The Ahnold

GET TO DA CHOPPA!

"Welcome to the land of freedom, bitches! AHHHHHHHHH!!!"

— Jack Howitzer, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas

An Affectionate Parody of 1980s action stars. It could be an actor, or a character based on one of them, or a futuristic killer robot. But specifically, it's probably an impression of Arnold Schwarzenegger, particularly exaggerating his accent (most examples use a Germanic accent, but occasionally one will have a Russian one), hence the trope name. Other stars, like Sylvester Stallone, Jean-Claude Van Damme, and Dolph Lundgren happen as well.

Common signifiers include a very obvious Fake Nationality (usually Not Even Bothering with the Accent), near-Testosterone Poisoning attitude, a Heroic Build, fondness for More Dakka in their weapon choices, and a tone of voice that fluctuates between bored monotone and enraged bellowing. Like the action star they are imitating, they may do a cliched Pre-Asskicking One-Liner or quip that is witty or ironic.

This is a subtrope of No Celebrities Were Harmed and a supertrope to Terminator Impersonator. The Hollywood Action Hero is when this trope is played straight.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• One of the first duels to occur in Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V is against a muscle-bound duelist who's quick to anger and confusion who's named The Sledgehammer. The English dub gives him an overly-thick Faux Austrian accent, and the English voice actor speaks with the inflections and patterns that most parodies of Arnold Schwarzenegger tend to use.
• Lunar's dad in My Bride is a Mermaid, is the Terminator. And a yakuza. And a merman.
• When SD Gundam Force was dubbed in America, weapons expert Destroyer Dom is given an Ahnold flavor.
• In the Yu-Gi-Oh! GX dub, Gem Beast Amber Mammoth is given an Ahnold accent.
• Bando in Elfen Lied is a walking Shout-Out to The Terminator, up to and including having a bionic prosthetic arm and special eyes, despite not having the accent. His name sounds awfully familiar to Rambo.
• Mr. Lucky Strike, the PE teacher from Futaba-kun Change!, looks and acts quite a lot like Dutch from Predator.
• In the English dub outtakes of Berserk 1998, Guts' voice actor breaks out into an Arnie impression at certain points.
• YuYu Hakusho: Possibly Younger Toguro. He bears an uncanny resemblance to the Terminator, as well as having Arnold's Japanese dub voice...
• Goku, in Dragon Ball, encounters a killer android called Sargent Metallic (Major Metallotron in the Funimation English dub), who is clearly an expy of the Terminator. He is one of the bad guys that Goku defeats fighting his way up through the Red Ribbon Army's Muscle Tower. In the anime's 10th anniversary movie Metallic got a Race Lift into a Scary Black Man, taking him away from this trope.
• Harnold Dogegenchonegger/Barnold Shortsinator in How Heavy Are the Dumbbells You Lift?. A pro bodybuilder and action movie star, and he actually gets briefly mistaken by Arnold Schwarzenegger when he appears in the gym for the first time. And a fact, he's voiced by the Japanese Voice Dubber of Arnold Schwarzenegger.
• In an episode of Red Baron, Ken's opponent is a clear parody of Arnold Schwarzenegger. His Metal Fighter is even called "Eliminator", and is designed clearly to look like a skeletal robot right out from Terminator.

Asian Animation

• Cubix Robots For Everyone: The American dub gave Maximix a thick Austrian accent as a parody of Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Comedy

• Australian comedy duo The Umbilical Brothers frequently use impressions of Schwarzenegger as staples of their live-action and puppet routines.

Comic Books

• Judge Dredd: The series has a couple of examples. A throwaway example had a clone kit based on an actor named "Schwartzenburger" who was a muscular actor. Another one was attending the Academy Awards for an action film of his that was nominated for an award. He tries to fight back during a terrorist attack and gets shot for his trouble. Hilariously, the Oscars have been renamed the Arnies.
• Nightwing: Randy Violent.
• Ninja High School:
  • "Arnie" doesn't even try to be subtle about it (although in his case, he's a pastiche of Sylvester Stallone, despite the name).
  • Also Hotaro no Kenterminator, a mix of Kenshiro and the Terminator.
• Marvel 2099: Hulk 2099 features a brief appearance by an action movie star called Albert Studebaker.
• Spider-Man: There was once a subplot with Mary Jane getting excited over being in an "Arnold Schwarztenheimer" movie but choosing to pass up the role when it was revealed she would have to do a nude scene. The Arnold never showed up but it was obvious who the celebrity was supposed to be.

