Editorials
[Editorial] The Brutal Reality of Pokemon Trading
Pokemon that only evolve when they’re traded can be a nuisance. If you happen to be replaying Gen 1 for nostalgic reasons, sourcing a link cable and a friend to play with can be tough. As a result, getting yourself an Alakazam or a Gengar is pretty much impossible. Not fun.
However, the implications of Pokemon who only evolve when they’re traded are pretty rough. I used to think it was something to do with the process of trading itself when I was a kid. I didn’t get it, but I kind of left it at that. However, I recently realized that it’s not so much to do with the process of trading as it is to do with the idea of being given away—the idea of being abandoned.
Let’s look at the Gen 1 Pokemon who evolve as a result of being traded:
Machoke > Machamp
Haunter > Gengar
Kadabra > Alakazam
Graveler > Golem
Machoke, a Pokemon with an iron will, is abandoned by the trainer it trusted. What happens? It trains harder than ever, both to make itself worthy of its new trainer so it won’t be abandoned again, and so that it will be more capable of dealing with abandonment issues in the future. The notoriously modest Pokemon becomes rash, punching the walls of the mountains rapidly, until it begins to punch faster than it ever has, fuelled by pain, Thus, it evolves into Machamp, who is known for throwing up to five hundred punches per second.
Haunter, the prankster Ghost-type who spends all of its time trying to amuse its trainer, becomes Gengar, the Pokemon embodiment of mischief, after it fails to impress its trainer. Although Haunter is known for its mischievous and happy nature, and much prefers playing pranks and making people laugh to battling, Gengar can be malicious at times. Haunter would react sensitively when it accidentally scared someone, as seen by the way it treats Ash before Ash fights Sabrina in the anime. However, Gengar purposely pretends to be people’s shadows, as it serves its own humor instead of that of humans after having been abandoned by its trainer.
Kadabra, the evolution of the teleporting Abra, becomes lonely and evolves into the super-cerebral Alakazam, who remembers everything that has ever happened to it. Burdened by its memory, it uses psychic powers to hold its head up, as its weak muscles can’t support its ever-expanding brain. From Generation IV onward, even the Everstone cannot prevent a Kadabra from evolving when it is traded, testifying to its inability to forget the pain it felt after being abandoned. When Kadabra has a headache, the psychic waves it uses telekinetically become unregulated. This is likely what triggers its evolution into Alakazam, as it is incapable of mentally dealing with the loss of its trainer, necessitating a greater capacity for understanding.
Finally, Graveler becomes depressed after being cast away by someone it trusted and loved. Its stone heart hardens, causing its entire gravelled body to manifest into a smooth layer of hardened rock. It is known that Graveler’s shell can break apart, but will slowly regenerate over time. As its Pokedex description in Pokemon Gold reads, “With a free and uncaring nature, it doesn’t mind if pieces break off while it rolls down mountains.” However, Golem’s hollow shell testifies to the fact that Graveler’s emphatically gravelly interior coagulates, forming a thick layer of solid rock that can’t even be scratched by dynamite. It sheds its shell once a year, quickly developing a new and stronger one as it grows in size with each year that passes since its original abandonment.
All of the above instances involve a Pokemon becoming depressed due to the fact that its trainer abandoned it. None of the above Pokemon can realize their full potential until they acquire strength from pain. The same can be said of Gen 2 trade evolutions; Scyther evolves into Scizor after it assimilates the object with which it associates its original trainer, the Metal Coat, into its own body. Slowpoke’s evolution into Slowking as opposed to Slowbro can be explained using the same logic, as is the case with Onix’s evolution into Steelix and Seadra’s evolution into Kingdra. The fact that Pokemon always retain their original Trainer ID helps testify to the fact that they are partially defined by the trainer who originally raised them.
It’s not just trade evolutions that hold horrifying implications, though. In Gen 2, baby Pokemon were introduced into the series, such as Pichu, Magby, and Elekid. These Pokemon were not present in Gen 1, despite the fact that Pikachu, Magmar, and Electabuzz could be encountered in the wild. This could be due to the power of Team Rocket in Gen 1, but there’s another reason that seems to fit the bill more neatly.
It is highly likely that their absence from the Kanto region is likely due to the Pokemon War that Lieutenant Surge fought in with his Electric-type team. As Gen 1 contained no breeding, and actively permitted only a single Pokemon to the Day-Care in order to ensure this, it could be the case that trainers were not permitted to bring baby Pokemon into the region that had recently been torn apart by war. Even in other regions, baby Pokemon must be hatched from eggs, caught within the confines of the Safari Zone, or caught in an enclosed private area like Gen 3’s Trophy Garden.
Surprisingly, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon adds to this theory, as the baby Pokemon in the Pokemon-exclusive world often go missing. Even without a human presence, the baby Pokemon are endangered, so in the world of Kanto that has recently suffered greatly from a human war, it simply isn’t safe for baby Pokemon to be out in the wild.
