Plot: A mysterious meteorite hurls towards Earth and crashes into the polar zone. In it lies the Pokemon Deoxys who is carrying a green orb but suddenly loses it when the legendary Pokemon Rayquaza attacks it believing it to be an enemy. The battle between them destroys a nearby research site and traumatizing a young boy named Tory who gets scared by a stampede of the Pokemon Spheal, Sealeo, and Walrein. The fight ends with Rayquaza supposedly killing Deoxys and the researchers recover the green orb and bring it to their home for studying. Four years later, Tory has a phobia for Pokemon after the event and his father is still trying to figure out what's in the green orb. He eventually meets Ash and his companions who try to help him overcome his fear, but things take a turn for the worse when Deoxys comes to the city fully regenerated and is cutting off the power and abducting people and their Pokemon.
Part of me looked forward to seeing this movie because apart from recently seeing Deoxys on my Pokemon: Alpha Sapphire game, I've never seen Deoxys in any of the games. I had only seen still shots back when generation 3 was around and I thought it looked pretty cool. He has a fascinating and unique design that made me want to see a little more. So how did it turn out once I saw a movie starring Deoxys? Well there are some aspects of it that were surprisingly really good... and some aspects were not so good.
The most stand-out aspect of the movie than even Deoxys was Tory's phobia of Pokemon. This aspect sounds a little silly when you put it on paper, but it's done reasonably well. When the film cuts to the point of view shot all those Pokemon coming so close to trample him, his fear is totally justified. Heck, even I couldn't help but think "okay...that's a little intimidating." But they were very clever at giving his fear a good balance by stating that he both fears and loves Pokemon. He wants to interact with them and cherish them, but the idea of them going anywhere near him after such a traumatic event at a small age is too much for him. On top of that, you care for him more when you realize it also makes him very lonely given that everyone else in the world is into Pokemon. Every other kid in this world is a Pokemon trainer and he isn't, making him a complete outcast. This makes it more satisfying when he begins to slowly interact with Ash and his friends and their Pokemon.
Deoxys was not only as cool as I hoped it would be, but it was kind of intimidating...at least in its own Pokemon, child-friendly way. It's powers were destructive, it can clone itself and can regenerate, the list goes on. And the sound that makes it so intimidating but cool at the same time. I think like Mewtwo, I would have loved it way more if I saw this as a kid, but I enjoyed watching it well enough as an adult. I did like Rayquaza during the beginning, but he's starting to overstay is welcome as the film went on. It made sense in the beginning because Deoxys was invading its territory. But once the action starts getting to the city, his importance in the climax started to wear out very quickly to the point where it felt like he was there just to be a pompous jerk.
The story is much more interesting than Jirachi because we are mostly left in the dark as to what exactly is happening. We get that this is about Deoxys and its orb, but we don't really understand what it is or what the characters can do about it or what the Deoxys clones are doing to the people and Pokemon they're capturing and so on. In a way that made Deoxys more fascinating because I didn't know what it was planning to do or why. The fact that it's causing all this mayhem kept me under my seat...somewhat. The story does tend to drag a lot to the point where I was becoming a little annoying that I'm waiting what feels like a long while for the plot to move along. The fact that it takes its time works in some areas of the film, but it felt a little too drawn out as a whole.
The climax is also a mixed bag. Granted, we get more action then the last couple of films, which is especially enjoyable when it is Rayquaza and Deoxys fighting each other. But like I said before, Rayquaza started to have less of a purpose as the movie went on. In fact, there's a moment during the end that was so nice and happy that they should've started to end the movie on that note. But no, Rayquaza has to go and a still cause mayhem. Also, shortly afterwords we come across another conflict that came right out of nowhere and had little to no purpose. I guess you could say it was needed for showing ass the final developments if you will between Tory and these two little Pokemon named Plusle and Minun but you could have easily done that while Deoxys and Rayquaza are fighting.
And that's my review for Pokemon: Destiny Deoxys. It has its pacing problems and both Rayquaza and the climax overstay their welcome. But in the end, the story was interesting, Tory and his phobia were well delivered, and Deoxys was as cool as I hoped he would be. It's not great, but it's a decent flick.
Rating: 65%
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