Trivia / Hamtaro

• Cross-Dressing Voices:
  • Hamtaro, Oxnard, Panda, Snoozer, Cappy, Maxwell, Howdy, and Jingle are are all voiced by women in the Japanese version. Not all the foreign dubs followed this, although Hamtaro and Cappy play this trope straight in most languages.
  • In the Latin Spanish, German, Italian, Dutch, Swedish, and Norwegian dubs, Oxnard is voiced by a male.
  • In the English, European Spanish, Italian, Dutch, Finnish, and both Portuguese dubs, Maxwell is voiced by a male.
  • In the English, Latin Spanish, Dutch, Polish, Finnish, and both Portuguese dubs, Howdy is voiced by a male.
  • In the English, French, Polish, both Spanish dubs, and both Portuguese dubs, Jingle is voiced by a male.
  • In the European Portuguese, Brazilian Portuguese, European Spanish, Latin Spanish (first voice) and Finnish dubs, Panda is voiced by a male.
  • In the Latin Spanish, Polish, and both Portuguese dubs, Snoozer is voiced by a male.
  • Boss averts this trope in most languages. So does Dexter, though he's voiced by a woman in the Taiwanese Mandarin dub.
  • Stan averts this in both the Japanese and English dubs. However in the French, Italian, and all the Spanish dubs, he's voiced by a woman (in the French one, he and his twin sister share the same voice actress).
• The Danza: In the Latin Spanish dub, Kana (Oxnard's owner, who is renamed Karla) is voiced by Karla Falcon.
• Fandom Life Cycle: The series started at Stage 1, then went straight to Stage 3 during it's days on Toonami. It's currently at Stage 6(b) as of this writing.
• Keep Circulating the Tapes: The series has been off the air for ages, and many of the episodes were not released on DVD. And then those DVDs are no longer manufactured pretty hard to track down new (Amazon has a few new condition copies of the volumes scattered around the marketplace, but good luck finding all of the volumes in new condition). Also applies to the Second season theme song which was only aired a few times in the series' entire run. And let's not get started about the episodes that have not been exported out of Japan in the first place...
• Kids' Meal Toy: To promote "Ham-Ham Halloween", Burger King released eight Ham-Ham toys with matching Halloween costumes: Hamtaro (Frankenstein's monster), Bijou (witch), Boss (alien), Oxnard (spider), Penelope (bedsheet ghost), Cappy (jack o' lantern), Panda (skeleton) and Elder Ham (werewolf).
• Marth Debuted in "Smash Bros.": Ham-Ham Games featured Prince Bo, the Rainbow Girls, Lapis, Lazuli, and characters from the third movie, which never aired in the US.
• Missing Episode:
  • In the English dub, an episode explaining Setsubun was skipped because it was too foreign of a concept to translate. However, the German, French, and Italian dubs did translate this episode.
  • There are, in actual fact, at least 196 episodes left untranslated into English.
  • The obscure 1999 OVA adaptation "Tottoko Hamutaro Anime Dechu!" was lost in Japan for 18 years. This version wouldn't resurface until it got uploaded to Youtube on July 20, 2017.
• No Export for You:
  • The later seasons of the TV series (aside from the first Halloween episode) and the spinoff TV series in its entirety. Also, all the movies and half of the OVAs, of which some were tie-ins with the games.
  • The first Game Boy Color game and the first DS game. Also, the fourth game, Rainbow Rescue, received a release in Europe and Japan, but not in the US. Though a bootleg version exists with a US product code on the title.
  • The Sega Pico titles. Expected, given that it pretty much died an early death outside Japan.
  • The official kiddie ride by Banpresto is Japan-only and never exported. Expected, given that it came out when Cartoon Network was almost done screwing up the show elsewhere. And well, as a general rule, Japanese kiddie rides are almost never exported in the first place, although parallel imports in other Asian countries have been recorded.
  • Introducing TwitHamtaro(translation), yet another Twitter app for the iPhone, with a Hamtaro skin! Want it? Sorry, it's only available on the Japanese iTunes Store, and thus only to those lucky enough to have a Japanese address and credit card!
  • Several box sets were only released in Europe, such as the season 2 and season 3 sets.
• The Merch: While a ton of Hamtaro merchandise was sold in the West during the early 2000s, Hamtaro has tons more in Japan, and there are even Hamtaro themed rides in the Fuji-Q Highland amusement park in Japan!
• The Other Darrin:
  • On the official English website, there was a page where you would know about each Ham-Ham. However, while some Ham-Hams had the same voice actor and actress, the majority of Ham-Hams, such as Hamtaro, Sandy, Penelope, and Dexter all had different voices provided by unknown voice actors.
  • Wake Up Snoozer! (the PC game based on the show) is one example of that, too.
  • Also, in the first 104 episodes of the dub, Noel Fisher voiced Stan, while in the specials after that Michael Coleman took over.
  • One of Mimi's older brothers is voiced by Matt Smith (not that Matt Smith) in "Midnight Celebration" and Seren Pendleton Knoll in "The Very Best Present".
• Out of Order: Cartoon Network aired the first season in one-hour blocks, the second episode being a much later one from the season. It's most noticeable with Stan's appearances in the later airings despite him not being referenced until "Let's Dance, Sandy!".
• Pet Fad Starter: The anime made many people want hamsters, and in some countries it was a true boom. It faded some years after, however.
• Playing Against Type: You know the awesome Scott McNeil? Try to imagine him as a shy teacher who has a crippling fear of chickens. Yeah, he's Mr. Yoshi in the show.
• Referenced by...: The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, Really Love You: In Chapter 66, Kusuri discovers a sunflower seed in the hotpot, causing someone to ask if Hamtaro brought it.
• Screwed by the Network:
  • The second opening theme song only aired a few times (counting reruns) in the US, by accident. Yeah, Cartoon Network hated it for some reason.
  • Additionally, the second season was aired once-a-day every weekday, effectively burning out all but the show's most loyal fans. Afterwards, they didn't air it in repeats.
• Short Run in Peru: "Ham-Ham Halloween" aired in English-speaking countries ten days before its Japan airdate.
• Technology Marches On: The plot of "Jingle, the Wanderer" involved a Floppy Disk.
• Writer Revolt: Hamtaro's placement on Toonami lead to a number of jokes by Williams Street.

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