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"Admiral Piquet (Joaquim de Almeida)—a Frenchman who is so devious he substitutes French NATO troops for Americans in a phony rescue mission, and calls them off just when Burnett is desperately waving from a pickup area. Bet you a shiny new dime that when this movie plays in France, Admiral Piquet becomes an Italian."
X is a foreign product which gets ported over to your local market. It is notable, though, that it features references to its new culture. So this gets changed to another culture. This is usually done to keep the "exotic flavor" that is invoked in the original work, but sometimes this is done for less wholesome reasons: After all, who wants to see a bad guy whose defining character trait is that he comes from the audience's own country?
Subtrope of Cultural Translation. See also Accent Adaptation, Too Long; Didn't Dub.
Examples:
Anime and Manga
- Yukari-sensei becoming a Spanish teacher in the Azumanga Daioh manga translation might count here. It later becomes an Inconsistent Dub, because several jokes later depended upon her knowing English.
- In the Pretty Sammy OVAs, Pixy Misa peppers her speech with Gratuitous English. When Pioneer dubbed the show into English, it became Gratuitous French.
- Eiru and An were posing as American exchange students in Sailor Moon and turned into French exchange students in the English dub.
- In one episode of Sailor Moon, there is an English gentleman who invites the Sailor Senshi to his party, and they try to learn English to communicate there. In the English dub, the new language was changed to French and so was the nationality of the rich gentleman who invited the girls and Darien to his party.
- In the episode of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya where Asakura attacks Kyon, Kyon asks himself "why?" in Gratuitous English, followed immediately by a Japanese "naze?" The English dub keeps both, though it switches the order around.
- Can be seen in a lot of anime fansubs, when English loanwords and Gratuitous English in general becomes Gratuitous Japanese in the subtitles. A common example is "Sankyuu!" ("Thank you!") being translated as "Arigatou!"
- Several professional companies have also done this. Notably Animeigo for the (live-action) Sure Death! Movie.
- One episode of Excel Saga had Ilpalazzo briefing Excel in Gratuitous English, which the dub changed to Gratuitous Spanish. Later, Excel trying to talk to some people on the street when she landed in America in Gratuitous English was changed to a mix of Spanglish and faux ghetto-slang.
- An episode of Tokyo Mew Mew featured an American pianist who didn't speak Japanese. When 4Kids turned it into Mew Mew Power, she became Spanish.
- Not so much a translation as an update - in Gankutsuou, the Count of Monte Cristo's servant Ali is changed from a black African man to an Alien partly to keep him 'exotic' (and because the original character would likely appear racist by modern standards.)
- Arisa's Gratuitous English in Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha is changed to Gratuitous Japanese in the English dub.
- The English subtitles (though not the dub) of Hand Maid May translate Cyberdoll Mami's Gratuitous English into Gratuitous Japanese.
- An in-story version occurs in One Piece, when Usopp creates the alter ego of "Sogeking." Sogeking uses all the same attack names, but speaks them in English instead of Japanese as Usopp does. Admittedly, the FUNimation dub hasn't reached this point yet. However, given Usopp's attack names are translated in English versions, this entry will likely earn its place when FUNi does get there.
Film
- Famous example (because of Executive Meddling): The German dub of Die Hard (the first one) changed the German terrorist team to an international one, and the main villain Hans Gruber was renamed Jack Gruber. During the scene where Bruce Willis' character writes the names of two of the bad guys on his hand, this is explained by him calling them after giants from a fairy tale.
- This is all but ignored during Die Hard 3, which even featured a flashback sequence to the first Die Hard.
- The "I always wanted to become a surgeon" guy in Hostel became Spanish in the German version of the movie.
- In the European Spanish dub of Terminator 2, "Hasta la vista, baby" became "Sayonara, baby". The Latin American dubs, however, usually keep it the same.
- In the Spanish dub of The Goonies, Mouth and Rosalita speak Italian.
Literature
- In French translations of Animal Farm, Napoleon's name is usually changed to César (Caesar).
Live Action TV
- Versions of Fawlty Towers shown in Spain did this with Manuel, the well-meaning but dim waiter who happened to come from Barcelona. In the Catalan version, he is Mexican. In the Castilian, he is Paolo from Naples.
- Perhaps irrelevant, but definitely still cool: Andrew Sachs, who played Manuel, re-did his own lines for the German dub. As a fluent German speaker, he could just speak the German with a Spanish accent
- In the Latin American dub of Suddenly Susan, the exiled Cuban photographer played by Nestor Carbonell is Russian... a Russian called Luis.
