Line #53 GratuitousEnglish/LiveActionTV


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9	* ''Annyong Francesca'' is a comedy about a Korean business man living with a family of vampires. This trope is lampshaded when the main character talks about Lunar New Year and then says in English, "Korean New Year." The lead female character quickly berates him by saying "Don't try to impress me by speaking English!".
10	* The Italian GameShow ''[[Series/AvantiUnAltro Avanti un Altro!]]'' has a category called the "English Lesson," where all of the questions are asked in English.
11	* This shows up every now and then in the Korean anthology show ''Series/BanjunDrama''. Instances of this are usually PlayedForLaughs:
12	** Lee Hwi-jae's character in "Get That Girl" has a habit of speaking in English when provoked. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] in that he's an English teacher.
13	** The second girl Hwi-jae goes out with in "Marriage Corporation," being Korean-American, often inserts English words into her Korean speech. For example, instead of saying "''neomu maeryeokjeokida''" ("you're so charming" in Korean), she'll say "neomu ''charming''hashida."
14	* In Series/{{Best Motoring}}, Creator/{{Akira Kamiya}} will sometimes use English words in his speech to convey excitement. The later announcer was known for this, as well.
15	* ''Series/CinderellaChef'': Jia Yao occasionally throws English phrases like "no way" into her speech. She also convinces Chun Yu to say "I love you" in English, without telling him what it means.
16	* The Brazilian MTV show ''Covernation'' -- a BattleOfTheBands between cover groups -- had two regular contests that fell into this, "Catch the video, [[ThisIsForEmphasisBitch motherfucker!]]" (the original band's video plays, and at certain points the audio would shift to the cover) and "Crossroads" (named after the Ralph Macchio movie, namely [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CqdL36VKbMQ the guitar duel]] with Music/SteveVai -- although the duel could be between vocals, bass, keyboards or drums). Occasional ones included "Put your hands in the air" (getting the audience fired up) and "Touchdown" (the singer, carrying an American football, had to go through a "groupie brigade" to reach his band on his cue).
17	* ''Series/CriminologistHimuraAndMysteryWriterArisugawa'':
18	** In their first meeting, Himura tells Arisugawa that his novel is interesting. Arisugawa is surprised and asks "Really?", to which Himura responds with an English "Absolutely," seemingly to show how serious he is.
19	** While checking out the social media of one of his fans, Arisugawa lets out a hilarious "Oh my god!" in English when he realises how cute she is.
20	* The [[ShortRunners short-lived]] series ''Series/DoctorDoctor'' had an episode in which a Japanese television crew did a [[{{Mockumentary}} documentary]] within the hospital. At the end of the shoot, they left several Japanese gifts for the hospital staff, including a t-shirt that said "DOCTORS ARE BIG SEX."
21	* Parodied to hell and back by ''Series/TheFastShow'''s Chanel 9. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=piKeDrrOrsE Like here!]]
22	* ''Series/{{Guardian}}'': "We Won't Be Falling", the opening song, is inexplicably in English.
23	* In most Hispanic Soaps Operas (telenovelas) for adults or teens, preppy student and [[SpoiledBrat spoiled brats]] can be easy identified by the Gratuitous English they use. Girls will said "''Daddy'' porfas" and boys " the veo en la ''party, brother''". Oh and "Oseas...Hello!" is a classic.
24	* ''Series/TheIndianDetective'': In India, where a lot of locals are fluent and speak straight English around Doug, and often even without him. It's [[JustifiedTrope justified]] given how India was a British colony, and English, as an official language, is one of the few that the country's 1.5 billion people can mutually understand.
25	* The Russian medical sitcom ''Interns'' has an American named Phil Richards as one of [[DoctorJerk Bykov]]'s interns. Despite his pretty good Russian (he's played by a Russian-American actor), he frequently swears in English or says things like "You've gotta be kidding me!" or "Please kill me" when agitated (upon hearing the latter phrase, Bykov says that he doesn't know what it means, but it sounds good). One episode involved the hospital administrator being sent to an international medical conference in London, so she enlists Richards's help in improving her English, which turns out to be so horrible that he feels physically sick to listen. None of the English is subtitled, but most Russian learn at least basic English in schools these days.
