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Pikachu

I kind of picture it as being sort of hamster-like, but with long ears and the flexibility/ dexterity of a squirrel or chipmunk. I have no idea how the tail would be zig-zagged like that.
 
Its tail resembles a lightning bolt, which presumably would help when discharging electrical attacks. Remember how it used its tail to ground itself during a battle?

It doesn't resemble a mouse much; Marill looks more mouse-like. I'd say it's a cross between a rabbit and some sort of rodent.
 
I don't think it's a mouse any more than Sandshrew is. :p

Hmm.... Some people (including myself) think that it is similar in body shape to a creature who name happens to be... the pika. It's a lagomorph (along with rabbits and hares). Both Pikachu and the pika have short stout bodies and comparatively short muzzles. The ears don't match, but then again, mouse ears don't either.

The only Pikachu I've seen that I'd really think of as Pikachu are those Jonas Stenius' (if its head were taller) and hibbary's.
 
Yeah, that is really good. Not too sure about the Raichu, though. It looks a little too much like a cat.
 
What are their feeding habits?
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Do we know what Pikachu eat? I'd say wild Pikachu are omnivorous and eat berries, leaves, insects and all sorts of stuff. That seems to be the diet of small rodents anyway.

A relevant discussion here would be Pikachu and its electrical attacks. How is the electricity produced? Where does it come from?
 
It has something to do with the red circular pads on its cheeks. Maybe these are organs that generate electricity somehow. Remember in the early Kanto eps, when Ash was getting ready to battle Brock, and he hooked Pikachu up to a machine to increase Pika's power? The electrodes were placed on Pikachu's cheek pads. But, as with most Pokémon powers, I'd chalk it up to magic and the supernatural more than anything else.
 
Perhaps the cheeks collect static electricity present in the air.
 
That is a possibility. Perhaps the Electric Types have managed to adjust the electromagnetic field of their planet in order to survive and to harness its power.
 
Electrocytes or electroplaques are cells used by electric eels and other electric fish for electrogenesis and electroreception. They are flat disk-like cells that are stacked in a sequence in a manner similar to a battery. Electric eels have several thousand of these cells stacked, each producing 0.15V. Postsynaptically, electrocytes work much like muscle cells and, because of their resemblance to nerve-muscle junctions, are used in research. To discharge the electrocytes at the correct time, the electric eel uses its pacemaker nucleus, a nucleus of pacemaker neurons. When an electric eel spots its prey, the pacemaker neurons fires and acetylcholine is subsequently released from electromotor neurons to the electrocytes, resulting in an electric organ discharge
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This is from wikipedia.
I don't think that this could account for Pikachu's electrical powers. I mean, you'd have to have a huge amount of these cells and even then, I'm not sure you can send bolts of lightning out.
 
Pikachu is just a Pikachu XD
For Pokémon drawn that simple, it's pretty hard to understand. Pokédex isn't helping either: think Grovyle, it's listed as a "Wood Gecko" but it looks more like a generic feathered dinosaur... So, even if its classified as "mouse", it could be anything.
There are billions of small mammal species that could look like Pikachu, for a detail or another. In my personal interpretation, I didn't think of any animal in particular, I just tried to make it the most realistic I could, with a tail different from any animal tail I've ever seen: Pikachu
This one was a quick sketch and I really didn't put much attention in precise anatomy, but it gives the idea. As for the red cheecks, they're furless areas with some particular, harder skin. Don't ask, I just always think at them in that way o.o
 
Great job, Irene. It does looks like a pretty realistic pikachu (although maybe a bit large and strong-built).
 
A point that is probably most relevant here is the sounds of Pokémon. Surely they don't all ound exactly the same? Pikachu is the only Pokémon in the animé I know of that has that distinction, since Sparky clearly sounds different to Ash's Pikachu.
 
Is it possible that as Pokémon grow and increase level-wise, their voices change somewhat? Guys in particular should know what I'm talking about. Think of how different Bulbasaur sounds from Venusaur.
 
FabuVinny said:
A point that is probably most relevant here is the sounds of Pokémon. Surely they don't all ound exactly the same? Pikachu is the only Pokémon in the animé I know of that has that distinction, since Sparky clearly sounds different to Ash's Pikachu.
Click to expand...

There are also other Pokémon that sound different, but in the Japanese version of the anime. For example: Meowth and Meowth in Boots, Ash's Bulbasaur and May's Bulbasaur have different voices, not to mention Mew from the first movie and the Mew from movie 8th.

Also, remember that since the anime can't have like 386+ voice actors making noises for every single pokémon you see, it's more likely to have only one person in charge of a pokémon's voice. So I think every pokémon has their own distinctive voice even amongst the ones of their own species.
 
Exactly, in the Japanese version, they usually try to give each one a different voice... even if the voice actor is the same. For example, the Blaziken from the series and the one from the Deoxys movie... and all the other ones Kasumi-san quoted. I'm pretty sure the various Crawdaunts of Team Aqua had different voices... though I'm 100% sure that when Bannai/Brody made his Ditto transform into one, it had a different voice from Team Aqua's. I should check.

I'm sure in reality each Pokémon would have its own voice, just like our animals: I've seen a lot of cats and dogs in my life, and they ALL have a different voice tone from each other.

... by the way, isn't this becoming a bit off-topic? We were talking about Pikachu... XD
 
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