Comic Strips

• In the semi-regular Swordplay comic in Dragon, a recurring character was a muscular knight named Arnold, who spoke with an Austrian Funetik Aksent.

Fan Works

• In Evangelion: ReDeath, Asuka sounds almost exactly like Schwarzenegger.
• The OMG most Original fanfic Idea EVER has an Arnold parody named Sorass. He's a bulky echidna from Earth 2.

Films — Animation

• Hoodwinked!: Dolph, one of Boingo's henchmen.
• In Disney's Aladdin, the Genie does a brief impression of Arnold Schwarzenegger.
• The animated adaptation of the Discworld novel Soul Music portrays the Hubland warrior Vrolf Vrolfssonssonsson as an Ahnold, since the Hublanders are basically Cimmerians.
• In Tom and Jerry: Blast Off to Mars The president of the United States is based off of Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Films — Live-Action

• Last Action Hero: Arnold Schwarzenegger plays Jack Slater, an Affectionate Parody of himself.
  Danny Madigan: You think you are funny, don't you?
  Jack Slater: I know I am. I'm the famous comedian Arnold Braunschweiger.
  Danny Madigan: Schwarzenegger!
  Jack Slater: Gesundheit.
• Lampshaded, like much of the stuff going on in Super Capers, of the Gadgeteer Genius' Robot Buddy Robo, who bases all his inventions off movies.
• In an infamous television cut of Die Hard 2 removing the movie's Cluster F-Bomb swearing (which gave us "Yippee ki yay, Mr. Falcon"), the dub-over voice not only doesn't sound anything like McLane's actual speaking voice, the actor seems to be going for a thick Arnold Schwarzenegger accent.
• In UHF, Conan the Librarian has a heavy Austrian accent, referencing Arnold Schwarzenegger's role in Conan the Barbarian (1982).
• Thomas in Dial Code Santa Claus is a Lonely Rich Kid who spends his free time play-acting an '80s action movie fantasy like his big-screen idols. The prodigious amounts of baby oil used to get Ahnold and Stallone's pecs glistening look downright comical when applied to a scrawny adolescent boy trying to do a Lock-and-Load Montage like in Commando.
• The plot of the German comedy film Otto - Der neue Film starring Otto Waalkes prominently featured an actor namend Amboss^note "anvil" in German who starred in movies like Amboss - Der Kontrollator and Amboss - Der Rabiator.

Live-Action TV

• Saturday Night Live:
  • Pumping Up with Hans und Franz'': "I am Hans." "Und I am Franz." "And ve ah here to pump..." *clap* "YOU UP!"
  • On an aside note, most versions of this trope that use the phrase "Girly Man" are getting it from here.
  • In one episode, the real Arnold turns up and shows them what's what.
• In Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, the primary Terminator antagonist Cromartie takes the appearance of an actor best known in that universe for playing a barbarian.
• Chip Rommel from Son of the Beach is a straight-up parody of Arnold Schwarzenegger. ^note Chip's actor, Roland Kickinger, played Schwarzenegger in See Arnold Run, a 2005 TV-movie biopic about Arnold. He also had a small role in Terminator Salvation as a prototype T-800 (The 'Arnold' Terminator).
• The Lizzinator monster in Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers.
  "This is too easy! Fighting all the Power Rangers would be a better challenge for the Lizzinator. I'll be back!"
• In an episode of The Cosby Show, Clair and Theo see a rather violent movie to her chagrin and his pleasure. Cliff asks, "well, what is the plot of this epic?" to which Theo responds, "there's this guy called Max Savage, right? And this gang steals his car... so he has to get it back!"
• Shaun Micallef's Mad as Hell has Darius Horsham (played by Stephen Hall), a spokesman for Finance Minister Matthias Cormann, who constantly references not only Arnold's movies but his political speeches ("Shaun, you're being an economic girly-man!", a line that was later used by Cormann himself to refer to Opposition Leader Bill Shorten.)
• Season 3 of Stranger Things has Grigori, a Soviet assassin who is an obvious shout out to the Terminator - coldly and ruthlessly efficient, quiet but deep voiced, with a similar hairstyle and wardrobe.