26	* In ''Series/TheJulekalender'', the Nisses always speak IntentionalEngrishForFunny. There's no in-universe explanation why.
27	* In any ''Franchise/KamenRider'' series, if the transformation belt says ANYTHING, it will usually be in English (unless it's one of the rare belts that actually is sapient and can converse with the main characters, like ''Series/KamenRiderKiva'' and ''Series/KamenRiderDrive''). Examples are Faiz's "Standing by... Complete!" and OOO's "Scanning Charge!", among others.
28	** ''Series/KamenRiderKiva'':
29	*** The second Rider is named ''Kamen Rider IXA'', which stands for "Intercept X Attacker". While this is a less oddball example compared to others on this page, it's still probably not something a fluent speaker of English would ever codename a hero. "X Attacker" is an apparent code name for Fangires. Emphasis on "apparent." Likely, it's there because [[XtremeKoolLetterz X-es are cool]]. It's also an example of FunWithAcronyms in Japanese; it sounds like the word "ikusa", which means "war".
30	*** Kiva's name is this itself, being that it's short for '''Ki'''ng of '''Va'''mpire.
31	*** There's also Arkivat from TheMovie when Kamen Rider Ark goes into its OneWingedAngel form. Its faceplate falls off and the skeletal space spots off "Go to hell!" at the heroes below in Gratuitous English.
32	** Some of the character songs are insane. "Get the Memory! Fight the scary!" "The bullet is running!"
33	** The English bits added to the new version of "Let's Go, Rider Kick" from ''OOO, Den-O, All Riders: Let's Go Kamen Riders!'' take it up to eleven. "Rider Kick at the dark and black force! Rider Jump to the next generation! Rider Chop with the fighting in the truth! Let's go the hero, Kamen Rider!"
34	** And, of course, TheMovie for ''Series/KamenRider555'' has Kamen Rider Psyga. There was no real reason for him to say all his lines in English (the exception being ''[[ByThePowerOfGrayskull Henshin!]]''), and strangely, nobody had trouble understanding him. Though one urban legend claims that the Taiwanese-American actor's Japanese was so bad nobody could understand him, so the director asked him to translate the lines into English. This was worked into the script by identifying Psyga's user as a foreigner.
35	** More fun with IXA and Psyga comes when Diend summons IXA in ''Series/KamenRiderDecade''. We get an inside view of his helmet, which has the words, "Return it to the life and the god" scrawled across the heads-up display, which is a crude translation of Nago's CatchPhrase "Return that life to God". Psyga is also in the scene, and he simply says "It's showtime!" -- made even more gratuitous by the fact that Psyga's original actor spoke perfect English. Decade's Psyga ''didn't''. After "It's showtime," he yells "Let's enjo-oy!" before whooping like he thinks he's in a cowboy movie while firing. It's ''hilarious'' if you remember the real Psyga, but not so much if you ''liked'' the real Psyga.
36	** In one episode of ''Series/KamenRiderSkyrider'', the villains are loading boxes of "DINAMAIT."
37	** ''Series/KamenRiderFourze'' continues this trope with the English being tossed around every few seconds. Justified in that its setting is based around an American-style High School, but it doesn't help that poor Gentaro has no idea what those words mean. A very hilarious example was the first episode; the local AlphaBitch called him "the trashiest of trash", but he thought she called ''the manliest of men''.
38	** In ''Series/KamenRiderDenO'', the [=DenLiner=]'s dining car has a menu that says "Welcome to denliner" and offers items like "spagetti".
39	** ''Series/KamenRiderGaim'' has the Lockseeds, which occasionally spout GratuitousEnglish.
40	*** Gaim's are half-Japanese, half-English - "Hanamichi on Stage", "Funsai Destroy", "Shushutto Spark", "Odama Big Bang". [[spoiler:Bujin Gaim, a movie-exclusive Rider, uses "Ja no Michi on Stage" instead.]]
