Oh, hey. Look at this totally random and unexpected thing I whipped up! Why, you ask? Why not, I answer.

'Tis apparently the season where the gaming industry likes to release a dozen or so games I want all at once (I was slammed pretty hard about this time last year too). And one of this year's big releases is the upcoming latest installment of Pokémon: versions Black and White. With that in mind, I wanted to draw something Pokémon-y.

But since I'm still obviously trying to focus on my ongoing webcomic Rain (which has nothing whatsoever to do with Pokémon), I came up with this cute idea to make each of the main characters into Trainers. The end result created a rare instance in which I liked how it came out on paper even better than it looked in my head. They just look surprisingly fitting like this. In fact, it's made me realize just how versatile these characters are; I could totally keep doing crossovers like this and make them into Hogwarts students, Konoha ninjas, Jedi, Benders and all manner of other miscellaneous fandoms if I REALLY wanted to (I mean, I've already made them cosplay as the cast of Lucky☆Star).

But what about the picture itself? Let's talk about that.

The cast themselves are designed with a general mutt of design elements from miscellaneous trainers throughout the Pokémon franchise. Fara in particular, being the only adult of the main cast, I wanted to have portrayed as a Gym Leader... ironically, I think she looks a little more Team Rocket...

As for the Pokémon themselves, with this upcoming installment we're now up to a metric bajillion of these things to choose from. So why these five? The reasons probably aren't as deep as readers of the comic might expect. Hell, if I had announced I was doing this, I'm sure people might have suggested better picks for each character than the ones I picked. (Oh well...)

The only real restriction I placed on myself was that I wanted at least one Pokémon from each generation.

***

(from left to right)
- I gave Gavin a Heracross, simply because he's a man's man. I mean, we can't honestly expect this guy to be walking around with something cutesy like a Clefairy or something, right? And Heracross is a lot of things... but I can't say it's cute (and it's worth mentioning, it was the most challenging thing for me to draw in this piece). I did debate giving him a Hitmonlee for a while though...

- Fara got a Dragonite. Again, as the only adult, I wanted her to be the only one with an evolved Pokémon. It's hard to say exactly why it works so well, but I really think Dragonite was just made for her; probably the cute face/frightening power combo. ^_^

- Rain was given a Plusle. Now don't think too hard about this one. I chose it simply because she has a pet rabbit in the comic. And I chose Plusle over Minun because she'd need something "positive" to keep her negativity in check (oh, that was lame).

- Maria admittedly had the least thought put in. Being the last one I thought of, she was stuck with getting something from the upcoming fifth generation (which I'm intentionally trying NOT to research so I can be surprised). The only fifth gen Pokémon I really know are the new starters, so I just went with Tepig (the fire starter), because I liked it best out of the three.

- I SO wanted to give Rudy a Magikarp and have him be all excited about it. But I'm happy with my choice of giving him a Drifloon. It's just odd enough to suit him and his holding onto like an ACTUAL balloon still amuses me.

***

So, I hope you guys enjoyed this. If this gets a very positive reception, I may do more of these sorts of things in the future. ^_^

Oh, and read the comic here!

©2004-2011
Rain, all characters and all other aspects of the story are copyright material belonging to me.
I do not own Pokémon though. That's all Nintendo and GameFreak.