Pokemon Scarlet and Violet’s ghost dog, Greavard, is cute but dangerous

Candles, decorative sources of insufficient light collected and beloved by cultists, goth kids, and your one aunt with a dream catcher in her car who has purchased so many pumpkin spice lattes at Starbucks she’s actually had her name spelled correctly on one of their cups.

But if you’re the Pokemon Company and/or Game Freak, candles hold a much different set of meanings. See, if there’s a Pokemon with an open flame, that means nothing good.

Take the ever-popular evolutionary line of Charmander through Charizard. Sure, the flame on its tale looks cool but if it gets snuffed out…it DIES.

Likewise, Pokemon of the ghost variety like Litwick, Lampent, and Chandelure all have flames that represent the burning away of the souls around them.

In the seaside town of Pokemon Sword and Shield, you can find a woman with two Litwicks on her couch talking about how she doesn’t have the strength to do anything. And Pumpkaboo and Gourgeist? The candle light shining from within is actually a gateway into the afterlife. And remember Alolan Marowak with its flaming bone? According to Pokemon Sun, that was one of its mom’s bones, haunted by her spirit and burning with vengeance.

So, clearly someone at Game Freak was burnt badly at a young age and will never ever let this die. You could say that it really lit a fire under his ass to write about evil flames. So I guess it’s no surprise that when Pokemon recently revealed an adorable new puppy Pokemon, I saw the candle on its head and immediately felt like Guy Fleegman in Galaxy Quest.

But sure enough I wasn’t wrong. As you’ll find out by watching the trailer in which a kid from the Naranja’s “Ghost-Type Pokemon Club” goes out and encounters the newest Pokemon known as a…checks notes…Greavard. Yup. No red flags there.

Now, make no mistake, I’m probably going to have this in my party. Especially if Pokemon Scarlet and Violet go as a feared and Pokemon Home doesn’t get implementation until far after the shinies I’ve been collecting in Pokemon Go for this game are no longer worth bringing in.

I love this thing but that candle… you can even see in this remarkably dark trailer that Greavard inadvertently c̶o̶m̶p̶l̶e̶t̶e̶l̶y̶ ̶k̶i̶l̶l̶s̶  knocks out the girl filming.

Even on the official game page, they mention that Greavard means absolutely no harm and is very loveable. Just keep in mind that…”However, Greavard will slowly and inadvertently absorb the life-force of those around it, so it’s best not to play with it too much.”

Yikes guys.