41	*** Baron's are entirely in English, and usually consist of a "X of Y" phrase -- "Knight of Spear", "Fight of Hammer".
42	*** Gridon has "Never Give Up!", Kurokage has "Ichigeki in the Shadow!", Bravo has "Mister Dangerous!" and Knuckle has "Mister Knuckleman!"
43	** ''Series/KamenRiderBuild'' got Ryuga Banjou/Kamen Rider Cross-Z's FunTShirt such as the ''You look better on social media'' in Episode 2 and ''KEEP YOUR MIND BE OPEN WINDOW EVERYDAY'' in Episode 17 and 18.
44	** ''Series/KamenRiderZeroOne'' features the heroes' {{Transformation Trinket}}s stating an English line in MachineMonotone at the end of the sequence. For example, the line with Zero-One's default form is "A jump to the sky turns to a Rider Kick", Vulcan's is "The elevation rises as the bullet is fired", and Valkyrie's is "Try to outrun this demon to get left in the dust."
45	** ''Series/KamenRiderRevice'' has a lot of the Drivers exclaiming the most random English phrases as part of the transformation sequences. Examples include the Sakura's asking "what's coming up?!" repeatedly, which means nothing, and Daiji's memetic "[[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment wings to fly!]]". George Karizaki also likes to pepper English into his dialogue, but it's usually appropriate, mostly limited to when he's surprised or excited ("Goddamn!" is his favourite English phrase).
46	* ''Series/TheLongestDayInChangAn'': For some reason the third song on the soundtrack, "阙勒霍多/Quē Lēi Huò Duō", is entirely in English. Not very good English, either; many lines are awkwardly-phrased.
47	* ''Series/MimpiMetropolitan'': Mami Bibir has a habit of using English words in her sentences for the sake of it even though she's not really good at pronouncing them.
48	-->'''Alan:''' ''[After Mami Bibir says "fan" with a "p" instead of "f"]'' If Mami can't speak English, just use Indonesian, Mi.
49	* In an episode of ''Series/NewsRadio'', Jimmy James' book "Jimmy James: Capitalist Lion Tamer" becomes popular in Japan, so for some reason he has the Japanese version translated back into English... and it ends up pure GratuitousEnglish. The title becomes "Jimmy James: Macho Business Donkey Wrestler", and the book now features lines like "Glorious sunset of my heart was fading. Soon the [[TitleDrop super karate monkey death car]] would park in my space. But Jimmy has fancy plans, and pants to match."
50	** "What did you mean when you wrote, bad clown making like super American car racers, I would make them sweat, war war"?
51	* ''Series/NinjaWarrior'''s stages contain obstacles that are almost entirely named in complete or partial English. Aside from the competitors' names and periodic use of 'Sasuke' (the show's original name), this is all most watchers of the show are likely to understand.
52	* ''Series/PanelQuizAttack25'''s {{Catch Phrase}} is "ATTACK CHANCE!" Also by the host, when calling for the last box: "Last call!"
53	* ''Series/{{Player}}'':
54	** Ha-ri's {{Catchphrase}} is "Okay".
55	** Byeong-min exclaims "My family!" in English when he meets up with Ha-ri and A-ryeong.
56	** Ha-ri says "Thank you" in English to President Na.
57	* In ''Series/PrettyGuardianSailorMoon'' "Episode Zero - Birth of Sailor V" prologue, the jewel thief Cutie Kenko (who can only be described as [[JustForFun/XMeetsY Tuxedo Mask being played by David Bowie]]) speaks gratuitous English as part of his attempt to be cool. While preparing the next heist he quotes the English expression "time is money", and answers each his minions' reports with a lazily drawn out "ooo-kay!"
58	* ''Series/RuPaulsDragRace'': In the show's many {{foreign remake}}s, a large number of the [[DragQueen contestants]] in non-anglophone countries have English drag names, like Yvonne Nightstand from ''Drag Race Germany'' or Bunny Be Fly from ''Thailand''. Since speaking English is often seen as a sign of worldliness in these countries, this is not uncommon in international drag culture.
