First off, apologies for skipping a week - I'm a terrible person, I know. Actually, it was this dreaded, horrifying thing called college that has prevented me both from playing SoulSilver and from writing this post.
Another apology. Initially, I was going to do a song from one of the older games (Gen II, to be specific), since I did a newer generation last time. I had the exact song picked out and everything. And then this theme popped up when I was listening to a list of RPG Final Battle themes, and I knew. Introducing, Ghetsis's theme.
Er, spoiler alert for Black and White, I guess, though you could probably see this coming a mile away. After you beat the Elite 4 and go to fight the Champion, you see that N has already beaten the Champion, and Team Plasma creates a giant castle out of nowhere. After capturing the legendary dragon of your version and fighting N, you find that the true genius behind Team Plasma was Ghetsis, N's father.
Ahem:
But anyway, this is the theme that plays when fighting Ghetsis.
Like villain themes, final villain themes in Pokemon have a tendency to be pretty awesome. However, Ghetsis's theme was awesome in a way incredibly different from most villain themes. This theme is much darker than most music in Pokemon games. The focus is often put on the deep sounding drums, which give a rushed, anxious, and actually fairly scary theme to the song. In fact, there's a point in the song where it's entirely drums, something that I don't recall ever hearing in a Pokemon song before. When the other instruments, which actually sound a lot like a choir, kick in, it's even more dramatic. Choirs are often used to add drama to pieces, and it certainly does its job here. I actually saw in a comment on this video that this song sounds like a Metroid Prime boss battle. I'm a huge Metroid Prime fan, and once I thought about it, I have to say that I agree. Just listen to the first few bars of this boss battle from Metroid Prime and tell me you don't see a similar theme.
(Okay, apologies for the Metroid music in a Pokemon post. It won't happen again. Probably.)
The theme was remixed in Black and White 2, where Ghetsis's outfit in my opinion matches it a bit better.
Well, this is still a pretty good theme, but to be honest, I like the original better. This theme goes a bit too fast for me and loses the dark and evil atmosphere that the original has. At this tempo, the choir loses its drama and really does stick out as being just electronic instruments. I think with this theme the game designers went back to their usual sound for team bosses, but the difference of the original is what made it really special.
Fan remix time~! :D
The beginning of this scares the pants off me. I like how, even though the tempo picks up, the drums are still kept as the main focus of the remix. I believe that this remix sounds a lot like the Metroid song I posted, maybe more so than the original. And the way the remix handles the silence and strong outbursts of the original is really good as well. Unlike BW2's remix, I can still feel the creepy atmosphere even though the tempo is up.
Well, that's all for today! I promise next week I'll do something from the first two generations, and I'll attempt not to make it a battle theme. Til then, ciao~
-umchan649
