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4[[quoteright:350:[[Creator/StuartAshen https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/RetievalMankindsBatman_2942.jpg]]]]
5[[caption-width-right:350:"I can't even hazard to guess as to what they were trying to ''say'' with that title..."]]
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7->''"[[Literature/TheTalesOfBeedleTheBard Babbity Rabbity and her Cackling Stump]] is the stupidest title ever written by man or beast and of course when I wrote it... when I gave [[Literature/HarryPotter Ron]] that title, I didn't imagine for a second that I was actually going to write the story."''
8-->-- '''Creator/JKRowling''', on combining this trope with {{Defictionalization}}.
9
10%% One quote per page is sufficient. Please use the quotes page for additional entries.
11
12The persistent practice of using titles that look like someone mashed together random words lifted out of an English dictionary. At worst, they will be as meaningless as "Super Punk Octo Pudding Gas Mark Seven", and at best, they will just cryptically allude to the show's premise or characters while trying to make a clever Western pop-culture reference. Basically, GratuitousEnglish (or whatever language the work was originally made in) as applied to work names.
13
14Contrast with ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin, this trope's direct opposite. See also NonIndicativeName, for characters and in-story objects with similarly unintuitive names, albeit ones that still carry meaningful communicative significance; and NeverTrustATitle, for titles that are grammatically sound, but misleading. Related to JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant. For an example of a "TV Tropes" title that follows this formula, see NinjaPirateZombieRobot.
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16The [[ExaggeratedTrope extreme version]] of this trope is the WordPureeTitle, when even the words themselves are garbled or made up.
17
18See also GoryDeadlyOverkillTitleOfFatalDeath, for when horror movies do this. A SisterTrope would be WordSaladLyrics, often performed by [[AGoodNameForARockBand suitably named bands]]. Also very closely related to MeaninglessMeaningfulWords, which sound impressive in any haphazard order. An OperationBlank might turn out like this if it's randomly-generated.
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20Not to be confused with ColonCancer or InWhichATropeIsDescribed. {{Mad Lib Thriller Title}}s follow a set of rules that may or may not result in this.
21
22!!The following company has its own page:
23
24* WordSaladTitle/SquareEnix
25
26----
27!!Examples That [[ItMakesSenseInContext Make Sense in Context]]
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35[[folder:Anime and Manga]]
36* ''Manga/KaijuGirlCaramelise'': The "Kaiju Girl" part is a more straightforward example of ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin, as main character Kuroe Akaishi is a high school girl who intermittently turns into a {{Kaiju}}. The "Caramelise" is a bit more complicated; it references caramelization, the process of browning sugar to give it a distinct sweet taste, and in relation to the manga refers to how [[ShrinkingViolet shy]] and antisocial Kuroe gradually becomes a sweeter person as she starts making friends.
37* The confusingly-named ''Manga/FruitsBasket'' is named after a Japanese kids' game also called "Fruits Basket". Makes logical, if not grammatical, sense. The problem comes from Japanese at one time lacking a ''tu'' syllable - it's ''tsu'' or ''to'' - with the result that so many English words ending in ''t'' get an extraneous final -s when transliterated into Japanese. In particular, "fruit" has issues in the fact that Japanese does not have distinct R and L consonants; ''furuuto'' is the transliteration of "flute", so "fruit" is stuck with ''furuutsu''.
38* The meaning behind the title of ''Anime/AngelBeats'' doesn't become clear until the final episode. [[spoiler:Angel, the female antagonist received Otonashi's heart ("beats"); both literally in a heart transplant while she was alive, and metaphorically in the afterlife when he falls in love with her. "My soul, your beats."]] Before then, there's only the weak explanation that one character is an angel and some other characters are musicians.
39* ''Anime/BoogiepopPhantom'' got scrambled in localisation. The original Japanese title was "Boogiepop Doesn't Laugh" (alternately, "Boogiepop Never Laughs").
40* ''Anime/SamuraiChamploo'' sounds like it but actually makes some sense. [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champloo Champloo or rather Chanpuru]] is a Japanese dish made from a mix of regional foods, just like how the anime mixes Edo-period and modern elements together. Interestingly, both the dish and the main character of the anime are from Okinawa.
