Pokémon Detective Pikachu

Pokémon Detective Pikachu is a 2019 urban fantasy mystery film directed by Rob Letterman, who co-wrote the screenplay with Dan Hernandez, Benji Samit and Derek Connolly, from a story by Hernandez, Samit and Nicole Perlman. Based on the Pokémon franchise created by Satoshi Tajiri and the 2016 video game Detective Pikachu, the film is produced by Legendary Pictures, in association with Toho. It is the first live action entry in the franchise. The film stars Ryan Reynolds as the voice and facial motion capture of the titular character, with Justice Smith, Kathryn Newton, Suki Waterhouse, Omar Chaparro, Chris Geere, Ken Watanabe and Bill Nighy in live-action roles.

Filming for Pokémon Detective Pikachu took place from January to May 2018 in Colorado, England, and Scotland. It was released in Japan on May 3, 2019, and in the United States on May 10, 2019, distributed by Warner Bros. Entertainment in RealD 3D and Dolby Cinema. It is the first Pokémon film to be distributed theatrically in the United States by Warner Bros. since Pokémon 3: The Movie (2000), and with a PG rating from the MPAA, it is also the first Pokémon film released in the United States not to receive a G rating by the group. Detective Pikachu received mixed reviews from critics, who praised the creature designs and Reynolds' performance, but criticized the plot as being standard. The film is the best-reviewed live-action film adaptation of a video game on Rotten Tomatoes. It also received positive grades from audiences polled by CinemaScore and PostTrak.

Plot
In the Pokémon universe, Tim Goodman is a 21-year-old insurance salesman who has given up Pokémon training due to the death of his mother and the absence of his father, Harry. While hanging out with his friend Jack, Tim learns that Harry has died in a car crash while investigating a case.

He travels to Ryme City, a metropolis where humans and Pokémon live together as equals and Pokémon fighting is illegal, to collect Harry's assets. Tim also meets Lucy Stevens, a fluff columnist who wants to be a reporter and is suspicious of Harry's death, and her Psyduck. While reminiscing in his apartment, Tim encounters a deerstalker-clad Pikachu that can speak and only he can somehow understand. They are attacked by a party of Aipom under the influence of a purple gas that Tim accidentally released, but they both escape.

They take shelter at a café where Pikachu reveals that he is an amnesiac detective who was Harry's police partner and that they were investigating a case together when Harry disappeared; the only clue to Pikachu's identity and Harry's whereabouts being the deerstalker hat labelled with Harry's name. They look for Lucy, who reveals that while investigating she discovered that Harry was once at Ryme Wharf, and set out to find clues.

Tim and Pikachu interrogate a Mr. Mime who directs them to an illegal underground fighting arena owned by Sebastian, whose Charizard previously lost a battle to Pikachu. Sebastian demands a rematch, but Pikachu cannot remember his own moves and Sebastian gives Charizard the same mysterious gas labeled "R". While Tim attempts to save Pikachu, Sebastian accidentally releases R, causing the entire stadium to get affected alerting the authorities, but not before revealing to Tim that he got R from "the doctor."

Tim tells police lieutenant Hideo Yoshida that Harry may be alive, but Yoshida shows him the video of Harry's crash, explaining that survival would have been impossible. Soon, Tim and Pikachu are met by Ms. Norman who takes them to see Ryme City's benefactor Howard Clifford, who had once tried to cure his ailing condition and instead created the humanitarian city. He shows him more revealing footage of Harry surviving the attack, apparently caused by the recently escaped Mewtwo, but that he was taken away by the Pokémon, leaving Pikachu with amnesia. Howard tells them to watch out for his son, Roger, who he claims is in control of his company and the city. With this new information, Tim and Pikachu recruit Lucy and Psyduck.

The group breaks into the lab facility Harry was investigating and learn that Dr. Ann Laurent, the doctor Sebastian mentioned, was experimenting on Mewtwo, who had been recaptured after escaping 20 years earlier, and had apparently hired Harry to aid them. They are soon attacked by several Greninja who chase them out of the building, but are fended off by Psyduck. They then escape a field of colossal Torterra, but Pikachu is gravely injured. Tim manages to communicate with a Bulbasaur and takes Pikachu to a clearing in the forest where they are greeted by Mewtwo, who heals Pikachu. Mewtwo attempts to reveal its intent, but is captured by Roger. Thinking that he betrayed Harry to a vengeful Mewtwo, Pikachu leaves Tim while the others return to Ryme City to warn Howard.

