! Barboach VS Whiscash!!"]] and [[Pokémon "Rocket-dan VS Plasma-dan!" Parts 1 and 2 (Unaired 2011 Episodes)|"Rocket-dan VS Plasma-dan!" Parts 1 and 2]].