User:Hikaru Wazana/Team Rocket (anime)

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If you were looking for the group consisting of Jessie, James, and Meowth, see Team Rocket trio.

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Team Rocket ロケット団 Rocket-dan

The new Team Rocket logo in the anime

Leader Giovanni Region Kanto, Johto, Sinnoh, Unova and Alola Admins Unknown Major targets Lake of Rage, Dreamyard, Battle Subway, Milos Island, Twist Mountain, Abyssal Ruins Base locations Team Rocket HQ Animated debut Pokémon Emergency!

Team Rocket (Japanese: ロケット団 Rocket-dan, literally Rocket Gang) is a recurring villainous team in pursuit of evil and the exploitation of Pokémon. They are based in the Kanto and Johto regions.

Team Rocket is the main antagonistic force during Pokémon the Series, with Jessie, James, and Meowth facing off against Ash and his friends in nearly every episode. However, over the course of the series, several other members were also introduced.

In the anime

History

Original series

The Team Rocket appears

Team Rocket was first seen in Pokémon Emergency, where Jessie, James, and Meowth crossed paths with Ash for the first time. In this episode, it was revealed that they already had a criminal record and had been wanted by the police for some time. From that moment on, the trio began to follow in the footsteps of Ash and his friends with the personal goal of capturing Ash's Pikachu.

Team Rocket as an organization was first seen in Battle Aboard the St. Anne, they led the invasion of the St. Anne on Giovanni's orders, where they and dozens of Team Rocket Grunts stole numerous Pokémon and Poké Balls from the passengers with special mechas. However, the passengers retaliated, led by Ash, Misty and Brock and they defeated the grunts and took back their Pokémon. Later, the ship sailed into a violent storm, was overcome by waves, and sank into the sea.

Butch and Cassidy at the Breeding Center

In The Breeding Center Secret, it was shown that the organization created a Pokémon breeding center that was a front for a Pokémon theft scheme led by Butch and Cassidy. With the help of Ash and his friends, Todd Snap gathered the necessary evidence and presented to Officer Jenny the proof of what really happened there.

Pokémon the Series: Diamond and Pearl

In Memories are Made of Bliss!, following rumors that Jessie, James, and Meowth helped take down Team Galactic, Matori recruited the trio for a series of future missions in the Unova region.

Pokémon the Series: Black & White

The trio in their black uniforms

During Pokémon the Series: Black & White, the Team Rocket Trio achieved a more privileged position compared to previous missions and actively participated in several important missions in the Unova region. These missions were supervised by Giovanni himself or by Dr. Zager.

Meteonite mission

Team Rocket's first moves on this mission were in The Bloom Is on Axew! until Battling For The Love of Bug-Types!'

Pokémon the Series: XY

Team Rocket Vs Team Flare and Z2

In Pokémon the Series: XY, Team Rocket's actions shown, especially those of Jessie, James and Mewoth, focused solely on the Kalos region.

In An Explosive Operation!, the trio directly confronted the members of Team Flare on Giovanni's orders so that Team Rocket could research more about the mysterious Z2.

Infrastructure

In the anime, Team Rocket is based in Kanto, much like the games, with many smaller branches across Kanto and Johto. Like in the games, Giovanni was the Gym Leader of Viridian City's Pokémon Gym during Ash's journey through the region; however, he was later revealed to have abandoned his duties.

An underground school for aspiring Team Rocket operatives is present somewhere in the region, while the organization's headquarters were formerly near Pallet Town. The headquarters was relocated sometime during Ash's journey in Johto or Hoenn to a large building in a canyon following damages it sustained due to Mewtwo's anger at being controlled.

For the original series, Pokémon the Series: Ruby and Sapphire, and Pokémon the Series: Diamond and Pearl, the Team Rocket insignia from the games was used. However, in Pokémon the Series: Black & White, a new, anime-exclusive 3D logo was introduced, being retained for most Team Rocket material well into Pokémon the Series: XY. A variation of this logo with a circular symbol behind the insignia was introduced in An Explosive Operation!, subsequently being utilized in Giovanni's office. Since Pokémon the Series: Sun & Moon, the logo is flat. It has two variations, one with a circle behind it for Giovanni's office, and a red one that is used on the trio's balloon. The older logo is also used. This continues into Pokémon Journeys: The Series, where multiple variants of the logo are used at different times.

