Pikachu ex
Quick take
- Day half of a Day and Night Special Illustration Rare pair with Pikachu ex 150/128
- Illustrated by kantaro; the regular print at 053/128 is by 5ban Graphics
- 190 HP Basic Lightning Pokemon ex, Fighting weakness, no resistance, retreat 1
- About two dozen Pokemon in the crowd, four of which (Fuecoco, Mew, Sylveon, Salamence) have their own SIRs
Collector's readWhat it means for your master set
Set landscapeWhere this card sits in 30th Celebration
VariantsCard variants
Holofoil 149/128 · $49.17 — the only variant this card was printed in (no reverse holo or special pattern), so a master set needs just this one copy.
The storyHalf of the set's crowd, and half of a pair you will want to finish
30th Celebration already gives every pack one of thirty numbered Pikachu, so a Special Illustration Rare Pikachu ex has to offer something else. kantaro's answer is a crowd. The Day card puts about two dozen Pokemon into one parade, and every species in it also has a card somewhere in the set, so the picture works as a guide to the checklist. Four of them, Fuecoco, Mew, Sylveon and Salamence, also have Special Illustration Rares of their own.
“Day half of a Day and Night Special Illustration Rare pair with Pikachu ex 150/128”
It pairs with the Night card, 150/128, also by kantaro. The two are separate cards with different attacks, not one card painted twice, and most collectors will treat them as a single binder slot that takes two pulls or two purchases to fill.
The attacks follow the parade idea. Pika-Pika Parade costs one Colorless Energy and puts any number of Basic Pokemon from your deck onto your Bench. Thunderbolt does 200 and discards all Energy from Pikachu ex.
By the numbersMarket analysis
Day Pikachu sits in a tight middle group of the ten Special Illustration Rares, close to Jirachi ex and Mewtwo ex. Mew ex leads the set's numbered cards, Gengar ex is second and Night Pikachu third. The Day card has traded at or below the Night card in every market we track, in English and in Japan.
Roughly halved since release day, one of the steeper falls among the set's SIRs, and the Night card has held up better. Day Pikachu also appears to be the most traded of them, which fits a card that is easy to want and fairly easy to pull. Singles across the set have fallen in the first three weeks, because the hit rates are generous and supply kept arriving, including a wave of booster bundles in early October.
Not a card to rush. Prices have fallen for three weeks, the Ultra-Premium Collections add more packs in November, and a specific SIR in this set is far easier to pull than in a typical modern set. If you need it for the binder, the steady decline argues for waiting or for buying it together with the Night card when a seller offers both.
Too early to say. Three weeks after release there is no meaningful PSA or CGC population to price a graded copy against, and no reliable reports yet on how this card centres.
About 1 in 210 packs for this specific card, from a count of more than 3,000 English packs. Any SIR turns up about once in 21 packs. A 9-pack Elite Trainer Box gives roughly a 4% chance at this card and about a 36% chance at some SIR. Pulling both Day and Night Pikachu takes around 307 packs on average.
These are friendly odds by modern standards. Recent Mega Evolution sets run about 1 in 80 packs for any SIR, so a specific SIR in this set is easier to reach than in most current sets. Ten SIRs sit between the illustration rares and the two Futuristic rares. The RGB Mew cards are numbered outside the set and are far rarer than anything here.
ArtworkWhy the art matters
kantaro painted both the Day and Night Special Illustration Rares. The standard prints are by different hands: 5ban Graphics did the Day regular print, 053/128, and takuyoa did the Night regular print, 054/128.
A daytime parade under a blue sky full of confetti and streamers. Pikachu runs through the centre with Fuecoco beside it, Family of Four Maushold on the left, Slowpoke's face filling the bottom of the frame and a Roaming Form Gimmighoul carrying its coin. Moltres and Articuno fly overhead at the top right, with Lapras raising its neck beside them. The crowd also includes Exeggcute, Alolan Exeggutor, Volbeat, Poke Ball Pattern Vivillon, Mew, Espeon, Sylveon, Drifloon, Cosmog, Nidorina, Salamence, Hakamo-o, Meowth, Ditto, Igglybuff and a Morpeko half out of frame on the right.
