Holerö

From the Super Mario Wiki

Holerö (pronounced [hɔləˈʁøː]) is a German neologism used as an informal greeting or an interjection expressing joy or slight surprise. The word became a running gag in the later era of the Club Nintendo magazines and played a major role in the comic "Sag niemals Holerö!".

1 Origin
2 Usage in Club Nintendo
- 2.1 History
- 2.2 "Sag niemals Holerö!"
3 References

[edit] Origin

Claude M. Moyse, chief editor of the German Club Nintendo magazine from the mid-1990s until 2001, suggested that it may have been used by Loriot or Helge Schneider, two popular German comedians.^[1]^[2] According to Moyse, his co-worker Marcus Menold first introduced the term "holerö" to the Club Nintendo comics.^[1]

[edit] Usage in Club Nintendo

[edit] History

The word first appeared in the German version of Secret of Mana and was subsequently used in the majority of German Super Nintendo game translations, for which Moyse was responsible as well.

Part one of "Super Mario in Die Nacht des Grauens" marked the first occurrence of the word "holerö" in the Club Nintendo comics. In this story, it was used by Mario to greet Kirby and Link, whom he surprisingly met in the basement of their shared house. Later in the same story, Mario used it again as a joyful exclamation after defeating the friends' enemies. Since then, the word was found in almost every comic of the series. In "Donkey Kong in: Banana Day 24", Donkey Kong used it as a joyful exclamation. Mario used it to greet the other musicians at Koopa Records in the comic "Super Mario: Die Blume meines Herzens".

The comic "Blast Corps in Yoshis Knallkekse" marked the first occurrence of the word that actually affected the story in some way. After a spell was put on Yoshi's truck by Kamek (who exclaimed "Holerö!" when suddenly appearing next to the truck), Yoshi sees a poster reading "Blast Corps - You've got a problem? We'll solve it! Call 3-2-1-Blast Corps and we'll be there before you're able to pronounce 'holerö'!". He calls the Blast Corps team, steps out of the phone box and starts to pronounce "Holer...". In this moment the Blast Corps team arrives indeed, rhetorically asking whether they have promised too much. Later in the comic, Dr. Light too exclaims "Holerööööö!" when arriving with a helicopter.

In the second part of "Super Mario in Die Nacht des Grauens", Link and Kirby exclaim the word in pain when they suffer from Mario trying out a magical dice. Later in the comic, Mario uses a magical spell that results in him, Link and Kirby wearing women's clothes. Their reaction to this is "Ho..." (Mario), "...le..." (Link), "...rö!" (Kirby). The demonical creature Abigor also makes use of the word when meeting the three friends.

[edit] "Sag niemals Holerö!"

Finally, the term was featured prominently in "Sag niemals Holerö!". The comic centers around an evil extraterrestrial called KKDU, who disguised himself as a crooner called Heini. One of his songs is called "Holerö", and anyone listening to it will turn into food (to be more exact, a kind of food typical of the country the person lives in). Only Mario, TicToc and Bomberman can resist the evil spell, because they are the chosen ones to stop Heini from invading Earth and eating all the transformed terrestrials.