They call it a praying mantis because you'll be praying once you cross this thing.

123: Scyther

Scyther here has gone down as one of the “rad as hell” types of Gen 1 Pokemon. And Scyther within its own context is deserving of such a position. It does look like quite the badass, being a man-sized mantis that sports huge scythe-arms over the usual forelimbs of the typical mantis. Mantises are one of my favorite animals of all time, so I'm just gonna at least like Scyther on a baseline.

And while I have shown appreciation for Gen 1's tendency to go for chimeric creatures, I think it backfires a little bit here. A cross between a raptor and a mantis wins on a rule-of-cool level of course. But I feel like the mantis part gets unfortunately sacrificed. Namely in its face, where it just looks pure reptile with no bug traits in sight, not even antennae! And it doesn't ruin the design by any means, but it still has me thinking "this could've been so much cooler." Mantises have one of the most distinct and easily recognizable faces of all insects, and it's a shame Scyther doesn't take advantage of that any. You wouldn't even have to change Scyther that much! Just!

Just give it some big bulbous bug eyes, you can even keep the lizard mouth if you really wanna! But either way, I digress. Scyther's definitely cool and is one of Gen 1's most stand-out creatures for it having so much cool-factor. I just wish it had a bit more insectoid-ness to it, and it would've been perfect.