The Pokemon franchise has created hundreds of adorable, creepy, and downright bizarre pocket monsters for gamers to collect over the last 26 years. One of the most well-known Pokemon in history is Magikarp, but this little orange fish isn't always popular for the best reasons. A group of Pokemon fans recently took a look at all of Magikarp's PokeDex entries so far and began discussing why the games are so mean to Magikarp.
Magikarp is also known as the Fish Pokemon and is notorious for being a weak and often downright useless creature. Not only is its move set incredibly limited, but its stats are also quite low. In most of the games Magikarp appears in, its PokeDex entry is quick to point out the creature's perceived failings.
Redditor theleeman14 shared most of these cutting PokéDex entries and kicked off the discussion by asking other fans if they had insight on why the Pokemon games are so mean to Magikarp. It seems that the main reasoning of many other players is that the Magikarp PokeDex entries belittle it to highlight the strength and ferocity of Magikarp's equally famous evolution Gyarados. Gyarados takes the form of a titanic blue sea serpent and associated lore implies that the beast will often take revenge on those who hurt it as a Magikarp. Through this lens, it makes a degree of narrative sense that the PokeDex would contrast Magikarp's apparent uselessness with Gyarados' frenzied might.
The Pokedex is so unnecessarily brutal to Magikarp in most of its entries (all examples in description) from pokemon
Several other users compared Magikarp to the protagonists of iconic revenge stories like Stephen King's Carrie, with one user stating that Gyarados should be a Psychic-type Pokemon. A second user shared a short parody of the song "Pumped Up Kicks" rewritten to be about a newly-evolved Gyarados wreaking havoc. A third user started a new branch of the discussion by mentioning that Magikarp seems to be inspired by a legend about a fish that jumps a waterfall, turning into a dragon. They expand on this statement with the theory that, since the PokeDex entries say that most Magikarp are weak and can't swim well, it's possible this is an explanation for why Gyarados are rare in the wild.
One of the responses notes that other, more forgiving PokeDex entries state that especially long-lived Magikarp can jump over entire mountains using the Pokemon move Splash. In that case, perhaps Magikarp's evolution is just a matter of surviving long enough in spite of its numerous predators. According to another user, Magikarp needs to be sufficiently angry as well as strong to evolve, which may explain why the PokeDex is so cruel to Magikarp - life itself needs to be cruel to these innocent fish in order for them to become the titanic, rage-filled serpents famous across the Pokemon franchise.