Religion

Pokémon has been criticized by members of both the Christian and Jewish religions.

After the US release of Pokémon Yellow, a sudden widespread criticism of it passed through Christian congregations primarily by word-of-mouth. Some Christian groups in the United States believe Pokémon to be Satanic in origin. Claimed parallels between Pokémon and Satanism include the capturing and invoking of Pokémon to perform tasks, similar to demons; the concept of Pokémon "evolution," which denies some forms of biblical interpretation; and certain abilities of Pokémon, such as psychic or elemental powers, not stated to derive from God.^[16]

In 2001, Saudi Arabia banned Pokémon games and cards, alleging that the franchise promoted Zionism.^[17]

Health

Main article: Banned episodes of Pokémon

One frame of the scene that caused the seizures.

On December 16, 1997, more than 635 Japanese children were admitted to hospitals with convulsive epileptic seizures. It was determined that the seizures were caused by watching an episode of Pokémon, "Dennō Senshi Porygon," (most commonly translated "Electric Soldier Porygon", season 1, episode 38); as a result, this episode has not been aired since. In this particular episode, there were bright explosions with rapidly-alternating blue and red color patterns.^[18] It was determined in subsequent research that these strobing light effects cause some individuals to have epileptic seizures, even if the person had no previous history of epilepsy. As a consequence, many publishers (including Nintendo) added warning labels to their video game products (or made pre-existing labels more prominent), warning that exposure to video games may trigger seizures in individuals vulnerable to photosensitive epilepsy.

This incident is the most common focus of Pokémon-related parodies in other media, and was lampooned by The Simpsons episode "Thirty Minutes over Tokyo"^[19] and the South Park episode "Chinpokomon," among others.