The Pokémon Trading Card Game developed into quite a beast over the years. From its humble base set beginnings to it’s more modern Sword and Shield sets, these trading cards remain relevant among competitors and collectors alike. Many fans of the series may opt to hold onto older cards, hoping they’ll be worth more in the future. However, if there is one apparent fact about Pokemon cards both old and new, it’s that some of them can be quite comical.
Throughout the Pokémon Trading Card Game’s many years of existence, some bizarre cards have popped up from time to time. Sometimes these cards are of creatures that are already well known, other times, they’re based on factors outside of the Pokémon franchise. Many of these cards are so wacky for one reason or another, that they had to be banned from competitive play altogether. Let’s take a look at some of the Pokémon Trading Card Game’s funniest, stupidest and weirdest cards.
Shockingly, much of Pokémon’s silliest cards came in it’s earlier years. Some examples of this come in many different promo cards, like promotional Pikachus. One of them was a Surfing Pikachu which depicted the lovable mouse riding some waves, referencing the surfing minigame in Pokémon Yellow. Another was nicknamed Birthday Pikachu despite having a large blank spot before Pikachu’s name on the card, implying the player was supposed to write their own name. Interestingly, Birthday Pikachu had an attack with the potential to do massive amounts of damage if it was the player’s birthday. Needless to say, many kids probably lied about their birthdays to try to get the full effect of the attack and the card was eventually banned in tournaments for this reason. The notion of competitors fibbing about their birthday to utilize Birthday Pikachu’s full ability is admittedly a hilarious thought.
The Funniest Pokémon Cards Ever
Other funny cards include the confidently named Cool Porygon. The card was essentially just a normal Porygon card, and it’s still unclear what exactly sets it apart as “cool”, but its existence is quite comical nonetheless. Many of Pokémon’s strangest trading cards aren’t even from the series at all. Perhaps the weirdest of all are the Imakuni cards. Imakuni was a character in the Pokémon Trading Card Game for the Game Boy. While many may think his inclusion is just a simple easter egg, Imakuni is responsible for creating some of the tracks featured in the Pokémon Anime. Imakuni was a big fan of the card game, and because of this many cards of him were created and distributed in magazines.
Although Imakuni’s cards are a form of parody, they are the funniest Pokémon cards ever released to the public. Due to Imakuni being fairly unknown in America, his cards were initially only distributed in Japan leaving English speaking fans of Imakuni’s quirky cards out of luck. Thankfully, some Imakuni cards were finally reprinted in English with the release of the XY Evolutions set, making fully English Imakuni cards finally a reality.