Spexico: Difference between revisions

[[File:spain_flag_2161spain flag 2161.jpg|frame|[[Irony|Picture found at an educational website]].]]

{{quote|''"Spain is a peaceful land of giant hats and luchadores (or maybe we're getting that confused)."''|''[[Cracked.com]]''}}

Fiction writers seem to not just confuse [[Useful Notes/Mexico|Mexico]] and [[Useful Notes/Spain|Spain]], but to fuse them into a strange amalgam of the most general stereotypes of both, much as [[Scotireland]] fuses Scotland and Ireland. Maybe it's because they share a language and [[Christianity Is Catholic|religion]], the fact that Mexico used to be a Spanish colony, the exotic foods and customs of a non-Anglo-Saxon culture, or simply that the author [[Did Not Do the Research]] ''and'' hasn't travelled much, either. American writers also have the excuse that Mexico is closer, geographically, to the US than Spain is, so they're more familiar with Mexican culture, colouring their perception of Spain. Never mind that Mexican culture has also much in common with the [[Mayincatec|Aztec, Maya, and other native civilizations]] and is much more influenced by American culture; they all speak Spanish, so they must be the same, [[You Fail Logic Forever|right]]?

This is represented by a group or town that is full of [[South of the Border|stereotypically Mexican]] or [[Toros Y Flamenco|Spanish]] people, set in a location or doing an activity better suited to the other. That is, when they aren't made into a mish-mash. It could be a Spanish mariachi band at a wedding instead of a [http://en.[wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuna_:Tuna (music) |tuna]] singing ''Clavelitos'', or a town of thick-mustachioed men in sombreros and ponchos dancing Flamenco. Inversely, it could be a depiction of Spain as a hot, tropical jungle full of revolutionary outlaws, or even a [[Banana Republic]] run by a Fascist dictator (technically true during Franco's dictatorship, except there are no tropical jungles in Spain).

Part of this could be that Mexicans have many more demonstrable stereotypes in American pop-culture than Spaniards do. Alternately, U.S. productions will likely have a much easier time casting Mexican actors than Spanish ones (and not care about the accents). Also justified to some degree because, having been a Spanish colony, Mexico still keeps many Spanish traditions.

* Verizon, as seen in [https://web.archive.org/web/20100425005059/http://contexts.org/socimages/2010/04/17/spain-mexico-whatever/ this sociologist's blog post], has got a print ad out there with "Coverage in Spain" on it (just ignore the "and [[Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics|25 more countries]] than the UN recognizes" part) with the Verizon guy in front of a crowd of stereotypical Mexicans.

** Penélope Cruz is Spanish, but has played Mexican and even Brazilian characters.

** Gael García Bernal, who is Mexican and has played so in ''Babel'', has played the Argentinian Che Guevara in two different movies. He also played a Spaniard in ''[[Bad Education (Film)|Bad Education]]'', after convincing director Pedro Almodóvar that he could speak with a convincing Castilian accent.

* Also invoked by Don Cheadle's character in ''[[Crash (Filmfilm)|Crash]]''. He cuts short a phone call with his mother because he's "having sex with a white woman." He later remarks that she's Mexican. His girlfriend, who's Hispanic but not from Mexico (forgot where she said her parents were from), is ''not'' amused.

** Her father came from El Salvador, her mother from Puerto Rico-she helpfully points out, "Neither of those is Mexico." His response: "The question we have to ask ourselves is-who gathered together those remarkably different cultures and taught them all to park their cars on their lawns?" in keeping with its theme of "insult every ethnicity imaginable."

* In ''[[Clueless]]'', Cher makes her maid Lucy talk to the gardener for her, and tells her it's because Cher doesn't speak "Mexican". This infuriates Lucy, as she is from El Salvador, which Josh explains. Cher doesn't get what the big deal is; Josh points out that Cher gets mad if anyone thinks she lives below Sunset.

* Take a band of Zapatistas. The more indigenous the better. Then drop them in [[Television Geography|the Rockies]], dress them with the clothes left over by the Sicilian scenes of ''[[The Godfather (Film)|The Godfather]]'' and make them live in wooden barracks with bananas in the porch. According to ''[[MacGyver]]'', this is [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IjbbfK87JWc the Basque Country].

* Intentionally invoked in ''[[Arrested Development (TV series)|Arrested Development]]'' when GOB discovers fake plane tickets to Portugal (don't ask you'd have to watch) and that Michael is trying to learn Spanish, he concludes that Michael is fleeing to South America.

* Lampshaded in ''[[Whose Line Is It Anyway? (TV)|Whose Line Is It Anyway]]'', in a sketch where Neil Ashdown is supposed to be a bartender in Spain:

{{quote| '''Neil:''' Would you care for some tortillas? ...No, wait, that's Mexico. Never mind. ...I've been around, you know.}}

{{quote| '''Blanche:''' The point is, [Fidel]'s rich, he's handsome and we were made for each other...even if I don't speak Mexican.<br />

'''Dorothy:''' Spanish.<br />

{{quote| '''Crane:''' When I dined on werewolf in Seville, the ''cocinera'' used an understated ''molé'' [sic] sauce to bring out the meat's tanginess.}}

* One episode of ''[[Mind of Mencia (TV)|Mind of Mencia]]'' had a Spanish celebrity invoke this to get into a nightclub. [[It Makes Sense in Context]].

