Summary
- In Pokemon anime, most of the evil acts are committed by Pokemon under the influence of their trainers, but a few episodes feature purely evil Pokemon.
- “Conspiracy to Conquer!” the episode reveals the hypnotic Malamar leading Team Rocket and Officer Jenny with plans to conquer the world.
- Malamar’s high intelligence and psychic abilities make him a dangerous villain, and there may be other evil Pokemon with similar abilities.
In Art Pokemon in anime, in general, there aren’t very many evil pokemon, but pokemon that do evil things because their trainers want them to. Several episodes XYhowever, strip away that excuse by introducing a Pokemon that is pure evil, and the result is simply awful.
In the episode “Conspiracy to Conquer!” Team Rocket falls prey to a mysterious woman who passes by Madame X and her Pokémon Malamar, who hypnotizes them and controls their actions. Meowth escapes and gets help from Ash and the gang, but gradually everyone but Meowth and Ash fall prey to Malamar, giving him half a dozen humans and all their Pokemon at his command. However, things take a turn for the worse when it’s revealed that Madame X is actually Jenny’s officer – and she’s being monitored as well. Malamar himself was the mastermind behind this villainous scheme, and he is instantly on the run, ready to continue his plans for world conquest.
Malamar proves how dangerous intelligent Pokemon can be
Malamar in the episode is clearly very intelligent to be able to come up with such a plan, and his psychic abilities seem equally impressive considering how many people he could control at once. Malamar is a rare example of an evil Pokemon that cannot be influenced and simply acts on its own whims. Malamar actually appears later, back in “Facing the Grand Design!”, where he teamed up with two other Malamars to brainwash scientists into creating a dangerous weapon. Malamar, however, actually managed to escape in this episode as well, but he didn’t appear again – meaning there are still evil Pokemon out there taking over the world.
Malamar never explains the motivation behind wanting to take over the world; seems to just think that it is possible and necessary. While it’s possible that Malamar is in some sense seeking revenge like Mewtwo, it doesn’t seem like he has any specific goal in mind. Their extremely high intelligence may indicate that they have been experimented on, although by whom and why is a mystery. It should be noted that this evil nature does not apply to all Malamars; in the second episode where it appears, some friendly Inkai and Malamar help foil the evil Malamar’s plans.
Evil Pokemon can threaten the world
Fortunately, evil Pokemon seem to be pretty rare, but given the sheer number of wild Pokemon in the world, there should be a lot more. The powers that Pokemon possess, even non-psychic ones like Malamar, have great potential for destruction. Even a few evil Pokemon that want to harm people can cause enormous conflict and suffering with their abilities. Perhaps defeating evil Pokemon is a task that falls to legendary Pokemon, many of which are said to maintain balance and peace. Despite this, there are at least three terribly intelligent and powerful evils Pokemon there, free to do as they please… and next time Ash might not stop them.
