Magikarp

Magikarp sits at #33 in XY Evolutions, released in November 2016. XY Evolutions is part of the modern English Pokémon TCG era and uses the standard contemporary card frame and rarity tiers. Illustration by Mitsuhiro Arita. Arita was the original Pokémon TCG illustrator and the artist behind the Base Set Charizard. His vintage-era art has a painterly quality that distinguishes it from the cleaner reference-style work of the Sugimori cards.

The flavor text on the card reads: "It is virtually worthless in terms of both power and speed. It is the most weak and pathetic Pokémon in the world." Pokédex entries from this era are short and often quirky, written by the original Japanese localization team for a specific stat-block layout that no longer exists in modern cards.

A water-type fish famous for being almost useless until it evolves into Gyarados. Base Set Common. Sentimental and emotionally significant for many collectors.

XY Evolutions shipped in standard Holofoil and Reverse Holo prints. No 1st Edition; that convention had been retired years before. The set reuses original Base Set artwork inside modern XY-era card frames, which makes the Evolutions Charizard a popular modern reprint chase despite the small price gap to other 2016 cards.

Modern Commons grade easily and trade thinly in graded condition. Raw pack-fresh copies are the practical buy for set completion. PSA 10 submissions on a Common from a modern set rarely return enough premium over raw to justify the service fee.

Raw copies of this card are inexpensive enough that the grading math rarely justifies submission unless you have a clearly pack-fresh example. For set completionists, picking up a clean raw copy and sleeving it is the practical move.