Pikachu comes across the area where Harry crashed his car and finds proof that it was not Mewtwo who attacked, but the Greninja. Tim reaches Howard, but learns too late that he intends to transfer his consciousnesses into Mewtwo and use R so that the Pokémon can become docile enough for him to fuse them with their owners, thus allowing humans to evolve within their Pokémon. As Howard in Mewtwo's body releases the gas into the world, Pikachu arrives and finally summons his electricity powers to battle Mewtwo. Meanwhile, Tim finds out that "Roger", and in turn Ms. Norman, was really a shape-shifting Ditto who was modified to transform into humans, with the real Roger having been tied up and hidden. Tim subdues Ditto with R while Pikachu fends off Mewtwo long enough for Tim to free Mewtwo from Howard's control.

Mewtwo restores everyone to normal while Howard is arrested by the police. Roger is impressed with Lucy and hires her as a full-time reporter. Mewtwo then reveals that Harry was in fact fused with Pikachu in order to heal him. The fusion erased Harry's memory while keeping his consciousness within Pikachu. After Mewtwo unfuses them with the help of Tim, a fully revived Harry offers Tim the chance to return home, but Tim decides to stay in order to learn how to become a detective and spend time with him and Pikachu.

Cast

 * Ryan Reynolds as Detective Pikachu, a world-class detective and exceptionally smart Pikachu whom only Tim can understand. Reynolds performed both the voice and facial motion capture for the character.
 * Reynolds also portrays Harry Goodman, Tim's missing father and a veteran Ryme City police detective.
 * Ikue Ōtani provides Detective Pikachu's normal voice as heard by everyone other than Tim.
 * Justice Smith as Tim Goodman, a former Pokémon trainer looking for his missing father; he is also Detective Pikachu's partner, and the only person capable of hearing him speak.
 * Max Fincham portrays a young Tim Goodman.
 * Kathryn Newton as Lucy Stevens, a junior reporter who is accompanied by a Psyduck.
 * Bill Nighy as Howard Clifford, the disabled visionary behind Ryme City and founder of Clifford Enterprises.
 * Ken Watanabe as Detective Hideo Yoshida, a veteran Ryme City police lieutenant and friend of Harry who is accompanied by a Snubbull.
 * Chris Geere as Roger Clifford, Howard's son and president of Clifford Enterprises.
 * Suki Waterhouse as Ms. Norman, a disguise used by a modified shape-shifting Ditto that is Howard's accomplice.
 * Omar Chaparro as Sebastian, a Pokémon trainer who runs a battle arena for Pokémon and is accompanied by a Charizard.
 * Rita Ora as Dr. Ann Laurent, a scientist for Clifford Enterprises experimenting on Mewtwo.
 * Karan Soni as Jack, Tim's friend who is a Pokémon trainer.
 * Josette Simon as "Grams", Tim's grandmother who took care of him after the death of Tim's mother.
 * Kadiff Kirwan as the Mayor of Ryme City
 * Rina Hoshino and Kotaro Watanabe as Mewtwo (voice)
 * Rachael Lillis as Jigglypuff (archive voice recording)

Additionally, Diplo appears as himself, the DJ who performs at Sebastian's Pokémon arena. Ryoma Takeuchi, who provides the Japanese dubbed voice of Tim, has a cameo as a Pokémon trainer in a video Tim watches.

Development
The film was officially announced in July 2016, although Legendary Pictures were reported to be in talks as early as April of that year. The Pokémon Company and Letterman wanted to adapt Detective Pikachu because of their interest in making a film that focused on another character besides Ash Ketchum, the protagonist of the Pokémon animated TV series. On the premise, Letterman stated, "The Pokémon Company, they've already made many, many movies of Ash, and they came to Legendary with this idea of using a new character. So when I came onboard, I was pitched this character of Detective Pikachu, and I fell in love with the story behind it." The idea of talking Pokémon originated from an early concept for the 1990s TV series, but was scrapped when the original game developer, Game Freak, was unsatisfied with the concept. The idea was revived for the 2016 Detective Pikachu spin-off game. Letterman said that they "spent a year designing all the characters ahead of shooting so that we could get it all right."

