
Maybe someone told him to “go train,” and he misunderstood.
Spoiler Alert: If you haven’t watched Dragon Ball Super in its entirety, you might want to immediately scroll down below the picture of Mr. Sato getting a haircut in Turkey.
With the end of Dragon Ball Super last March the series’ most popular villain, Frieza, received a special prize and was resurrected to the land of the living. Being the go-getter he is, Frieza immediately declared his intention to rebuild his evil paramilitary enterprise.
But you try building an evil empire in this business climate. Times are tough, so to make ends meet and help raise the capital for his new planet trading venture it seems as though the conqueror of worlds has gotten a job with the railway.
▼ OK now we can all be on the same page!
There have been several sightings – or listenings rather – of a voice identical to that of Frieza’s. Now, this part’s tricky because depending on when and where you watched his appearances in Dragon Ball, you may have a specific voice for Frieza in your mind.
Here’s a rundown of voice actors who have taken on the part.
Obviously, the second voice in the above video, done by Ryusei Nakao, is what Japanese audiences associate with the legendary character.
Here’s a little more of him speaking so you can get a good sense of it.
If you haven’t, go back and listen to his voice before checking out this recording of a train conductor making an announcement, and tell me that isn’t Frieza speaking. Even a person in the video can be heard blurting out, “That’s Frieza, isn’t it?”
https://twitter.com/hiro_pon109/status/989163989841068033According to comments this employee is something of a local celebrity on the rails of Tokushima Prefecture where he can be heard.
“That guy is well-known around Tokushima.”
“I’ve heard him on various trains like the Tsurugisan Limited Express and regular trains.”
“That sounds exactly like him! I live near Osaka and am going to go there someday.”
“Totally Frieza. Are we sure this isn’t Ryusei Nakao doing these announcements?”
“Actually he kind of sounds like [Anpanman antagonist] Baikinman.”
Many also pointed out to the original tweet that he can be found frequently on YouTube listing station names in the intonation of Goku’s greatest adversary.
The question remains, however, whether this guy is just trying to break the monotony of train conducting by doing his best Frieza imitation, or he just naturally sounds like that.
Although it gets lost in translation, one of the main features of the character of Frieza is his very polite way of speaking. This habit not only makes him more of an unnerving villain, but is very similar to the way train conductors speak while addressing passengers.
So, it is very conceivable that this is just a guy with a very similar voice who, by nature of his job, also speaks in a very similar manner to that of the self-proclaimed emperor of the universe.
At the very least we can rule out the real Frieza because it’s already been determined that he has upper-management written all over him.
Source: Twitter/@hiro_pon109, Hachima Kiko
Top image: YouTube/Dragon Ball super short videos


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