Pokémon Sword and Shield UK Parodies

About

Pokémon Sword and Shield UK Parodies refers to jokes about how the Galar region of Pokémon Sword and Shield appears to be based off of the United Kingdom. This led to parodies in which people made jokes pairing Pokémon tropes with English dialect and comparisons to the the political climate in England in 2019.

Origin

On February 27th, 2019, Nintendo streamed a Nintendo Direct focused entirely on the announcement of Pokémon Sword and Shield (shown below).

Twitter users were quick to comment on how the game's new region, the Galar region, seemed to be based off of the UK. User @androssety pointed out that the Galar region looked like the UK if it was flipped upside down, gaining over 90 retweets (shown below, left). User @AStartShow^[1] pointed to a figure mowed in grass from the trailer, saying it bore resemblance to the Cerne Abbas Giant in Dorset, UK (shown below, right).

Spread

Twitter users made jokes about Pokémon being set in England. Many of these jokes imagined the dialogue in the Pokémon universe playing out with UK accents. User @puritikuma tweeted Pokémon-related dialogue with a Scottish accent, gaining over 8,700 retweets (shown below, left). User @PunishedHag did the same with cockney slang, gaining over 14,000 retweets (shown below, right). User @Elsielovelock performed a video of herself reading the tweets, which gained over 17,000 retweets (shown below, bottom).

Other users joked about the political climate in the UK as it related to Pokémon. Twitter user @TBSkyen joked that the villains of the game would be pro-Brexit, gaining over 30 retweets and 70 likes (shown below, left). User @JacobKleinman joked that the new games could be called "Leave / Remain," referencing the Brexit debate (shown below, right).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References