10 Characters Who MUST Appear In Upcoming Movie Sequels
2. Ash Ketchum - Detective Pikachu 2
Picking Detective Pikachu as Pokémon’s first live action movie was a stroke of genius. The third act is a little convoluted, but overall it’s a basic story, chock full with recognisable Pokémon and gives full focus to their franchise mascot.
More importantly though, barely anyone played the game. Tim Goodman is not a recognisable character, so there was no real pressure on Justice Smith to live up to expectations. If they’d started with Red or Ash, that would’ve been a different story.
The focus would’ve been off the Pokémon themselves and instead thrown onto whether the protagonist was fitting with everyone’s version of them; not an easy task when you consider the variation involved.
Red is a silent protagonist in the games and is decidedly more violent in the manga, so he’s unlikely to feature in the movies at all.
Ash is much more family friendly and iconic, but he varies a lot between Kanto to Alola and everywhere in between. Still though, now Detective Pikachu has laid the groundwork for a Pokémon cinematic universe, they can start taking a few more risks.
Surely this includes writing in the most famous human characters: Professor Oak, Brock, Misty, Team Rocket and of course, Ash Ketchum.