Music to My Ears is taking a look at a remix of a remix of a great theme.

Cynthia is probably my favorite champion in the Pokemon series, and that’s not light praise.

After all, there’s been no shortage of badasses over the last two decades. Lance strolled around with a cape to help beat the tar out of Team Rocket, then hacked the game and had Dragonites before they were even possible. Gary earned 10 badges in Kanto because he was a badass, and drove around in a convertible with cheerleaders at his beck and call. Steven Stone (his full name is always required) flew through the skies on a Metagross and was the sharpest-dressed gentleman you’ve ever seen. Wallace…okay, they can’t all be winners.

So why Cynthia? A few reasons, really. She was the first female champion in a series that was notoriously slow about embracing female options (you couldn’t pick a girl trainer until Crystal, after all). Luckily, Game Freak introduced a character who didn’t pander to anyone — if anything, Cynthia was the most fleshed-out NPC yet. She studied history and entered bizarro dimensions to stop Cyrus. She owned a fancy house on the beach where you could challenge her in the post-game. And she gave you a Togepi, which could turn into the badass behemoth that was Togekiss.

Like the other champion battles, Cynthia comes with her own awesome music for the fight. In Diamond/Pearl/Platinum, her theme features a driving drum beat that picks up even harder when the snare comes in, and synthesizers that won’t allow you to let your guard down for a second. She shows up as an optional boss encounter in Black/White with a slightly modified theme, and that version gets tweaked a little bit further for her appearance in the Pokemon World Tournament in Black/White 2 (in fact, all of the champions for that tournament get updated tracks). I’m going with the B/W 2 version here because I like the addition of a modified bass line, but you really can’t go wrong with any of them.

vs. Champion Cynthia

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OqKH-dTgAs

Music to My Ears covers soundtracks or individual songs from video games every week. You can view all posts in the series by clicking here.