Pokémon Theme Music Video
This article or section needs expansion. |
| Video | |
|---|---|
| Title: | Pokémon Theme Music Video |
| Creator: | Smosh (Anthony Padilla and Ian Hecox) |
| Date(s): | 28 November 2005 |
| Medium: | Video |
| Length: | 3:15 |
| Genre: | Comedy/Parody |
| Fandom: | Pokémon |
| External Links: | YouTube (reupload) |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Pokémon Theme Music Video is a viral video created by Smosh, then just the two friends Anthony Padilla and Ian Hecox. The video featured the pair lipsyncing to the English Pokémon theme song. Created in November 2005, the video was uploaded to YouTube and became one of the very first viral videos on the site, if not the internet as a whole, and was among the most viewed videos on YouTube until it was removed for copyright infringement sometime in June 2007.[1]
In 2010, Smosh recreated the video with lyrics parodying the situation and a cameo from Ryan Higa, another YouTuber who became popular around the same time for comedy skits.[2]
History
Anthony and Ian first uploaded videos of themselves lipsyncing to the Power Rangers and Mortal Kombat theme songs on Anthony's website, smosh.com, for their friend group. Someone then took the Mortal Kombat video and uploaded it to the then newly created video sharing website YouTube, which Anthony found during a video search.
I actually did a search for our video and we found our Mortal Kombat video was uploaded to YouTube by someone. And it had, like, 10 view and like 2 comments so we were like "geez this is really popular" so we decided to start uploading our stuff there too.[3]
Pokémon Theme Music Video was therefore the first content created specifically for the Smosh YouTube channel, rather than being previously uploaded to smosh.com and ported over. The original video is representative of popular content on YouTube in the early days of the platform: raw, relatively unscripted, and made by regular people without skills or budget. It features a very random, eclectic mixtures of scenes that have very little to do with Pokémon itself or even the song that's being lipsynced, aside from the occasional feature of a Pikachu plush. This style of humor and video was very popular at the time, with other popular examples in the genre being i want candy.. DEAD and Keenan Cahill, who became popular enough to collab with 50 Cent[4] and other musicians. This type of humor resulted in the offshoot communities of parody musicians, such as Dave Days, and comedy skit YouTubers, which Smosh eventually became.
At the time Pokémon Theme Music Video was posted, however, Smosh primarily produced lipsync content with a "haha so random" humor style. The oldest of these videos still up on their channel are the videos of them lipsyncing to the English Power Rangers[5] and Mortal Kombat themes,[6] which were uploaded on the same day, likely because they were uploading their backlog.
In March 2006, the video briefly became the most watched video on YouTube, keeping the spot for almost two months before being overtaken by Evolution of Dance.[1] It remained very popular on the site until it was deleted for copyright infringement, however, with the last available viewcount being over 24.5 million views[7] and has been cited as Smosh as the moment they knew their channel was something more than messing around with friends:
When we released our Pokémon Theme Music Video like two months later, we we sitting on YouTube and back then they refreshed the views like every second. It wasn't, like, every ten hours like it is now. So we'd sit there refreshing and there'd be like five more views every time we refreshed and we were like "oh my god this is huge."[3]
Parody Remake
On the fifth anniversary of the video's upload, Smosh uploaded a parody of the Pokémon theme with lyrics critical of the situation.[2] The video featured a backing track by popular YouTube musician Kurt Hugo Schneider and a cameo by Ryan Higa, a YouTuber who became popular around the same time as Smosh for similar skit-style parody and was dedicated to everyone who watched the original video. This new video featured many references to the old video, including a moment where Ian summons "Anthonymon" like he did in the original video and another where a Jesus figurine appears. The main plotline, however, features the legal team of Game Freak sending ninjas led by Ryan to take down Anthony and Ian.
Fan Comments
I don't know what is worst- Anthony is gone - SMOSH is just a brand now - The quality of this video is still better than the new ones
- The copyright laws are more stupid than they were when this video was posted[8]
I saw the Pokemon Theme Parody by Smosh less than a year it was posted when do I get veterans pay?[9]
oh to go back in time and view pokemon theme song lip sync by smosh for the first time...[10]
References
- ^ a b List of most-viewed YouTube videos. Accessed 7 Feb 2023.
- ^ a b Pokemon Theme Song REVENGE!. Posted 26 Nov 2010. Accessed 7 Feb 2023.
- ^ a b Smosh Exclusive Interview: The Partners Project Episode 13. Posted 10 Mar 2011. Accessed 7 Feb 2023.
- ^ Down On Me (Keenan Cahill and 50 Cent). Posted 8 Nov 2010. Accessed 7 Feb 2023.
- ^ Power Rangers Theme. Posted 19 Nov 2005. Accessed 7 Feb 2023.
- ^ Mortal Kombat Theme. Posted 19 Nov 2005. Accessed 7 Feb 2023.
- ^ Archived YouTube Page. Archived 10 Jun 2007. Accessed 7 Feb 2023.
- ^ YouTube Comment. Posted 2022. Accessed 7 Feb 2023.
- ^ Tweet. Posted 3 Feb 2023. Accessed 7 Feb 2023.
- ^ Tumblr Post. Posted 15 Nov 2020. Accessed 7 Feb 2023.