Lawrence III (Pokémon)

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Lawrence III.

In the Pokémon anime, Lawrence III (or Lawrence the Third) is a young man who collects Pokémon, which sometimes refers to another nickname "The Collector". He appears in Pokémon: The Movie 2000 (Pokémon: Revelation Lugia in Japanese), where his main objective is to steal Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres in order to awaken the Water's Great Guardian. To fulfill this goal, he pilots a hovering spacecraft-like vehicle (known in Japan as 'Hikoukyu') around the Orange Islands. By the end of the movie, the airship is in ruins, having been shot down by Zapdos and Moltres, then sliced in half by an Aeroblast from Lugia.

He considers himself to be a 'collector', whose obsession to capture legendary Pokémon began with his first Pokémon card, Ancient Mew. However, his biggest downfall came from actually reading the ancient legend wrong: 'Bring together all three, their treasures tame the beast of the sea'. He interpreted the 'three' as literally being Zapdos, Articuno and Moltres and set out to capture them, which caused great chaos across the planet (it is also possible that he already knew that, and in his greed, decided to capture them anyway). The 'three' which the legend spoke of was actually the three element stones which the Chosen One (Ash Ketchum) had to collect, which would stop the fighting. It is also possible that he thought that he was the chosen one, as he describes his passion to collect Lugia as his "destiny". After his scheme fails, all of the artifacts he's collected have fallen into the ocean, except for one. On the ground next to Lawrence is his Ancient Mew card, miraculously undamaged by the destruction of his airship. He picks up the card and describes it as, "How it all began. And how it will all begin...again."

The fate of Lawrence III remains to be seen. While his final words in Pokémon: the Movie 2000 might imply that he intends to try again to capture Lugia or that he will continue hunting artifacts, no evidence of such an attempt has been seen. Given the global chaos resulting from his first attempt, it is therefore unlikely that Lawrence, if he intends to repeat the scheme, has actually begun to do so yet. However, a picture of him was seen in the end credits for Pokémon Heroes, where that particular movie's villains, Annie and Oakley, were planning their next scheme. None have been seen since, so how their plans link to him is yet to be seen.

Instead of receiving Pokémon cards, during the Japanese theatrical release, earlygoers received a booklet of Lawrence's history, such as how his mother died and his first card was Mew. Since this booklet was never translated into the U.S, 4kids added some background info into the film. His name is never revealed in the movie, not even the Japanese version. Booklets and articles about the movie before the release said the name was "Lawrence III", though the movies closed-captioning says that his name is Geraldan (Japanese name is Jirudan), and was voiced by Takeshi Kaga, better known to American viewers as "Chairman Kaga" of Iron Chef fame.

It is a possibility that his name is Geraldan Lawrence III or some combination of the two names. There could also be confusion on the part of translators, etc.