41* ''Manga/FullmetalAlchemist'' just plain makes more sense in the original: the word translated as 'full metal' is a pun in Japanese, meaning [[ArtificialLimbs steel]] but also stubborn (an adjective that suits Ed very well). Its Japanese title, ''Hagane no Renkinjutsushi'' (commonly abbreviated to "[=HagaRen=]"), would translate to the far more comprehensible ''Alchemist of Steel''.
42* ''Literature/FullMetalPanic'', on the other hand, is GratuitousEnglish and a slightly off-kilter reference to a Creator/StanleyKubrick [[Film/FullMetalJacket film]].
43* ''Manga/DevilmanLady'' was changed to ''The Devil Lady'' for the American release. The original title came about because the titular character is the DistaffCounterpart to ''Franchise/{{Devilman}}''.
44* ''Manga/{{Bleach}}'' had its name derived from Creator/TiteKubo not wanting to name his manga ''Black'' after the color of the shinigami uniforms and so titled it ''Bleach'' as the inverse of black, in order to evoke the meaning of white. Prominent fan theories for its naming were Ichigo's light red hair, which supposedly looks bleached, the band Music/{{Nirvana}} of which Tite Kubo is a fan, whose first album was titled ''Bleach'' or the "bleaching" purification effect a Shinigami's sword has on a Hollow fallen ghost. And then there's the rumor [[EpilepticTrees that he called it bleach because in his cleaning supplies the bleach was right next to the Resolve, and resolve is a major character trait]].
45** Many of the chapter titles also make very little sense without context, such as "Four Arms to Killing You" and "Superchunky from Hell". The former involves an Arrancar with [[MultiArmedAndDangerous four (later six) arms]] trying to kill Kenpachi Zaraki. The latter is about a [[spoiler:giant blob-shaped hollow coming from Hueco Mundo to aid in Aizen's attack]]. In the ''Bleach'' [[AllThereInTheManual character data books]] there are sections to translate the titles.
46* ''Ah! Megami-sama'', aka ''Manga/AhMyGoddess'', was changed to ''Oh My Goddess!'' in some translations to fit the Western expletive "Oh My God." According to its creator, [[{{Woolseyism}} this is the correct translation]].
47* ''Anime/ElHazardTheMagnificentWorld''. Given the loose Arabic feel of the series, it is likely that "El Hazard" (pronounced El "Ha-ZARD") is a bastardization of Scheherazade, the teller of 1001 Tales of the Literature/ArabianNights. Each episode is described as a "night." The first episode is "The First Night." Given this, it is likely to have taken Makoto 3 years until the epilogue to find a way to get back to Ifurita; or 1001 Nights. It could also be a reference to Lovecraft's Mad Arab Al-Hazred, who wrote the Necronomicon, knowledge that man should not know. There certainly is enough LostTechnology in the series that mankind would have been better off not creating. Although the El- prefix is actually Spanish, as in El Cid, the noted Spanish general.
48* Speaking of ''Anime/MagicalGirlLyricalNanoha'', "Lyrical" is her rarely used incantation, (she stopped using it after the first episode of the second season), she's a MagicalGirl and her name is Nanoha.
49* ''Manga/MermaidMelodyPichiPichiPitch''. Pichi pichi is both the onomatopoeia of a fish blowing bubbles and a phrase describing a GenkiGirl like the heroine, Lucia. Pitch refers to the MagicMusic used in the series. Still, that's like naming an action film ''Man With a Gun Bang Bang Sound."
50* ''Anime/StrainStrategicArmoredInfantry''. Strains are the HumongousMecha, and the name stands for [[FunWithAcronyms STRategic Armoured INfantry]]; it may also refer to the strained relationship between the EmotionlessGirl heroine and her evil AloofBigBrother.
51* ''Anime/BubblegumCrisis'': [[WordOfGod As the creators explain]], a bubblegum crisis is a bad situation that just keeps expanding until it pops and leaves a mess all over the place. They may have been thinking of 'Sticky Situation'.
