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On the Origin of Species: Slowpoke, Slowbro and Slowking: Investigating the inspirati

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On the Origin of Species: Slowpoke, Slowbro and Slowking: Investigating the inspirations behind ...

As part of an ongoing series exploring the likely cultural and zoological origins of Pokémon species, we take a look at the Slowpoke family.

Read more on Bulbanews
 
Re: On the Origin of Species: Slowpoke, Slowbro and Slowking: Investigating the inspi

Slowpoke! I've been looking forward to this one.

All I knew from them is that they are a really unusual take on a particularly obscure youkai... which was something I simply heard offhand. Otherwise they really looked to me like just some kind of "from scratch" creature with subtle mollusk hints.

In fact, I never even noticed that trend of the Sazae-oni, and thought it was just the logical conclusion of a "mollusk monster". Good to finally learn what was that thing about.


Still, Slowpoke's design stands out to me as one of the more original ones. It may take a bit of a look from some animals, but ultimately it just looks like its own creature. Which is interesting, considering the concept already is obscure enough.


(Also after learning there's such a thing as the Shirime, I honestly just expect about anything from japanese stories.)
 
Re: On the Origin of Species: Slowpoke, Slowbro and Slowking: Investigating the inspi

I can think of a few instances where i saw that turban shelled demon in other media. The first boss in Final Fantasy VI and a monster-of-the-day in an early Power Rangers episode are the first examples to come to mind.
 
Re: On the Origin of Species: Slowpoke, Slowbro and Slowking: Investigating the inspi

The Slowpoke family was always a bit of an oddity to me, especially in my younger days. Before I was always just content thinking it was some kind of sea otter that fished for shells and liked wearing them. However just as it was mentioned in this article, in those days of playing an assortment of video games, there were many times where I have noticed similar creatures wearing that same kind of spiked turban shell, and how they all reminded me of the Slowpoke line. Bomberman's Kai-Man comes to mind, as well as that one Digimon whose name I have simply forgotten. Come to think of it, I think it was pink as well. But noting these similarities, I have wondered as a child if there was some kind of similar link that all of these creatures had.

It wasn't until recent years that I heard about the Sazae-oni, and only through a posting to a similar article theorizing the Slowpoke line were based on it. I think it's pretty safe to assume that's what they're based on, at least to an extent.

While I'm also late saying this, I must say that I'm pretty happy to see these articles again, even if it's only going to be for a short while. I love this series.
 
Re: On the Origin of Species: Slowpoke, Slowbro and Slowking: Investigating the inspi

I'm beginning to wonder if all of these are gonna be from Bogleech. =P Which is kinda disappointing, since so many people lift from the site without sourcing. Oh well. I'm still hoping for some new articles with origins I was completely unaware of. =/
 
Re: On the Origin of Species: Slowpoke, Slowbro and Slowking: Investigating the inspi

I'm little bit late, but I'm happy to see these articles again. Love to read these.
 
Re: On the Origin of Species: Slowpoke, Slowbro and Slowking: Investigating the inspi

Gronarak:

1)Of all the articles you linked to, only eight pokémon evolutionary lines appear that were also in bogleech. That means 22 Origin of Species articles were about species not covered by bogleech.

2)Of those eight, six were posted over three years ago. Given that the bogleech page discuss Black and White pokémon, and the OOS articles were posted before the release of BW, I'm not sure which came first.

3)In seven of those eight cases, the bogleech article is two paragraphs or less, versus four or five time that for the OOS article.

4)In the vast majority of those cases, the only thing they have in common is that they talk about the same Pokémon and the same probable origin. Given that we're talking about things like "Victreebell is based on the Pitcher plant" or "Nincada is based on the Cicada" (No, really?), ie things any moderately informed pokéfan would know already...

5)And this is pretty much the case here. The OOS article describes in details the legends surrounding the Japanese mytholigical creature, while the Bogleech article talks about Digimon.

Basically, your accusation that the article are being lifted seems very unfair to our writer.
 
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Re: On the Origin of Species: Slowpoke, Slowbro and Slowking: Investigating the inspi

The morphing of Shellder is one of the bizarre oddities I seen with these species, especially since Slowpoke doesn't come with a shell to be associated with the thing it is based on.

Thanks for reading.
 
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