📚📕📘📗 /mg/ Sapphire Resources 📗📘📕📚

A collection of Sapphire Birch resources! Anyone can help edit this page. Edit code: "maymays"

Current Sapphire status: Waiting for Volume 65's release, which will contain the true ending to the ORAS arc (it's been 10 years)

📖 Manga Reading List (Spoiler free) 📖

The following links are either broken or modified.

📖 Who is Sapphire? (Spoilers) 📖

Official Biographies

Emerald Arc Bio (English)

From Volume 29.

Pokespedia Biography pages (Japanese)

Page 1 is from Bulbapedia, page 2 is low res. Note: There's actually a lot of incorrect or inaccurate information in this book.

Anon's Summary

>>57774706
So what’s Manga May’s/Sapphire deal? Im loosely familiar with the manga but my understanding is that the dex holders tend to have some sort of gimmick, Gold is especially good at hatching pokemon, Kris is especially at catching, Selene is a super genius, etc So May’s thing is that she acts like a dog?

>>57774716
Yeah basically. There's actually a lot of different Pokemon manga and multiple different manga Mays (see this chart >>57767792 for some of them). But the most popular manga is Pokemon Special (Japanese title)/Pokemon Adventures (English title), and the May in this series is named Sapphire. All the main characters in this series (Pokedex holders) are named after the main Pokemon games, so in this universe Kris is actually named "Crystal" and Selene is named "Moon" and so on. All the main characters have a gimmick to make them unique, and they're also given a semi-official "title" to represent their gimmick (which aren't story important anymore, it's just a way to make the gimmicks look official desu). So Gold's the "Hatcher" and Crystal's the "Catcher" etc. Many of these titles have no official English translations, they're often fan translations from Japanese exclusive sources.

Anyway in my opinion, Sapphire's gimmick is "nature". As in being a nature expert. She's so knowledgable and in tune with nature that she can just live in the jungle alone Tarzan style and not die, in fact she thrives and gets animal superpowers and shit. Her dedication to nature ends up making her act like a retarded dog compared to normal people. But in the end she usually does the right thing and helps save the day, so ultimately nobody cares how weird she is.

(The only people who can't let go of the the dog thing are people obsessed with appearances over character. Like Ruby the vain contest boy, whose story parallels Sapphire's in the RS story arc.)

>>57774795
But there's some old translation controversy I don't see discussed anymore, about what Sapphire's actual gimmick/gimmick title is. Which is why I earlier said her gimmick being "nature" is just my opinion.

On Bulbapedia she's listed as the "Conqueror". "Conqueror" is (probably) a fan translation, and it's also vague as hell, but Western fans usually think it's referencing Sapphire getting all 8 Hoenn badges really fast. Her Bulbapedia title is a translation of 究める者 which I can't read lol. The drama is I've seen some people years ago claim the correct translation is more like the "Scholar" or something, referencing Sapphire's dedication to and study of nature. While I think the "Scholar' makes more sense for her character and Hoenn's story, I don't know how to verify anything.

What made the confusion extra contentious back then is that, if Sapphire's title actually has been mistranslated for the past decade plus, then this would be just part of a wider trend of the Western fanbase completely flanderizing her character. Misunderstanding a dex holder's title means fundamentally missing the point of their existence. The "Conqueror" might not mean anything specific, but it sounds masculine and Sapphire's "totally a violent frothing feminist girlboss who conquers shit just to display her power" or something. Meanwhile the "Scholar" implies Sapphire has interests outside of being a hyper masculine tsundere tomboy stereotype, that she isn't actually into destroying things for personal gain, that she's studious/intelligent in a unique non conformist way, and that her chosen subject of study- nature- is often associated with the feminine.

>>57774803
> 極める者
Conqueror is such a liberal translation, especially the "極める" part. Yes it does work in a technical sense, but it conveys the wrong tone. It's more like "to reach the extreme/peak" or "to master" which I don't have a great alternative in mind. Conqueror fits a character like Black more than Sapphire, but he's the Dreamer (夢みる者), and for good reason. Basically, I agree with your last paragraph in the sense that Conqueror gives the wrong message about her dexholder title, and it's probably part of a bigger issue (when PokeSpe's fandom was very alive) of mischaracterization because of bad TLs and bad interpretations that kept spreading from reader to reader.

