History Main / PropheticNames

** An alien from a planet with such names as Katma Tui & Soranik Natu?

* One episode of ''LightNovel/DirtyPair Flash'' has the girls split up, with airhead Yuri getting a new partner. Her new partner "Lily" has every one of Yuri's flaws (doesn't take work seriously, easy to scare, always worried about her appearance etc.) writ much larger. Naturally, "yuri" can translate as "lily" in Japanese.

* Light Yagami from Manga/DeathNote, who has the character for "[[AGodAmI god]]" in his name...

* The Planet Kallamity in ''Five Star Stories''. [[EarthShatteringKaboom Guess how this one turns out]].

* In {{Gundam 00}}, [[spoiler: the main character's (code)name means "A Moment From The Holy Eternity". If one translates it to Japanese except the ''From'', which you will remove the other three letters after ''F'' then it would read as Setsuna F[[strike:rom]] Seiei. [[WordOfGod The director said]] that it represents the moments of revolutions in the long history of mankind, hinting at Setsuna being the true Innovator, the one who is going to bring revolution to mankind. Appropriately, Setsuna [[EvolutionaryLevels evolves into an Innovator]] during the last few episodes of the series.]]

* Bibliophile Yomiko Readman of Anime/ReadOrDie fits this quite well. (Yomiko literally meaning "reading child" and Readman being quite obvious)

** Even more egregious, early ''X-Men'' villain the Vanisher, who is a teleporter. His real name? Telford Porter.

* The Riddler's birth name is Edward Nigma.

* In the JamesBond movie ''Die Another Day'', the name of the orbital mirror system Icarus rather obviously foreshadows the device's final fate.
* StarWars: "Vader" sounds like [[FunWithForeignLanguages Dutch]] for [[LukeIAmYourFather "father"]]. Truly prophetic, considering that George Lucas didn't originally intend Vader to be Luke's father.

* Parodied with ''Hot Shots!'': One of the characters has Deadmeat as his nickname. Gee, I wonder...?

* Near the beginning of the novel ''The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy'' by Lawrence Sterne, the title character describes his father's theory that a person's given name has a profound influence on their life, their character, and their destiny.

* Melony in ''The Cider House Rules''. Her name was apparently supposed to be "Melody," but there was never anything melodious about her.

* In ''PeterPan'', Captain James Hook.

* The [[Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer Buffy-verse ]] has an interesting example: Season 3 of ''Series/{{Angel}}'' has a BadassNormal man whose surname was Holtz(meaning wood) seeking revenge on a [[HeelFaceTurn formerly evil]] vampire who murdered his family. He was able to capture and harm said vampire, but was never able to kill him and later stopped trying to. Season 7 of ''Buffy,'' a year later, has a man whose actual surname ''is'' Wood; if you make the connection, you can guess what he turned out to be.

* Just about every single named character in TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}.

* Also played straight throughout. Makes-Things was the Korean technological genius who invented a number of useful items allowing the Agents to go about their duties. He was given this name by the Flowers, who were unable to pronounce his correct name. His assistant and later replacement Techno-Dann may also fit this trope.

* In WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}, Nora Valkyrie is an ActionGirl and, [[GeniusBonus yes,]] a little bit of a BloodKnight.

* Invoked for a gag in ''TheSimpsons'' where Cletus the Yokel comments;

* ''Inch High Private Eye''. Inch wasn't a nickname.

* WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries:

* In {{RWBY}}, Nora Valkyrie is an ActionGirl and, [[GeniusBonus yes,]] a little bit of a BloodKnight.

** Played with in the case of Saves-A-Fox, who decided to ScrewDestiny and kill the fox she was prophesied to save. [[spoiler: Dies-Horribly later reveals that from her description of the fox, it was probably suffering from an illness that would soon have resulted in a drawn-out, agonizing death, so that in a sense she saved it by killing it quickly.]]

** Possibly subverted with [[spoiler: MAIN ANTAGONIST, who doesn't seem very much like a villian. He complains that nobody wants to get near him because of his name (and accent?) and offers BC and LI some soup.]]

* Amelia Aerhart (pronounced the same as "air heart") was one of the most famous aviators of all time.

->''You may ask yourself why he became a specialist in haemotology; well, he originally wanted to be a dancer, but when your name is Vitus Hemos, some choices are just made for ya. It's why I changed my name, my parents kind of wanted me to be a proctologist, that's why they named me Jimmy O'Buttocks.''

** Planet names in "The Chase": Aridius, which is a desert when we see it, was presumably named while it was still an ocean world, and likewise Mechanus must have been named when the intent was still that the Mechanoids would prepare it for human colonisation, rather than keeping it. The ''Magazine/DoctorWhoMagazine'' review for the PastDoctorAdventures novel ''Catastrophea'' refers to "the charming TerryNation habit of naming planets after what's ''going'' to happen to them".
* ''[[Series/BabylonFive Babylon 5]]'' mentions a science ship named the Icarus. The ship gets a bit too daring in its explorations and meets an unfortunate end, [[WhatDidYouExpectWhenYouNamedIt to the surprise of absolutely no-one]].

* Samantha Bond played Moneypenny in the PierceBrosnan Film/JamesBond films.
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* In WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries, during the Riddler's StartOfDarkness episode, Batman lampshades this trope when Edward Nigma reveals his new identity, asking him if it's meant to be a joke.
** At the ''BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'' episode ''[[Recap/BatmanTheAnimatedSeriesTheClockKing The Clock King]]'' the eponimous villian name, ''Temple Fugate'' sounds a lot like ''Tempus Fugit'' ([[AltumVidetur latin for 'Time Flies']]). Given Fugate is a CosmicPlaything, this was the name [[{{Franchise/DCAU}} the Universe itself]] chose for him.

