Giovanni

"The Self-Proclaimed Strongest Trainer"
Giovanni
Species	Human
Affiliation	Team Rocket
Hair color	Black
Eye color	Black
Base	Viridian City Gym
Relatives	Silver (son)
Voiced by	Ted Lewis (2000) Andrew Russell (2019)
Debut	Pokémon: Red/Green Versions

Giovanni is a Pokémon trainer who acts as a recurring villain within the Pokémon series. He was first featured as the primary antagonist of the first generation games, where he was the criminal mastermind who once led Team Rocket, and at the same time was the Gym Leader of the Viridian City gym (a duty that he neglected while running Team Rocket). He has since resurfaced in appearances in several later generations, which has included taking advantage of the existence of multiple worlds to form Team Rainbow Rocket. As a gym leader, his specialty is Ground-type Pokémon.

Background

Generation I

In Pokémon Red, Green, Blue and Yellow (as well as FireRed and LeafGreen), Red first encountered Giovanni in the Celadon City Game corner, which doubled as a Rocket base. Giovanni, like most of Team Rocket, regarded Red as a minor nuisance at first. Red then proceeded to defeat Giovanni in a battle. Losing a small bit of dignity and the Silph Scope, Giovanni proceeded to resume negotiations with the president of Silph Co. in Saffron City. Giovanni wanted Silph Co.'s new Master Ball, a prototype Poké Ball that would capture a Pokémon without fail. His plans for the ball were unclear, but Red foiled that plan by showing up and defeated him again.

Giovanni finally returned to his gym, humiliated, to bide his time until he could rebuild Team Rocket. Populating his gym were tough trainers who mostly specialized in ground type Pokémon. After being defeated again at his gym, he awarded Red with the Earthbadge and TM 27: Fissure (TM 26: Earthquake in FireRed/LeafGreen). He then disbanded Team Rocket and decided to focus on bettering himself, and being a better Pokémon trainer. His gym was abandoned and was eventually taken over by Blue.

In the Let's Go remakes, Giovanni's role was largely the same, except that Chase/Elaine took Red's place in the story. Archer also appeared as one of his main underlings answering to him. Archer had presented the Silph Scope to Giovanni and pushed for taking over Silph Co. Giovanni was not impressed by the Scope, but still saw Silph as a valuable target. Additionally in these versions, he gave out TM 41: Earthquake upon his defeat, and Blue was shown to take over his gym almost immediately after his departure.

Generation II

A flashback in HeartGold/SoulSilver shows him leaving Kanto after arguing with his son Silver, intent on training alone and returning later to revive Team Rocket, while Silver sought to become stronger without Giovanni or Team Rocket. He wound up training within the Tohjo Falls, while at the same time, several Team Rocket executives attempted to band the organization together in Johto. Three years later, those executives attempted to contact Giovanni during Pokémon Gold, Silver, and Crystal. He never answered their calls, despite their faith in him.

It was not until HeartGold and SoulSilver that the truth was shown. Giovanni truly did intend to answer the radio calls and take his place as ruler of Team Rocket, believing that the time was right to rebuild the organization and work towards world domination. However, the young trainer Ethan/Lyra (who had traveled from the future with Celebi), who had a look in his eyes that remind him of Red's, stood in his way and defeated him. He was ashamed at losing to a child again and wondered if his three years of training were for nothing. With Team Rocket's dream ruined, Giovanni then departed from the cave and was not seen again in those games.

Generation V

He did reappear in Black and White 2 as an opponent in several divisions of the Pokémon World Tournament that was held at Unova. Even though he was no longer a gym leader, he was still faced as part of the Kanto Leaders tournament instead of Blue. He could also be faced in the World Leaders tournament as well as the Type Expert tournament for Ground types.

Generation VI: Team Rainbow Rocket

Giovanni returned to a role as central villain in a post-game storyline of Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon known as Episode RR. Reforming his team as Team Rainbow Rocket, he enlisted help from Faba and took over Aether Paradise in order to use its resources to conquer all worlds and assemble an army of Ultra Beasts. To aid him, he summoned villains from other dimensions in which their plans were successful (Maxie, Archie, Cyrus, Ghetsis and Lysandre) and had them act as his lieutenants. As a result of the dimensional warping, Lusamine's mansion was changed into Team Rainbow Rocket's castle. As for Lusamine herself, Giovanni used a toxin from an Ultra Beast to put her to sleep and intended to brainwash her into becoming his loyal servant.

