Pokémon, Anatomy, and Books

Some days ago, my raid fellows alerted me to the existence of something unique related to Pokémon. That something unique is called "Pokénatomy", and it takes the form of a book related to Pokémon. The book contains illustrations of the first 151 Pokémon along with - as the key part of this book - depictions of their inner organs. It sounds astoundingly impressive, and it is, to a really good extent. And since I've discovered it as a result of my raid fellows discovering it, it is wise to make a discussion of it in a blog post here.

The book is authored and illustrated by one Christopher Stoll. Remarkably, this book became a Kickstarter project and it was successfully funded in a span of a little more than a month... in 2016, and back then I wasn't paying attention to Kickstarter, let alone have a possible way to back any project on it. Alas, the link on the Kickstarter project page to where one might also be able to obtain a copy of the book points to a dead page, decreasing hope for doing so. It is still sufficiently remarkable that a Pokémon project like this managed to gain enough support as a crowdfunding project on the site and result in a creation that fans and more enjoy.

As for the contents of the book, all the first-generation Pokémon and their innards are depicted in great detail. It could appear as a real-world book of anatomy - or rather, an anatomy book from the realism of the world of Pokémon. To that end, some of my raid fellows have stated that the book creeps them out because of how gory it appears, perhaps in similarity to how some people might say human anatomy books creep them out. It might be that people who are not used to or familiar with anatomy and dissections might find them creepy as such. For me, I still find it very fascinating as with most things related to Pokémon.

There is one more reason why I find the book fascinating: the book itself represents something that I myself would like to make (or at least very similar to that), with a focus on Pokémon but not on the same topic as what was made on this book. And while I might have the core visions of the book and how it should be structured, since Pokémon is partly visual, I'd need help on the art direction since my artistic visions tend toward the abstract. Therefore, I might need to team up or collaborate with someone on this matter. If not with someone like Christopher Stoll, it would have to be someone who understands Pokémon (and my vision) like I do.

Regardless, this project is impressive - I can't say that enough times - even if I discovered it a few years too late and the realism might not suit everyone's tastes. For a Pokémon book, it seems to encapsulate many things that make something like that a keeper for its fans, and it has been proven with the project on Kickstarter becoming funded successfully and resulting in a creation that fans can and do keep. That has to be quite inspirational for myself with my own aspirations and should be too for my raid fellows, who too were captivated.

One year ago: The Ups and Downs of Showdown

Two years ago: A Mew Pouch

Three years ago: How Do I Live, Without You?

Four years ago: Two Pokémon Notebooks