Music

• The song "I'll be back" by Arnie and the Terminators is sung in this manner, naturally.
• Three words: Austrian, Death, Machine! All of their songs not only have Ahnold style vocals, but they all pay tribute to various films starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. "Get to the Choppa!" They even have their lead singer in a giant rubber Schwarzenegger mask and call him "Ahnold", just to score the extra point.
• Gloryhammer:The hootsman is a homage to/Expy of Arnold Schwarzenegger, the song "The Hollywood Hootsman" states that the hootsman is a Hollywood actor famously known for his role as a barbarian who became ruler of California, and a later song states he is also a cyborg powered by a neutron star.

Podcasts

• Brunsk the Barbarian, an NPC from the Yorkton Gamer Guild's recorded Pathfinder. Actual Play sessions at RPGMP3, often serves as a frontline fighter, in addition to being the fortunate owner of a characteristic accent.

Puppet Shows

• Les Guignols de l'Info:
  • In this French Spitting Image-style satirical show, Monsieur Sylvestre, a highly cynical and brutal man with a dark sense of humor who occupies many different functions (White House adviser, Cardinal, CEO, etc.), is one of the few characters who does not correspond directly to any real-life person... but he does look an awful lot like Sylvester Stallone, though.
  • His voice has grown different from the one of the puppet standing in for Sylvester Stallone himself, however. The latter is closer to the French dubbing voice in Stallone's movies (mainly Rambo or Rocky).
  • Also, the puppet for Arnold Schwarzenegger always speaks with the Terminator's voice.

Roleplay

• We Are Our Avatars has Mark, who looks and acts like Arnold Schwarzenegger in all of his roles.

Tabletop Games

• Ambuscade in Sentinels of the Multiverse, is an 80s action-movie star turned supervillain who seems loosely inspired by Jean-Claude Van Damme, by virtue of being an action star with a pronounced European accent (French, rather than Belgian, admittedly). That being said, similarities are somewhat limited given that JCVD did not disappear at the peak of his career to try his hand at Hunting the Most Dangerous Game.
• Warhammer 40,000: The Catachans are the inhabitants of a jungle planet so murderous barely a quarter make it to adulthood. Those who survive are among the toughest unaugmented humans in the galaxy, and all of them essentially overly-muscled Ramboes if he'd been in Predator who dress as The Deer Hunter. And then there's Sly Marbo, a One-Man Army with serious PTSD issues (but that doesn't make him any less effective).

