Klaus (American Dad!)
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Klaus is a fictional character on the television series American Dad!. He is voiced by Dee Bradley Baker. He is the Smith family's pet goldfish. His full name is currently unknown.
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[edit] Biography
[edit] Before Becoming a Fish
Klaus used to be an East German Olympic ski-jumper until his brainwaves were switched with that of a goldfish in the 1986 Winter Olympics by the CIA to prevent him from winning the gold medal. His original body gone and his mind now inhabiting the body of a fish, he took up residency with the Smith family, posing as their pet, a fact he has still apparently not come to terms with.
In "The Most Adequate Christmas Ever", Klaus stated that his grandfather was a train conductor who ran the kiddie train at the Auschwitz zoo (and is appalled when the family assumes he was referring to the concentration camp and reminds them that there is other stuff in that large town).
[edit] As The Smith's Pet
He lusts after Stan Smith's wife Francine; she is the subject of many of his sexual fantasies, which often revolve around sadism.
In the "Finances with Wolves" episode, Klaus switched his goldfish body for that of a black man's (the front man for an Earth, Wind and Fire cover group who ripped off the CIA at their summer mixer), and almost ran off with Francine, but the body was mortally damaged in the aftermath of an explosion at the mall. Deciding to spare his life, but also to make sure he never try to seduce Francine again, Stan placed his brain in another goldfish's body (Klaus flushed the previous fish's lifeless body down the toilet). This episode also gave an indication of his personality--while Stan dove to save Francine from the blast, Klaus was more concerned in saving his new human body.
[edit] Future
The episode "Of Ice and Men" shows Klaus in the year 2045, where he is inexplicably in a new human body. He also has a grandson in this future; the majority of the episode consisted of a story Klaus told him about the past. The grandson was apparently unaware Klaus had once been a fish. Klaus also claims in this episode to have been two sharks and a monkey as well as roommates with Rick Schroeder during the course of his life.
[edit] Personality
His voice is modeled, in part, after Peter Lorre's.
Klaus has a strange obsession with Beauty and the Beast. His view is that without Mrs. Potts (whom Francine played in "Stan of Arabia"), the Beast would have killed himself years ago. This may also be interpreted as simply part of his obsession with Francine. He also takes the story personally, "for who could ever love a beast?" (referring to himself).
Klaus is a fan of Scrubs. He can also play "Hava Nagila" on champagne flutes, and enjoys playing Tempest. Like Stan, Klaus is a fan of the Georgetown Hoyas.
Being that the other family members pay little attention to Klaus, he feels extremely isolated from the others. At one point, he convinced Steve to hold him so he could infect him with Ich, thus forcing Steve to spend time with him, while his other friends avoid him, out of fear of being infected.
[edit] Production Notes
Of the main cast, Klaus is the one least featured in the show's various plots, and often does not show up in episodes for more than brief cameos. The show's creators seem to acknowledge this fact in "Big Trouble in Little Langley," where Francine, asking if each family member is safe after a fire, forgets to mention Klaus, which leaves him frustrated. In Haylias, he points out the fact that the only time anyone talks to him is when they have no one else to turn to. Also, he acknowledges the fact that he is frequently ignored. He also frequently breaks the fourth wall; for example, he provided audio commentary in a fight scene between Stan and Bullock, and once bleeped himself to "take the joy away from the censors," using the word "bleep" in place of the actual swear he is implied to have used.
It is revealed in the episode "Haylias" that he does not know how to read, yet he frequently fakes reading whenever he wishes to have time to himself. He and Stan also befriend each other, though Stan appears to forget about Klaus completely after he experiences slight memory loss when recovering from a gunshot to the head.
In the German dubbed version of American Dad!, Klaus speaks in a Saxon dialect, which is seen as a stereotype for East Germans in general. His behavior in the German version is similar to that of an ex-Stasi agent and he hints that he was attached to the Stasi agency.
Klaus has appeared more frequently in Season 3, wherein he is repeatedly featured in several episodes' subplots.
[edit] Trivia
- Coincidentally, an issue of the webcomic The Parking Lot Is Full from July 26th, 1996 features a scientist named Viktor Von Klaus telepathically switching minds with a goldfish.
- If the IOC used the convention for holding Olympic Winter Games editions in between the Summer Games during the 1980's, that would put Klaus's events in Calgary Canada. In reality, up until the 1992 Winter Olympics, each winter edition was held in the same year as the summer edition.
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