“Pika Pika?”

We join Dialga, the pokemon of time, as it takes a drink at a seemingly peaceful lake. Suddenly, a sub-space rift opens ups in the lake and the pokemon Giratina appears and drags Dialga down into the Reverse World. Dialga wasn’t the only thing that Giratina brought to the Reverse World; holding on for dear life is a little Shaymin on Dialga’s back. As Giratina’s and Dialga’s epic battle rages, Shaymin falls into a cloud of toxic gas. Instead of dying like most things would, Shaymin absorbs the toxic cloud and converts it into pure energy. This enormous burst of energy causes another sub-space rift that leads back to our world. Dialga quickly flees from Giratina, but not before creating a space-time anomaly around Giratina which prevents it from leaving the Reverse World. Luckily for Shaymin, he is sucked up into the portal. All the while, someone with dire purposes was watching, and waiting, for the time to strike.

Highlights
This Shaymin is one of the most selfish pokemon you will ever meet. It is rude, self centered, and a narcissist. Since Shaymin can speak telepathically, there is nothing about it that is very appealing, except the “cute” factor. Once a year all the Shaymin gather at the Glacidea Flower Garden for a yearly migration. When a Shaymin comes in contact with a Glacidea flower, they change into sky form. A Shaymin in sky form has some physical advantages to its normal form, most important is the fact that Shaymin can fly. When our Shaymin meets Ash and the gang, it automatically takes a disliking to Ash, loves Dawn, but prefers to sit on Ash’s head. Luckily for Ash, his head is full of air, otherwise he would be top heavy.    

Overall
This was a fine movie, just not as strong as the others. The story alone is pretty straightforward and isn’t the most interesting, but it’s still entertaining and part of the first Pokemon movie trilogy. The manga is in color, which is nice. Each character gets its own color speech bubble and that is helpful, especially when the character speaking isn’t in the picture.  There is also a Pokedex for the pokemon in the movie that don’t appear regularly in the T.V. show. Overall, turing one of the weaker pokemon movies into a manga just made it weaker because it’s just less enjoyable. Drier, in a sense. For being a hardcore pokemon fan, it was just a let down, but if you did enjoy the movie, you would like this.

ComicsOnline gives Ani-Manga Pokemon: Giratina and the Shy Warrior! 3.5 out of 5 Lighting attacks