Pokémon in Brazil

The Pokémon franchise arrived in ' on May 10, 1999, with the broadcast of Pokémon, Eu Escolho Você!'' during a morning TV program called ' in. Currently, Pokémon games are officially distributed in English by NC Games, the Pokémon anime is broadcast on, Pokémon Adventures is published by Panini Comics, and the Pokémon Trading Card Game is released by.

Pokémon video games
All Pokémon games have been available to Brazilian customers in English. However, from January 2015 to May 2017, Nintendo's officially licensed distributors in the Brazilian market due to the ongoing significantly high taxation tariffs on imported electronic goods, especially as direct competition recently decided to open manufacturing plants within the country to lift some of these tariffs. In May 2017, NC Games became the new licensed distributor of Nintendo products.

The Pokémon Trading Card Game Online and Pokémon GO are the only games to be localized into Brazilian Portuguese.

Distribution events
There have been official events for Pokémon distribution in some Brazilian cities for Jirachi in 2010, Celebi in 2011, Keldeo in 2012, Meloetta and the shiny creation trio in 2013 and a shiny Gengar and Diancie in 2014. As of January 2015, future events are now up in the air since Pokémon games are to be available in the Brazilian market in limited quantities as Nintendo lost its mainstream distributor in Brazil.

Pokémon anime
Pokémon started airing on on May 10, 1999. It aired daily in the morning. A few months later, it also began to air on. Both channels noticed the great success that they had in their hands, and after several reruns of the first season, the second season began to air on both channels, first on RecordTV, and then on Cartoon Network starting the week after.

The second season had also high ratings, but was not as successful as the first. This was due to the broadcast of the  series on a rival channel of RecordTV,, in the same time slot. Eventually, RecordTV acquired seasons three and four as well. Around this time, in 2002, the success of Pokémon on RecordTV led another network,, to buy the rights to the first three movies in partnership with , making the films a well-known part of SBT's film rotation.

Since RecordTV had aired its episodes in a short period of time, it started to rerun episodes frequently, a fact which lowered its overall audience ratings. Because of this, Rede Globo purchased the rights to season five in 2003. Pokémon was so successful in the mornings on Rede Globo that it also acquired the sixth and seventh seasons. When they too ran out of new episodes, Rede Globo reran them a few times and eventually took the show out of its morning schedule.

In 2008, needed a temporary cartoon to fill a space which would be taken by a new show, and acquired the first season to do so. However, Pokémon was so successful that RedeTV! acquired other seasons to air at night on the channel at 6pm. In 2009, RedeTV! was the first to air season eleven, even before Cartoon Network, which usually is the first to air new episodes.

Starting on January 1, 2010, previous seasons of the anime debuted on, a sister network of Cartoon Network. The channel aired the first 17 seasons in sequence, and then started airing reruns of Aventuras em Unova e Mais Além and XY. Some movies have also aired on this channel.

Seasons 12-18 premiered on Cartoon Network. On May 12, 2016, the nineteenth season premiered on Pokémon TV. The first 28 episodes debuted on the service, but the last 20 debuted on Cartoon Network.

Pokémon Generations premiered on February 10, 2017 on The Pokémon Company International's Portuguese YouTube channel in Brazilian Portuguese. The final episode of the series was made available on June 20, 2017.

On June 5, 2017, the twentieth season premiered on Cartoon Network, airing in blocks of four or eight episodes every one or two months until the end of the season with a special marathon on Pokémon Day 2018.

On January 26, 2018, the sixth season of the anime was made available on Amazon Prime Video, being the first Pokémon season available on the service.

Originally planned for January 2018, RedeTV! started re-airing the first season of the anime on March 19, 2018, during the program "". This marks the first time the anime is aired on the channel since 2012. It currently airs from Monday to Friday at the same time as it aired in previous years, at 6 p.m. BRT, with two episodes per day, and also another episode at 9 a.m. BRT. They also aired the first two movies.

The twenty-first season premiered on Cartoon Network on June 4, 2018, following the same schedule as previous seasons.

To celebrate the release of Pokémon: Let's Go, Pikachu! and Let's Go, Eevee!, Cartoon Network held a seven-episode marathon on November 18, 2018, most of them featuring Pikachu or Eevee. The following episodes were aired: The Cave of Mirrors!, Lights! Camera! Pika!, Party Dancecapades!, The Young Flame Strikes Back!, Dewpider Ascending!, Master Class Is in Session!, and Turning Heads and Training Hard!.

Dubbing
The Brazilian dub of Pokémon is based on the English dubs by 4Kids Entertainment and The Pokémon Company International.

