Miles: Well, its time to review another card. Its Blaine's Charizard today,
which will probably be idolized by little kids as much as the Base and TR
Charizards. However, does it serve a purpose, unlike the others?

             Here are the stats:


Blaine's Charizard        100 HP           Evolves from Blaine's Charmeleon

 1 Fire: Fire Breath: 20+
  Discard all fire energy attached to this Pokemon not used to pay for this
attacks energy cost. This attack does 20 more damage for each fire energy
discarded in this way.

  2 Fire- Flame Flight
     Flip a coin. If heads, choose one of your opponents Pokemon. This attack
dpes 40 damage to that Pokemon. (Don't apply Weakness or Resistance)

 Weakness: Water      Resistance: Fighting -30     Retreat: 3 Colorless

    Lets start with the HP. HP-wise this card is an improvement over the Dark
Charizard. There's not much else to say about the HP. The attacks are a
different story. When this card comes out in the US, people will load enough
energy on Blaine's Charizard to do the ever-popular 100 damage. However, this
card will discard  as much energy to do "100 damage" as a base Zapdos. Ouch.
That's 4 energy discarded for 100 damage. If you dare to use Fire Breath, use
1 or 2 extra energy. Flame Flight is a mixed bag as well. Sure, 40 damage to
any Pokemon is OK, but it requires a coin flip. Also, a Pokemon on your
opponents bench would probably have higher HP than 40 by the time you get
Blaine's Charizard out(unless the opposing deck is a Wigglytuff deck loaded
with Clefairy Dolls and Mysterious Fossils).The usual triple retreat is seen
on this Charizard as well. The bottom line: If used improperly this Charizard
is the new king of discarding. Although it is probably the most useful of the
Charizards, there are far better cards in Gym 2 (Sabrina's Abra's evolution
chain, TR Mewtwo).

              I can be contactes at  <A HREF="xmiles123@aol.com">xmiles123@aol
.com</A>

                                                                             
   ~Miles