Elio/Selene ultimately challenged him after rejecting an offer to join his team, which Giovanni saw as nostalgic. Observing that the trainer raised their Pokémon with care, Giovanni claimed that he had no need to unleash his full might upon the child and retreated. Colress restored Lusamine's mansion back to normal, and Giovanni was last seen wondering what new world he should target next.

A battle program based on Giovanni could also be battled as the boss of the Battle Agency.

Pokémon Roster

Generation I

Giovanni specializes in Ground-type Pokémon. In Red, Blue and Green (as well as FireRed and LeafGreen) he uses an Onix, a Rhyhorn and a Kangaskhan in the Game Corner battle. For the Silph Co. battle he again uses Rhyhorn and Kangaskhan along with a Nidorino and Nidoqueen. Finally the Pokémon he uses in the battle at the Viridian Gym are:

• Rhyhorn
• Dugtrio
• Nidoqueen
• Nidoking
• Rhydon

The Yellow version replaces Giovanni's Kangaskhan (in the first two battles) and Rhyhorn (in the last battle) with a Persian to reference Giovanni's pet Persian from the anime series. In the Let's Go! games, Giovanni only uses Ryhorn and Persian for the first battle, and he adds a Nidoqueen for that roster for the second battle. For the gym battle, Giovanni does not use his Persian, and the roster is identical to the past versions aside from the absence of Rhyhorn/Persian.

Generation II/IV

In HeartGold and SoulSilver, he uses the following Pokémon:

• Nidoking
• Nidoqueen
• Kangaskhan
• Honchkrow

Generation V

In Black and White 2, he has two different rosters that he draws from in the different tournaments. The only shared Pokémon between his rosters are Rhyperior and a Nidoking. Otherwise, the Kanto Leaders roster also has:

• Golem
• Marowak
• Sandslash
• Nidoqueen

And his Type Expert/World Leaders roster also contains:

• Garchomp
• Gliscor
• Krookodile
• Hippowdon

Generation VII

In Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon, his roster consists of Dugtrio, Nidoking, Nidoqueen, Rhyperior and Mewtwo. They are all kept in Master Balls, and the Mewtwo has a Mega Stone that it will use for Mega Evolution (the X one in Ultra Sun and the Y one in Ultra Moon). During battles at the Battle Agency, his program's pool of potential Pokémon includes Dugtrio, Arcanine, Exeggutor, Marowak, Kangaskhan and Gyarados.

In Other Pokémon Games

Giovanni was the eighth opponent in the Gym Leader Castle of Pokémon Stadium. In the first round he used Persian, Dugtrio, Nidoqueen, Nidoking, Rhydon and Tauros. In the second round he used Golbat, Raticate, Persian, Moltres, Dodrio and Parasect. In Pokémon Puzzle League, Giovanni was the tenth enemy and the final boss of Easy Mode. Ash had to battle him for the Earth Badge. Giovanni claimed that he was the legendary Puzzle Master, but was later revealed to be bluffing, as Mewtwo emerged as the true Puzzle Master. In this game, Giovanni used Persian, Sandslash and Nidoking as his Pokémon.

In Pokémon GO, Giovanni was featured as the villainous leader of Team GO Rocket, in events that started in 2019. In a promotional video accompanying the event, Giovanni decided that Earth was the next world that he would unleash his evil schemes upon, implying that this continued from Giovanni's storyline from Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon. Players could use the Super Rocket Radar to detect him and battle him, although there were also Rocket Grunts disguised as him who acted as decoys. In battle, he used a team of three Shadow Pokémon that were randomly chosen from a pool of possibilities. One of them would be a Legendary Pokémon during bonus challenges, and these would shift on the first of each month. Thus far, he has used Kanto's three legendary birds, Johto's three legendary dogs and Mewtwo.

Pokémon Masters EX

In Pokémon Masters EX, Giovanni and Mewtwo appeared together as a playable sync pair, and Mewtwo gained the ability to Mega Evolve in Mega Mewtwo Y after collecting Mewtwo Crystals from the event that started running at the end of September 2021. Giovanni and Mewtwo starred in and could be recruited through the game's first Legendary Event, "Lurking Shadow". Giovanni was taken from after Episode RR, as he wore the Team Rainbow Rocket insignia and could also refer to the events of Episode RR in one of the randomly-chosen Pokémon Center conversations. He also bemoaned being known as a criminal "no matter what world he finds himself in", implying that this was another instance of Giovanni hopping across worlds after Episode RR.