When Pokémon arrived in Brazil, the Latin American distributor of Pokémon (Televix, that works with Swen in Brasil) led it to be dubbed by Master Sound Studios in. After the anime was shown to be successful in Brazil and around the world, the distributors brought the second season, this time dubbed by BKS. BKS changed the voices of the Narrator and. In addition, many voice actors in the series refused to dub at BKS and it took a lot of work to convince the original cast to come back.

The following year, Swen and Televix decided to change the dubbing studio again, especially after the controversy caused by BKS's dubbing of . The new studio that dubbed the third season of Pokémon was Parisi Video, also from São Paulo. Parisi Video went on to dub the fourth, fifth, and sixth seasons as well. Parisi brought the entire cast of the series back, but the company went bankrupt and was left unable to pay its employees. Thus, yet another dubbing studio had to be found.

Centauro took over the anime from the seventh season onward. Although they brought the main voice cast back, they changed the voices of almost all the supporting cast and extras. The dub was very well-received and they won the Prêmio Yamato in 2006 for Best Redub or Sequel. Centauro also dubbed the spin-off series Pokémon Chronicles, which had few translation errors, but changed the voices of all the supporting characters again.

Centauro has also dubbed the eighth season and onwards. While the eighth season had many translation errors and another cast change, the ninth season restored many older voice actors and made many improvements to the translation quality. Centauro was also the first studio to dub both the movies and the anime, starting with Lucario and the Mystery of Mew.

In 2015, several episodes from the anime had to be redubbed by Centauro, at the request of The Pokémon Company International, due to bad audio quality. These redubs have maintained most of the original cast intact and also didn't use the official translation glossary, with moves having the same name they had at the time, except. These episodes include: Bulbasaur and the Hidden Village, The Bridge Bike Gang, Moving Pictures, Bulbasaur... the Ambassador!, and A Double Dilemma. The fourth movie was also redubbed in 2015, but, unlike the episodes, both its opening and ending themes were played in English, instead of in Brazilian Portuguese.

Starting with Pokémon, a Série: XYZ and Volcanion and the Mechanical Marvel, Pokémon has been dubbed in Rio de Janeiro at MG Studios. The original actors from São Paulo were completely replaced, including those that have been dubbing the anime since the first season. Pokémon is MG's first non-live action production. Part of the reason why the dubbing changed cities is because Fábio Lucindo, Ash's voice actor, moved to Portugal in 2015, and DuArt Media Services took over the Latin American dubbing production from SDI Media Poland. In January, Lucindo said that he and all the original actors would dub the movie at Centauro, likely due to the fact that Hoopa and the Clash of Ages is part of Kalos Quest.

The miniseries Pokémon Generations was also dubbed in Rio by MG Studios.

Music
All of the Brazilian dub opening themes are translated versions of the North American ones. The first was sung by Jana Bianchi and became a great success at the time of the "Pokémon boom".

Pokémon 2.B.A. Master was released in Brazil in two versions: the English-language 2.B.A. Master, and a Portuguese-language translation entitled . A Portuguese-language translation of Totally Pokémon was also released, entitled Totalmente Pokémon.

The ' and ' soundtracks were released in Brazil as well. The soundtracks were identical to the English releases, but with the corresponding Portuguese-language movie opening theme added as a bonus track. The third movie soundtrack was also released in Brazil, featuring the Portuguese-language songs from Totalmente Pokémon in place of the English ones, as well as the Portuguese opening theme for the film.

The score to the second movie was sold in Brazil as well.

Cast and crew
The Brazilian dub of Pokémon, despite changing dubbing studios several times, has maintained a fairly consistent voice cast, at least for the main characters. Some of the voice actors who have worked on the Brazilian dub of Pokémon include Fábio Lucindo, who provides the voice of Ash Ketchum, Márcia Regina, who provides the voice of (and later Professor Juniper and directed the dub starting in BW), and Alfredo Rollo, who provides the voice of.

is voiced by Tatiane Keplmair, who also voiced Sakura in her Johto appearances, Fennel, and later Skyla. May's brother, Max, is voiced by Tatiane's real-life brother, Thiago Keplmair (who would later return as Glenn and Kendrick). Another of Ash's traveling companions,, is voiced by Fernanda Bulara, who also voiced Sabrina and Whitney. Both of their mothers, Caroline and Johanna, are voiced by Denise Reis.

As of the, Lucindo, who continues to voice Ash, took the direction of the dub. is voiced by Alex Minei, who previously voiced the Pokédex in Pokémon: Master Quest, Ben, Buck, and Roland. is voiced by Agatha Paulita, while Trip is voiced by Felipe Zilse (who had previously voiced Volkner).

In the, is voiced by Michelle Giudice, who previously voiced the Kanto Fair Host,  is voiced by Bruno Mello, who also voiced Sean and , and 's voice actor is Jussara Marques, who previously voiced Audrey, Kathryn, and Shannon.