Rob Letterman was hired to direct the film on November 30, 2016, and the studio fast-tracked production to start in 2017. On August 16, 2016, Nicole Perlman and Alex Hirsch were in negotiations with Legendary to write the screenplay. Later revisions were provided by Eric Pearson, Thomas McCarthy, Derek Connolly, Dan Hernandez, Benji Samit and Letterman. Ultimately, Hernandez, Samit, Letterman, and Connolly received screenplay credit, and with Hernandez, Samit and Perlman receiving "story by" billing.

Casting
In November 2017, Justice Smith was cast in the lead human role, with Kathryn Newton added to costar after an intense session of reading and testing actresses opposite Smith. Newton beat out Natalia Dyer, Haley Lu Richardson, and Katherine Langford for the role. In December 2017, Ryan Reynolds was cast in the title role, portrayed via motion-capture and voice over. Other actors considered for the role were Danny DeVito, Dwayne Johnson, Mark Wahlberg and Hugh Jackman. In January 2018, with production commencing, Ken Watanabe, Bill Nighy and Chris Geere joined the cast, in February 2018, Suki Waterhouse and Rita Ora were added as well,  and in April 2018, Omar Chaparro had been signed. In January 2019, Rob Delaney had previously stated that he had a role, but he does not appear in the final cut of the film.

Filming
Principal production began on January 15, 2018, in London, England and Denver, Colorado. Nine days later, Legendary announced that principal photography had officially begun. Much of the on set interaction and vocal reference for Pikachu was filled in by Jon Bailey. However, all of his dialogue was dubbed over by Ryan Reynolds. Principal photography concluded on May 1, 2018. Some filming was done at Shepperton Studios, Warner Bros. Studios, Leavesden, and Minley Woods in Hampshire; rural areas of Colorado, just outside Denver and Colorado Springs; and Scotland.

The film's cinematographer, John Mathieson, noted that, like his other films, Detective Pikachu was shot on traditional film, in contrast to most other contemporary films which are shot digitally. He said the use of traditional film helps make it "look more realistic."

Post-production
The film's visual effects were provided by the Moving Picture Company (MPC), Framestore, Image Engine, Rodeo FX, and Instinctual VFX. Much of the visual effects were provided by the same team behind The Jungle Book, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, and The Lion King. Letterman compared the visual effects to the character of Rocket Raccoon from Guardians of the Galaxy; "They're technically, some of the most high-end visual effects in the world... It's completely photo-realistic, like they are alive and in the movie." Additional audio recording of a fight between Detective Pikachu and Charizard was recorded at the Pokémon World Championships 2018.

Music
Henry Jackman provided the score for the film. Kygo and Rita Ora appear on the soundtrack with the lead single titled "Carry On". The song and the music video were released on April 19, 2019. Japanese hip hop group Honest Boyz also collaborated with Lil Uzi Vert to make another song for the film, titled "Electricity" and produced by Pharrell Williams.

Marketing
In early November 2018, with the film in the post-production phase, a screen test was held for an incomplete version of the film, which drew considerably positive reactions from the test audience. Praise was directed towards the script, visual effects, and Reynolds' performance.

The film's first official trailer was released on November 12, 2018. Warner Bros. revealed versions of the trailer in English along with dubbed versions in Spanish, French, Italian and German. It soon became the top trending video on YouTube, and a top trending topic on Twitter, while inspiring numerous internet memes and reaction videos. Within 24 hours, the high-concept trailer amassed more than 100million views across multiple online and social media platforms. On YouTube, the English-language trailer garnered over 1million likes within two days, and 1.22million likes within five days. On Twitter, it set a new record of over 400,000 mentions on the day of the trailer reveal. A second trailer, featuring an appearance by Mewtwo, was released on February 26, 2019. A day prior to the trailer's release, Ryan Reynolds uploaded a video onto his YouTube channel that features interviews with himself and his wife, Blake Lively. A third trailer was released on April 22, 2019.

On November 30, 2018, Letterman, Smith, and Newton appeared on stage during the Tokyo Comic-Con event.

On May 7, 2019, a Warner Bros. YouTube channel named "Inspector Pikachu" uploaded a video purporting to be a bootleg recording of the film. Spanning nearly 1.75 hours in length, the opening minute shows the production logo sequences followed by a scene from the film featuring Tim Goodman, before spending the remainder of its runtime depicting Pikachu performing aerobics to an upbeat, 1980s-inspired synthwave tune. Reynolds aided in the prank, posting on Twitter as if he was alerting Warner Bros. and the film's official accounts about the alleged bootleg. The video, which Paul Tassi of Forbes described as "brilliant", received 4.2 million views in less than a day.

