Weirdos with time on their hands lip-synching gleefully to their favorite songs is a tradition on YouTube, the video clip clearinghouse that seems to spawn a viral hit every five seconds. And buried inside this visual Internet landfill, underneath all the attempts at reformatted karaoke, are a series of lip-synch clips devoted to — what else? — the Pokémon theme song.
People love their Pokémons and they've filled up YouTube with clips of themselves mouthing the animé series' creepily triumphant theme song.
I wanna be the very best
Like no one ever was
To catch them is my real test
To train them is my cause!
I will travel across the land
Searching far and wide
Each Pokémon to understand
The power that's inside!
Imagine these stanzas sung by an overzealous guy who sounds a little like Henry Lee Summer, matched to a galloping rhythm and a truly amazing group chorus, and "Pokémon" begins to sound like the theme to Bloodsport mixed with "Self Control" by Laura Branigan.
Anthony Padilla and Ian Hecox of Smosh.com understand this, and that's why their version of the theme is one of the best on YouTube. (www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmp0SUExY-w).
Yes, it's shot in a suburban bedroom, and it's stupid ... at first. Watch it for the moment when one of them swallows a dashboard Jesus. Watch for the edit that turns a boy into a Pokémon, or watch it simply for when the green T-shirted dude flies into the shot on a wheeled office chair. Lip-synched backing vocals haven't been this dramatic since Fab Morvan and Rob Pilatus.
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