52* ''Franchise/SailorMoon'': The Sailor Soldier's MagicalGirl costumes deliberately resemble the common Japanese school girl uniforms, popularly known as "sailor fuku" that are patterned after traditional sailor's uniforms. The resemblance is mostly in the shirt collar and scarf. The show even referenced this in one episode of TheNineties [[Anime/SailorMoon anime]] when Usagi used her Disguise Pen to become an actual sailor. Actually, the officially translated full title is "Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon," just to throw in a few more nouns there.\
53Later anime arcs tack on "R", "S", "Super S", and "Sailor Stars" to the series title. R is said to stand for Rebirth and Romance, S refers to Super, according to eyecatches, as in Super Sailor Moon. Super S refers to...multiple Super Sailor Soldiers (i.e., the Sailor Team) while Sailor Stars? Probably all the Sailor Star Lights (alien Sailor Soldiers).\
54This trope also applies to too many attack names to count. There is nothing particularly illusionary about Shine Aqua Illusion, nor do Star Serious Laser and Star Gentle Uterus actually involve lasers and uteri. ([[{{Squick}} Ew.]])
55* ''Manga/AzumangaDaioh''. The title refers to the author of the manga (Kiyohiko Azuma) and the magazine it was published in (''Dengeki Daioh''), as well as it being, well, a manga. A translation would basically go something like "Azuma's great comic for Daioh Magazine." The anime version calls it "Azumanga Daioh: The Animation", even though it's only accurate for the print version. It also sounds like "Azumanga da yo", which would translate to "It's Azuma's manga!". They play with this interpretation at the very beginning of the anime (they cut the phrase off, resulting in 'Azumanga da!').
56* ''Anime/AllPurposeCulturalCatGirlNukuNuku''. "Cultural", in this context, is a post-World-War-II word indicating that a consumer product is NewAndImproved. Still, it fails to capture English syntax.
57* The "Cure" part of the ''Anime/PrettyCure'' franchise is assumed to refer to the act of eliminating the evil influence that turned an ordinary object of some kind into the MonsterOfTheWeek. Makes the most sense in ''Anime/FutariWaPrettyCureSplashStar''.
58* ''Manga/LuckyStar'' doesn't seem to specifically refer to any star that is lucky, although there is quite a bit of symbolic use of a star within the series as a decorative motif, and there is an extended sequence where the characters discuss wishing upon a star. Possibly, it was referring to the Madonna song, which at least vaguely makes sense.\
59Furthermore, the title is spelled ''Raki ☆ Suta'', which is not the proper way to spell Lucky ''or'' Star, which ought to be Rakkii and Sutaa respectively. It is a little bit like naming your show "Lukky St'r" (just enough similarity to the actual words that the intended meaning is clear, but it still looks odd). It's just another example of the ''Fun With The Foreign Languages'' game so popular in Japan. The ''Lucky'' part came from ''Comptiq'', the magazine it serializes; ''Lucky Channel'' is actually the name of their reader's column.\
60There is a scene where one of the characters wishes on a shooting star, but it doesn't appear until Volume 2 of the manga. The anime theme song also makes reference to meteorites.
61* ''Manga/XxxHolic'' sounds like someone hopelessly addicted to pornography, those x'ed jars of moonshine, or maybe Vin Diesel. It's actually supposed to evoke those little x's on the blank where you sign your name on official documents: therefore, "[=×××HOLiC=]" is more like "fill-in-the-blank-holic", or "ABC-holic". Many of the characters fit this description (workaholic, alcoholic, etc.). It's supposed to be pronounced as just "holic". It can also mean "addicted to the unknown" with the xxx being a "mystery".
62* ''Manga/TokyoMewMew'' is a PunBasedTitle involving the onomatopoeia of a cat's "mew" and the Greek letter "mu", which is pronounced the same and used extensively in the field of genetics. The main character is a {{catgirl}}, and she and her team of LittleBitBeastly are genetic experiments. And, well, it is set in Tokyo.
