Stop motion animation feels like magic to me. I could never dream of having the amount of patience you need to meticulously capture every movement of a clay model for an entire video, let alone a show or movie. Well, after the success of Pokémon Concierge, The Pokémon Company is creating another series in partnership with Wallace & Gromit studio Aardman Animations called Pokémon Tales: The Misadventures of Sirfetch’d & Pichu, and it looks so damn delightful.
Aardman Animation was part of a panel at the ongoing Pokémon XP convention happening in San Francisco this weekend, showing off the show’s puppets, describing the process of working on stop-motion animation, and also bringing a teaser trailer featuring the titular dynamic duo. The team describes the two as a “knight” and “squire” journeying together in a story that is told exclusively through the eyes of Pokémon. As such, the show won’t have dialogue beyond the monsters saying their names, and all the storytelling be communicated through painstakingly animated puppetry.
I already feel an immense amount of respect for animators, but The Misadventures of Sirfetch’d & Pichu has so much style even within the limitations of stop motion. According to the staff, the process is so longwinded that one scene can get around 13 seconds of animation in done in a week. That’s why these shows take years to create, and the final result is pretty stunning. The show will premiere on Disney+ in 2027.