It’s baffling to me that 26 years on, Poison/Flying is still a unique type combination. Zubat is so ubiquitous and common in this series that it’s very easy to forget that fact since it’s not like it “feels” unique when the type combination can be acquired in almost every game. Nevertheless, it remains unique to this evolution line and that’s just one of the many things I think are truly special about these guys.

Zubat is unfairly maligned as some kind of rodent of the caves, dismissed as useless fodder and nothing more than an annoyance, or at worst considered ugly by some. However this eyeless little cave demon is both adorable and my go to Flying type over almost any regional bird. Its obvious traits are its striking blue colour scheme with accents of purple in its ears, which I think looks phenomenal and keeps it safely away from earthy tones the early game sees a lot of, while also being evocative of its Poison typing, but most importantly forgoing eyes in favour of huge distinctive ears and being an echolocation-based creature. This is a phenomenal start already for a juvenile bat design, its undeveloped trailing blue tendrils presumably allow it to hang on cave ceilings, and while they don’t offer too much on their own they do add shape to what would otherwise be a pretty formless blob on wings, which given those are well developed later in its evolution is more than forgivable. Unlike regional birds, bugs, rats, and Pikachu copies who are cycled through once a generation, Zubat is something different. Zubat is eternal, Zubat is forever, and the last two generations leaving it behind has been a dreadful mistake because nobody else does it quite like them.

Golbat was, for a time, Zubat’s only evolution and while far from the strongest Pokemon in Red and Blue, being something of an obvious candidate for a future evolution when Crobat rolled around, I do think there’s a lot to love here. I’ll start with the small negative, I’m not a huge fan of the less pronounced ears, that feels like a misstep. However aside from their shape changing to less exciting little nubs it’s important to remember that Golbat is double the height of Zubat so a lot of that change in perspective is the ears being relatively unchanged in overall size while Golbat’s newly developed eyes and huge gaping jaw take centre stage. Speaking of The Maw, Golbat historically got a lot of unfair press for its Red and Blue sprite being “ugly” when depicting a 1.6m tall blood sucking bat monster, whose height is about 80% jaw and it’s clearly looking for a meal. That sprite is fantastic and I absolutely love it. Golbat does also develop Zubat’s tendrils into proper footlike appendages to be able to function in more environments, which is just solid and only a taste of what to come. The loss in echolocation dependency is a little unfortunate but I do think the changes to focus on the mouth as more of an offensive tool is still a worthy evolution. Really Golbat is unfortunate that both Kanto remakes have restricted its ability to evolve to varying degrees when it really needs that evolution, making it feel more like a burden and an underwhelming final stage than the great middle stage it is.

I’ve covered regional forms, Mega Evolutions, Gigantamax Forms, and Baby Pokemon already, but none of those match the thrill of plain and simple new evolutions for older Pokemon (though regional forms do come incredibly close). Crobat, in my view, is one of the absolute best examples of this and not just because Golbat was crying out to evolve further. Crobat, most obviously, inverts Zubat and Golbat’s colour scheme to be predominantly a wicked shade of purple. It closes its jaw, now developed more to not need to constantly scream to see or disorient thus allowing it to be more aerodynamic, and its eyes become more prominent but also more purposeful, with a red and yellow colour presumably better for seeing in the dark to replace echolocation dependency more. The real kicker, however, is the development of Golbat’s simplistic legs into a secondary set of wings to allow for faster and more controlled flight. This is what really makes Crobat look like such an incredible step up from the other two and really develops it from just a big monster to a sleek assassin predator. Its ears also come back more and it develops new little feet to replace its old ones, which are probably about as good for hanging as Zubat’s if not better but with the added control of more wings. Crobat is also a friendship evolution which I think ties a lot of things together: through bonds with its trainer Golbat can develop into a more complete creature who is more capable and can realise its full potential, vindicating anyone who loves Zubat and Golbat. Despite the fact that I’m too young to remember a time without Crobat, I can still really appreciate the value of that and cross-generational evolutions revitalising great designs like this.

Final Verdict: 10/10 – one of Pokemon’s greatest and most underappreciated staples of the series