63** Tokyo Mew Mew's hentai parody, ''Sex Warrior Pudding'', fits this bill as well. The original Japanese title is ''Family Restaurant Warrior Pudding'', which makes just as much sense though is less frightening; the protagonist is named "Pudding" which fits the {{edible theme naming}} of much of female cast work at a family restaurant and is a ([[ClarkKenting ostensibly secretly]]) superheroine. The "sex warrior" part comes from the fact that she and the other female cast are involved in inordinate amounts of, well, sexual situations (the positive feelings they get from such being used to power their superheroine strength, weaponry, super modes, etc.).
64* ''Manga/KaitouSaintTail'': {{Kaitou}} is obvious, Saint because [[ChristianityIsCatholic she's Catholic]], Tail because she has a ponytail.
65* ''Anime/KiddyGrade'' makes sense when reviewing the background material, which states that the young-looking nanomachine-enhanced ES members are 'graded' in increasing orders of power as C, S, G (Copper, Silver, Gold). Ironically, the main protagonists are listed as the weakest of their organization...at first.
66* The Japanese title ''Kidou Senkan Nadeshiko'' is a fairly straightforward play on [[Anime/MobileSuitGundam two]] [[Anime/SpaceBattleshipYamato classic]] series and the term YamatoNadeshiko. For whatever reason, the English title, ''Manga/MartianSuccessorNadesico'' was taken from the antagonists of TheMovie, who don't even exist in the time frame of the series.
67* ''Manga/ExcelSaga'' is the saga of the title character whose name is Excel. The full title of the [[Anime/ExcelSaga anime adaptation]] is "Quack Experimental Anime Excel Saga", which ''also'' [[QuirkyWork says it all]].
68* ''Anime/SerialExperimentsLain'': Lain is our protagonist. The series spans a short anime series and a Platform/PlayStation game, the latter of which involves reading case files on Lain's 'progress' throughout laboratory tests. Also, each episode of the show can be seen as Lain experimenting with something new, progressing serially from the simple (trying out a new computer) to the mindblowingly, cosmically profound. Metatextually, the episodes can be seen as a series of experiments with storytelling technique, each one trying something different.
69* ''Anime/KurauPhantomMemory'': Kurau, the protagonist, merges with an [[EnergyBeings energy being]] calling itself "Rynax", which is likely the phantom from the title. The new Kurau retains a strong sense of morality since she still possesses all of the memories of her human part. During the course of the series, she encounters other "Rynasapiens" who suppress their human memories and as a result, have a high disregard for life.
70* ''Anime/CowboyBebop'': other than helping to set the mood of the show, a "cowboy" is slang for a bounty hunter and ''Bebop'' is the name of the ship the hero bounty hunters live on. And no, [[CowboyBebopAtHisComputer the title doesn't refer to a specific character]]. Bebop is also a type of Jazz and the opening theme song Tank is sort of an example of this style. Some of the background music is in a country style, which the "Cowboy" may be alluding to. Naming the show after music also works in a show influenced by styles of music.
71* ''Manga/TriGun'' '''can''' make sense in context, though that context is debated (see below).
72* ''Manga/BoboboboBobobo'' is named after the main character, and both he and the series are [[QuirkyWork every bit as weird as the name]].
73* ''Manga/MagicKnightRayearth'' stars a trio of characters who become, yes, {{Magic Knight}}s. One of them eventually gains a guardian god-robot called Rayearth.
74* ''Anime/CodeGeass'': "Geass" is the main character's name for his MagicalEye powers (which is derived from geis or geas, a type of enchantment that heroes in Celtic mythology are often put under by goddesses or witches), but the "Code" part remained a mystery for one and a half seasons, until in episode 15 of ''R2'', CC referred to [[spoiler:her and VV's immortality and ability to bestow Geass as "Code"]]. Yup, it was as simple as that. On the other hand, "R2" remains unintuitive and unclarified in the text, but WordOfGod states it refers to "reconstruction and revolution".
75* ''Anime/KishinCorps'' had its title changed to an example of this trope for [[Creator/{{Geneon}} Pioneer/Geneon's]] DVD re-release: ''Alien Defender Geo Armor''.
