We now come to the neglected planned mascot for the series and our first proper Fairy type family with Clefairy’s little moonlit dance troupe. Honestly the concept of Clefairy being an intended mascot for the franchise is still a pretty wild concept and it feels very ill-fitting for the job compared to Pikachu, so I do think a bullet was dodged here, but there’s a fun design to look into regardless and not having quite the universal appeal to be a good mascot is not exactly a meaningful criticism, so there’s plenty to appreciate here.

Unfortunately, fitting for an almost mascot of the franchise later replaced with Pikachu, we have another baby Pokemon designed to be a cuter version of Clefairy. Another one of the Odd Egg’s funny tricks. Unlike Pichu however I find that Cleffa completely misses the mark and is just devoid of much charm at all. It’s really nothing more than a Clefairy with fewer defining features and a smaller size, and of all the Generation 2 Baby Pokemon it’s the one that feels the most like the slew of scrapped baby Pokemon that seemed to be handed out to just about anything in the Spaceworld 97 Pokemon Gold demo. Cleffa, more than anything, feels like a Pokemon made from some misconstrued sense of obligation, and now that we are long past Baby Pokemon being looked upon as a useful addition to the franchise that obligation wears thin for me.

Clefairy, on the other hand, is a much nicer design for a mystical little fairy that actually remembers Pokemon are supposed to have interesting features. It’s a pretty cute thing with fairly stereotypical Fairy elements like the wings, whimsical magic, pale pink, and appearance approximating a five pointed star fitting its supposedly extra-terrestrial origins. It’s nothing hugely pioneering but in its roles both as a whimsical rare Pokemon tucked away in Mt Moon that contrasts the rest of the cave’s monster collection and as a de-facto mascot of the Fairy typing itself alongside Sylveon, it’s basically cast in exactly the way it needs to be. It’s a small shame that Eviolite Friend Guard Clefairy is an insufferable bastard in competitive doubles that makes me dread seeing it there, because I do think it’s a genuinely very pleasant design the rest of the time.

Clefable boldly asks the question: “what if Clefairy was slightly larger and had a few more interesting features” as an inverse of the exploits of Cleffa. To that end it’s a perfectly solid design. It’s hugely improved by the Fairy type adding an extra layer of mystical vibes to its design. Obviously, its lunar lore is interesting, but pure Normal always felt like a bit of a cop out and never really did it justice, making it just another pink blob. As a Fairy, simple elements like its wings really just feel more effectively realised and purposeful rather than just a cop out of loose shapes, and this escalates Clefable from a Pokemon I really didn’t care about when I was younger to one I sincerely think has a lot to offer (though it too has a reputation for being insufferable in competitive). It’s a more subdued Fairy than some of the later additions to the type, but somewhat unsurprisingly is the most purposeful of the retconned Fairies, even if it’s not my favourite. Overall, it’s a nice Pokemon I enjoy seeing around that exemplifies the value of less obvious improvements to older Pokemon outside of evolutions and regional forms.

Final Verdict: 7/10 – despite a wholly unnecessary baby pre-evolution and not being the most exciting or detailed design, it’s a solid Pokemon and a good showcase of the thematic value of the Fairy typing.