Ever since the beginning of the Pokémon franchise, evolution has been one of the most important parts of the games. Most Pokémon will evolve by growing stronger or being traded between players, among many, many other methods. However, not every Pokémon gains an evolution right away in the same generation of games that it is introduced.
Very often, the developers at Game Freak have added new evolutions or earlier stage baby forms for Pokémon from an earlier game into a new entry. Yet out of all these cross-generational evolutions, there are two specific Pokémon that lack a fairly obvious evolutionary connection: Tauros and Miltank. The upcoming Pokémon Scarlet and Violet could remedy this issue.
Tauros was first introduced in the original Pokémon Red and Blue games as a famous occupant of the very dangerous Safari Zone. It was one of several Pokémon from those original games that had no other evolutionary stages. However, over the years, the vast majority of these single-stage Pokémon have eventually gotten either next-stage or baby evolutions, or even temporary Mega Evolutions, Regional Variants, and even Gigantamax forms.
After all these additions over the years, only two of those original single-stage Pokémon, not counting the Mythical Pokémon Mew, have never obtained a different form: Ditto and Tauros. It also makes sense for Ditto, as Ditto has already carved out a perfect niche for making Pokémon breeding and shiny hunting an easier endeavor, and there’s no reason to change that. However, Tauros not having an evolution by this point seems to be quite a missed opportunity, especially when Game Freak often tries to establish a connection with Miltank, another single-stage Pokémon from Generation Two, and Whitney’s infamous partner Pokémon.
For a start, Tauros is a bull-like Pokémon that can only ever be male, while Miltank is a cow-like Pokémon that can only ever be female, and the two share the same Base Stat Total of 490. Also, in Pokémon Sun and Moon, the two share a Pokédex page despite not sharing an evolution, further implying a connection between them. Further, the two are practically inseparable in the games, as they either share at least one route together or don’t appear at all. This happens most notably in Pokémon X and Y, as whenever a horde of Tauros appears on Route 12, there will always be a Miltank among them.
Game Freak should finally act on this connection that they’ve established between Tauros and Miltank by introducing a baby Pokémon that can evolve into either species. There is already a precedent for this within the Pokémon games, as in Generation One, the Pokémon Hitmonlee and Hitmonchan were another pair of unofficially connected single-stage Pokémon until a baby Pokémon called Tyrogue was introduced in Generation Two that could evolve into either, as well as a third option called Hitmontop.
As an evolution for Tauros or a baby Pokémon that connects it to Miltank have been talked about among the fans for years now, it may seem strange that this hasn’t already been done if they were ever going to do it. However, the timing has never been more perfect for this than right now.
The new, unnamed region featured in the upcoming Pokémon Scarlet and Violet appears to be based on Spain, and Spain has a famous connection in the real world to bulls, particularly the yearly Running of the Bulls. This connection is so well-known around the world, that it would make little sense for a Pokémon region based on Spain to not include a bull-like Pokémon somewhere, and Tauros is a perfect jumping-off point for that.
A new leak suggests Pokémon Scarlet and Violet may include around 72 new entries added to the Pokémon world. Since only a few of those have been identified so far, including the wildly popular Lechonk, there’s still plenty of room for a cute baby bull that connects Tauros and Miltank, or at least a new Regional Variant to finally give Tauros some much-needed love.