>>57774858
Honestly the dex holder titles are kind of dumb on a conceptual level after GSC, they're not really used inside the story itself anymore. If a character is good at something then others can usually acknowledge it without going "omg we need the Hatcher™ to hatch this egg". The titles these days seem like marketing stuff for the Japanese audience, a quick way to show how unique the manga versions of these characters are in a single word, even if the titles are getting increasingly weird over the years (X is the "Hermit" as if that's a positive trait kek). But on the international side, the dex holder titles just create more opportunities for confusion since there aren't many official English translations for them.

As for "to master" yeah that's one of the other translations I used to see thrown around. It sounds vague too but maybe it could be referencing Sapphire grinding hardcore and studying in the woods for years, or something, since that's actually unique to her story. If her title was actually just about gaining badges, pure physical training or just "working hard in general" without reference to nature, then many other dex holders like Black would also fall under the same category and Sapphire wouldn't be unique in that aspect.

>>57774795
i see now, and I think "nature" makes sense. With the other protags their theme seems to be related to something significant about their game, Hoenn had an emphasis on environments and the balance between humanity and nature.
>>57774803
"Scholar" also works is she's supposed to be Birch's daughter. She's essentially doing field research taken up 11

>>57777450
Yeah Sapphire's occupation is technically "field researcher", she just follows in her dad's footsteps (a contrast to Ruby who rebelled hard against his own dad). During the timeskips it's shown that while Ruby continues to pursue his contest career, Sapphire's just out in the wild "researching". But the field research thing kinda just sounds like an excuse for Sapphire to keep playing in the woods 24/7 and maintain the Tarzan nature girl gimmick desu. The ORAS arc basically reveals Sapphire's true role in the world is Hoenn's lorekeeper which makes so much more sense than being a mere researcher, it makes her weird animal superpowers and hero theme (versus Ruby's anti-hero) and vague Hoenn nationalism relevant and is perfectly in line with the overall trajectory of her character arc. Which is why the ORAS arc isn't completely awful, it had great ideas and was clearly part of Kusaka's long term plan, but the execution was just done in the worst way possible.

Sapphire Outfits

Refer to the May Identification Guide for comparisons to other similar-looking Mays.

📖 Relationships (Spoilers) 📖

Pokespedia Relationship Chart (Japanese)

Full chart

Romance

Another fun one in hindsight was at the end of volume 15 where the guy literally admits Ruby and Sapphire will fall in love, spoiling his whole story in advance. But since he drops the comment so early on in RS, nobody noticed, since at the time Ruby and Sapphire looked more likely to kill each other than fuck.

Summary

I can't post images here anymore, but according to the Pokespedia, basically all the protagonists are labelled "friends" unless stated otherwise.

Protagonist non-romances:
>Red + Green (male) + Blue (female) + Yellow, probably = friends
>Green (male) + Yellow = "master + trainee"
>Gold + Silver + Crystal = friends
>Blue (female) + Silver = "just as good as family"
>Ruby + Emerald + Sapphire, probably = friends
>Diamond + Pearl + Platinum = friends
>Diamond + Pearl = "partners"
>Black + White + Whitley = friends
>Blake = "infiltrator" (into the BW friend group above)
>White ---> Black = "employment"
>X + Y = friends
>Sun + Moon = friends
>Sun --- > Moon = "client"

Very few relationships are labelled "romance" in the chart, there's only like 6, and most of them are just literal background characters unrequited crushing on someone else:
>Yellow --- > Red = onesided romance
>Misty --- > Red = onesided romance
>Bill --- > Daisy = onesided romance
>Ruby + Sapphire = mutual romance
>Some BW Youngster --- > Yancy (I think that's her name?) = onesided romance
>Chaz --- > Lisia = onesided romance

Franticshipping is genuinely the exception in all of this by being mutual. (Though you could argue the chart is leaving some romances/unrequited crushes out, but deciding which ones those are would be a whole new can of worms.)