- In the Japanese dub of the original Star Trek, Sulu was renamed "Mr. Kato", since Sulu wasn't Japanese-sounding enough (Roddenberry actually took the name from the Province of Sulu near the Philippines).
- In the French dub of Lost, Danielle Rousseau is German.
- Bizarrely averted by the Korean dub, where Jin & Sun are kept Korean and have difficulties communicating with everyone else, who also speak Korean.
Tabletop Games
- The first few editions of the Yu-Gi-Oh! Card Game had cards that had English names in the Japanese version - these became Japanese in the English version.
- Example: Cyclops (Japanese) became "Hitotsume Giant" (Hitotsume meaning One-Eye) in the English version.
- Thunderbolt (Japanese) became Raigeki (English)
Western Animation
- In Futurama, French is a dead language. In the French version, it's German instead. (If they are speaking French, it can't very well be a dead language now, can it?)
- Uter is Swiss in the German dub of The Simpsons.
- Swiss German, so it's semi-internal mockery. It really makes more sense, because he appears to be more stereotypically Swiss then German.
- However, in the Spanish dub, Bumblebee Man's Gratuitous Spanish is retained.
- Mainly because a Mexican accent sounds foreign (and well, is) to somebody from Spain. As there are more that a single Spanish dub, and every Spanish-speaking country mocks the accent of the others (and in Spain, of each autonomy). So, the
- In the Spanish dub of Cow And Chicken, Supercow's Gratuitous Spanish dialogue was changed to Gratuitous English.
- Not used in the Spanish-language version of Dora The Explorer. Instead of speaking in English and repeating in Spanish, everyone says everything in Spanish twice. This kinda defeats the purpose of the show.
- Other translations replaced Spanish with English.
- An episode of Kim Possible has Kim's brothers suggesting that she send an anonymous email to someone. When she hesitates, they explain that "[They], like, route it through Sweden or some place, and it can't be traced." Since that wouldn't work in the Swedish dub, they changed the reference to Iceland.
- In the French dub of Looney Tunes, Pepe Le Pew is Italian, though the other characters around him still speak French (and in real French, not silly fake French).
- There's a version of this in Shrek 2. Antonio Banderas dubbed his own voice for both the Mexican and Spanish versions of this movie. For the Mexican version he spoke with a Spanish accent and for the Spanish version he used a Mexican accent.
Video Games
- The Russian version of Heroes of Might and Magic V changed Russian-like names of the kings of the Griffin dynasty to vaguely Latin-like.
- Wait, wasn't Heroes V made by Russians?
- It was, but it was developed in English first, and then translated into the developers' native language.
- The Russian version of WarCraft III left Rexxar's bear, Misha, nameless.
- Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Pretty much all references to America in the Japanese version are changed to Germany in the English version. Thus we get Manfred von Karma, among others.
- This was actually probably their best choice, considering that their last name was still "Karuma", and more to the point they dress like 19th-century German fashion plates.
- The regionalization does get a Lampshade Hanging when Morgan Fey constantly refers to Lotta Heart as a "foreigner" due to her Southern accent (originally Kansai). Phoenix has to point out that the "heartlands" are still technically a part of America.
- Villain Yeager from Tales Of Vesperia spoke in a rather peculiar way in the original Japanese dub, filled to the brim with Gratuitous English. Rather than going with the typical response of some other gratuitous language to this in the English dub, he was given a goofy, over the top german accent. Not exactly the same, but gets the character's "off-kilter"ness out just the same.
- In Sonic Adventure 2, the line "Adios, Shadow the Hedgehog" is translated "Sayonara, Shadow the Hedgehog".
- In Spanish translation of The Longest Journey, the Hispanic Cortez, who often slips in bits of his "native" tongue becomes Corthes, the Frenchman who often slips in bits of his "native" tongue.
- In the Japanese version of Pokémon Platinum, a random NPC in Veilstone City asks you a question in English, which the English version changed to French.
- In Pokémon Diamond and Pearl, the Gym Leader Fantina was originally named "Melissa" in the Japanese version, and spoke English. In the English translation, her name was changed to the more French-sounding "Fantina", and she spoke French. In the French version, she spoke English again (though her name was changed to "Kimera").
- Waka of Okami originally spiced up his sentences with Gratuitous French, which was mostly changed to Gratuitous English... except when he quotes recognizable catchphrases, such as "Let's rock, baby!" or "Just go for it!"
- One thought of an NPC in The World Ends With You is in Japanese in the NA and PAL version. This is changed to English for the Japan version.
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