Descriptions:
🏳️🌈 This video is part of the Pokémon Pride 2026 Fundraiser 🏳️🌈
Please consider donating to support queer youth in need at the Lambert House LGBTQ+ Youth Center in Seattle: https://donate.tiltify.com/cb41b632-87ee-49da-b175-efaf83d9a3b9
Maddie Blaustein was, to put mildly, a big nerd. The type of nerd who would DM D&D sessions from childhood and, according to her brother, create intricate and vivid worlds complete with their own individual languages. She was intersex and a transgender woman, in a time when even fewer people understood what that meant. And, as one of the most prolific voice actors for anime in the 90s, you probably grew up hearing her voice in shows like Sonic X, Kirby, Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokémon, as one of the most iconic characters in the entire series, and according to anime head writer Takeshi Shudo, who the real protagonist of the series could’ve been: Meowth.
Maddie’s story is beautiful and tragic, and it’s honestly heartwarming how much there is to say about her — because of the sheer amount of articles that her friends have lovingly written in her honor. An artist who could voice femme fatales and Yugi’s Grandpa. But this is also a video about, not only the power of stories to help us understand who we are, but the sheer magnitude of raw queerness in Team Rocket, enough to empower a trans woman to go live her life, her best life.
🐦 Follow my other channels!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPzjTyCEbtf2dKI-AWFoVzg
https://bsky.app/profile/cecilily.bsky.social
https://www.twitch.tv/cecililystreams
📧 cecililycontact@gmail.com
🖊Sources and extra material:
http://www.style.fm/as/05_column/shudo184.shtml
https://awesomedbycomics.blogspot.com/2008/12/i-was-extremely-saddened-to-learn-of.html
https://www.comicsbeat.com/rip-maddie-blaustein-3/
https://www.them.us/story/maddie-blaustein-pokemon
I want to draw special attention to an intersex short film made in the 90’s by Lynell Stephani. This is where I got most footage of Maddie from.
Watch “Still The One,” about a relationship with an intersex person: https://youtu.be/PDqOSxxD1to?is=SEWBVIBLRY8QnKXS
📚Chapters:
0:00 – Maddie Blaustein
3:22 – Go West, Young Meowth
9:47 – Team Rocket and Takeshi Shudo
18:20 – People living in-between
23:02 – Pokémon Pride
🎵 In this video, you listened to Pokémon HGSS, Pokémon: the Movie, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Mario Kart World.