📖 Meta Summaries (Spoilers) 📖

Summary of Sapphire in Pokemon Special/Pokemon Adventures

On Sapphire, I'm too tired to find the chapters but

>Early RS arc (generally volumes 15-17) is peak "what couldve been" if Sapphire stayed a real MC. By the time she teams up with Ruby (end of vol 19) it's his show and you don't get as much solo Sapphire content ever again, she becomes a background character. Her best gym battles are with Roxanne, Brawly, and Winona

>Later RS arc (vol 19-21) is full of Ruby/Sapphire shipping (Franticshipping) for better or for worse. If you like shipping, this shit was enough to make the RS arc the most popular one in Japan, people went crazy. But if you don't like that then this is where you'd stop reading. Sapphire looks extra pretty here though as the artwork changes

>We don't talk about vol 22

>Midway through the Emerald arc (vol 28-29) has Sapphire chilling with her BFF not-boyfriend in the background. It's the only time we see them in a light hearted story after RS as the Hoenn arcs can be very dramatic. Sapphire also meets older Kanto/Johto MCs and fangirls over them. Between that and her growing up (she's less aggressive and much happier/cuter) her portrayal here is one of her most popular, down to her iconic blue outfit. Most fanart even today shows her from this point in the timeline

>The ORAS arc is shit and nobody should read it, except maybe the end (vol 64-65) where Sapphire and Ruby kinda get married but I'd still say it's optional, everyone knew that'd happen anyway.

Besides that Sapphire doesn't show up except rare vague mentions. Also her every appearance shows character development, yeah even in the awful ORAS arc and anyone who says it's "character regression" is objectively wrong. But it won't make sense if you skipped Ruby's parts as everything in Sapphire's story is an inverted mirror of his, it's hard to see them in isolation as they were written to be a pair

Online Sources Summary

Also here's PokeSpe reading links for Sapphire content, sadly I can't link to specific chapters as my better source died, so you might have to scroll a lot.
>Volume 15: https://weebcentral.com/chapters/01J76XYYRH4XC6SSH3JN724ZR1
>Volume 19: https://weebcentral.com/chapters/01J76XYYRHE95SG9BEXY409D6R
>Volume 21: https://weebcentral.com/chapters/01J76XYYRHP01CGN4SAS8Y1Z6F
>Volume 28: https://weebcentral.com/chapters/01J76XYZ3NNSFAREDXDYT0BCJ3
>ORAS spoiler scene: https://mangadex.org/chapter/eab644ef-2425-490c-a9bd-8544a76a64e8/22
For the last one, volume 64 doesn't have an official English edition yet, and volume 65 hasn't even been released in Japan and has been delayed for years, because (insert random Kusaka excuse here)

📖 Trivia (Spoilers) 📖

Official Trivia

Various Trivia

There was an entire site on netkun that they ran dedicated to random trivia about the characters and worldbuilding. It went down during the switch to the current PokeSpe website (which hasn't been updated since 2022). A fan did archive the trivia, info on Sapphire is linked below. A lot of newer fans don't appreciate the amount of work that went into PokeSpe because those resources aren't exactly the most conspicuous, which is a shame.
https://pkspedia.com/02_datebase/05_overchap/urasettei/poken-tover-urasettei1.html#sapphire

Summary:

>Sapphire didn't know what Pokemon Centers were
>Sapphire knows how EVs work
>Sapphire is a vet
>Sapphire's Wailord did not commit genocide
Love the bullshit explanation for why she could read Ruby's note too, she can sense "feelings" from paper? Kusaka, just admit it was an oversight.

Starter Pokemon Change

Mizugorou = Mudkip Kimori = Treecko Achamo = Torchic

>>57801896
>>57801926
https://dogasu.bulbagarden.net/read/comics/gen-multiple/1997_pocket_monsters_special/story/pocket_monsters_special_story_mfbs_ruby_sapphire_03.html##File-04

>After we figured out Ruby's team we had to do the same for Sapphire. Since Sapphire is a wild girl we wanted to give her pokemon who gave off the image of being real monsters. Don't pokemon like Bossgodora, Donphan, and Tropius give off that monster vibe? When you line them up next to Ruby's pokemon you can clearly see each Trainer's personality reflected in their teams.

>But it's because of that that we had trouble with choosing the starter pokemon.

>We had already talked about rotating from Grass to Fire to Water with each new Chapter but I had to give out one of each to a main character, a rival, and a heroine.

