The Pokémon cartoon’s about to reach a major milestone

Japanese viewers celebrated the Pokémon anime’s 1,000th episode back in November, and now it’s American audiences’ turn. As we noted when the Japanese episode aired, the version of the cartoon that’s aired in the U.S. has a different order than its Japanese counterpart; thankfully, the 1,000th episode set to air here is still a cute, special one.

“The Professors’ New Adventure,” set to air at 9 a.m. on Saturday, April 28, features one of the Pokémon Sun and Moon anime’s traditionally low-key storylines. Professor Kukui, one of the hottest bachelors in the Pokémon universe, is ready to finally settle down. Much to our disappointment, Kukui proposes to fellow hot single Professor Burnet after 50-plus episodes of romantic tension, robbing us of two of Pokémon’s few of-age crush material.

We’re not surprised that Kukui and Burnet hook up, since they’re already married in the Pokémon Sun and Moon games. Plus, we get the Pokémon anime’s first actual wedding out of all this, which sounds like a nice way to spend a Saturday morning.

Maybe the Pokémon cartoon left you behind when it moved from Kids’ WB to Cartoon Network, or you dumped it once you hit a certain age and Pokémon wasn’t a “cool” thing to like anymore. (Just one of myriad reasons why middle school was terrible, by the way.) But reaching 1,000 episodes is a rare accomplishment in television, animated or otherwise: The Simpsons has aired 633 episodes, for comparison. (Yeah, anime has far longer seasons ... but still.)

Even if you no longer tune in, it’s comforting that Pokémon is still going and has no signs of stopping anytime soon.