Quick question about character portrait backgrounds

I believe I posted a very similar thread like this before, but that one's really old now and I would also like to hear what you think of this right now.
The thing is this - every single time I download a Japanese version of this game the character portraits look like this:

http://www.mobygames.com/images/shot...cter-menus.png

Black backgrounds.
But everytime I download an English version they suddenly always look like this:

http://images.wikia.com/finalfantasy...NES_0_HP_1.png

Blue backgrounds.
Now I'm wondering - is it supposed to look like this for each respective version?
Or is there something wrong with all the Japanese versions out there so they have problems with transparencies or something?
Because I have never been able to find a Japanese version that actually has blue backgrounds, no matter which computer or emulator I have used.

The portrait background is supposed to be black; this saves a color from needing to be used to outline the portrait. Notice how without the black background in the fan-translation, the characters' faces are not outlined. For some reason, that particular translation decided to change the graphics that way. The prototype English translation also maintains the black background.