Video Games

• Jack Howitzer in the radio stations of the Grand Theft Auto games. He started out making the Destroyer films, a parody of the Rambo series, around the time of Vice City, and by San Andreas he had branched out into family comedies with Special Needs Cop, a parody of Kindergarten Cop. Unfortunately, his career was derailed when he accidentally shot the host of a radio show while promoting Special Needs Cop; the page quote comes from that incident. By Grand Theft Auto V he's become a washed-up self-parody trying to use a Reality Show to become famous again, a show that instead only illustrates how insane he is.
• Sven T. Uncommon in the English dub of Popful Mail speaks with an accent evoking that of Arnold's.
• Duke Nukem is a combination of this and Clint Eastwood; in French, he's dubbed by Arnold Schwarzenegger's official voice actor in a few episodes of the series (Duke Nukem: Time to Kill, Duke Nukem: Land of the Babes, and Duke Nukem Forever).
• This review illustrates that even if the original game (Ark 22) doesn't include Arnold, the fans can always pretend it does.
• Command & Conquer: Red Alert Series:
  • Command & Conquer: Yuri's Revenge has the second mission of the Allied campaign take place in Hollywood. As you explore the map you can find parodies of Clint Eastwood, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Sylvester Stallone (in that order, depending on where you send your forces) that are quite helpful in taking back the city and stopping Yuri from feeding the civilian population of Los Angeles into his Grinders. Unfortunately, a patch made it so that the names and voices of these units were changed to the standard-issue "Civilian" and "G.I.", respectively. But if you make some modding, it's possible to make the voices back for them and the names. Fact: Voices weren't deleted from the game's files. But you still need to edit one file to edit the names as what they were.
  • The Cryo Legionnaires in Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 are basically Mr. Freeze with nearly every line being an ice-based pun in an Ahnold voice.
• Sting Sniperscope from Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard.
• Space Quest:
  • Space Quest III: The Pirates of Pestulon has Arnoid the Annihilator, a Terminator-like android sent to kill Roger for mail fraud.
  • Space Quest VI: Roger Wilco in the Spinal Frontier has a T-1000-like Endodroid.
• Jim the body building pit bull from Toonstruck.
• Ubel from the Battalion Wars series. To underline the reference, he's promised the role of "Governator" in his boss' empire.
• The Thor pilot in StarCraft II. In fact, most of his Stop Poking Me! lines are Arnold quotes (except for the one Ghostbusters reference) like this gem:
  "What is best? To crush the Zerg, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentations of the Protoss."
• Lisa's father in Persona 2: Innocent Sin is a carbon copy of Steven Seagal, right down to the martial arts badassery. His first name is even Steven!
• Several mercenaries in Jagged Alliance series count. The most stereotypical example is Bobby "Steroid" Gontarski who shares his appearance and accent with Schwarzenegger despite the fact he's supposed to be Polish rather than Austrian... or at least that's probably what his VA was aiming for. The result doesn't even sound much like a Polish guy doing a bad impression of Ahnold.
• The Hublanders in the Broken/Mended Drum in the Discworld PC adventure game both speak with the Arnie accent, and even go so far as to say in conversation "This ffery boring town" and the follow-up "Ja... ve von't be back."
• Prinny: Can I Really Be the Hero?: You don't get anymore Ahnold than Asagi Schwarzinature.
• Johnny Cage of the Mortal Kombat series is very much an expy of Jean-Claude Van Damme, because originally the game was to star the real Van Damme, with a bunch of other characters he could beat up. When Van Damme backed out because he considered it "selling out", thus was born Mortal Kombat as we know it. Things would later come full circle when it was confirmed that Mortal Kombat 1 would feature a skin for Johnny that turns him into Van Damme.
  • The Terminator's guest appearance in Mortal Kombat 11 is a variation of this trope. While he is an actual Schwarzenegger character, and Arnold himself was used as the CG facial model, he's voiced by a different actor doing an impression, though it's said that Arnold personally chose his replacement.
• Biff Atlas, the bodybuilding ghost from Luigi's Mansion.
• One boss in the original Metal Gear was a pair of Terminator ersatzes named Arnold, later renamed Bloody Brad for legal reasons.