* The ''Literature/DeathGateCycle'' gives us Alfred. When finally revealing his backstory states his real name is Corren, which means Chosen One in his language. Even though he is [[LastOfHisKind Last of His Kind]], it admits it isn't all that prophetic since every family has at least one child given that name to invoke [[TheChosenOne The Chosen One]].

* In ''{{Goblins}}'', the goblins are all named by their tribe's fortune teller. While this isn't so bad for Chief, Big Ears, or even [[LampshadeHanging Complains-of-Names]], you have to feel sorry for poor Dies-Horribly. And of course, Young and Beautiful got to name herself, even though she... well, isn't.
** Although so far it's worked out for Dies-Horribly. He's downright ''terrible'' at it...

** Played with in the case of Saves-A-Fox, who decided to ScrewDestiny and kill the fox she was prophesied to save. [[spoiler: She then [[YouCantFightFate saves the fox's tail]], [[CompletelyMissingThePoint as a symbol of how she defied her destiny]].]]
*** [[spoiler: Dies-Horribly later reveals that from her description of the fox, it was probably suffering from an illness that would soon have resulted in a drawn-out, agonizing death, so that in a sense she saved it by killing it quickly.]]

* In Creator/JRRTolkien's Middle-earth (''TheLordOfTheRings'', etc), it is custom for (at least some tribes of) Elves to be given a name by each parent, and the name given by the mother tends to be descriptive of the person and may even be prophetic as to their fate. See for instance one of Fëanor and Nerdanel's twin sons, called by his mother 'Umbarto', meaning 'the Fated' (though she wouldn't tell which one it was.) Fëanor attempted to change his doom by having Nerdanel call him 'Ambarto' but [[spoiler: still ended up accidentally killing him.]] See also the human [[ButtMonkey Turin]], who attempted to dispel the {{curse}} laid upon him by calling himself 'Turambar' ('Master of Fate'.) [[spoiler: It didn't work.]]

** Ever wondered if the name Aragorn has any meaning? Well in Sindarin it means "revered king" (though the prefix ''ara(n)-'' meaning "king" is quite used in names from Isildur's heirs, possibly justifying this).

** At the ''BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'' episode ''[[Recap/BatmanTheAnimatedSeriesTheClockKing The Clock King]]'' even before becoming the ClockKing, ''Temple Fugate'' sounds a lot like ''Tempus Fugit'' ([[AltumVidetur latin for 'Time Flies']]). Given Fugate is a CosmicPlaything, this was the name [[{{Franchise/DCAU}} the Universe itself]] chose for him.

** At the ''BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'' episode ''[[Recap/BatmanTheAnimatedSeriesTheClockKing The Clock King]] Temple Fugate sounds like ''Tempus Fugit ([[AltumVidetur latin for Time Flies]]''). Given Fugate is a CosmicPlaything, this was the name [[{{Franchise/DCAU}} the Universe itself]] chose for him.

** At the ''BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'' episode ''[[Recap/BatmanTheAnimatedSeriesTheClockKing The Clock King]] Temple Fugate sounds like ''Tempus Fugit'' (''[[AltumVidetur latin for Time Flies]]''). Given Fugate is a CosmicPlaything, this was the name [[{{Franchise/DCAU}} the Universe itself]] chose for him.

* A US Representative named Anthony Weiner, who resigned in disgrace over sending pictures of his... weiner.

* Anthony Weiner was a New York representative until he was caught tweeting pics of his groin in 2011 and was forced to resign, although in April 2013, he announced he was going to run for his old seat again.

* The ''HarryPotter'' books by J.K. Rowling feature ''many'' names with deliberate meanings on one level or another. A number of websites have sprung up to analyze her naming patterns, like [[http://www.theninemuses.net/hp/list.html this one]]. A few examples:

*** Very, very much lampshaded in CleolindaJones' ''Movies in Fifteen Minutes'' version of ''Prisoner of Azkaban'':

* Mangus ver Mangnusson, which translates to "Big Guy, son of Big Guy, who was the son of another Big Guy", holds the record for most wins in the World's Strongest Man competition.

-->-- '''Noah ''[[WebVideo/TheSpoonyExperiment 'The Spoony One']]'' Antwiler''', on ''[[http://www.spoonyexperiment.com/2009/10/20/terror-t-r-a-x-track-of-the-vampire-pc-part-1/ Terror T.R.A.X -- Track of the Vampire]]''

** Sanguinius, Primarch of the Blood Angels (who suffer from a debilitating bloodthirst), Konrad Kurze (had the gift/curse of foresight, eventually turned traitor), Angron, Primarch of the World Eaters, (who are, to a man, AxCrazy [[TheBerserker Berserker]] {{BloodK night}}s with UnstoppableRage), Mortarion the Primarch of the Death Guard (and its current leader Typhus) devoted to the disease god Nurgle.

** Sanguinius, Primarch of the Blood Angels (who suffer from a debilitating bloodthirst), Konrad Kurze (had the gift/curse of foresight, eventually turned traitor), Angron, Primarch of the World Eaters, (who are, to a man, AxCrazy [[TheBerserker Berserker]] BloodKnights with UnstoppableRage), Mortarion the Primarch of the Death Guard (and its current leader Typhus) devoted to the disease god Nurgle.