Within "Lurking Shadow", Giovanni had traveled to Pasio due to being intrigued by the power of the sync stones and was aware some hidden power that he could use to conquer the world. Giovanni used Mewtwo to mine a sync stone from a cave that he could use. He was discovered by Scottie/Bettie, Brock and Misty, and he ended up battling them. After being defeated, he claimed that he was planning to turn over a new leaf in Pasio and convinced the player to let him join their team by promising to compete in the Pokémon Masters League fair and square with Mewtwo. Afterwards, Giovanni mused to himself that his true plan was to infiltrate Scottie/Bettie's team, but he was genuinely unsure if he wanted to start fresh on Pasio or not.

He was later featured as an antagonist in the Legendary Event "Father or Foe". In that event, Ghetsis arrived on Pasio with the Legendary PokémonKyurem under his control. Giovanni recognized Ghetsis from Team Rainbow Rocket and formed an alliance with him to gain the power of more Legendary Pokémon. Under this plan, Ghetsis tried to trick N into thinking that he was reforming and wanted to be a family again. This was to lure N into unleashing his Zekrom, at which point Giovanni and Mewtwo acted to immobilize it. Ghetsis planned to fuse Kyurem and Zekrom together in order to harness the power of Black Kyurem. Giovanni stopped the fusion process from happening, as he sought to claim both Kyurem and Zekrom for himself first, as he felt that Ghetsis would otherwise betray him after obtaining Black Zekrom. Both of them had recruited Team Break members as back-up, but they were disrupted by the arrival of other trainers. Alder had managed to stop them from getting Zekrom, but Giovanni was still set on defeating Ghetsis so that he could take his Kyurem. N and Nate ultimately stepped up to help Ghetsis to repel Giovanni. Giovanni still considered sending minions after them, but Silver confronted him and convinced Giovanni to stand down. Claiming he was impressed with what he saw today, Giovanni proceeded to retreat.

Giovanni was later featured within the Main Story's Villain Arc, where he acted as the antagonist of the initial chapter, "Kanto: Team Rocket Returns". In this chapter, Team Rocket became active in Pasio under Giovanni's command, and he had the island's trainers expand their resources searching for them across the island as a diversion, while he had Professor Bellis captured for her sync stone research. Red and Blue confronted him and saved Bellis, while Red destroyed his base by having his Snorlax Gigantamax. Mewtwo was still able to snatch the memory stick containing her research data. With her data, he was able to amplify Mewtwo's power, which temporarily caused many of the island's Pokémon to go berserk as a side effect. Giovanni offered to help Mewtwo control its new power as its sync partner, and this caused it to stabilize by Mega Evolving into Mega Mewtwo Y. When Red and Blue got an edge against Mega Mewtwo Y in battle, Giovanni was able to turn the table on them by having Mega Mewtwo Y push past its limits. This caused Red and Blue to ultimately let Giovanni go, as they did not want to risk Mewtwo being hurt by continually pushing itself.

