We now come to the last of the three Generation 1 Grass/Poison families, and one I’ve been excited to talk about for a while, as this is just one of those Pokemon where my attachment skews a lot more strongly towards the personal side.

Bellsprout stands out to me among Grass Pokemon and Generation 1 Pokemon at large, mainly due to its more unique body structure really leaning into it being something that looks like it just popped out of the earth, spindly little roots and all, and just started to wander around. Where Oddish put the emphasis on a solid plant mass that would rest underground making up most of its body, Bellsprout changes things up a lot and I love how it looks in motion as a result. The basis of the evolution line and the source of its Poison typing is very clearly pitcher plants, but Bellsprout does a good job of looking enough like a simpler flower with bell-like petals that it straddles looking more benign and friendly while still distinctly poisnous and somewhat threatening. Any time I’ve tried to play through the Kanto games I’ve always had a little fascination with Bellsprout because it really stands out to me among the early game Pokemon; there’s just something so wonderfully eccentric about it and its easily accessed variety of status moves early in the games give it a delightfully horrible little bag of tricks. Those tricks are compelling enough that in addition to training up one in Blue on the 3DS Virtual Console, I raised two Bellsprout when slogging through a borrowed copy of ‘Let’s Go, Eevee!’ to transfer a Melmetal from GO, and they made the whole thing a little more bearable. A strong start for the family that is only going to get crazier and nastier as it evolves.

Weepinbell is a Pokemon I am fascinated with for almost the exact opposite reasons I praised Bellsprout: the roots are now completely gone and this is just a bizarre, floating plant mass with an endlessly gaping maw and big leaves acting as almost wing-like appendages. It’s a very weird middle stage that really doesn’t feel grounded or natural in the ways that Bellsprout and Victreebel do, instead just hanging there listlessly, waiting for small bugs to just wander into its acidic mouth. It does in some ways feel a little underdesigned and cobbled together, as it doesn’t really have much cohesion with plant elements slapped on a creature that doesn’t look like much at all. However I think that works to its benefit as a truly bizarre carnivorous plant and jungle predator, I find it so weird and lovable that I just can’t fault it at all. I think it owes a lot of the success of its design to its design having some shock factor after the fairly cute Bellsprout, that serves well to lead into it evolving into something about as absurd and a hell of a lot more vicious. Overall, Weepinbell is something I have a lot of fondness for just as a window into how messed up and truly off-beat Pokemon can look while still having a compelling charm.

Victreebel is a fantastic balance between a very simple design and feeling fully realised from its pre-evolutions’ potential. Being an upside down evolutionary jump from Weepinbell over 15 years before Malamar signed a dark contract with the 3DS gyroscope, I’ve always found the little changes Victreebel makes to be more aggressive looking than Weepinbell just fascinating. The eyes have gone from beady to sunken in, furious glaring things partially obscured by the lip of the pitcher, and the brown vine moving and growing as a tail-like appendage that almost evokes something like a handle on the jug lid of Victreebel’s horrid maw with an uncanny underbite. While Weepinbell just suspends itself in wait for something to be stupid enough to fly inside its mouth, Victreebel evokes the mood of a much more sulking, craven beast that lies in wait with the chops to ensnare and violently dissolve that which gets too close. That being said, it still looks pretty ridiculous while still being the most recognisable as a proper pitcher plant in its family. I kind of wish that some depictions showed us a glimpse inside its mouth to see the festering, stinking pool of acid inside, but there’s some value in not showing that. Victreebel has become special to me over the years from just being a standout oddball among the many Grass Pokemon that have a tendency to look a little tame in future generations and having some history as a goofy, reliable Pokemon I’ve gravitated to in several of Pokemon’s more scuffed adventures.

Final Verdict: 10/10 – One of the best designs that Grass types have to offer, beautifully disgusting.