You did it, Pikachu!

Ok, For those of you who don't know, I'll tell you about the infamous Pokemon episode, Dennō Senshi Porygon. (Info Courtesy of Wikipedia)

Ash, Misty, Brock and Pikachu discover that the system used to transfer Pokemon from one Pokemon Center to the other is malfunctioning. On Nurse Joy's request, they go to Professor Akihabara, the one who created the Pokeball transfer system. He tells them that Team Rocket stole his prototype Porygon, a CG Pokemon who can exist in cyberspace, and is using it to steal trainers' Pokémon from inside the computer system. He then sends them into the computer system to stop Team Rocket with his second Porygon. Porygon is able to defeat Team Rocket's Pokémon, but Nurse Joy, monitoring the situation, has sent a vaccine into the system to combat what she thinks is a virus. Pikachu uses a Thunderbolt attack on the vaccine, and the group and Team Rocket are able to escape the computer.

About 20 minutes into the episode, there was a scene in which Pikachu stops some rockets with his lightning attack, resulting in a huge explosion that flashed red and blue lights. Although there were similar parts in the episode with red and blue flashes, this scene was extremely intense, for these flashes were extremely bright strobe lights, with blinks at a rate of about 12 Hz for approximately 4 seconds in almost fullscreen, and then for 2 seconds outright fullscreen. At this point, viewers started to complain of blurred vision, headaches, dizziness and nausea; in a sense, this might be considered a striking occurrence in actual reality of the literary trope known as the motif of harmful sensation. A few people even had seizures, blindness, convulsions and lost consciousness. Japan's Fire Defense Agency reported that a total of 685 children (310 boys, 375 girls) were taken to hospitals by ambulances. Although many children recovered during the ambulance trip, more than 150 of them were admitted to hospitals. Two people remained hospitalized for over 3 weeks.

After the airing of "Dennō Senshi Porygon", Pokémon went into a four month hiatus. TV Tokyo discontinued some program specials that were supposed to air around the end of December. After the hiatus, the timeslot changed from Tuesday to Thursday. The opening theme was also redone, and black screens showing various Pokémon in spotlights were broken up into four images per screen. Before the seizure incident, the opening was originally one Pokémon image per screen.

Before the beginning of the reairing, "Anime: Pocket Monster Problem Inspection Report" (アニメ ポケットモンスター問題検証報告, Anime Poketto Monsutā Mondai Kenshō Hōkoku?) was shown. Broadcast in Japan on April 11, 1998 and April 16, 1998, a woman named Miyuki Yadama went over the circumstances of the program format and the on-screen advisories at the beginning of animated programs.

Here is a URL to the scene: http://youtube.com/watch?v=_aaiWqYXy5Y&mode=related&search=