I only know the German version from RTL2 which had funny commentary dubbed over it with made-up names and stuff. Curious, did the dubs in other countries do the same? Were there languages with the original commentary translated?

In the uk it was Craig Charles of red dwarf fame, renowned funk and soul DJ and robot wars host. It was brilliant.

I can hear his laugh just reading this

We had this in the 80s/90s in Italy within a show called "mai dire banzai", they mixed up clips of Takeshi's Castle and Za Gaman[0], and the commentary was three guys of which two acted as faux Japanese experts and the third acted surprised at the completely made up bits of Japanese culture.

It was incredibly popular back then.

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Za_Gaman

The dubs for the Spanish version did it too. There were two dubs, one in 1990 and another one for a 2006 re-run. Both completely made up.

Yes, it was a deliberate strategy to add localized commentary, as the original context would not apply in foreign markets. An example of Transcreation

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcreation

US had Most Extreme Elimination Challenge (MXC)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Boww2fJUEHc

strange Poland didn't have one...

Back in the early 2000s, I always had a good laugh whenever I was flipping through TV channels and stumbled upon Takeshi's Castle.

You can watch some English subtitled rips here:

https://archive.org/details/takeshis-castle-with-english-sub...

The other archive link shared here, it's to another set of rips that appear to lack subtitles.

“Right you are, Ken!”

(From MXC, based on footage from Takeshi’s Castle)

Still remember that phrase from years ago.

Kenny Blankenship and Vic Romano! The names so discordant with the visuals...

His movies are also worth a watch: Hana bi, Sonatine, Brother, Dolls, and Zatōichi are all amazing movies.

Should do a rewatch again, it's been a while...

Getting Any, a total Takeshi movie

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Any%3F

absolutely blowing my mind to realize vic romano and detective nishi are the same actor

Wouldn't have expected this on Hacker News. Used to love watching this as a kid!

wait did you see that microsoft execution container (mxc) article and think "oh wow remember the best show that was on spiketv"? :D

I don't know about spiketv but yes @ microsoft execution container post

Most of Beat Takeshi's work is amazing, from this, to his films, even his infamous Nintendo game.

IRL OG Fall Guys

"Right in to the mud!"

Remember watching this as a kid after school eating my bag of chips I'd been given for lunch which I'd save up so I can eat it later while watching this. In Canada, it was aired as MXC.

Thanks! Someone once told me about this, told me MXC is actually Takeshi's Castle, but I forgot, long ago. Fun fact.