Pokémon’s most adult fan theory explained and dissected

I love fan theories. If you’re unfamiliar with their magic, basically the internet has helped communities repurpose details of a story that its creator probably included as inconsequential color. Sewn together into a quilt, the speculation appears from a distance kind of logical. For example, one of my favorite fan theories claims the original Pokémon games take place after a massive war and that our hero, a child going on his first adventure, will gradually reunite the two feuding territories.

Of course, the theory collapses like a five-foot house of cards if you fuss with an individual part. People don’t speak about the war; few relics of battle remain; and the most substantial evidence is cliché dialogue from a forgettable soldier-turned-Pokémon trainer. But as PBS Idea Channel’s Mike Rugnetta explains, there’s more to this fan theory — and others like it — than whether or not it’s definitively true or false.