• Abore in Double Dragon II, although the arcade game's version also has elements of André the Giant.
• The Sledger in Battle Realms (a game set in a Fantasy Counterpart Culture of feudal Japan) is an Arnold reference, constantly talking with the accent and making references to his giant muscles.
• Bill Rizer is a pretty obvious stand in for Schwarzengger in the Contra series, while his buddy Lance Bean is the same for Sylvester Stallone.
• The Barbarians of Krolm in Majesty: The Fantasy Kingdom Sim are obvious examples, being Expies of Conan the Barbarian and having exaggerated Austrian accents.
• Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble! has the Kremling cyborg KAOS. The game (being on the Super Nintendo) has no voice acting and his dialogue doesn't reflect Arnold's mannerisms, but he strongly resembles the T-800, down to the shades.
• Chaac, the Mayan God of Rain in Smite is a very muscular God that wields a mean axe he called 'Chaacca'. Unsurprisingly, he comes with Arnold's accent despite his origin coming from South America, and one of his joke/taunt is yet another Predator Shout-Out, which is why that's how they named his axe: "GET TO THE CHAACCA!"
• Broforce is built around this trope. All playable characters are over-the-top parodies of various 80s (or early 90s) action movie or TV heroes, some of which were played by Arnold Schwarzenegger himself.
• World of Warcraft: In the Warlords of Draenor expansion, there is a raid boss that is a team of orcs named Hans'gar and Franzok. They are blatant Hans and Franz expies. When aggroed, they announce that they are going to "pump you up". They do several other Hans and Franz quotes during the fight.
• Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon gives us Sergeant Rex "Power" Colt, a cybernetic Super-Soldier with a penchant for Bond One Liners and huge guns. He's even voiced by and modeled after Michael Biehn, the actor who plays Kyle Reese and Corporal Hicks.
• River City Girls and its sequel have the Terminator-like mooks as one of the enemies, they speak in an accented gibberish and even sport a shade for a brief moment upon being recruited or after they launch an attack, as an Assist Character.
• Titanfall 2 has Richter, a high-ranking member of the Apex Predators who speaks in an incredibly thick Austrian/German accent similar to a specific bodybuilder-turned-actor. Fittingly, defeating him unlocks the "See you at the party!" achievement; the Schwarzenegger references continue when he orders his subordinates to "Get to the relay!" in a familiar tone of voice.
• Albert Spindlerouter from LEGO City Undercover is an incredibly buff foreman who tasks Chase McCain with filling in for one of his workers. Not only is his voice actor clearly doing an Arnold impression, but almost all of the commands he barks at Chase throughout the mission contain titles of movies Arnold was in.
  "Fix that fuse box! I don't need any more Collateral Damage!"
• Big John from the Rise of the Triad remake has a ridiculous Arnold impression that makes a standard boss entertaining. He later makes an appearance in Episode 2 of DUSK, using the same voiceclips, and in a secret level of AMID EVIL, this time as the Wee John Clan.
• Power Blade, the Western version of Power Blazer, changed the protagonist from a Mega Man wannabe to a muscle-bound Schwarzenegger pastiche, along with ripping off the poster/cover of The Terminator for its box and title screen art.
• An entirely unintended and consequently incredibly Narmtastic example appears in Dead Effect with the character of Dr. Heinrich Wagner, who's clearly trying to do a stereotypical Herr Doktor voice, but his performance is so flat that he sounds like this trope instead.
• Deus Ex has Gunther Hermann, a muscular Blood Knight cyborg with a thick German accent.
• Forsaken has LA Jay, a muscular dude with attitude sporting an Ahnold-esque hairdo and sunglasses, who also bears a resemblance to Duke Nukem.
• In Kung Fu Chivalry for Macintosh, the first Player Character is a composite of an Ahnold and a Bruce Lee Clone.
• Bobby, one of the two Cuckoolander Commentators for various Deadly Games in the Saints Row series, is a ridiculously buff man with Cool Shades and a low voice which comes across as his voice actor imitating Arnold. That said, his accent is clearly American, not German, and as a commentator, we never see him fight.
• Sonny, one of the four playable characters from Silent Dragon, is based on Ahnold from the first Terminator movie, complete with shades and clad in a biker jacket the whole game. He's a human instead of a cyborg, though.
• Mad Dash Racing: Tremlord is a hulking, muscular Tremmel who speaks in a comical Austrian accent.