Other Appearances

Other Media

• In the Pokémon anime, Giovanni's appearances were few and far between. Unlike in the games, he never directly confronted the main character (in this series, Ash Ketchum). He was mostly seen commanding the bumbling Jessie and James from afar, usually while stroking his pet Persian. He received some more screentime in the Pokémon movie and a television special that acted as a sequel to it, in which Giovanni was trying to hunt down Mewtwo. In later seasons, Giovanni mostly appeared in comical fantasy sequences thought up by Meowth, although he occasionally had storyline appearances. Unlike in the games, Giovanni has not resigned from Team Rocket and continues to oversee it well past the Gold and Silver era. He made his most prominent appearances in series based on Black/White, in which he eventually battled the protagonists directly and was temporarily driven mad by the power of the Reveal Glass until Jessie, James and Meowth talked some sense into him, leading to his retreat.
• Giovanni is the main villain of the live action Pokémon Live! musical, which was based primarily upon the anime. In the musical's storyline, he tries to make up for Mewtwo's failure by creating a MechaMew2 that can learn any attack that is used against it. After a tournament, MechaMew2 learns every attack except for several electrical attacks, which prompts Giovanni to send Jessie and James after Ash's Pikachu. They begin to battle, but after MechaMew2 learns the final attacks, the real Mewtwo arrives and uses a collection of Ash's happy memories to attack MechaMew2. Learning the importance of friendship, MechaMew2 then turns on Giovanni and self-destructs, During the curtain call, Giovanni is seen with a charred suit, suggesting he survived somehow. This musical also revealed Giovanni having a past relationship with Ash's mother when they were teenagers, supporting speculation that Giovanni is actually Ash's father in the anime canon. He was played by 4Kids voice actor Darry Dunstan in this portrayal.
• Giovanni appears in several arcs of the Pokémon Adventures manga. First he acts as the primary antagonist of the Red/Blue/Green arc, where he controls Team Rocket with Lieutenant Surge, Sabrina, Koga and Blaine under his command. He first meets with Red when he has Red escort him through the Diglett's Cave and is impressed by his battle abilities when he defeats a pair of Magmar that had burned down the Pewter City Museum, but he was disappointed that Red spared them and after he left Giovanni had his Cloyster kill them. He enacts a plan to capture the three legendary birds and uses the power of the eight gym badges to fuse them together, although Red, Blue and Green foil this plan. Red finally faces Giovanni at his gym and defeats him, although he does not receive an epiphany as he did in the games. In the Yellow arc he saves Red from ice and gives him evolutionary stones, then summons his former minions to help in the battle against the Elite Four at Cerise Island due to the challenge they pose to his own ambitions. He successfully defeats Lance but retreats when Lugia is summoned. He is missing for the Gold/Silver/Crystal arc (at which point the Mask of Ice takes over Team Rocket) but returns for the FireRed/LeafGreen arc, where he uses Team Rocket with new lieutenants to capture an escaped Deoxys in the Sevii Islands for use in locating his lost son, which apparently was his underlying motivation all along. He is also shown to be suffering from long-term health conditions at the time. He uses Deoxys to battle Red and Mewtwo while his underlings retrieve his son, although they do not meet until Giovanni had been knocked out after losing the battle. Giovanni risks his life protecting his son, shown to be Silver, from the flames of the crashed airship and although he appears to die, Silver gains some affection for his father and has his Pokémon take Giovanni to his Secret Base for recovery. He returns in the HeartGold/SoulSilver arc, where he teams up with Pryce and Lance to fight the legendary Pokémon from Sinnoh, taking on Giratina in battle. Silver ultimately takes over the fight and defends Giovanni when he's incapacitated by his diseased, and Giovanni is later cured with help from Celebi, at which point he decides to continue leading Team Rocket. He later appears in a supporting role in the Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire arc.
• Giovanni is featured in the Pokémon Origins anime, which is based more directly on the story of the first generation games. Giovanni is shown to have encountered Red at the Rocket Hideout and Silph Co. before battling him at the Viridian City Gym. When fighting Red at the gym, he was reminded of the passion he used to have for battling and became ashamed with his current self. This led to him disbanding Team Rocket after being defeated by Red and seeking a new path for himself.
• He also appears in the Pokémon Generations anime, where several episodes involve Looker attempting to track down Giovanni. In one episode, Giovanni watches from a nearby hill as Looker raids his empty gym. In another episode, Looker questions Silver about Giovanni's whereabouts, and Giovanni is seen in a flashback scene similar to the one seen in HeartGold/SoulSilver.

Trivia

• His English name is a play on "Geo", a prefix alluding to "earth", and Giovanni, a common Italian name. This seems to be due to comparing Team Rocket to an Italian mafia. His original Japanese name is Sakaki, named after a sacred tree from the Shinto religion on which the Earth Badge's design is based.
• While he specializes in Ground types, he also uses Normal Types.
• It was often speculated in early years of the Pokémon series that Red (or Ash in the anime) was Giovanni's illegitimate son, but this was debunked by a scientist in FireRed and LeafGreen who briefly assumed that Red was Giovanni's son, before remembering that Giovanni's son actually had red hair. This also foreshadowed HeartGold/SoulSilver officially revealing Silver being Giovanni's actual son (a plot point which had earlier been implemented into the manga).
• It is unclear if the Team Rainbow Rocket appearances are by the original version of Giovanni or one that has traveled from another world.