I recently have had the fortune of watching Animaniacs dubbed into Japanese. It was a fun experience to say the least, seeing Yakko, Wakko, Dot go about their antics in another language entirely, but one part of Animaniacs stood out to me in Japanese: Pinky and the Brain.

Upon initially watching Pinky and the Brain in Japanese, nothing seems amiss. That is, until you notice an odd aspect of Pinky’s speech: his tendency to put the non-word “Naafu” into his sentences. In English, this is obviously Pinky’s famous catch phrase “Narf,” but in Japanese it ends up being more akin to Ayu’s “Uguu” or Stealth Momo’s “~ssu.”

Then you start to think. Pinky’s primary traits are being dumb, naive, and prone to clumsiness, but his secondary traits are being honest, kind, and strangely wise in a roundabout sort of way. You see Pinky, for all of his goodness and his desire to support the Brain in world-conquering endeavors, essentially to stick together forever, and you realize: in a different setting, with his distinctive catchphrases and wide-eyed innocence, that Pinky could have been a moe character.

I’ll let it sink in for a moment, and also remind you that Laura Winslow is a tsundere.