Merchandise and other tie-ins
On March 15, 2019, it was revealed that Legendary will release a graphic novel based on the film.

Niantic Labs promoted the film through the Pokémon Go app, by featuring, among other things, select Pokémon from the movie appear in the game, including a limited edition "detective" version of Pikachu.

The Pokémon Company released a series of trading cards featuring images from the film, including a limited edition card only available the first weekend of the film's release.

Release
Initially, Universal Pictures was due to handle distribution outside Japan, while Toho would handle the Japanese distribution. On July 25, 2018, Warner Bros. announced they had taken over worldwide distribution duties (except in Japan and China) from Universal, with the release date unchanged.

When the film's Japanese release was announced on November 29, 2018, Ryoma Takeuchi was confirmed to voice Tim Goodman in the Japanese version. Takeuchi also has a brief cameo appearance in the film itself as a Pokémon trainer. On March 20, 2019, it was confirmed that Marie Iitoyo will voice Lucy Stevens and Ken Watanabe will reprise his role as Detective Yoshida, in the Japanese dub. When the film premiered in Japan on May 3, 2019, Hidetoshi Nishijima was confirmed to have voiced Detective Pikachu in the Japanese dub.

Box office
, Pokémon Detective Pikachu has grossed $106.3 million in the United States and Canada, and $211.4 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $317.7 million, against a production budget of $150 million.

In the United States and Canada, the film was released alongside Tolkien, Poms and The Hustle, and was projected to gross $50–70 million from 4,202 theaters, although the studio was estimating a lower $40 million debut. The film made US$20.7 million on its first day, including US$5.7 million from Thursday night previews, both records for a film based on a video game. It went on to debut to $54.4 million, finishing second, behind holdover Avengers: Endgame. It was the best-ever opening for a video game film, and was also the sixth-highest total for a film that did not debut number one at the box office. In its second weekend the film made $24.8 million, finishing third behind John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum and Avengers: Endgame.

In other territories, the film was projected to debut to $90–120 million from 62 countries, including $40–60 million in China. Prior to its worldwide release, the film grossed US$21 million from openings and previews in several international markets, including Japan, through Thursday. The film had an international opening weekend debut of $103 million (and a five-day debut of $112.4 million), dethroning Avengers: Endgame at the top of the international box office. Detective Pikachu topped the international box office again in its second weekend.

In Japan, the film opened at number three (behind Detective Conan: The Fist of Blue Sapphire and Avengers: Endgame), grossing ¥948 million ($8.6 million) in its opening weekend, before topping the box office in its second weekend, with a cumulative ¥1,465,395,700 ($13,327,837). In China, Detective Pikachu had an opening day gross of US$16.4 million, and topped the box office with a weekend debut of $40.8 million. It topped the Chinese box office again in its second week, with a cumulative US$69.3 million. In the United Kingdom, it topped the box office with a £4.9million ($6.6 million) debut.

Critical response
As of May 2019, 66% of 254 reviews compiled by review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes are positive, and have an average rating of 5.97 out of 10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Pokémon Detective Pikachu may not take its wonderfully bizarre premise as far as it could have, but this offbeat adaptation should catch most – if not all – of the franchise's fans." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, provides a score of 53 out of 100, based on 46 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews." Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A–" on an A+ to F scale, while general audiences polled by PostTrak gave it 4 out of 5 stars.

Scott Mendelson of Forbes called the film "the best video game movie ever" and wrote, "Detective Pikachu works because it's a good movie first and a promising franchise-starter or a brand cash-in second. It's a real film, rooted in character arcs and narrative twists with just enough raw emotion and personal stakes to make the significant special effects moments matter beyond spectacle." CNET's Sean Keane also called the film the best ever based on a video game, calling it an "entertaining romp with plenty of heart," and praising Reynolds.

Writing for The Hollywood Reporter, Michael Rechtshaffen said, "Although the script... tends to compartmentalize the comedy, action and emotional bits rather than organically blending them all together, Letterman's energetic direction manages to hold everything aloft." Alonso Duralde's middling review for TheWrap is led by the subheading, "live-action-plus-animation take on the popular game feels both ambitious and lazy, frenzied and sluggish."

Sequel
In January 2019, months ahead of the release of Detective Pikachu, Legendary Entertainment announced that a sequel is already in development. Oren Uziel signed on as screenwriter.