Janine: the Fuchsia Gym Leader who took over from her father

Swap the syllables of her name and you get "ninja," and the game makes no secret of it. Janine has run the Gym in Fuchsia City ever since her father Koga moved up to the Elite Four, with the same specialty and the same traps. She's also the only Kanto Gym Leader the anime has never put on screen: everything we know about her comes from the games, the manga and the cards.

Contents

• A Gym Passed Down from Father to Daughter
• The Same Traps, Plus Look-Alikes
• A Meal Delivered, a Number Saved, a Monday Rematch
• From the Pokémon World Tournament to the Mobile Game
• In the Manga, a Thief in Search of a Master
• Janine at a Glance
• Frequently Asked Questions

A Gym Passed Down from Father to Daughter

Janine debuts in Gold, Silver and Crystal, at the exact moment when Koga leaves Fuchsia City to take his seat on the Elite Four. The vacant post goes to his daughter, who keeps the family specialty: the Poison type.

This handover is a rarity in the series: Gym Leaders rarely move on, and almost never in favor of a member of their own family. Here, the post, the city and the type stay in the same household from one generation of games to the next.

FireRed and LeafGreen show the other end of the timeline. There you can come across Janine as a child, near the Fuchsia City zoo, where she talks about the training her father puts her through. What she says about Koga gets recorded in the Fame Checker, and her overworld sprite is the generic Lass one.

The Same Traps, Plus Look-Alikes

The Gym wasn't redesigned for the new Gym Leader. Janine inherits her father's invisible walls, and the path leading to her is exactly the same as in Koga's day.

Yet the building adds a challenge that belongs to her alone: the Gym's other Trainers have taken on her appearance. So the player makes their way through several identical Janines, only one of whom is the real one.

The trick shifts the challenge. Identifying the Gym Leader becomes a puzzle before it becomes a battle — ninja logic applied to the layout of the place rather than to the moves.

🥷 A ninja on the shelf has to be earned: see the Pokémon figures.

A Meal Delivered, a Number Saved, a Monday Rematch

In HeartGold and SoulSilver, the Gym Leader can be battled again once you've beaten her the first time. You still have to go find her somewhere other than her Gym.

Every day, between 4 and 6 p.m., Janine heads to the building at the entrance to Victory Road: she brings Koga his meal there. A player who talks to her at that exact moment leaves with her number saved in the Pokégear.

The next meeting takes place at the Fighting Dojo in Saffron City, on Mondays, between 10 a.m. and 8 p.m. The detour says a lot about the character: Fuchsia City's Gym Leader spends as much time looking after her father as guarding her Gym.

From the Pokémon World Tournament to the Mobile Game

Black 2 and White 2 take her out of Kanto and enter her in the Pokémon World Tournament. You can face her in several brackets, including the one that brings together Poison-type experts, and the one that gathers the Kanto Gym Leaders.

The format shapes her roster: three Pokémon in Single Battles, four in Double and Rotation Battles, all six in Triple Battles. The gender and Ability of her partners vary from one battle to the next, and beating her earns you one Battle Point.

The mobile game Pokémon Masters has featured her since launch, in her outfit from the Johto remakes. There she forms a default sync pair with an Ariados, and an alternate sync pair with a Crobat that you unlock with a Sync Pair Voucher. Her profile sums her up in one sentence: she has taken over the Pokémon of a father she idolizes.

In the Manga, a Thief in Search of a Master

The manga adaptation gives her a motive the games never mention: like Koga, she is looking for a master to serve. The story also pits her against Suicune.

She does run the Fuchsia City Gym, but leaves it now and then for small jobs. In one of them, she steals a fake pearl in Goldenrod City — not to sell it, but to test the building's security.

Her strongest scene plays out at the Indigo Plateau, during the Gym Leaders' competition. Facing Falkner, she is on the verge of winning, then forfeits the match and leaves the field to follow a man she believes is her father. The story never reveals whether they found each other.

Janine at a Glance

Frequently Asked Questions

• Who is Janine in Pokémon?
  Koga's daughter and the Gym Leader of the Fuchsia City Gym. She takes over the post when her father joins the Elite Four, and she uses the same Poison type he does.
• How do you get Janine's phone number?
  By talking to her between 4 and 6 p.m. in the building at the entrance to Victory Road, where she brings Koga his meal. Her number is then saved in the Pokégear.
• Why are there several Janines in the Fuchsia City Gym?
  Because the Gym's other Trainers have taken on her appearance to make the challenge harder. Only one of them is the real Gym Leader, and the layout reuses Koga's invisible walls.
• Does Janine appear in the anime?
  No. To date, she is the only Kanto Gym Leader who has never appeared in it: you only see her in the games, the manga and the card game.
• Where can you battle Janine again after earning her badge?
  At the Fighting Dojo in Saffron City, on Mondays between 10 a.m. and 8 p.m., in HeartGold and SoulSilver, once her number is saved.

In short

Janine holds a strange place in the gallery of Gym Leaders: she exists everywhere except on screen. The games give her a Gym, a family routine and several tournaments; the manga invents a quest for a master and a commissioned theft for her; the card game features her Pokémon as early as 2001 in Japan, and devotes a card to her in 2019 in France with the Sun & Moon—Unbroken Bonds expansion. A Gym Leader by inheritance, who never needed an episode to stand on her own.