Executive (Trainer class)

An Executive (Japanese: ロケットだんかんぶ Team Rocket Executive), known as a Team Rocket Admin (Japanese: ロケットだんかんぶ Team Rocket Executive) in Generations and, and as a Rocket Executive (Japanese: ロケットだんいんのかんぶ Team Rocket executive member) in Generation II, is a type of Pokémon Trainer that first debuted in the Generation II games. They are the highest ranked members of Team Rocket after Giovanni, and are the heads of Team Rocket after he abandons the organization. They tend to use a combination of and.

As of, there are four of them: three men and one woman. They were unnamed in Generation II, but they all got individual names and sprites in Generation IV. Archer disbands Team Rocket after he is defeated.

Generation I
There aren't any distinct Rocket Executives in Generation I; however, both Jessie and James appear in ranked higher than grunts, guarding the room where Giovanni waits in the Rocket Hideout and Silph Co. However, they are unnamed in this game, being referred to simply as "ROCKET", since most Trainers were not given names until Generation II.

Generation II
In Generation II, Executives have the same Trainer class name as s—Rocket (Japanese: ロケットだんいん Team Rocket member)—but have the name Executive (Japanese: かんぶ Executive) and a different sprite.

In, Team Rocket has four male executives and one female executive (who is battled twice). They battle the player at Team Rocket HQ and Goldenrod Radio Tower.

Two Executives, one male and one female, also appear in Pokémon Stadium 2, along with a pair of Rocket Grunts, interrupting the player's progress through the Johto Gym Leader Castle after the player has defeated Jasmine. Because their teams contain the distinctive Pokémon Vileplume and Houndoom, they appear to be inspired by two of the admins from.

Generation III
In, two higher-ranking members of Team Rocket appear in command of the Rocket Warehouse. They seem to be two of the same members who would head the Team in Johto three years later. Here, their Trainer class was changed to Team Rocket (Japanese: ロケットだん Team Rocket) in order to remain identical with the Grunts', whose sprites they also shared. However, they are both given the name Admin (Japanese: かんぶ Executive).

In the Rocket Warehouse, the female Team Rocket Admin is battled before going into the male administrator's room. She objects that Team Rocket is disbanded, but after a battle, admits that it probably is and as a final act, turns off the floor so that the player can go back and heal. After defeating the male Team Rocket Admin, he sees the player's and realizes that the Viridian City-based Team Rocket has disbanded; he then tells the player that he will find Giovanni and revive Team Rocket.

The Team Rocket Admins are the same people as the Rocket executives in Generations and, as hinted by the similarity in their teams and the male administrator's determination to revive Team Rocket after he is defeated, as well as the information given on the computer screen which the Rocket administrator was working on ("The influence of magnetic waves on Pokémon evolution"). This is linked to what happened in Generations II and IV, when Team Rocket used radio waves to evolve the at Lake of Rage.

Generation IV
Their Trainer classes are finally dissociated from those of the Grunts when they make a return in, where they are each known as an Executive. However, the Japanese Trainer classes remain unchanged from Generation III, but they are still given names. They are all adapted from the Executives from but given individual names and identities. Their names, Proton, Petrel, Ariana, and Archer, refer to real-life rockets or missiles in all languages, much like Team Galactic's s, who were named after.

changed the number of Executives slightly: a Grunt in Slowpoke Well was amalgamated with an Executive in the Radio Tower to become Proton, and the Executive in Giovanni’s office in the Team Rocket HQ was merged with the Executive disguised as the Radio Director to become Petrel.

In the anime
It is unknown whether or not there are executives present in the, as is still in control of the organization. Instead, the anime tends to focus much more on high-ranking Team Rocket field agents such as Domino and the Iron-Masked Marauder. and Oakley were also inclusive to the ranks of Team Rocket, working as hired spies hunting and, but this was only in the English dub.

In the Pocket Monsters HGSS Jō's Big Adventure manga
The four Generation IV Executives appear in the Pocket Monsters HGSS Jō's Big Adventure manga, fulfilling similar roles as in the games.

In the Pokémon Adventures manga
In the, Lt. Surge, Koga, and Sabrina are Team Rocket executives. Blaine, previously an executive, left the organization because of problems with. In the, the executives were recalled by after he saw a battle between Lance and  and realized he still had much to learn.

In the, executives are replaced by two sub-leaders, Sham and Carl, while the real Leader is the Masked Man. The characters of male and female Executive from Generation II were adapted as Carl and Sham, respectively.

Years later, in the, Archer, Ariana, Petrel, and Proton, who collectively call themselves the Four Generals, appear in Johto searching for and its Plates to accomplish their plan of making Giovanni return to Team Rocket's leadership.

In the Pokémon Gold & Silver: The Golden Boys manga
Grey from the Pokémon Gold & Silver: The Golden Boys manga is based on the male Executive design. His role within the team is based on Archer's.

In the TCG
This listing is of cards mentioning or featuring Team Rocket Executives in the Pokémon Trading Card Game.

Trivia

 * Though Rocket Executives are members of Team Rocket, like s and s, the background theme played when fighting them is the normal Trainer battle theme in . This was rectified in, where all members of Team Rocket-related Trainer classes play the Rocket battle theme.
 * In merging multiple Executives together, introduced a plot hole: Petrel is present in both the Goldenrod Radio Tower and the Team Rocket HQ at the same time. When the player first visits Goldenrod City, a guard comments on the Director's changed nature:
 * "Sorry. Authorized personnel only beyond this point. It wasn’t that way before. There’s something wrong with the Director…"

In other languages
Team Rocket Vorstand Commandant (Team Rocket) Generale Rocket ロケットだんかんぶ 火箭队干部