59	* ''Series/{{Seacht}}'' has quite a few English words mixed in with the Irish dialogue; this is particularly surreal as the series is set in Belfast, and one would think that this means the characters are [[TranslatorMicrobes actually speaking English]].
60	* Most ''Franchise/SuperSentai'' series feature a usual amount of Gratuitous English for attack names and such, but ''Series/EngineSentaiGoOnger'' deserves special mention for having the team uniform be covered with it. Extra-special mention for Hant (Go-on Green)'s Gratutious Japanese along with the English. ("Doki Doki Delight")
61	** That is his [[InTheNameOfTheMoon roll call phrase]], though he says it all in Japanese. The others' roll call phrases are mostly written all in English but said in Japanese or part English and part Japanese. (The phrases rhyme, too.)
62	** Jiraiya/Ninja Black in ''Series/NinjaSentaiKakuranger'' indulged in this quite often. It helped that he was a faux-McNinja played by Kane Kosugi.
63	** Gaku/Gao Yellow from ''Gaoranger'' was annoyingly fond of this habit.
64	** As does Hoji/Deka Blue in ''Series/TokusouSentaiDekaranger''
65	** And Shurikenger in ''Series/NinpuuSentaiHurricaneger'' makes it part of his whole schtick, [[CatchPhrase baby]].
66	** Ironically, the page image is Takeru/Shinken Red from ''Series/SamuraiSentaiShinkenger,'' a sentai series with a samurai theme that tries very hard to convince the kiddies that kanji really is cool. (A lot of younger Japanese citizens, by this point, don't know kanji, preferring the phonetic alphabet to the fancy one). It's also one of few series to keep the attack names in Japanese. Yet Takeru seems to own few shirts that aren't covered with (utterly incomprehensible) Engrish. The ones that don't... looks like they have text lifted from Wikipedia[[note]]The one in the page image is clearly lifted from an entry about the Chevrolet Impala[[/note]]
67	*** Chiaki (Shinken Green)'s surfing T-shirts are worse, when you look at it, because he uses them OnceAnEpisode.
68	*** Kotoha has shirts with English on them too.
69	*** Also, the names of the Shinkengers' weapons (except for Red's Rekka Daizantou and Gold's Sakana-maru): Water Arrow (a bow that shoots... [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin well...]]) for Blue, Wood Spear for Green, Land Slicer for Yellow and Heaven Fan for Pink.
70	** A LOT of the HUD in ''Series/GoGoSentaiBoukenger'', sometimes veering into {{Engrish}} territory.
71	*** One thing that is generally used across all seasons, it seems they use the English words for their Ranger colors more than the Japanese ones. Like in [[Series/KaizokuSentaiGokaiger the 35th season,]] they're [=GokaiRed=], [=GokaiBlue=], [=GokaiYellow=], [=GokaiGreen=], and [=GokaiPink=], with their SixthRanger [=GokaiSilver=]. Even in some of the older series, where the Ranger designations aren't ''always'' colors, the designations are English ([[Series/JAKQDengekitai Spade Ace]], [[Series/TaiyouSentaiSunVulcan Vul Shark]], [[Series/DengekiSentaiChangeman Change Phoenix]], and so forth, though exceptions exist.)
72	** In ''[[Series/TokumeiSentaiGobusters Go-Busters]]'', Masato Jin occasionally shouts "Oh shit!", which is... a little [[DidNotDoTheBloodyResearch out-of-place]] on a kids' show.
73	** During the transformation sequences in ''Series/DenjiSentaiMegaranger'', English words scroll across the screen, ostensibly listing systems activation and computer jargon. It is, in fact, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_%28album%29#Track_listings track titles from the band Electronic]], albeit a bit jumbled. [[FreezeFrameBonus If you care:]]
74	-->TIGHTEN UP REALITY GANGSTER\
75	STIGMA THROUGH IDIOT HEARING\
76	KEEP FRUSTRATION CLEAR\
77	PATIENCE OPEN AHEAD\
78	GETTING AWAY WITH IT LEAD\
79	SOME DISTANT MEMORY DROVE\
80	GET THE MESSAGE\
81	INDISCIPLINE ALL REMAINS\
82	WISH DOUBLE EDITORIALS COVER\
83	UNDER STRESS NEW CANOE
84	** One episode of ''Series/RescueSentaiGoGoFive'' has writing in the HumongousMecha cockpit say "The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion!" in an out of the way place that looks like typical Ranger HUD stuff. On the other hand, this could be a continuation of the ''Denji Sentai Megaranger'' Electronic track listings joke- ''The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion'' is an American band.
