Honestly the Pokemon fanbase at this point feels less like an actual fanbase for the franchise and moreso just a bunch of very loosely connected communities with vaguely similar interests that all consist of either 27+ year olds who have nothing else in their life going for them but this franchise or actual, literal children and sometimes a very disturbing mix of the two. Basically, the same thing that happened to the Sonic fanbase.

I don't even really think this is a 'fanbase' anymore than you could say Garfield has a fanbase.