Dondozo

About

Dondozo is a Water-Type Pokémon introduced in Pokémon Scarlet and Violet. The Pokémon resembles a large blue catfish and has a unique ability that, when paired with the Pokémon Tatsugiri in Double Battles, will raise all of its stats. For this reason and its generally bulky build, Dondozo grew infamous among competitive Pokémon players, leading to memes about its prevalence in competitive teams.

Origin

Dondozo debuted in Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, released November 18th, 2022,^[1] but its design was leaked about 10 days prior along with the rest of the Paldean Pokédex. The Pokémon uniquely interacts with the Pokémon Tatsugiri when the duo appears together in Double Battles. Tatsugiri canonically hops in Dondozo's mouth and with its Commander ability, raises all of Dondozo's stats by two stages. When Dondozo uses its move "Order Up," one of its stats will be raised additionally depending on the type of Tatsugiri it is interacting with. The pair serve as one of the Titan Pokémon in the games' plots.

Spread

Dondozo became the subject of discussion and memes after the game's release in mid-November 2022, but unlike other popular new Pokémon like Tinkaton and Clodsire, this was largely due to its prevalence in competitive play, where it proved to be a headache thanks to its tanky build and its synergy with Tatsugiri.^[2] Additionally, some players would teach the Pokémon the move Fissure, a one-hit KO move that has low accuracy, leading to situations where opponents would be stuck attempting to drain Dondozo's high health bar while Dondozo spammed Fissure (clip from @ninopokebros shown below).

When you hit the Fissure on the opposing Dondozo #PokemonScarletandviolet pic.twitter.com/slh5XOKhMb

— 🔴 LIVE! PokeBros (@ninopokebros) December 23, 2022

As a result of the headaches the Pokémon caused in competitive play, many players made memes about frustrations caused by Dondozo. For example, on December 20th, 2022, Twitter user @HannaVGC^[3] posted a How Many Times Do We Have to Teach You This Lesson meme about Dondozo and Tatsugiri, gaining over 29 retweets and 600 likes in one week (shown below, top). On December 26th, Twitter user @goldenyuusha then compared the Dondozo/Tatsugiri combo to Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O'Neal, gaining over 40 retweets and 200 likes in three days (shown below, bottom).

dondozo and tatsugiri in doubles pic.twitter.com/bVaF8DMFNr

— sisley🦦 (@goldenyuusha) December 26, 2022

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References