Pokémon thrives on a generational crossover that has made it one of the most popular and endearing franchises in the world—from those of us who trod through the tall grasses of Kanto as kids, to new generations who hopped on board in Scarlet and Violetthere’s a connection that transcends years. But as an older Pokémon fan, sometimes it’s hard to feel like the franchise is still really for you.
The games are, by and large, still mostly focused on an unnuanced, straightforward, and simplistic set of RPG mechanics that make them excellent entries into the genre for younger audiences—and while there are challenges there, especially in elements like the competitive scenes, that simplicity carries on in the series’ broad difficulty. The anime likewise centers a young Pokémon audience’s perspective: we might have grown up with Ash Ketchumbut Ash didn’t really grow with us, and his replacements in Pokémon Horizons are also young kids ready for their first adventures of many, just like we were all those years ago.
None of this is to say that Pokémon can’t be enjoyed by older generations—of course it can. Like I said, that’s the key to its longevity; it brings people across different periods of their lives together. The franchise is even occasionally willing to explore this itself, with shows like last year’s J-Drama Pocket ni Bōken wo Tsumekondewhich was all about a young woman revisiting the Pokémon games of her childhood. But Pokémon has rarely made me feel seen as an older fan recently (the heaps of generation 1 nostalgia aside) as it does in Netflix’s adorable streaming series Pokémon Janitor.
You would think that would be because of its human protagonist, Haru (Rena Nōnen/Karen Fukuhara). A stressed-out office worker who obsesses over not blowing meetings and overworks on presentations, Haru comes to the Pokémon Resort to both escape her normal life and start a new job, one where she is more explicitly in touch with the world of Pokémon as we understand it in the franchise already. We only see glimpses of it, but Haru’s pre-Concierge life feels weirdly devoid of Pokémon as an aspect of it, alien to a franchise that is usually explicit in showing off a society where humanity and Pokémon-kind co-exist and thrive in mingling. Struggle as she might at first, in a new career without performance reviews and a need to slave over a laptop in her “free” hours just to stay caught up, at first Haru flounders, and then thrivesonce she embraces the chill vibes of the resort and its denizens.
No, that feeling of being seen for me is instead in the perfect foil Haru finds in her partner Pokémon at the resort: a local Psyduck. I, as much as I would like to be, am not a giant fluffy yellow duck the size of a preteen with psychic powers, but in Pokémon Janitor’s Psyduck I felt a kinship unlike anything I’d experienced recently as a life-long Pokémon fan. Of course, there’s the obvious fact Psyduck is a first-generation Pokémon, one of the original 151—we’re both oldheads. We’re both very stressed and prone to headaches; mine just make me want to go lie down in a dark room instead of telekinetically lift objects with my mind. But what really drew me to Concierge’s Psyduck, beyond being a Psyduck, was an altogether more simple fact: Psyduck is a resident of the island the Pokémon Resort, but they’re not a guest. They were already there, in paradise, and yet… they are Psyduck. They are still a stressed out little duck with a bad head and a desire to be left alone.
It’s telling that even before Haru makes it her goal to make Psyduck her partner at the resort, Psyduck is drawn to this stressed-out millennial running from a life of tedium in Concierge’s first couple of episodes—flittering around in the background, hiding in bushes, running away when the threat of social engagement becomes too apparent, inspecting her from afar as much as she turns Psyduck into her own subject. Psyduck already has Haru’s dream of being on this idyllic island with little to do other than relax and vibe, and yet they can’t do that—they cannot be like the Pokémon that are invited to this party, an outsider looking in and wanting that connection.
It takes Psyduck and Haru finding kinship in each other for them to both start mellowing out and going with the flow of the magical world in Conciergebut it’s a kinship in understanding where they’re both at in their lives: older, tireder, weighed down by the reality of the world, but still wanting to see that spark of magic that makes Pokémon's joyful society thrive in themselves. After years of still loving Pokémon but feeling increasingly out of touch with that spark, in Psyduck Concierge melted my crusty “genwunner” heart—and said there’ll always be a place for me as long as I’m willing to seek out that connection.
Pokémon Janitor is now streaming on Netflix.
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