Five Pokémon Pitch Black Chase Cards to Watch Before the July 17 Release

Mega Darkrai ex #120/084 – Mega Hyper Rare

The gold etched Darkrai closes out the set list, and it is the only Mega Hyper Rare in Pitch Black – no second card at that tier to split demand, no alternate chase at the top of the numbering.

Its Japanese counterpart opened as the most expensive card in Abyss Eye and has held that spot across the set’s entire run so far, which is what you would expect when a set mascot draws the gold treatment in a tier this thin.

If you pull one Friday, you have almost certainly pulled the best card of your weekend.

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Mega Darkrai ex #116/084 – Special Illustration Rare

Akira Egawa’s illustration drops Mega Darkrai dead center and lets the color detonate outward around it, landing closer to a horror paperback cover than a Pokémon card. It has been talked about as one of the best pieces of the Mega Evolution era since the reveal back in May.

In Japan it settled in right beneath the gold, and through the set’s first month on shelves it moved less than anything else in the top tier.

That is exactly the profile you want in a long-term binder piece. Darkrai has pedigree working for it, too. The character has been pulling premium cards since its TCG debut in Great Encounters back in 2008.

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Gwynn #119/084 – Special Illustration Rare

Here is our set’s female Supporter SIR, and that slot has a long history of landing near the top of Japanese sets regardless of what the card does.

Gwynn is a Z-A Royale participant and a member of the Fist of Justice, hiding out in the sewers beneath Lumiose City through the events of Legends: Z-A, and her regular printing puts that setting right in the frame.

That base card at 078/084 is a Supporter that plays in the neighborhood of Roxie from Cosmic Eclipse, except it excludes every Pokémon with a Rule Box rather than only Pokémon GX and Pokémon EX.

One caution, she opened hot in Japan and has cooled meaningfully since. She’s a chase, but she’s not the sure thing she looked like in May.

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Morpeko ex #117/084 – Special Illustration Rare

Morpeko’s base card at 055/084 is a Basic Darkness type with 180 HP, and its SIR spent June climbing the Japanese rankings while several of the flashier names above it drifted the other way.

That’s the kind of movement worth respecting, because it reflects collectors coming to a card on its own merits rather than launch week hype pricing it before anyone had seen it in hand.

It balances a genuinely cute subject against dynamic composition, and it has very little competition in its lane inside this set.

*Buy Morpeko ex cards on eBay and TCGPlayer

Mega Zeraora ex #114/084 – Special Illustration Rare

The co-headliner, and the reason the box art isn’t entirely black.

Mega Zeraora ex is a Basic Lightning Mega Evolution ex with 270 HP on its base printing at 027/084, and the SIR leans all the way into that, with the card seeming to morph into the electric background around it.

It’s also the hardest card here to call. Zeraora has a devoted following that has been waiting a long time for a centerpiece moment, and the Japanese market has been indecisive about how much that’s worth, running the card up and back down more than once since May.

The English release puts it in front of a much larger Western audience buying in their own language, though don’t mistake that for untapped demand.

Western money has been reaching into the Japanese market for this one since Mega Zeraora turned up on the Pitch Black box art.

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