Special Illustration Rare, numbered 149/128 in the secret block above the 128-card numbered set. Every card in a 30th Celebration pack is foil, so the extended art and the number set it apart. The large 30th anniversary stamp sits on the art, as on every SIR in the set.
Several cameos seem to answer ones on the Night card: Mew here and Mewtwo there, Espeon and Umbreon, Volbeat and Illumise, Cosmog and Cosmoem, Moltres and Articuno here with Zapdos at night. That is our own reading of the two crowds rather than anything official. What is on the cards is this: between the Day and Night crowds, every other Pokemon with a Special Illustration Rare in the set turns up, Fuecoco, Mew, Sylveon and Salamence by day and Greninja, Mewtwo, Gengar and Jirachi by night. Kept side by side, the two Pikachu work as an index to the whole SIR page.
BackgroundAbout Pikachu ex
Pikachu has been the face of Pokemon since the anime made it the lead in 1997, a role it did not have in the original games, where it was one Electric Pokemon among several. Thirty years later it anchors an anniversary set that gives it thirty separate illustrations plus two Special Illustration Rares.
- ›The most recognisable Pokemon by a wide margin, inside the hobby and outside it
- ›The central motif of this set, which concentrates attention on its Pikachu cards
- ›Illustration-led Pikachu cards appealing to buyers who do not otherwise collect competitively
- ›Pokemon Red and Green, 1996, as an ordinary Electric-type encounter
- ›The animated series from 1997, which made it the franchise mascot
- ›Pokemon Yellow, 1998, as the starter that follows the player around
Pika-Pika Parade is a one-Energy search that fills your Bench with any number of Basic Pokemon, which is a real setup tool. Thunderbolt does 200 but discards all Energy from Pikachu ex. The Night card plays differently: its first attack attaches Energy from hand rather than searching for Pokemon.
Own it wellCollector guide
The busy crowd and confetti hide surface scratches until you tilt the card into the light, so inspect it at an angle. One collector has reported a red ink band across the top of a Day Pikachu, the same misprint seen on some Mew ex and Gengar ex SIRs. Treat any such copy as a separate purchase, not a binder copy.
Wait. There is no useful population data yet, and with raw prices still falling, the gap between a raw copy and a graded one is not worth paying for until gem rates are known. Read the grading guide →
Penny sleeve, then a semi-rigid or a well-fitted toploader. If the Day and Night cards share a binder page, put them in neighbouring pockets so the two crowds sit side by side. See the storage guide →
Decide on the pair first. Night costs more than Day, so if you pulled the Night card, Day is the cheaper half to buy. If you have neither, buying both together from one seller usually beats chasing them separately. Waiting has paid so far, and the November Ultra-Premium Collections add more packs. Those boxes also carry a separate YOSHIROTTEN Pikachu ex promo, which belongs on your promo list, not in the numbered set. See the singles buying guide →
Check the card number, 149/128, and compare the crowd against a known scan of the card. Look at the foil pattern under angled light and buy from sellers who accept returns.
Protect your card
High Chase Score — protect and consider grading. · Amazon affiliate links · Storage guideWord on the streetCommunity sentiment
The parade idea has gone down well, and the Day and Night pair has been called the widest range of Pokemon ever put on single cards. The common complaint is the large anniversary stamp printed over the art, a complaint that applies to every SIR in the set.
Most talk has been about who appears in the crowd and about pulling both halves. Pull reports vary a lot, from people with both Pikachu in a few dozen packs to people with one SIR in nearly eighty, which is what odds of about 1 in 210 per card look like in practice.
Good to knowFrequently asked questions
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