85	** Both of these examples can be seen in the ''Franchise/PowerRangers'' versions. The [[Series/PowerRangersInSpace Space]] morph is identical to the Mega morph but for "Morphing complete" replacing "Mega[Color] Ready," and The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion can be seen in [[Series/PowerRangersLightspeedRescue Lightspeed]] when the Megazord is fighting Queen Bansheera when she visits the human world in her full form for the first time.
86	** The motto of the fascist villains in ''Series/TheHighSchoolHeroes'' is "Pure, Right, Beautiful" in English. The BigBad shouts it one last time before committing suicide in the final episode.
87	** Episode 45 of ''Series/NinjaSentaiKakuranger'' brings us an illusion world where a cop rises from the dead and says, in English, "Today is [a] fine day in California", before shooting at one of the Sentai. This is believed to be a reference to ''Series/MightyMorphinPowerRangers'', the American repackaging of [[Series/KyoryuSentaiZyuranger three different]] [[Series/GoseiSentaiDairanger Super Sentai]] [[Series/NinjaSentaiKakuranger series]], all merged into a single continuity set in fictional Angel Grove, California.
88	* Whenever ''Series/TopGearUK'' visits Japan, Jeremy Clarkson has a great deal of fun pointing the horrific Engrish to be found. The following was from the Japan segment of ''Motorworld'', a solo side-project he did in the late nineties where he traveled to various countries and locales around the world to see their car culture.
89	** "Full of sport mind & luxury feeling super potential winter wheel Iver"
90	** "Just a roller skate grand touring. All over the physical ironic power."
91	* The ''Franchise/UltraSeries'' is loaded with this.
92	** General examples:
93	*** The most obvious example is probably the names of every defense team, which are all in English and often form [[FunWithAcronyms an acronym of an English word.]]
94	*** Every series has had the characters use English names for their technology and vehicles as well.
95	*** Hell, even ''the names'' of the Ultramen and some of the monsters are entirely in English.
96	** More specific examples:
97	*** An interesting subversion is ''Series/UltramanGaia'', where one of the XIG BridgeBunnies, Georgie, uses English fairly regularly. However, her actress is ''not'' Japanese and uses her English quite well, rather than the typical one-liners. Playing more straightly is [[TokenBlack Michael]] of [[TheMedic Team Seagull]], although he doesn't appear frequently enough to make it noticeable.
98	*** Sean from ''Series/UltramanMax'' is DASH's TokenWhite and makes heavy usage of Gratuitous English when the moment calls for it.
99	*** ''Series/UltramanOrb''[='s=] supporting cast, a team of amateur paranormal investigators, calls themselves the Something Search People. When Naomi's mother visits, she complains about how her daughter is mangling the language and that it should be "the Searchers of Something".
100	* ''Yomigaeru [[Series/IronChef Iron Chefs]]!'' But damn if the Chairman doesn't make it sound awesome.
101	** Kaga's also said 'Merry Christmas!' in English during battles set around Christmastime.
102	** If one's lucky enough to see an undubbed episode, they might notice that every battle is referred to as [Theme Ingredient] Confront.
103	** In the second Battle Cuttlefish, challenger Akira Watanabe (who, it should be noted, regularly traveled to the United States, so spoke pretty good English) decided to challenge Iron Chef Morimoto with the words 'MISTER MORIMOTO!' Morimoto, for his part, reportedly responded with 'come on, baby'. (At the time he was the head chef of Nobu in NYC, so also spoke good English.)
104	* Gutiérrez, a character in Colombian telenovela ''Series/YoSoyBettyLaFea'', does this a lot.
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Context GratuitousEnglish / LiveActionTV