The Pokémon Trading Card Game has been releasing promo cards pretty much from the beginning, though one of the earliest, Ancient Mew, remains the most iconic. Certain movie theaters would give out these cards when tickets were sold for Pokémon: The Power of One. Since then, many promo cards have been released, but none were quite as impactful as Ancient Mew.
Although most of the Pokémon TCG’s event cards are pretty cool, none of them can quite match Ancient Mew. Not only does it have a unique aesthetic, but its text is written in runes. Translating these runes would have been more difficult 20 years ago, with Wizards of the Coast providing a translation sheet at events. With internet access being much less commonplace than it is now and the small chance of knowing someone with the translation sheet, Ancient Mew was a true enigma. Despite this, it’s not a valuable Pokémon TCG card, with only the Japanese version being worth much.
Interestingly, Ancient Mew is one of the few Pokémon TCG cards to appear in the Pokémon anime. Of these, it is the only one that wasn’t removed from the dub. In The Power of One, the Ancient Mew card is stated to be the reason that the antagonist, Lawrence III, started his collection of rare Pokémon artifacts. It was originally meant to have an even bigger role in the story, but the final version makes it the only time a TCG card has been relevant to the plot of the Pokémon anime.
20 years after making its debut, the Ancient Mew card was reprinted as part of the promotion for the film Mewtwo Strikes Back – Evolution. Sadly, this was exclusive to Japan and a slightly later distribution in South Korea. Hopefully, the card will eventually get a wider reprint for the rest of the Pokémon TCG players at some point in the future. Even if these cards make Ancient Mew more commonplace, making it lose value like other Pokémon TCG cards, simply owning such an iconic card would be reward enough.
With the reprint itself only a couple of years old, Ancient Mew is still very much a talking point within the Pokémon Trading Card Game community. It’s one of the most memorable promo cards in the franchise’s history, and that is unlikely to ever change. If it is ever given a more widely distributed reprint, it hopefully won’t start a supervillain’s evil collection habit this time.