Members

In several episodes, it was shown that although Team Rocket is a criminal organization, it resembles a legitimate organization in many ways. In Dues and Don'ts, it was revealed that the organization has several sectors such as Human Resources and a Headhunter to recruit diverse potential talents and many times, a member of the organization can leave the team without any consequences.

A recurring detail shown in the anime is that members have a hierarchical scale, where agents like Jessie and James have access to resources that Grunts normally do not have at their disposal, just as Jessie and James reported several times to a member of the organization like Dr. .Zager.

This list is based on the most recent japanese episode:

Leaders

Member	Rank	Debut	Status
Giovanni	Boss	Battle Aboard the St. Anne (voice only) The Battle Of The Badge (physical debut)	N/A
Madame Boss	Boss	The Birth of Mewtwo	Unknown

Elite Officers

Member	Debut	Status
Tyson	Talkin' 'Bout an Evolution	Arrested
Gozu	Filling the Light with Darkness!	Unknown
Domino	Mewtwo Returns	Unknown

Operational position

Member	Debut	Status
Wendy	Dues and Don'ts	Unknown
Matori	Memories are Made of Bliss!	Unknown

Scientists

Member	Debut	Status
Dr. Namba	The Mystery is History	Unknown
Dr. Zager	Scraggy-Hatched to be Wild!	Unknown
Professor Sebastian	Talkin' 'Bout an Evolution	Unknown

Headhunter

Member	Debut	Status
Rocket Scout	Dues and Don'ts	Unknown

Agents

Member	Debut	Status
Jessie, James and Meowth	Dues and Don'ts	Unknown
Biff and Cassidy	Dues and Don'ts	Unknown
Attila and Hun	Dues and Don'ts	Unknown

Team Rocket trio

Main article: Team Rocket trio

Jessie, James and Meowth

A trio of Team Rocket field agents, Jessie, James, and a talking Meowth, were defeated on an assignment to steal Pokémon from Viridian City's Pokémon Center by rookie Trainer Ash Ketchum and his Pikachu, and since then have followed him everywhere on his journey in order to steal the Pikachu that humiliated them. After following him through Kanto, the Orange Islands, and Johto, coming in contact with many other Team Rocket members along the way and being shown as incompetent compared to said members, the trio followed Ash to the Hoenn region under directions from Giovanni to establish a branch of Team Rocket there (though this was really only a ploy to get them out of his hair). When Ash returned from Hoenn after competing in its regional League Conference, the trio returned to Kanto as well, empty-handed. After following him through Kanto once again, Giovanni assigned the trio to the Sinnoh region, again with the directive to establish a Team Rocket branch there.

Team Rocket in their black uniforms as seen from In The Shadow of Zekrom! through A Venipede Stampede!

Giovanni claimed before to not even recognize the three agents. Meowth often fantasizes about pleasing Giovanni with Pokémon captured using one of the trio's many harebrained schemes and mechas, at which point he would then replace Giovanni's Persian as "top cat", however this is hindered by both the fact that Ash and his friends defeat the trio each time, and formerly Giovanni's low opinion of the three as well, who have managed to eat up much of Team Rocket's funding with their failures.

While Giovanni viewed the trio as "bumbling idiots who can't do anything right", they have occasionally shown that they can do things right, if only by working on the side of Ash and his friends. It should be noted that when other Team Rocket members have come into contact with Ash or any of his friends they've been often just as easily foiled as these three.

The trio has often been shown as poor or having little money. This may be due to the amount of machinery and costumes they use in their attempts to capture Ash's Pikachu. They often take on side-jobs like selling food at stadiums or creating fake items and selling them to the public. Several episodes after the series began, they notably started speaking in rhymes from time to time.

Team Rocket's Headquarters as seen in Pokémon the Series: Black & White

In Pokémon the Series: Black & White, the trio stopped being the anime's comedic relief, accomplishing several missions assigned to them and also receiving new uniforms. They have also become more of a threat to Ash and his friends. Multiple agents were also situated in Unova, who passed on information and orders to Jessie, James, and Meowth. Giovanni himself has also been featured much more prominently, regularly assigning the trio missions and passing on information. Eventually returning to their old costumes, but retaining their serious tone and weaponry, they acted under Dr. Zager to accomplish further missions.

