#litwick line

litwick is a little emo candle who does...something a bit questionable to the humans. hell it can even outright kill them but it feels like they're not doing this out of hatred, but rather survival instinct. it's a fantasy creature, let alone one that specializes in spectral abilities, it can get nutrition from souls as a treat. it has a little ghostly flame up and it needs fuel for it as fire-types go. even if it's unacceptable for living beings.

lampent is such an interesting specimen to me. designwise it foreshadows chandelure's features (glass head with a flame in it, black body with long arms and no legs) while also keeping litwick's cute and young vibes especially both having the same eyes, a bit more like a teenager than a child litwick is. it even reveals its other eye now.

but it seems to have some distinctive features no other stage has. the disc on body aside (it's giving skirt to me) it has a big ole lampshade. since pokemon tends to do clothing on their creatures sometimes i always saw that lampshade as a hat. but it is quite large for its body huh? it covers the body a lot when looked from certain angles. but there's one very important thing that it covers, the flame. the distinct blue-purple flame this line has compared to most fire types. (they added more purple-fired pokemon since but they're the first ghost-fire line so it was distinct at the time)

it can be seen as it trying to protect its fire which seems to be very important to them since there's a lot of focus on their ghostly fire. but when you read lampent's pokedex entries it...does not lure people in and steal their souls anymore like litwick does, it now takes its time to wait for people and pokemon to die first. this and the big lampshade combined gives me the vibes of lampent being embarrased of one thing that keeps them sustained. it probably thinks "maybe if i go for someone that will die soon, i won't be shunned as much right?"

but then it evolves and the fire in its head is free and out, bigger than ever. hell it even gets some in its arms now to fit the chandelier theme. chandelure is all out on its ghostly vibe, a lot of spikes and swirls (which is used in halloween motifs a lot) with a nice and spooky head who almost looks like a skull or a stitched mouth. and the way it acts is...actually way closer to litwick! it returned to its habits of luring (heh) and stealing the spirits of living things instead of searching for who will die soon. by the way it gets a lot stronger and the flames are as obvious as ever it's giving me the vibes that it's no longer embarrased about what it does now. and it can kick off a 145 special attack stab fire blast or shadow ball if anyone dares to fight for it.

the entire line has this "kid likes something a lot but people think its cringe, teen tries to cover themselves up by being acceptable by society but adult doesn't care anymore and returns to their passion" vibe to me and along with the emo/goth/alt vibe this line has, i feel like i'm not too far off it. replace the stealing souls bit with something less morbid like...art or having a different taste in fashion. it makes a lot of sense right? i might be overanalyzing some light fixture ghosts but pokemon tends to put a lot of detail in their designs where people don't notice a lot of the time