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Originally posted by: ricarleite
For every French and Italian reader here: WHY did they re-named the characters in Star Wars? Did they sound like curse words?
In the portuguese version, Dooku is renamed Dookan (although he is referenced as Dooku on Clone Wars sometimes), and Sifo-Dyas was renamed to Zaifo-Vias, because both names sounded similar to curse words. Also, Panaka was not renamed, but he souds like "panaca", which means something like "jerk", "stupid", "idiot".
it was common at the time to "frenchise" the names; exemples in "new hope" novelization:
Han = Yan
Luke = Luc
Chewbacca = Chiktabba
Millenium Falcon = Millenium Condor
Darth Vader = Dark Vador (this being so popular in France stayed: Darth Maul = Dark Maul, same for Tyrannus, and Sidious)
but by the time of Empire Chewie gets his true name, the falcon is called "the falcon", but the names didn't changed for 3PO and R2 (except now 3PO is called "3PO" in the PT and "6PO" in the OT)