Web Animation

• Parodied with Bouncer Beagle in Ducktalez. His head is from a stock image of Arnold.
• MePhone4S in Inanimate Insanity is effectively a terminator, sent to kill the host of the series, MePhone4. While initially thwarted by showing his embarrassing home screen wallpaper, he appears much later on to finish the job... only for the two ultimately settle on co-hosting an episode of the show, despite neither of them really getting along too well. After MePhone4 is actually killed by MePhone5, MePhone4S has a full change of heart, and downgrades himself to revive the fallen MePhone4.
• Sonic In X Minutes: Played for Laughs. In this series, Knuckles is usually voiced with an exaggerated Arnold Schwarzenegger impression, complete with Austrian accent and (almost) No Indoor Voice. He's also the Dumb Muscle among the heroes who attacks people or objects whenever he's confused (which is often).

Web Comics

• Frans Rayner, "The Great Dane", from The Adventures of Dr. McNinja. Action star turned evil mastermind — and a clear homage to Jean-Claude Van Damme. The author even said in an interview that if the webcomic was made into a movie, he would insist on Jean-Claude playing Frans.
• "Nicki, do your Terminator impression!" "I'm from da FYOO-CHAH!"

Web Videos

• Parodied in Filthy Frank video "100 Completely Accurate World Accents PART 2", involving the German "accent".
  A YouTube comment: I am German and can confirm that we are all Arnold Schwarzenegger. Fun Fact the B in Berlin actually stands for Arnold....

Western Animation

• The Simpsons: Rainier Wolfcastle is one of the best-known parodies. McBain^note Not to be confused with (and in no way related to) a certain James Glickenhaus film of the same name, the supercop action hero he plays, is an example in himself. Strangely, in the movie, the literal Arnold Schwarzenegger is the President, but the only difference from Wolfcastle is brown hair.
• The Fairly OddParents!:
  • Jorgen von Strangle, complete with the accent. Naturally, when Timmy wishes his life were more like an action movie, Jorgen ends up in the role of Big Bad.
  • The episode "Movie Magic" had two: Arnold Schwartzengerman, who plays Hamlet while parodying The Terminator ("Yorick, I'll be back... with weapons"), and Sylvester Calzone, a parody of Stallone who is obsessed with punching things (mostly critics).
• Arnold Mousenegger, a minor character from Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers.
• The Western Darkstalkers cartoons turns Victor Von Gerdenheim into one of these. He has the accent and everything.
• Batman: The Animated Series makes reference to action star Donald Shaltenpepper.
• Doc Tari of “The Terrible Thunderlizards” from Eek! The Cat.
• Arnold the security guard dog from Tiny Toon Adventures. He's got a little bit of the Totally Radical '80s icon Spuds Mackenzie mixed in for more laffs.
• Ronald Weisenheimer from Doug.
• Blitzwing's Hothead face in Transformers: Animated seems to be based on an angry Arnold Schwartzenegger parody in terms of voice and demeanor.
• Occasionally Ahnolds show up in The Proud Family as minor characters with jobs like bodyguards and security.
• A variation occurred in Johnny Bravo with the character of Squint Ringo, an obvious parody of 90's action "star", Steven Seagal.
• One called Sly Eastenegger appears in an episode of The Mask, a parody of both Arnie and Stallone.
• The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy has Hoss Delgado, who seems based on Kurt Russell, particularly Snake Plissken in Escape from New York, and Bruce Campbell (as Ash Williams in Evil Dead).
• The animated adaptation of Beetlejuice has a green-skinned bodybuilder with a thick Austrian accent named Armhold Musselhugger as a recurring character.
• In the Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog episode "Robolympics", Dr. Robotnik had a muscular Badnik called Arnold Robonegger doing his team's weight-lifting.
• This was how Histeria! portrayed Leif Ericson.
• From Popetown, Richter the Swiss Guard is another Arnold parody.
• In Biker Mice from Mars, the title heroes face the Exterminator in their first episode debut. "I'll be back," indeed, as he sinks away in acid....
• A fictional TV hero called The Abdicator in Hey Arnold!
• The Critic, usually unafraid to hit celebrities with their real names, found it was funnier to have a fictional version of Jean-Claude Van Damme named Jean-Paul LePope.
• Animaniacs (2020) has Nils Niedhart, an Olympic gold medalist who has very large muscles and a thick Austrian accent.
• SpongeBob SquarePants had a brief gag with a live-action bodybuilder in boxer shorts with a thick Austrian accent after SpongeBob talks about how running is good for the buns and thighs.
• One episode of Totally Spies! has a villain named Ulrich Wernerstein, who turns people into bodybuilders with his energy bars.

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