Wikstrom: the steel knight of the Kalos Elite Four

He's the only Trainer in the Kalos League who speaks a language from centuries past. Wikstrom sits on the Elite Four, specializes in the Steel type and, in the games, speaks the way people wrote four centuries earlier. Behind the verbal quirk lies a fully rounded character: a chamber named after metalworking, a castle where you train in armor, and a string of battles he loses almost every time.

Contents

• A Knight Who Speaks a 400-Year-Old Tongue
• The Ironworks Chamber, and an Order Left to the Player
• Nine Pokémon on Record Around Him
• First Appearance: A Mega Scizor Swept Aside
• The Three Trials of the Castle of Chivalry
• Medals, a Metal Coat, Then the World Coronation Series
• Wikstrom at a Glance
• Frequently Asked Questions

A Knight Who Speaks a 400-Year-Old Tongue

Wikstrom sits on the Kalos League Elite Four and specializes in the Steel type. What sets him apart, though, isn't his specialty but the way he speaks, which belongs to no modern era.

In the French versions, the games have him use a mix of Middle French and Renaissance French, the forms of the language in use between the 14th and 16th centuries; the English versions give him Shakespearean English instead. It's a deliberate writing choice, not gratuitous eccentricity.

Since Kalos is the region modeled on France, Wikstrom stands in for its historical heritage, and its medieval heritage in particular. A knight down to his manners, he awards medals, crosses swords himself and judges Trainers on their vigor and their spirit of self-sacrifice.

The Ironworks Chamber, and an Order Left to the Player

You don't take on the top of the Kalos League in single file. Wikstrom, Drasna, Malva and Siebold can be battled in whatever order the player chooses, each with a chamber of their own.

Wikstrom's sits in the top left corner and bears a metalworker's name: the Ironworks Chamber. The setting announces his specialty before a single Pokémon is sent into battle.

His League title isn't the only one he holds, either, since he's also a Duke at the Battle Chateau. The mobile game, for its part, included him from launch, in his Pokémon X and Y outfit, as a sync pair with an Aegislash.

Nine Pokémon on Record Around Him

Across all media, nine Pokémon are associated with Wikstrom: Honedge, Aegislash, Scizor, Escavalier, Probopass, Klefki, Litwick and Dedenne, plus Goh's Scyther, which he only holds for the length of a trade.

Aegislash stands out as his signature partner. It's the one he's paired with in the mobile game, and it's also the one blocking Trainers' way during the final trial held at his castle.

Only one of them appears in Mega Evolved form, and that's on the big screen: Mega Scizor. The others are given very concrete roles — a magnetic field to endure, a key to carry, a defeat to swallow — which the episodes detail one by one.

🛡️ Armored Pokémon have their own section: browse the Pokémon figures.

First Appearance: A Mega Scizor Swept Aside

Wikstrom makes his entrance in the opening of the seventeenth movie, Diancie and the Cocoon of Destruction. A few shots are all it takes: he's shown in the middle of a Gym, facing Diantha and her Mega Gardevoir.

He sends out his Scizor, now Mega Evolved, and the type advantage does him no good whatsoever: a single attack is enough to knock his Pokémon out. The sequence lasts a few seconds and immediately establishes the region's pecking order.

One adaptation detail also sets the two media apart. The French dub of the anime doesn't have him speak Old French: the games' verbal quirk disappears in dubbing, and he talks like any other character.

The Three Trials of the Castle of Chivalry

The character comes into his own in episode 56 of Pokémon Journeys. He opens his Castle of Chivalry to anyone who wants to take an advanced training course, and Ash and Goh both sign up, with a Galarian Farfetch’d and a Scyther respectively.

The program comes down to three tasks, to be carried out in armor and for a Knight Medal. The first is to run ten laps around the building without giving in to the magnetic field generated by his Probopass; the second sends the candidates into the Labyrinth of Doubt, designed to tighten the bond between a Trainer and their Pokémon.

Wikstrom follows the labyrinth on camera and releases his own Pokémon to test the pairs; Ash's Farfetch’d worries him: powerful, but too much of a loner to reach its full potential. Finally, the third task is to retrieve the key carried by his Klefki, while he and his Aegislash block the way.

Medals, a Metal Coat, Then the World Coronation Series

The final trial turns into a sword duel between Wikstrom and the two Trainers, until Farfetch’d throws itself in front of Ash and takes a blow from Aegislash in his place. Goh and his Scyther seize the opening to grab the key.

All four participants receive their medals on the rooftops, then Wikstrom turns to Goh with an offer: to help his Pokémon reach the next level. One Metal Coat and a quick trade later, the Scyther has become a Scizor, and the training pays off in a very concrete way.

The anime then keeps him in the orbit of the World Coronation Series. Drasna comes to train at the castle, where Wikstrom's Escavalier is no match for her Altaria; he later turns up in Ash's waiting room, then in the audience, and finally in a podcast's listener mail, where he sides with Sirfetch’d ahead of the semifinal.

Wikstrom at a Glance

Frequently Asked Questions

• What type does Wikstrom use?
  The Steel type. He's a member of the Kalos League Elite Four, and nine Pokémon are associated with him across the games, movies and anime, including Aegislash, Scizor, Honedge and Klefki.
• Where can you battle Wikstrom in the games?
  In the Ironworks Chamber, the room at the top left of the Kalos League summit. Wikstrom, Drasna, Malva and Siebold can be battled in whatever order the player chooses.
• Why does Wikstrom talk so strangely?
  In the French versions, he mixes Middle French and Renaissance French, the forms of the language used between the 14th and 16th centuries; the English versions give him Shakespearean English. It's a metaphor for the historical and medieval heritage of France, which inspired Kalos. The French dub of the anime, however, drops this way of speaking.
• What happens at the Castle of Chivalry?
  Wikstrom runs an intensive training course there made up of three tasks, all completed in armor: ten laps around the castle under his Probopass's magnetic field, a trip through the Labyrinth of Doubt, then retrieving a key carried by his Klefki. Participants who succeed receive a Knight Medal.
• Does Wikstrom evolve a Pokémon in the anime?
  Yes. At the end of the training, he gives Goh's Scyther a Metal Coat: after a quick back-and-forth trade, the Pokémon evolves into Scizor.

In short

Wikstrom loses almost every battle the anime gives him, from the 17th movie to his duel against Drasna. That's not where his real value lies. Castle, armor, medals and Metal Coat: his contribution comes through what he passes on to other Trainers, and through a language no one else in the Kalos League speaks. A knight is judged by his students as much as by his record.