76* ''Franchise/{{Transformers}}'':
77** The title ''Anime/TransformersArmada'' refers to the eventual team-up of Autobots, Decepticons, and Mini-Cons to form a giant space fleet to fight Unicron...near the end of the series, making the title a total mystery for most of the time that it was in use. Meanwhile, its title in Japan is ''Transformers: Micron Legend'', referring to the Microns (Mini-Cons in the dub) who act as the main {{Mac Guffin}}s of the conflict.
78** ''Anime/TransformersSuperGodMasterforce''. "Masterforce" is the [[ByThePowerOfGreyskull transformation phrase]] used by the humans turning into Transformers. "Super-God" is a translation of the Japanese word ''chojin'' (超神). ''Jin'' is how the kanji 人 is pronounced; this sound is present in the Japanese words for both ''human'' and ''android'', and thus symbolises the combination of humans and robots (in this case, Transformers) to form the ultimate lifeform. Thus, a more accurate but less impressive name would be ''Franchise/{{Transformers}}: Super-Human-Robot-Hybrid-Soul Masterforce''. ''Super-God Masterforce'' can also refer to the Godmasters, the aforementioned fusions of human and Transformer.
79* ''Webcomic/HetaliaAxisPowers'' The series initially focused on UsefulNotes/WorldWarII versions of [[MoeAnthropomorphism Germany, Italy, and Japan]] before expanding its cast and focus. Hetalia is a portmanteau of the Japanese words for "useless" and "Italy".
80* ''Manga/TsubasaReservoirChronicle'' is certainly a chronicle, and "Tsubasa" means "wings", which fits the "search for feathers" quest that takes up the first half of the series [[spoiler: and also, two of the main characters are named Tsubasa, although they're using their clones' names (Syaoran and Sakura) as aliases. Pay no attention to the fact that said clones got the names in the first place from the aliases their originals were using, it just gives you a headache]]. Although the titular reservoir appears halfway through, [[ChekhovsGun it seems a minor detail unworthy of title attention until the grand finale]]. The "reservoir" can also refer to how Sakura's memories are in feathers, so the "wings" are a reservoir of what is the plot to our story.
81* ''Anime/YuGiOh'' makes sense in the original Japanese, as it means "King of Games", and Yugi is the protagonist's name. The latter is probably the reason why the title wasn't simply translated along with the rest of the show - the connection between the title and character name would be lost, and naming him "Game" would just be weird.
82** Specifically it's a pun. Yugi means "Game," while "-Ou" is a suffix for King/Lord/etc., so the title means both "Game King" and "King Yugi" in Japanese. However, "Game" would be an odd name in English, and the Japanese syntax doesn't translate at all.
83** The sequel series also get hit with this: aside from still maintaining the "King of Games" name (which has become more and more of an anachronism, as the term itself hasn't been used since the original series and whether it could apply to any of the protagonists is debatable), each of the series has a strange subtitle related to the plot:
84*** ''[[Anime/YuGiOhGX GX]]'' is short for "[[XtremeKoolLetterz Generation NeXt]]", in reference to how Jaden is part of the next generation of duelists following in Yugi's footsteps. It's also [[TitleDrop directly referenced]] in Season 2 with the GX Tournament.
85*** ''[[Anime/YuGiOh5Ds 5Ds]]'' is short for "Five Dragons", a reference to the five [[spoiler:([[ArtifactTitle later six]])]] Signers; it's also the name of the protagonists' Turbo Dueling Team in the second half of the series.
86*** ''[[Anime/YuGiOhZexal ZEXAL]]'' is the name of Yuma and Astral's special ability, [[spoiler:[[FusionDance allowing them to fuse together in order to]] [[ScrewDestiny perform Shining Draws]]]]. Depending on the translation, it might also be [[spoiler:the name they go by while fused]].
