What Browt’s design hints about its final Pokémon Wind and Waves evolution

What does a 'Bean Chick Pokémon' even mean?

The Pokémon Company celebrated the franchise’s 30th anniversary in a huge way Friday, not only announcing Pokémon Winds and Waves but also by giving us our first look at the Gen 10 starters right away. There’s the water gecko Gecqua and the fire puppy Pombon, but the internet’s early favorite is definitely Browt, who looks like an Angry Bird with some leaves growing on his forehead. You might say he has sprouts on his brow, which give him a menacing expression from most angles.

Pombon may be the undisputed goodest boy in the starter trio with a happy smile and fluffy mane, but don’t we have enough fire dog Pokémon already? Gecqua feels uninspired when we’ve already had water lizard starters like Sobble and Froakie (technically an amphibian, but all frogs are lizards) — and at least those two look comedically anxious by comparison. Thus, Browt emerges as the most interesting of the three here, already inspiring tons of fan art.

In official materials, the Bean Chick Pokémon is described as “lively but clumsy.” From behind, it looks fluffy, so he’s something of a chubby bean himself. Regardless of how much we all love Browt right now, what’s ultimately going to make or break everyone’s starter selection depends entirely on the evolutions.

What is Browt’s final evolution in Pokémon Winds and Waves?

Because he’s obviously a bird, you might think that Browt will eventually evolve into a grass/flying-type Pokémon, but unless developer Game Freak decides to break a major trend, that isn’t likely to happen. Charizard is the only fully-evolved starter with flying — and it’s not even a bird. To date, there have been three avian starters — Torchic, Piplup, and Rowlet — and even though Rowlet starts out as grass-flying, all three of these wind up with a non-flying subtype when fully evolved. That’s possibly because flying isn’t all that strong offensively in terms of type coverage. It boasts solid defenses but is weak to rock and electric, two very common types. It also just feels uninspired for a starter. Just look at Gen 9: grass/dark, fire/ghost, water/fighting all make for interesting combos.

When you look at the history of Pokémon starter types, there are some important trends to recognize if we’re going to try and predict where Browt goes from here. Other than four pure grass, there’s never been a repeat type combo. We’ve seen poison, ground, fighting, ghost, and dark appear just once each as a subtype on grass starters. That’s also the case for water with a different assortment. Fire is the anomaly here since Gen 3, 4, and 5 all had fire/fighting. These days, variety seems to be the focus for Game Freak.

There are a number of subtypes that have never appeared on any starters, namely electric, ice, rock, bug, dragon, and normal. Unless Game Freak really tries to break the mold with Pokémon Winds and Waves, none of these seem likely. If any, bug or dragon feel at least possible. Ruling those out, that leaves psychic, steel, and fairy — each of which has appeared on a starter, but not on a grass starter before.

At least one fan out there theorized Browt is destined to beef up his legs and evolve into thick-legged Dong Tao chicken and pick up the dragon subtype. That design would also work with fighting, but the color scheme of the Dong Tao is also more red-brown than green-white. Another interesting fan theory positions Browt as a fully-evolved peacock with the fairy subtype. This one feels more likely, but the fact remains that when we examine the history of grass starters, the features that get exaggerated over time are the ones that show vegetation of some kind. Look at Bulbasaur and Turtwig. They start with some kind of growth on their head and/or back that, as they evolve, gets bigger and bigger until we’re looking at a turtle with a huge blossom or tree on its back.

Browt’s growth is on its beak and forehead, so those leaves are likely to grow up, out, and back across its body in some way, unless it winds up a reverse peacock situation until we’re looking at a giant fan on its head. Browt’s current design seems to draw inspiration from New Zealand’s flightless parrot, the kākāpō. They’re mostly green with a bit of yellow and dark black feet, so the color scheme certainly matches there.

My gut tells me there are two strong possibilities here: magic beans have roots in folklore, and since we’ve never seen a grass/fairy starter, the Bean Chick Pokémon could become the very first. Or, if Game Freak leans into Browt’s angry, menacing glances, then fighting could also be on the table. Ultimately, however, this may be a fruitless exercise. After all, Browt’s fellow Chick Pokémon, Torchic, also started out as a cute little bird — only to evolve into a terrifying humanoid chicken that’s on fire.