Pocket monsters go on a relaxing holiday in the charming-looking Pokémon Concierge, a stop-motion animated series coming to Netflix. Here’s a trailer and more details:
It can’t be easy being a Pokémon, what with all that fighting and living inside a tiny, magical ball. It makes sense, then, that those pocket monsters would want a holiday now and again – which is where Netflix’s Pokémon Concierge comes in.
“When Pokémon need a break, they head to a peaceful resort to relax, looked after by a team of Pokémon concierges,” reads the brief logline for Netflix’s upcoming stop-motion animated series (thanks, Variety).
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen Pokémon go on holiday – the trippy short film Pikachu’s Vacation accompanied the franchise’s first big-screen outing – imaginatively called Pokémon: The First Movie – all the way back in 1998. Seeing those whimsical monsters brought to life using stop-motion is, however, a direction we’ve never seen before. The animation side of things is being handled by Dwarf Studio, the team that previously brought us the thoroughly lovely Rilakkuma And Kaoru, also for Netflix.
If you’ve seen that earlier series (it first appeared on the streaming service in 2019), you’ll likely recognise Dwarf’s house style – lovingly detailed models and background sets, all bathed in an intense and almost real-looking artificial sunlight.
Pokémon Concierge introduces a new character, Haru (voiced by Karen Fukuhara in the English-language version) who takes a job as a concierge at a resort aimed at Pokémon. As you can see below, it’s all thoroughly wide-eyed and charming – simply spotting your favourite monsters in each shot is fun in itself ('Ooh, look – Psyduck. I like Psyduck. He gets headaches all the time – I can relate.’)
The series will be short and sweet, with each of its four episodes weighing in at a brisk 14 to 20 minutes each. Pokémon Concierge will appear on Netflix on 28th December – perfectly timed to keep us amused in that weird twilight zone between Christmas and New Year.
Here’s that trailer:
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