>The rule had been to give the rival character the starter that was strong (Type-wise) against the pokemon given to the main character. And then the heroine would get the pokemon that was the Type strong against the rival's pokemon.

>With this rule in mind, and because we had already decided to give Mizugorou to Ruby, Sapphire would have gotten Kimori if she had been the rival. We thought that Jukain, the final evolved form of Kimori, was a perfect fit for Sapphire and so at first we gave her Kimori.

>>57804349
>Sapphire's going to have a Kimori...after deciding that I asked Mr. Yamamoto about it but to tell you the truth we were still going back and forth between Kimori and Achamo even then. If you look at how Ruby and Sapphire are competing with each other to reach their goals then Sapphire is definitely Ruby's rival. But to me, I was thinking that maybe Sapphire is the heroine instead...?

>We debated about this up until the eleventh hour but decided at the last minute to have a new Grass-Type using rival show up later. So Sapphire slid into the role of the heroine and had her pokemon changed to Achamo. This was before "Pocket Monsters Emerald" had even been thought up (laughs)

>Because of this, the rough sketches of Sapphire's very first scene had her with a Kimori, not Achamo. When I was going over the rough drafts I had to go to Mr. Yamamoto and say "I'm sorry but could you please change this Achamo into a Kimori?" And so he redrew it. This was the main thing that the two of us fought about. We had already hashed out the basic plot of the Chapter but the small details like who gets what pokemon and how that would affect the battles that take place is something that caused us a lot of headaches.

So yep, Sapphire almost got Treecko.

>>57804349
>>57804357
Yeah Treecko made the most sense for Sapphire regardless of heroine status. A Pokemon of the wilds for female Tarzan.

>>57804419
Yeah when you put it that way Sapphire getting Treecko makes sense. But I can also see why Kusaka and Yamamoto kept arguing about it to the point of redrawing panels.

Sapphire gets Treecko:
>Wild girl wearing leaves gets the leafiest starter
>Treecko actually fits in the woods
>Fits Sapphire's individual theme more

Sapphire gets Torchic:
>Fire is Water's direct opposite, just like Sapphire is Ruby's opposite, down to the inverted red/blue colors, and the whole plot is based on their relationship
>Add to the newish trend at the time, of starter typing trainer stereotypes (Green and Gold alone didn't have much in common, though others like Blue (f)/Silver/Ruby had a clear trend)
>Sapphire can later join Green (m) and Gold to form Team Blast Burn (very based)

Sapphire getting Torchic kind of embeds her better into the wider Pokespe cast and story as a whole. But if the story was just about Sapphire by herself, for example if there was only one Hoenn "chosen one" like in the RSE games (unlike Pokespe RS which insisted on 2 complementary Hoenn chosen ones for the Orbs) and it was her, then Treecko would be the obvious pick. Then again the ORAS arc implied there is only ever one Hoenn Lorekeeper chosen one at a time, that after Aster died it's now Sapphire. As much as Ruby quite tragically tried to be Lorekeeper for her, he just doesn't have magic nature powers and he would've died (without shitty ORAS writing giving him retconned plot armor anyway). But either way, at most I think he's just meant to be a clingy orbiter to the real Lorekeeper Sapphire, and everyone else could tell, but they just let him follow her to space so he'd stop crying. Anyway maybe in hindsight that's another point to Treecko, I don't know.

Pokemon Team

>>57815031

Also the Sapphire page in that site is full of funny commentary, or maybe it's just Google Translate making it sound funny.

https://w.atwiki.jp/aniwotawiki/pages/18296.html

Summary:

>List of Pokemon held by Sapphire, a character in "Pocket Monsters SPECIAL".

>If you just look at their typings, the lineup is very orthodox and well-balanced.

>Sapphire is good at tactics using the broad knowledge she gained from helping Professor Birch with his field work in the environment.

>However, perhaps because of the contrast with Ruby, who pursues the beauty of Pokemon, there aren't many individual episodes focusing on Sapphire's Pokemon, and most of them end up being ignored. Seriously, how did it come to this?

>Sapphire's nicknaming rule is make puns with the Pokemon species name. It's a simple idea, but it's better than Red's Pokemon...