Giovanni later returned to lead the trio in one last mission, Operation Tempest, in Meloetta and the Undersea Temple! and Unova's Survival Crisis!. Following its failure, Giovanni retreated with the trio to Kanto, but the trio later returned in New Places, Familiar Faces!. At first returning to their original goal of capturing Pikachu, they later came into conflict with Team Plasma and eventually aided Ash and Looker in defeating Ghetsis.

The trio returned fully to their previous role as comic relief in the Decolora Adventure! arc, roles they continued to retain during Pokémon the Series: XY and Pokémon the Series: Sun & Moon, but they still had advanced technology until the end of XY. Jessie's Wobbuffet rejoined them in The Dream Continues!, at the end of the Decolora Adventure! arc, and accompanied them to Kalos in XY and Alola in Sun & Moon as an effective fourth member of the group to steal rare Pokémon from those regions. Despite once again being comic relief, Jessie and James seem to have become much better at battling, immediately posing a challenge to Ash and his friends several times. Giovanni also continued to support them; he no longer admonished them for their failures and relied on them to accomplish Team Rocket's work in Kalos and Alola. However, Team Rocket had no presence in Kalos and Alola other than Jessie, James, Meowth, and Wobbuffet. Starting in First Catch in Alola, Ketchum-Style!, they have lived in a Bewear's den on Alola's Melemele Island. In A Seasoned Search!, they finished building a secret Team Rocket base inside the den.

In Pokémon Journeys: The Series, the trio operate out of a base hidden underground in Vermilion City and travel to different parts of the world searching for new Pokémon to steal. They are now equipped with new tools, most notably a Rotom Phone and the Rocket Prize Master, a capsule toy machine that provides them with Pokémon from Team Rocket's stock. As a result of this, they no longer use Pokémon of their own, although they have forged interactions with some of the Pokémon contained in the Rocket Prize Master.

Grunts

Main article: Team Rocket Grunt

A Team Rocket Grunt in Pokémon the Series: Black & White

Other members

Many other members of Team Rocket have appeared besides the aforementioned boss and the trio, most of them are field agents as well. In addition, at least in the dub, one of these members, Domino, implies that Team Rocket had agents in even the most innoculous places such as a university. A recurring duo who are rivals with Jessie and James, Cassidy and Butch, show up from time to time. This pair reports to Dr. Namba, rather than Giovanni directly. As revealed in JN095, however, Cassidy and Butch have since left Team Rocket and gone their separate ways.

Attila and Hun, operatives from Team Rocket's Johto branch, were featured as antagonists in The Legend of Thunder!, where they played the same role as Jessie and James do to Jimmy, Marina, and Vincent. Other Johto operatives include Tyson, who was in charge of the Lake of Rage experimentation; Domino, an elite Team Rocket member that was part of a mission to recapture Mewtwo; the Iron-Masked Marauder, a high-ranking agent who managed to capture a Celebi in one of his Dark Balls; and Professor Sebastian, a high-ranking Team Rocket scientist involved in both Attila and Hun's and Tyson's plots.

Jessie's mother, Miyamoto, was at one time a Team Rocket member under Giovanni's mother. However, she disappeared without a trace on an expedition to find and capture Mew.

Matori, Giovanni's secretary, first appeared in the final episode of Pokémon the Series: Diamond and Pearl. She appeared on occasion throughout Pokémon the Series: Black & White and Pokémon the Series: XY to debrief Jessie, James, and Meowth. Her role was expanded in Pokémon the Series: Sun & Moon, becoming a sort of rival figure to Jessie, recruiting an Alolan Meowth to her cause, and leading a special unit of Team Rocket known as the Matori Matrix, which consists of other grunts such as Gozu. In Pokémon Journeys: The Series', the Matori Matrix has been shown operating and targeting areas in Sinnoh. In A Little Rocket R & R!, the Resort Area was targeted to steal Pokémon from trainers on vacation. Later on in Nightfall? Nightmares!, the Matori Matrix attacked Cresselia on Fullmoon Island.

Pierce and Dr. Zager are two high-ranking members of the organization introduced to assist Jessie and James with their missions in Unova. Dr. Zager currently has a relationship to Jessie and James similar to that of Dr. Namba in relation to Butch and Cassidy, directly coordinating their missions and providing machinery. Among his creations were an energy cannon using the power of Roggenrola and the "Ghost Train".

