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** In one of the ''[[Star Trek Deep Space Nine (TV)|Deep Space Nine]]'' episodes, "Little Green Men", the Ferengi who crash on Earth in 1947 break their universal translators. Neither the humans nor the Ferengi are able to understand one another, implying that most species have this sort of technology so no one needs to be a linguist. Which explains why only ''Enterprise'' had Hoshi as a translator.
*** So, in summation, the universal translator is an amazing piece of technology, but still, an imperfect one regardless.
* ''[[Doctor Who (TV)|Doctor Who]]'' managed to explain this one by having the Doctor being able to mentally translate for his companions, who rarely thought anything odd about the fact they understood them. One of the Doctor's earlier companions did ask him once, but they were interrupted before he could answer and it was never brought up again. In the revival of the show that began in 2005, the translation is mentioned on more than one occasion to be performed by the Doctor's vehicle, the TARDIS, which is telepathically linked to the Doctor to the point that when he is unconscious, the translation fails. This became a plot point in the 2005 Christmas special, where an alien speech slowly turns into understandable English, {{spoiler|indicating that the Doctor is back in action and ready to deliver the smackdown}}.
** It often plays the trope straight, however, when aliens invade Earth. The series four finale features {{spoiler|Daleks that speak German when they invade Germany. Exterminieren! Exterminieren!}}
** At one point in the original series, it's stated that the translation is supposed to be unnoticeable. The fact that Sarah Jane Smith stops to wonder why she can understand Italian is evidence to the Doctor that something is wrong.
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** The movie that started it all, ''Stargate'', included the process of establishing communication with the locals, with all the slow laboriousness such as would not have worked as a regular feature of any TV show. (So did the SG-1 Season 4 episode "The First Ones," with an aboriginal alien, portrayed as Other enough not to know English.)
** Openly [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshaded]] in the "Wormhole X-Treme!" episode. Two of the crew get into an argument over whether they should have the off-world food be alien in appearance. When one demands whether the viewers will willingly suspend their disbelief in seeing a normal apple on an alien world, the other retorts it's not half-as-bad as all of the aliens speaking English.
* ''[[Babylon 5 (TV)|Babylon 5]]'' has a longstanding aversion of this trope -- the aliens all speak their own languages, and often have noticeable accents when they speak in English, if they speak in English at all. The ultimate example in this show would be Kosh, whose language is so strange it must be mechanically translated, and even then it is rarely comprehensible. Also of note is that mechanical translators are nothing near [[Translator Microbes]] : They must be tailor-made for a certain language, are of clearly visible size, have a stiff, monotonous sound, and are looked down upon by most species. [[Translation Convention]] applies when two aliens of the same species are conversing in private, per [[Word of God]].
* ''[[Crusade (TV)|Crusade]]'', the [[Too Good to Last|short-lived]] sequel series to ''[[Babylon 5 (TV)|Babylon 5]]'', played with this trope in its [[Homage]] episode to ''[[The X Files]]'', "Visitors From Down The Street". After rescuing a pair of aliens of a previously-unknown race who unexpectedly speak English, the Excalibur is hailed by an alien ship -- again in English. Captain Gideon comments sarcastically that either they're the same race as the others, or there's one hell of a busy English teacher running around that part of the galaxy.
* In the miniseries (and series) ''[[V]]'', this is [[Justified Trope|justified]] in that, since the aliens are trying to indoctrinate themselves into human culture, they must speak the local language at all times. Including poor Willie, who was meant to go to the Middle East and thus had learned Arabic, but ended up in the U.S. due to a bureaucratic bungle and was forced to stumble through English on short notice.
* The various screen adaptations of ''[[Flash Gordon (Comic Strip)|Flash Gordon]]'' all feature the Mongonians speaking flawless English, with no explanation as to why. The [[Flash Gordon (TV)|2007 series]] [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshades]] it, but still doesn't explain.
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* Possibly justified in 4E ''[[Dungeons and Dragons]]'', by the shardminds. The reason they can speak any language is most likely that they access the creatures memories, copy the language, and speak with it. Frankly, it makes sense.
* ''[[Feng Shui (Tabletop Game)|Feng Shui]]'''s GM section notes that just like in Hong Kong movies, everyone in the setting speaks perfect contemporary Cantonese, from Ancient Egyptian Pharaohs to the Prime Minister of Belgium to the bio-engineered abominations of the future -- and in your games, everything's being translated into English, including the puns. To heck with realism.
* Inverted in the ''Warhammer40k'' universe. No-one speaks English, not even the humans of the setting. Xenos races speak [[Indo -European Alien Language|their]] [[Starfish Language|own]] languages ([[The Voiceless|if they bother to speak at all]]), and humans of the Imperium speak [[Altum Videtur|High or Low Gothic]].
 
 
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* Inverted and Justified in ''The Accidental Space Spy'' - when the human character asks "How come all aliens are speaking English?", they explain that the someone [http://www.webcomicsnation.com/thorsby/spacespy/series.php?view=archive&chapter=48599#193466 hid mind control devices on a lot of planets], which gradually turn one of the planet's languages into Vricaltian. The culprit? {{spoiler|The Vricaltian Tourist Agency. To make it easier for tourists.}}
* Interplanar aversion in ''[[Planescape Survival Guide]]'', as it turns out when the cast make it to the first world (earth) [[Common Tongue|Common]] has nothing in common with English.
* On the planet in ''[[Verlore Geleentheid]]'' Afrikaans is evidently the dominant language (some English is spoken too). But considering it's somehow identical to South Africa in every way save for [[Schizo -Tech|some]] of the technology and the fact that the inhabitants aren't human that is to be expected.
* In ''[[Winters in Lavelle (Webcomic)|Winters in Lavelle]]'', all of the humans in Lavelle (so far) speak English. However, it's averted hard with the Gard, a species of (rather violent, it seems) half-deer men. They all speak Gardish, and the only one shown to be able to speak English so far is Xan- though his grasp on it is [[Strange Syntax Speaker|rather]] [[Eloquent in My Native Tongue|tenuous.]]
 
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[[Category:Speculative Fiction Tropes]]
[[Category:Alien Tropes]]
[[Category:Aliens Speaking English]][[Category:Pages with comment tags]]
[[Category:Trope]][[Category:Pages with comment tags]]
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