Ancient Mew is one of the more unique cards you can have. Ironically because of its unique look, it was immediately banned from being used in any Pokémon deck, simply because it’s impossible to read. This unique language means that your English and French Ancient Mews are printed exactly the same. This might lead you to think that all Ancient Mews were printed the same, but this isn’t true. In fact, there are five versions of Ancient Mew.
The easy way to tell the difference between all the Ancient Mews is through a combination of both their copyright date and holofoil pattern.
- Japanese Ancient Mew I (Nintedo Error) will have a speckle holofoil pattern and a copyright date of ©1995, 1996, 1998 Nintedo/Creatures inc./GAMEFREAK inc.
- Japanese Ancient Mew I (Nintendo Corrected) will have a speckle holofoil pattern and a copyright date of ©1995, 1996, 1998, Nintendo/Creatures inc./GAMEFREAK inc.
- Japanese Ancient Mew II will have a cosmic holofoil pattern and the copyright information will read ©1995, 1996, 1998, Nintendo/Creatures inc./GAMEFREAK inc.
- International Print Ancient Mews will have a cosmic holofoil pattern and the copyright information will read ©1995, 96, 98, 99 Nintendo, Creatures, GAMEFREAK. © 1999-2000 Wizards.
- The Japanese 2019 Ancient Mew reprint will have a speckle holofoil pattern and the copyright date reads ©2019 Pokémon/Nintendo/Creatures/GAME FREAK.
The rest of this guide will have visual images of the differences between the cards and some other good information about each of their releases.
Holofoil Patterns Explained
With the Ancient Mews, there are two holofoil patterns that are available. The speckle pattern and the cosmic holofoil pattern.
The speckle holofoil has a very dense pattern without any orbs or swirls. This holofoil pattern is found only in the Ancient Mew I both the corrected and error version as well as the 2019 reprint Ancient Mew.
The cosmic holofoil pattern is common in Pokémon, it was first introduced in Base Set II and used all the way till Call of Legends set. The comic holofoil contains a few orbs and some swirl patterns to help differentiate it from the sparkle pattern. The Ancient Mew II and all international print Ancient Mews have this holofoil pattern. It should be noted that the cosmic holofoil pattern is slightly different for these two cards.
Ancient Mew I – Nintedo Error and Corrected
The first Ancient Mew that was released was Ancient Mew I. However, there was a printing error and the copyright date had a misprint, where Nintendo was spelled Nintedo. This error didn’t get corrected right away and the corrected version of the card is actually much rarer than the error version.
Both the error version and corrected version share the same sparkle holofoil treatment and can only be differentiated by their copyright information where the error exists.
Ancient Mew II
The big difference between an Ancient Mew I and an Ancient Mew II is the holofoil pattern. This shift from the sparkle pattern to the cosmic holofoil pattern is the only way to tell the difference between an Ancient Mew I corrected version and an Ancient Mew II. The error version of Ancient Mew I will have the copyright information different as well, obviously.
International Ancient Mew
The international Ancient Mew is the first release outside of Japan. All versions of the international release are the same. This means the French version looks the same as the USA version which looks the same as every other internationally released Ancient Mew.
There are a few visual differences between the international Ancient Mew and the Ancient Mew II. While both have what’s considered cosmic holofoil patterns they’re slightly different when compared to each other, it’s hard to explain, but I’ve attached images of both cards below. They both also have different borders, with the Ancient Mew II’s being thinner. Still, the best way to tell the difference between them is the copyright dates.
2019 Ancient Mew Reprint
Finally, the 2019 Ancient Mew reprint. It was printed to resemble the original Ancient Mew I, and visually it accomplished the task. You can’t tell the difference between the cards except through the copyright date.
Ancient Mew Releases
All of the Japanese Ancient Mew cards were released in promotional pamphlets only in Japan. While the international release was done through promotional events through participating theaters.
Ancient Mew I and Ancient Mew II
The Ancient Mew I, error and corrected, and Ancient Mew II were first available on July 17th, 1999 inside a pamphlet to commemorate the theatrical run of Pokémon The Movie 2000: The Power of One. On the second page of the pamphlet was the Ancient Mew card. It’s impossible to tell which Ancient mew you would have gotten without looking at the card itself inside the pamphlet.
Here are images of the entire pamphlet with an Ancient Mew II insert.
International Ancient Mew
International Ancient Mew cards were given away in a cellophane packet with a Pokemon Leauge teaser card for the first week of the theatrical release of Pokemon: The Movie 2000:The Power Of One, which was July 21st-July 28th, 2000 for America.
The Pokemon Leauge teaser card is the only way of telling where the card was distributed. For example, below is an image of the US, UK, and French teaser cards. The Ancient Mew cards inside the cellophane wrap are all the same.
There are some differences in the teaser cards. For example, in Australia they used a Gameboy Color Insert instead of the standard Ancient Mew teaser card insert.
You can also find some inserts with text changes as well as different logos variants.
2019 Ancient Mew Reprint
Starting on July 12, 2019, participating cinemas in Japan were selling another movie pamphlet, this time for the movie Mewtwo Strikes Back – Evolution. On the second page, just like for the Ancient Mew I and II, was an Ancient Mew reprint.
Once again, I’ve provided images of the pamphlet below.
Non-TCG Meiji Ancient Mew
The Meiji Ancient Mew wasn’t produced for the Pokemon Trading Card Game instead it was a card produced by the chocolate company Meiji. It was sold with Meiji’s chocolate product and was only available in 1998 in Japan. It’s very easy to tell this Ancient Mew from the others just on the visuals alone.
Thank You
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