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Synopsis:
An opening short film which we came in halfway through, so was even more confusing than usual. It involved Pikachu and an Elakid (not sure how you spell that one...) rescuing some Exeggcutes. The main feature was about some English bloke (according to Pocket Bishonen, he's called Jiraldan, but I don't think they ever mentioned that in the movie) trying to capture Articuno, Zapdos and Moltres so that Lugia would come and save them, then he could capture it as well. Ash and co. have to stop him or the world will be destroyed.
Review:
Everything you'd expect from a Pokémon movie, really. Ash is annoying, Tracy isn't Brock (he does make a very brief cameo. Why did they get rid of him...?) and Misty is rapidly degenerating into the love interest. Team Rocket and Slowking get all the best lines. Team Rocket is around a lot more than they were in the first movie, which is excellent, and they've managed to blend the CGI much better, and make more use of it. The animation's still not up to movie standard, though it has improved.
Not recommended unless you're a die-hard Pokémon fan. Seriously. Not even to take your kids to see it. There are a couple of 'the kids probably won't get this' moments, but it's possible they were just the result of bad translation.
The Mew card gimic is a bit blantant, but the cards are very pretty. Also, following in the tradition of the first movie's "Pokémon weren't meant to fight" message, which invalidated the whole point of the game, this movie claims "Pokémon aren't just there to be collected," so there's no point to the trading cards either. I'm not sure if it's reverse psychology, or more translation problems...
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