Therefore, the implications behind the often unexplained aspects of Pokemon evolution are incredibly dark. Pokemon can evolve as a result of the pain they feel from being abandoned, whereas other Pokemon can be so vulnerable that they can only exist in conservation until they become stronger. In the world of Pokemon, there are certain types of Pokemon that have suffered severely at the hands of human maltreatment. From using them as weapons in a vicious war, to abandoning them at the first sight of something stronger, Pokemon can have their very existence altered irreparably as a result of naive human interference. It’s dark and horrifying, but painfully true.
In many ways, the world of Pokemon is defined by pain, suffering, and a devotion to human trainers who would happily dispose of them without so much as batting an eye.
Five decades ago, Stephen King published the story of a bullied girl with telekinetic powers and forever changed the world of horror.
Carrie follows a high school misfit who seeks revenge for a hideous prank by psychically destroying her senior prom. The name Carrie White has become synonymous with the concept of a formal dance thanks to a flawless adaptation from Brian De Palma. Now fifty years after the film’s release, Mike Flanagan is putting his own stamp on the troubling story.
Rather than a feature film, the writer/director will expand King’s relatively slim debut novel into an eight-episode miniseries for Amazon Prime set to premiere on October 7.
Flanagan is no stranger to the world of Stephen King. A long-time Constant Reader, he first made waves with his daring adaptation of Gerald’s Game (2017), a novel many fans considered un-filmable. His underrated Doctor Sleep merges the disparate plot of Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining with King’s original source material, and his 2024 genre-bending tearjerker The Life of Chuck faithfully executes one of the author’s most metaphysical novellas.
He’s currently mired in pre-production for an expansive adaptation of The Dark Tower series, keystone to King’s connected universe, and Warner Bros. recently announced that Flanagan will helm a new version of The Mist, King’s 1980 novella which sees a small Maine town overrun by otherworldly monsters.
Considering the vast array of the author’s previously unadapted material, an obvious question arises. Why reimagine Carrie in 2026? Noting the timeless nature of the content, Flanagan expressed his desire to bring the story of a bullied girl into modern times, mirroring his approach to Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House and Edgar Allan Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher. He explained, “The only way to approach it was to build something new out of the ingredients of Carrie. Otherwise, there’s really no purpose in trying to retread ground that’s been so beautifully walked before.”
His miniseries will maintain the novel’s bloody bookends while delivering “big surprises” along the way.
A New Prom Night Nightmare
The roughly 60-second teaser introduces Summer H. Howell as Carrie White just before the moment of catastrophe. Standing in a prom dress, she smiles at her applauding classmates with an ominous crown perched upon her head. Moments later, Carrie unleashes a rage-filled scream into the night air while promgoers rush for the exit doors. But careful examination of this scene shows Carrie wearing a different, albeit dirty dress as she seems to telekinetically punish her peers.
In an exclusive first look with Entertainment Weekly, Flanagan explains that in his version of the story, “the events of that prom are going to be completely different.” An open trunk emitting a crimson glow does hint at the pig’s blood dumped on Carrie’s head, but it’s likely Flanagan’s formal dance will be a different kind of horror altogether. Despite these changes, the series may end with the widespread destruction outlined in the source material. Unlike any previous adaptations, King’s novel ends with the near-total destruction of Chamberlain, Maine. A flaming street in Flanagan’s trailer promises similar carnage no matter what prank sparks Carrie’s deadly revenge.
The Monstrous Addition of Social Media
On the opposite end of this fiery conclusion is an extreme act of bullying that brings together the story’s main cast. King’s novel begins as Carrie gets her first period while showering in the girls’ locker room. Completely unaware of the concept of menstruation, the sheltered girl thinks she’s bleeding to death. Her classmates respond with vitriolic rage. Led by ultra-mean girl Chris Hargensen (Alison Thornton), they mock the terrified teen while pelting her with tampons. Glimpses of this disturbing event reveal that Flanagan has excised the scene’s nudity while adding a seismic update. As Carrie sobs in the shower stall, Chris and her friends film the breakdown with their phones.
Other scenes note the presence of social media, bringing King’s fifty-year-old story into the digital age.
Flanagan’s adaptation promises to explore the destructive power of social media, an often invisible entity with a potential for harm rivaling Carrie’s own powers. While King’s tormented heroine suffers in front of a small group of girls, Flanagan’s version of the incident will likely become a viral video, potentially circling the globe on social media. Similar to Katt Shea’s criminally underrated The Rage: Carrie 2, which includes elements of revenge porn exploitation, Flanagan’s modern retelling will distinguish itself by exploring the nebulous cruelty of online bullying, a force ten times more powerful than the irl pranks King first envisioned.
