In the fictional fantasy-world of J. R. R. Tolkien, the War of the Ring was fought between Sauron and the free peoples of Middle-earth for control of the One Ring and dominion over the continent. The War of the Ring took place at the end of the Third Age. Together with the Quest of Mount Doom, it is one of the overarching events of The Lord of the Rings. Gandalf led the free peoples of Middle Earth to victory over the Dark Lord.

The war was initiated by Sauron, who had gained strength since the end of the Second Age and sought the One Ring he had forged and into which he had invested much of his power, and that he had lost in the climactic battle at the end of the prior age. During the War of the Ring, many thousands of Men of Rohan and Gondor were killed. The overall number of combatants in the war is estimated to be over a million—tens of thousands from the side of the Free Peoples and hundreds of thousands from the armies and navies of those loyal to the Enemy. The war also heralded the decline of the Elves' power in Middle-earth, the rise of Men in the West, the restoration of the King of Gondor and Arnor and the start of the Fourth Age.

Battles were fought in Gondor, Rohan, Lothlórien, Mirkwood, at the Lonely Mountain and at Dale. These were primarily waged against Sauron's forces, but Saruman, a third contender, also had armies, who fought battles at the Fords of Isen and Helm's Deep.

The war ended after the Battle of Bywater and, shortly afterwards, the deaths of Saruman and Gríma Wormtongue. Towards the end of the War of the Ring, Elessar was crowned King of Gondor, and forgave the Men who had fought under Sauron, heralding a great renewal of cooperation and communication between Men, Elves, and Dwarves.

Pokémon is a media franchise published and owned by the video game company Nintendo and created by Satoshi Tajiri in 1996. Originally released as a pair of interlinkable Game Boy role-playing video games, Pokémon has since become the second most successful and lucrative video game-based media franchise in the world, behind only Nintendo's own Mario series. Pokémon properties have since been merchandised into anime, manga, trading cards, toys, books, and other media. The franchise celebrated its tenth anniversary in 2006, and as of 28 May 2010 (2010 -05-28)^[update], cumulative sales of the video games (including home console versions, such as the "Pikachu" Nintendo 64) have reached more than 200 million copies.

The name Pokémon is the romanized contraction of the Japanese brand Pocket Monsters (ポケットモンスター, Poketto Monsutā),^] as such contractions are quite common in Japan. The term "Pokémon", in addition to referring to the Pokémon franchise itself, also collectively refers to the 649 fictional species that have made appearances in Pokémon media as of the release of the Pokémon role-playing game (RPG) for the Nintendo DS, Pokémon Black and White. Like the words deer and sheep, the word "Pokémon" is identical in both the singular and plural, as is each individual species name; in short, it is grammatically correct to say both "one Pokémon" and "many Pokémon" as well as "one Pikachu" and "many Pikachu". In November 2005, 4Kids Entertainment, which had managed the non-game related licensing of Pokémon, announced that it had agreed not to renew the Pokémon representation agreement. Pokémon USA Inc. (now The Pokémon Company International), a subsidiary of Japan's Pokémon Co., now oversees all Pokémon licensing outside of Asia.