Dude bro influencer Logan Paul has spent the last few years trying to convince the internet he really loves Pokémon. The YouTuber routinely posts about his Pokémon trading card collection, once even calling the $150,000 purchase of a first-edition Charizard card a “nostalgic childhood dream come true.” This week, the boisterous blonde tried polishing his fandom credentials by posting something that seemed completely innocuous: a defense of Gengar, the mischievous ghost-type monster who debuted in the original Pokémon games.
On Monday, X user @tiaradraws posed a question to the internet: “why is every man’s favorite pokemon gengar?” The post, which was punctuated with a crying laughing emoji, blew up. Gengar fans came out in full force to the tune of 2.5 million clicks. Passionate fans explained that the original Pokémon games only had a single line of ghost-type monsters, of which Gengar is a part. The monster, who can only evolve after trading a Haunter to another player, was also much more difficult to get in the days before online connectivity. And with the Pokémon community’s fervent love for the first generation of games, Gengar has retained its allure over the years. We’re not even getting into Gengar’s great anime appearances, or its fantastic merch!
Thinking he was just going to be one of the lads, Logan Paul recently chimed in with his Theory of Gengar. Paul called Gengar “perfect” and an “essential” monster in any trainer’s repertoire.
“If he’s taken damage? Hypnosis —> Dream Eater will put your opponent to sleep, suck their HP, and replenish yours,” Paul argued. “With the right trainer, he can’t be killed.”
Already, there’s stuff to nitpick. According to Pokémon website Smogon, Paul is right when he says the purple puff benefits from having Hypnosis in its moveset. But if we’re talking about battle strategies in Gen 1, Dream Eater was probably not in the wider moveset. In later generations, Hypnosis wouldn’t be in the conversation at all.
