Mewtwo Strikes Back Evolution recently arrived in theatres. It's a remake of the classic animated film
Pokémon: The First Movie. However, what sets the new version apart from the old is its animation style. While the 1998 film was 2D;
Mewtwo Strikes Back Evolution makes use of some nifty, modern 3D animation technology.
Kunhiki Yuyama recently paid a vist to Anime Expo 2019 (via
Toonado), where he talked about why The Pokémon Company decided to go with the unique, new look. According to Yuyama, they'd been planning to use 3D animation for a while now but were hesitant as they weren't certain that all would transfer well into the new style.
"We felt that using 3D animation technology, we could portray maybe an extra level or different dimension of the Pokemon world that maybe would be a little bit difficult to do with one dimensional methods."
Yuyama believes that, using the 3D technology, they were able to get across
"a level of depth and a level of interesting imagery" that they wouldn't have been able to accomplish with the traditional 2D style.
"[T]his is first time we have done full 3D computer generated animation. And so even though we've done over 20 Pokemon movies, it feels like this is the first time. And I was so worried that this was just going to be a flop and that people weren't going to like it." Fortunately for Yuyama, it seems that the fanbase has welcomed the film with open arms.