In English He is Tonto

If you haven't recognized him, the actor in the photo is none other than Johnny Depp soon to appear in the Lone Ranger movie as the Indian who is the Ranger's trusted partner.
In Spanish we do not call this character Tonto. That would be disrespectful for a very single reason: Tonto in Spanish means FOOL or DUMB.
Since Tonto is an Indian it would not only be disrespectful it would probably be considered quite biased.
It was then quite a wise decision that of the original translators of the series (it was a radio serial at the beginning back in the fifties) not to use the name Tonto and instead they called him  TORO which means BULL in Spanish.
Tonto does have a meaning in an Indian language (Pottawatomie) and that would be "Wild One"- Kemosabe, what Tonto calls the Lone Ranger, means "Trusted Friend" or "Trusted Scout".
Tonto and the Lone Ranger was a great a series, hopefully the movie will be the same or even better.


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