Roaring Moon

We're now back to a couple of Paradox Pokemon, and the first is a wildly surprising one: a "prehistoric" version of, not simply Salamence, but specifically mega Salamence. The fact that megas - or any other Pokemon designs - were ever limited to only certain games or regions was one of the worst decisions this franchise ever made, so it's nice to see them acknowledged again, and I definitely never expected one of them to get a variant as a distinct species! The similarity is mentioned in its Violet pokedex entry and in "Occulture" Magazine, which also calls it a "primeval" Salamence. It basically looks like Mega Salamence if it were feathery, the crescent wings lined with little feather tips and the body decorated in fuzzy tufts. So Salamence was possibly feathered at one time, and evolved into a scalier reptiloid dragon? And its Mega form is a throwback to its ancestor, but still doesn't regain the feathers? Are other Mega Pokemon related to their "prehistoric" forms? It's too bad they couldn't all come back as permanent species in some way, then. Banette, Beedrill and Mawile remain terribly, terribly cheated.

I guess that's still my main overall takeaway when it comes to the Paradox mons: they're all "second chances" for their respective Pokemon, but only a few of them take full advantage of that. I really like that this thing exists, I like that people who loved Mega Salamence have an alternative, and I think it also actually looks a lot cooler.