Team Rocket has attempted to do many major and potentially globally-altering operations, including cloning DNA of Mew and altering it to create Mewtwo. This stemmed out of a desire of Giovanni to appease his mother's obsession with Mew, although he ultimately desired Mewtwo for use as a weapon. When Mewtwo finally finished developing, he deceived Mewtwo into working for him, using him in Gym Battles against such Trainers as Gary Oak (who suffered his first of only four losses in the anime to date). Team Rocket also attempted to capture and control a Lugia and Celebi, and it also created a device that could force Pokémon to evolve. It also successfully managed to capture a Rayquaza, although it is never revealed whether they maintained control of it or if it managed to escape.

They have various means of transportation, such as boats, submarines, and helicopters.

Pokémon

Pokémon used as operatives

Meowth ♂

Delibird

Delibird

Loaned to new recruits

Mankey

Raticate

Gallery

Team Rocket as seen in Pokémon the Series: Black & White

Trivia

• In the anime Team Rocket has operatives in the Orange Islands and Unova. It is also implied that they had operatives in Hoenn and Sinnoh after their respective villainous teams were disbanded.
• In the anime, Team Rocket has tried to obtain the most Legendary Pokémon for their own uses (by Jessie and James) out of any other villainous team.
• Both Jessie and James have befriended or owned a Pokémon whose species are known to frequently work for the good of common people, a Chansey and a Growlithe respectively, with Chansey being known to work as nurses and Growlithe (along with Arcanine) being often used as police dogs. This is unusual, considering Team Rocket's association with crime and illegal activities.
• Team Rocket's uniforms vaguely resemble bōsōzoku uniforms.

Names

Language	Name	Origin
Japanese	ロケット団 Rocket-dan	From rocket
English, Danish, Dutch French, German, Italian European Spanish, Swedish	Team Rocket	Same as Japanese name
Korean	로켓단 Rocket-dan	Same as Japanese name
Chinese (Mandarin)	火箭隊 / 火箭队 Huǒjiàn Duì *	From 火箭 huǒjiàn, rocket
	火箭團 / 火箭团 Huǒjiàn Tuán *
Chinese (Cantonese)	火箭隊 Fójin Déui *	From 火箭 fójin, rocket
	火箭兵團 Fójin Bīngtyùhn *
Arabic	عصابة الرداء الأبيض isabat Ar-Redda Al-Abiadh	Literally "The white robe gang"
Bulgarian	Тим Ракета Tim Raketa* Екип Ракета Ekip Raketa* Отряда Рокет Otryada Roket*	From English name
Croatian	Tim Raketa	From English name
Czech	Rakeťáci Tým Raket	From English name
Finnish	Rakettiryhmä	From English name
Greek	Ομάδα Πύραυλος Omáda Píravlos	From English name
Hebrew	צוות רוקט Tsevet Rocket	From English name
Hungarian	Rakéta Csapat	From English name
Icelandic	Eldflaugarliðið	Literally "The fire flying forces"
Indonesian	Tim Roket	From English name
Norwegian	Team Rocket Team Rockets*	Same as English name Similar to English name
Polish	Zespół R Drużyna R* Brygada R* Grupa Rakietowców*	Literally "Team R" Literally "Group Rocket"
Brazilian Portuguese	Equipe Rocket	From English name
European Portuguese	Equipa Rocket* Team Rocket*	From English name Same as English name
Romanian	Echipa Rachetă	From English name
Russian	Команда Ракета Komanda Raketa* Команда Р Komanda R* Команда Рокета Komanda Roketa*	From English name From Polish name From English name (misspelled)
Serbian	Tim Raketa	From English name
Latin American Spanish	Equipo Rocket	From English name
Thai	แก๊งค์ร็อกเก็ต Gang Rocket	Same as Japanese name
Turkish	Roket Takımı	From English name
Ukrainian	Команда Р Komanda R	Same as Russian name
Vietnamese	Nhóm Rocket* Băng Hỏa Tiễn*	Same as Japanese name Transliteration of Japanese name

Related articles

• Team Rocket (Adventures)
• Episodes focusing on Team Rocket
• Images on the Bulbagarden Archives
• Team Rocket motto
• Team Rocket