Pokemon: The Unbelievably Weird Origin of Nurse Joy

The majority of video game adaptations opt to use the main characters present in the game, and in many cases follow the story of the video game very closely. This can be done to varying degrees of faithfulness. The Super Mario Bros Movie, for example, uses the characters and worlds present in the Super Mario series, but clearly takes place in a different continuity.

The Pokémon anime took a different approach, namely when it came to the protagonist. Replacing Red with Ash was not a bad decision, nor were many of the anime’s character changes. However, in adapting the video game to an anime, a few characters were given strange interpretations. One of these was Nurse Joy.

When Pokemon Went From Video Game To Anime

When Pokémon was adapted into an anime, the show created an original character to serve as its protagonist. This wasn’t a bad decision on the face of it. The player characters in Pokémon serve less as characters with personalities and motivations, and more as blank avatars for the player to project themselves onto. There is also a case to be made that the most important characters in Pokémon are not the human characters, but the Pokémon themselves, who, of course, are brought over.

In short, choosing to replace Red with Ash was not a bad decision. It did, however, seemingly open the floodgates for altering details from the source material as was deemed appropriate. The most relevant changes were those made to several of the in-game characters. In the first season, Brock and Misty were given the prominent role as Ash’s friends and traveling companions, whereas in-game they remain in their gyms once defeated. Team Rocket is expanded to be a world-traveling threat rather than limited mostly to Kanto. The anime adds in the original characters Jessie and James to serve as recurring villains. Far stranger than any of these and the most bizarre interpretation in the show, however, is the anime adaptation of Nurse Joy.

Why Anime Nurse Joy Is Bizarre

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In the Pokémon video game series, characters of the same role share sprites and models. This most famously applies to the trainer classes that in-game trainers have. Every Hiker has an identical sprite, as does every Ace Trainer, as does every Youngster. This also applies to certain character classes who serve a function in the overworld, with these figures also sharing one design across the whole of them. This includes PokéMart employees, evil team grunts, and, of course, Pokémon Center nurses.

Basically, if there’s one role that numerous characters fill across a region, those characters will all share the same sprite. However, in canon, each of these people is not supposed to literally look identical. It’s a game design decision made to save time. Giving every single biker or battle girl a unique sprite would be an enormous undertaking, not to mention an unnecessary one. Players look at these sprites and understand the function that they fulfill. Every Pokémon Center nurse sharing the same sprite is not actually meant to look identical; their appearance is just an easy way for players to immediately understand that character’s role.

In spite of this, when making the Pokémon anime, for some incomprehensible reason, it was decided that Pokémon nurses would pay homage to this tradition of identical sprites. The Pokémon Center nurse was translated into the new character, Nurse Joy. Despite what her name suggests, she is not a single character. Much like how every Pokémon Center in the games will have an identical Pokémon nurse, every Pokémon Center in the anime is operated by an identical-looking Nurse Joy.

Joy is actually the last name here, as all Nurse Joys are related to one another. Every single woman born into this family looks and sounds identical to all the others. These Joys all share the same basic personality traits as well, being kind-hearted and dedicated to helping others. Every woman in this family tree apparently decides to become a Pokémon nurse, and as a result, their presence is known across the entire Pokémon world. Each Nurse Joy wears a different colored cross on their hat to signify where they work. In spite of this, other than the girl-crazy Brock and the Joys themselves, no one is able to tell these nurses apart from one another.

This was, to put it lightly, a strange creative decision. It’s one of those bits of lore that can’t be examined too closely without it overtaking the actual point of the show. Why, exactly, is every Nurse Joy biologically identical? One has to wonder why none of the Nurse Joys’ fathers had their genes win out on the biological battlefield.

Whatever the explanation, it occurred more than once, as the Pokémon anime created another family of nearly identical members. This time, it was with Officer Jenny, a family of identical ladies, all of whom became police officers. Putting such a bizarre phenomenon into the show once is one thing, but the idea that it happens regularly makes the Pokémon a very strange place.

Of course, none of this really matters. There was likely no intended explanation for why Nurse Joy is like this, no dark secret for fans to discover. In reality, this odd, spooky take on Nurse Joy was probably nothing more than a silly reference to the use of identical sprites in game. It’s a little out there to imagine that a children’s cartoon has some sort of demonic Joy-cloning scheme operating behind the scenes. Still, there’s nothing more fun than overthinking media, and Nurse Joy provides plenty of material to theorize about.