A Completely Reimagined White Family
In addition to modernizing these canon events, Flanagan hints at updates to Carrie’s oppressive upbringing at the hands of her mother, Margaret White (Samantha Sloyan). Dead before the novel begins, we never meet Carrie’s domineering father Ralph, known to carry a bible alongside his gun. Flanagan’s White household will be an altogether different beast. In his version of the story, Carrie and her mother have been hidden away in the unassuming home, forced out of hiding by Ralph’s unexpected death. Perhaps we will finally meet this elusive man whose shadow hangs over his wife and child. Considering the White family’s fundamentalist lifestyle, this reimagining hints at tradwife culture and a home ruled by staunch patriarchal control.
Whereas King’s Carrie has been tormented by her classmates since Kindergarten, Flanagan’s Carrie will be a wide-eyed newcomer to public school, eager to make friends and engage with her peers. We glimpse Carrie cozying up to Chris and the equally popular Sue Snell (Siena Agudong) as she navigates a new social scene. Of course, we know this kindness is part of an elaborate plot designed to lull Carrie into a false sense of camaraderie, setting up an atrocious act of public humiliation. These brief moments of feigned compassion put Sue’s own complicity into question. Will Flanagan’s version of the character find the courage to defend Carrie from vicious bullies or will she succumb to peer pressure and join in the mob mentality?
Perhaps the biggest deviation from King’s original text is the relationship between Carrie and her mother. King’s Margaret White is a horrifically abusive religious zealot whose worldview has been hardened by internalized misogyny. She shames Carrie for menstruating, locks her in a closet to “pray,” and regrets not killing her child in infancy. She’s also responsible for Carrie’s social ostracization. Known to berate her neighbors for their “sins,” Margaret forces her daughter to live by an extreme code of conduct and disallows any potential friends lest they corrupt the girl with their worldly ways.
Flanagan’s version of the character is perhaps just as much a victim as Carrie herself. Also trapped inside her home, his Margaret is overly vigilant, her own trauma manifesting as strict control. Describing a more sympathetic depiction of the iconic villain, Flanagan explains, “Our Margaret White is a woman who fiercely loves her daughter and wants to protect her from this world … [She] doesn’t know how to do that and thinks the way to protect her is to close her off; not punitively, but to create this private utopia.”
Despite this potential softening, Sloyan’s Margaret may still have a sharp edge. Though she has appeared in many Flanagan projects, from Hush (2016) to The Fall of the House of Usher (2023), she is best known for her role as the abhorrent Bev Keane in the poignant saga Midnight Mass (2021). Perhaps inspired by King’s Margaret White, Bev is pious and sadistic, willing to punish anyone who does not adhere to her warped approximation of Catholicism.
Flanagan specifically wrote Margaret with Sloyan in mind, likely remembering the actress’s eerie ability to create deceptive empathy and shift our allegiances on a dime.
Expanding Stephen King’s Telekinetic Universe
While most of King’s story deals with an unthinkable prom night in Chamberlain, Maine, large sections of the semi-epistolary novel see experts debating the nature of telekinesis. Do Carrie’s frightening abilities represent a new phase in human evolution or is the prom night carnage merely a fluke? King settles the debate with a shocking denouement in which a young mother recounts her infant daughter’s ability to dangle her crib toys in midair. We’re left to wonder if she will become another tormented girl who surprises the world with metaphysical strength.
Flanagan plans to build out this brief scene while amplifying themes of female empowerment. After introducing our main cast of characters, episode two will open with an unrelated story in which we meet another girl with the TK gene. Each subsequent chapter will expand this world, building out a roster of telekinetic young women. Considering King’s fondness for stories about powerful kids, often described as possessing “the shining,” Constant Readers will no doubt have their eyes peeled for various Easter Eggs nodding to the author’s vast catalogue.
Giving Carrie Her Own Voice
Perhaps the most striking distinction in Flanagan’s new trailer is the extent to which we hear Carrie’s voice. The sneak peek is fully narrated by the titular prom queen as she demands accountability. “I want to know why,” she explains while detailing Chris’ elaborate plan. Aside from the aforementioned coda, King’s book essentially ends with the aftermath of the prom night tragedy, leaving little time for Carrie to reflect. His shifting narrative does bring the reader into her fragile mind, though not before she’s been cowed by relentless cruelty. We watch Carrie sink into bloodthirsty revenge, but never hear a considered desire for justice or repair.
Flanagan’s original monologue allows Carrie to voice her pain and mourn the life she could have had. We’re also treated to a mug shot-style photo of Chris with a bruised and bandaged face, implying that the mean girl will have to answer for her senseless sadism.
Flanagan is known for filling his series adaptations with heartwrenching speeches that cut to the heart of his thematic intentions, and this teaser seems to follow suit. After years of fans, critics, and scholars analyzing Carrie’s pain, perhaps his modern retelling will offer the titular anti-hero a chance to finally speak for herself.
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