Pokemon’s 20th Anniversary coming up!

On February 27th, Pokemon will be celebrating their 20th anniversary with a release of a new 3DS bundle, as well as a re-release of Red, Blue, and Yellow for 3DS, making popular amiibos (Charizard, Jigglypuff, Greninja, Lucario and Pikachu) available at select retailers, special trading card expansions, digitally remastered Pokemon movies, and a bunch of other stuff we might not have learned about yet.

There will also be several distribution events for Pokemon X/Y and Pokemon Omega Ruby/Sapphire at Gamestop this year; Pokemon include Mew, Celebi, and Genesect!

They also have this amazing Super Bowl ad that they released.

To the kids telling themselves affirmations to the pyrotechnics and crowds cheering, this ad is making me tear up and get excited about the biggest franchise that ruled my childhood next to Legos and Hello Kitty.

I Will What I Want – Under Armor

I’m loving those new Under Armour ads. They’re a perfect follow up in the theme set by the Always #LikeaGirl Superbowl ads; crazy excellent women doing crazy excellent at the things they do. Misty Copeland, especially struck me as a a great model for this particular set of ads because I have experience with the dance and performance industry, and the voice-over used in her video really struck a chord. Under Armour especially does a great job expressing an emboldening message, while making their products look fantastic.

Any profession where the body is used as an outward vessel for expression incites criticism of the vessel. Calls for an idealization of the vessel that makes it so that expression through it is exclusive. Modeling is the same way, though Giselle Bundchen’s ad focuses on a slightly different issue. There’s this odd tendency in all visual arts, from videography to photography to writing to watercolor to etching to dance, that dehumanizes the subject, and concentrates them down to that moment. At best, art gives a summary. We can’t forget that there’re always more to the story.