Although the live-action adaptation of Detective Pikachu has proven to be a hit with casual audiences and Pokemon fans alike, it wasn’t exactly everyone’s first choice of Pokemon source material to bring to the big screen. So why did the studios decide on Detective Pikachu as the franchise’s big live-action debut?

Speaking to Comicbook.com, Detective Pikachu writer Benji Samit revealed that the decision had been made long before he and co-writer Dan Hernandez were brought on board. Samit believes that The Pokemon Company and Legendary Pictures wanted to do something completely different with Pokemon’s live-action debut, not rehash something everyone had seen before. In that respect, an obscure spin-off game with a unique premise like Detective Pikachu was the perfect fit.

“When we first got involved, it was already Detective Pikachu. I think some of those conversations happened before us. Detective Pikachu is what Legendary and the Pokemon Company were in agreement of. If we’re going to make a live action Pokemon movie, it needs to be different. It needs a reason to exist. We don’t want to just remake movies we’ve already seen before.

I think they rightfully thought this weird side-game that most people were not familiar with was actually a really cool thing to see in live action. Ryme City and Pokemon and people living together is such a cinematic thing [and] that’s what they wanted to do from very early on. When we first heard about it, we were like, ‘Yeah, that sounds awesome!'”

What do you think? Was Detective Pikachu the best choice for the first live-action Pokemon movie? Let us know in the comments.