Jessie is voiced by Isabel Cristina de Sá. James is voiced by Márcio Araújo, and has been voiced by Armando Tiraboschi (regular voice actor) and Marcelo Pissardini (Orange Islands season only).

Gary Oak was voiced by Rodrigo Andreatto during the entire original series. Starting from Pokémon Chronicles, he has had several different voice actors, such as Marcelo Campos (SS015), Gabriel Noya (AG192), and Raphael Ferreira (DP045). Gary's grandfather,, was voiced by Wellington Lima until AG040. Starting from AG041, he has been voiced by Dráusio de Oliveira, who also provided his voice for Pokémon Chronicles. Another one of Ash's rivals, Paul, is voiced by Gabriel Noya.

Nurse Joy is voiced by Fátima Noya, Gabriel Noya's mother. Officer Jenny was voiced for the entire original series and part of the by Raquel Marinho. Gilmara Sanches took over the role starting from the eighth season and stayed until the, when Marinho returned for the role. Gilmara also provided voices for in Pokémon Chronicles, Solidad, Marian, and many minor appearances since season eight, as well as some Pokémon such as  and  when their voices couln't be retained. She was also the dubbing director for the series from season seven to BW.

Tracey Sketchit is originally voiced by Rogério Vieira, however, Vagner Fagundes took this role since the, and also in Pokémon Chronicles. Letícia Quinto has voiced characters such as J,, Erika and Duplica (in her second appearance). Fábio Moura provides the voices for the Pokédex (Kanto and Johto only) and the narrator. Luciana Baroli voices Zoey, and has been also the voice of (original series only) and Flannery.

Sometimes in the earlier seasons, the English voices of some Pokémon couldn't be preserved, so their lines were rerecorded. Michel Di Fiori did the voices of Gastly and Mr. Mime, while Úrsula Bezerra took over as.

The first three movies, as well as Mewtwo Returns, were dubbed in Rio de Janeiro instead of São Paulo. Guilherme Briggs provided the voice of Mewtwo, while Márcio Simões temporarily replaced Meowth. Jirachi: Wish Maker was almost dubbed in Rio at the Dublamix studio, with Gustavo Nader as Ash, but only Priscila Amorim as Jirachi and Felipe Grinnan as Butler recorded in Rio.

After the dub moved completely to Rio de Janeiro, Charles Emmanuel began voicing Ash, Bruna Laynes landed the role of Serena, Yan Gesteira is providing the voice of Clemont, while Luiza Cesar voices his little sister Bonnie. José Augusto Sendim and Raphael Rosatto are the new voices of the narrator and the Pokédex, respectively. Jessie is now voiced by Flávia Saddy, James by Thiago Fagundes, and Meowth's new voice actor is Sérgio Stern. Other voices include Mariana Torres as Officer Jenny, Ronaldo Julio as, Bruno Rocha as Lysandre, Luisa Palomanes as Nurse Joy, Hannah Buttel as Miette, and Matheus Perisse as Sawyer. In addition, Márcio Simões, who voiced Meowth in the first few movies, came back as Squishy. Mário Jorge Andrade (who voices Xerosic) directed the first 26 episodes before Felipe Drummond (who voices Alain) replaced him. Eduarda Ribeiro is the new translator.

In the, , known in Brazil as Lulú, is dubbed by Hannah Buttel, who previously voiced Miette. is called Lílian, and she's dubbed by Evie Saide. is called Vitória and is dubbed by Taís Feijó. is dubbed by Marcos Souza. , known as Chris is voiced by Rafael Mezadri. Professor Kukui is known as Professor Nogueira and it's voiced by Cláudio Galvan. The narrator is now voiced by Filipe Albuquerque. Daniele Ribeiro is the translator.

Pokémon manga
The of the  The Electric Tale of Pikachu was split into four monthly issues for translation and release in Brazil. These four issues were based on VIZ Media's English translation and included all of the edits which removed sexual content from the manga.

The of Pokémon Adventures was published in Brazil by Panini Comics, beginning with  released on September 22, 2014. Panini has stated that they will publish other story arcs of the manga if this one is successful.

Panini announced on March 2, 2016 they would publish both the and the  s of Pokémon Adventures. The of Red, Green & Blue was released on October 10, 2016, and subsequent volumes released on a bimonthly schedule.

After the conclusion of the Yellow chapter in October 2017, Panini announced they will start publishing the in 2018. The first volume is set to be released in January.

Pokémon Trading Card Game
Both English- and Portuguese-language cards for the Pokémon Trading Card Game are sold in and Brazil. Portuguese-language cards are recognized as tournament legal for Play! Pokémon.

Related articles

 * List of Brazilian Portuguese Pokémon themes