Pokémon fans may have just been proven right about a longstanding suspicion that a character in the mobile game Pokémon GO is non-binary.
Blanche, the leader of Team Mystic (known to more casual players as “the blue team”), was mentioned over the weekend in the ongoing set of blog posts reporting on in-game events. In it, the narrator, Professor Willow, explains:
“We set out in hopes of testing [the Rocket Radar prototype’s] tracking abilities, but the prototype kept malfunctioning, causing us to be led aimlessly to random PokéStops. Blanche became visibly upset, which tends to happen when things don’t go to their carefully curated plans.”
Not only did the official Pokémon narrative use the pronoun “they” when referring to the Team Mystic leader, but it appears to be the only time a pronoun has been assigned to Blanche at all.
Most of the in-game interaction with Blanche and the other Team Leaders revolves around daily training battles the player can engage in. While there is a script assigned to those, pronouns never come up.
However, fans noticed that over the summer, the Pokémon GO Twitter used gendered pronouns for the Team Valor and Team Instinct leaders, but consistently only referred to Blanche by name, even in formats where other leaders were referred to by a pronoun.
While this isn’t explicit confirmation that Blanche is non-binary, if it’s true, it’s wonderfully casual inclusion. And Pokémon fans are pretty excited about the possibility.
No one from Nintendo has weighed in one way or another yet, and very well may not, but we’ll definitely be keeping an eye out for more pronouns!