* In an episode of ''[[Six Feet Under]]'' a Mexican-American family comes to Fisher and Sons to bury their son who was killed in a gang shooting. Nate asks Rico to deal with them, since Rico is Hispanic. Rico takes offense -- becauseoffense—because Nate assumes that he knows how to deal with gangs, but also because Rico is ''Puerto Rican,'' not Mexican.

* [https://web.archive.org/web/20100219065641/http://www.theonion.com/content/node/38654 Classic example] from ''[[The Onion]]'' that perfectly illustrates this trope.

** What is more hilarious is that the restaurant had a clearly Spanish name. ''[[Don Quixote (Literature)|Don Quixote]]'' is a novel written in Spain by Miguel de Cervantes, a Spaniard writer, and set in La Mancha, Spain.

* In Paris, there are quite a few 'Tex-Mex' restaurants that serve Spanish food.

* On a train from Barcelona to Zaragoza, you might be surprised to see how much the landscape of the Spanish countryside looks like classic depictions of southwestern North America (almost like a [[Wile E. Coyote and The Road Runner (Animation)|Road Runner]] cartoon). It is for this reason--asreason—as well as the high availability of dark-skinned, Spanish-speaking actors, that [[Sergio Leone]] and other Italian directors of "[[Spaghetti Western|Spaghetti Westerns]]s" tended to shoot their films in Spain, particularly in Andalucia, since getting to the actual Mexico or United States was simply too expensive.

* A nice example would be Castille in ''[[Seventh Sea|7th Sea]]'', with fencers, powerful Inquisition, pirates and Armadas... and inexplicably, Ranchos and El Vago, [[Zorro]]'s [[Expy]].

* Spain Hill is a location in ''[[The World Ends With You (Video Game)|The World Ends With You]]'' whose only feature is... a Mexican restaurant. Note that "Spain Hill" is a ''real life location'' in Shibuya, Tokyo, in which the game is set.

* Black Velvetopia in ''[[Psychonauts (Video Game)|Psychonauts]]'' combines bullfighting and Spanish architecture with Mexican luchadores and painters dressed in [[South of the Border]]-style outfits. It's mildly justified in that it takes place in the mind of an ambiguously Latino asylum patient who {{spoiler|was never involved in bullfighting or masked Mexican wrestling to begin with, and probably hasn't ever been to Spain.}}

* In the episode ''The Bull Market'' of the ''[[Ace Ventura]]: [[Recycled: Thethe Series|Pet Detective]]'' series, Ace discovers that a stolen bull has been shipped to Spain. Of course, because there is only ''one city'' in Spain, he immediately goes to Pamplona, [[It's Always Mardi Gras in New Orleans|that happens to be in the middle of the Running of the Bulls]]. Except it's only the bulls who are running because the "Spaniards" are sleeping the siesta inside their ponchos and sombreros in the middle of the street. Ahem.

* ''[[FilmationsFilmation's Ghostbusters (Animation)|Filmations Ghostbusters]]''' episode "[[Our Ghosts Are Different|The Ghost of]] [[Don Quixote (Literature)|Don Quixote]]" has a milder example with Spaniards constantly using Mexican slang and a villain who is a walking robber baron stereotype down to the Cantinflas moustache. Also, every Spanish character but Don Quixote has orange skin for some reason.

* In the 1930's [[Classic Disney Short]] ''Ferdinand the Bull'', the narrator tells us the story is set in "sunny Spain." However, many of the Spaniards look like stereotypical Mexicans, with sombreros, brown skin, thick black mustaches, etc.

* ''[[Looney Tunes]]'', more specifically, [[Speedy Gonzales]]. The town where Speedy lives is the clearest example of [[Spexico]] you'd ever find. Complete with flamenco, bulls, tacos and ''zarapes''.

* [[Dream WorksDreamWorks]]' ''[[Puss in Boots]]''. In ''Shrek 2'', the setting is against a take on Authorian England, so viewers assumed Puss was Spanish. In this prequel, it shows he came from somewhat of an anagram of Spain and Mexico. And if the filmmakers ''did'' mean for him to be Mexican, that brings up the other question of just how he was able to get across the Atlantic!

* Subverted in ''[[Jackie Chan Adventures (Animation)|Jackie Chan Adventures]]'' when the Enforcers were in Pamplona and were trying to remember what makes that town famous. Hak Foo suggested the paella, Ratso asked if that was the thing people hit with clubs to get candy and Valmont pointed out that was a piñata and that they were in Spain, not in Mexico.

* Bizarrely, ''[[The Road to El Dorado]]'' casts [[The QueensQueen's Latin|Anglo-American/British actors as the Spaniards]] and (mostly) Latino actors as the Indians.

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