>◆ Chamo (Torchic -> Combusken -> Blaziken)
>Mainstay #1. Evolves from Torchic that Professor Birch studied. Most trusted by Sapphire, she's often forced to fight Flying-types, which she struggles with. She learns the ultimate fire move "Blast Burn" in Chapter 6. Mega Evolution in Chapter 13.

>◆ Dorara (Aron -> Lairon -> Aggron)
>Mainstay #2. A glutton that crunchies on iron. In Chapter 13, a surprising new fact is revealed that he was present at the Salamence incident 9 years ago.
>Thus, he seems to have initially viewed Zinnia's Salamence as an enemy, but by the final battle, perhaps due to Sapphire's reconciliation with Zinnia, he's smiling quite fondly.

>◆ Eruru (Wailord)
>Surfing member. Sapphire borrowed it from Birch but shows no signs of returning it. Eruru's large size and performance at the revival of the Regi trio at the end of the story prevent it from becoming invisible.

>◆ Tororo (Tropius)
>Flying member. Borrowed from Professor Birch. There aren't many opportunities for it to battle to begin with, and it doesn't have any real highlights.

>>57815053

>◆ Fadodo (Donphan)
>Captured during the journey. It's so empty that I don't see the point in having it in the team. What is this thing doing, honestly? But maybe in the expanded volume for Chapter 13...?

>◆ Jirara (Relicanth)
>A diver. He was rescued after being caught up in the disaster at the end of Chapter 4. He was key to solving the incident in many ways, but he can only be active in water and has never been used in battle. So many readers don't realize Sapphire captured him.

>◆ Minun
>Helped with training for the double battle on Mirage Island.

>◆ Kiruru (Kirlia -> Gallade)
>A new Pokemon from Chapter 13. He touched a Dawn Stone while training with RURU and evolved into Gallade. When he was a Kirlia, his eyes were a little sharper than RURU's.
>Note that Ruby's RURU evolved into Gardevoir at the same time. (RURU is a female and can only evolve into Gardevoir), so Emerald laughed about that while their Pokemons' forms are the opposite of their trainers' genders, it fits Ruby and Sapphire perfectly.

>○Considerations on battle tendencies

>Compared to Ruby, who uses his abundant battle sense to fight rationally, Sapphire can be said to be a trainer who uses the intuition she has cultivated in nature to fight with surprise.

>Ruby is the "talent" type, while Sapphire is the "sense" type.

>However, there is one aspect of Sapphire's battles that is very unreliable: her excessive trust in a specific Pokemon, Chamo (Blaziken).

>Because it's the Pokemon she received from her father, she trusts Chamo the most and uses it as her main force, with the rest of her Pokemon as support.

>However, perhaps because she trusts her opponent too much, she often tries to fight back with Chamo even if the opponent is a bad match (Ludicolo or Altaria).

>>57815065
>Also, perhaps because of her impulsive personality, Sapphire has a dangerous side where she loses focus when her own plan doesn't work or she is trapped by the opponent's plan.

>Overall, she fights like a beginner gamer who doesn't know how to battle efficiently. (Probably because she is imitating a certain boy who helped her in the past)

Confusingly the Japanese original text/fanbase call each PokeSpe story arc a "chapter", when in English a manga "chapter" usually means something else. So "Chapter 4" = RS arc, "Chapter 6" = Emerald arc, and "Chapter 13" = ORAS arc.

In the manga the Pokemon nicknames get changed across translations too, made worse when there's at least 2 official English translations for the RS arc. So Sapphire's Pokemon have 2 different sets of English nicknames. As if trying to keep up with this series isn't annoying enough.

Official Doodles

Doodles by the manga series artist Satoshi Yamamoto.

That comic sent me because not only has Sapphire magically learned to read again, but also the implication that Ruby doesn't have any redeeming qualities kek. He's also literally a Cancer (July 2). But Yamamoto probably just wrote it as a quick joke.

VIZ Censorship

Left: Chuang Yi (CY) translation Right: VIZ translation

Also found Sapphire's Emerald arc bio from the CY volumes and it's always hilarious to compare these pages to the Viz editions. CY was more direct with the translation while Viz keeps using euphemisms and straight up deletes shit sometimes. Why are American localizers like this?

Viz actually did delete every instance of and reference to Sapphire getting shitfaced.

Screenshot Compilations

Sapphire Sitting

"Do it for her"

Butt Gallery