87*** ''[[Anime/YuGiOhARCV ARC-V]]'' is more complicated: it apparently combines the word "arc" (in reference to the arc of a pendulum, such as Yuya's pendant) and the Roman numeral for "5" (in reference to this being the fifth ''Yu-Gi-Oh!'' series). [[spoiler:Near the end of the series, the machine used by Academia to fuse the Four Dimensions back into one is also called [[TitleDrop ARC-V]].]]
88*** ''[[Anime/YuGiOhVRAINS VRAINS]]'' is an acronym for "VirtualReality and ArtificialIntelligence Network System", and the story revolves around a CyberSpace called LINK VRAINS.
89* ''Manga/FlunkPunkRumble'', despite being the English title, sounds like it makes much less sense than the Japanese title (Yankee-kun to Megane-chan / Delinquent Boy and Glasses Girl). But if you consider that the aforementioned Manga concerns students trying to not ''Flunk'' from school and that almost all of the characters are ''Punks'' / ''{{Delinquents}}'' and that the main characters often get involved with ''Rumbling'', it makes at least ''some'' sense in context.
90* ''Anime/EurekaSeven'':
91** The full title is ''Koukyoushihen Eureka Seven'', literally "Symphonic Psalms Eureka Seven" or [[WordOfGod officially]] "Psalms of Planets Eureka Seven". OK, Eureka is the name of the female protagonist, and the episodes are all named after songs, so the story can be regarded as a collection of "psalms" in that sense. The answer to ''Seven'' is a very submerged TitleDrop: [[spoiler:During the flashback explaining the origins of the Scub Coral they first remember a rocket that crashes. Its underwater wreckage shows "Eureka" on the rocket a screen later. The entire series of events began with a space mission named Eureka Seven]].
92** The meaning in the AlternateUniverse [[TheMovie Movie]] is spelled out much more explicitly: [[spoiler:Eureka was the seventh girl who a cult experimented on to obtain knowledge from the Coralians/Image, so she was referred to by [[YouAreNumberSix a serial number ending in "7"]] which was shorten to "Eureka 7"]].
93* ''Manga/PumpkinScissors'' is named after the postwar recovery organization the characters in the series belong to, so it makes sense that the series would be called that. Where the ''organization'' got its name from is that just as a pair of sturdy shears can cut through the thick pumpkin, so does the recovery unit cut through the hopelessness and corruption after the war.
94* ''Manga/MarmaladeBoy'': In the book, a [[TitleDrop direct reference]] is made by Miki's description of her step-brother [[spoiler: and later boyfriend]]: sweet with some bitterness (unpleasantness) in it. But by WordOfGod, all four main characters were originally gender-flipped, and "Marmalade Boy" was meant to describe Miki's [[TheIngenue sweet, naive and cheerful character]] before the GenderFlip.
95* ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'':
96** Neon means "New One" in Greek so the title is ''New One Beginning/Creation/Origin Gospel'' in English. The Video games entry for NGE has a more detailed version. According to Sadamoto, the title came from wanting a similar name to the also confusingly titled ''Anime/SpaceRunawayIdeon''.
97** The literal translation of the original Japanese title, ''Shin Seiki Evangelion'', is "New Century Evangelion", possibly a reference to its TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture setting. Hideaki Anno has said that he chose the word "Evangelion" because it "[[RuleOfCool sounded cool]]".
98** The final film in the ''Anime/RebuildOfEvangelion'' series provides a new meaning for the title: [[spoiler:when Shinji gains the ability to remake the world in his image, he uses the opportunity to give himself and those closest to him a happy ending by making a world without Evangelions or Angels, which he calls a "Neon Genesis"]].
99* ''Anime/DaphneInTheBrilliantBlue'' is pretty much this for awhile - it's not until episode 10 (nearly halfway in the series) that the 'Daphne' part is given any explanation whatsoever, and the full title still doesn't make a lot of sense until the final few episodes.
100* ''Anime/YumeiroPatissiere''. ''Yumeiro'' literally means "dream-colored," and connects to the fact that the protagonist (the Patissiere) wishes to make dreams come true through her sweets.
101* ''Anime/IMyMeStrawberryEggs''. There's actually a pun in here. In Japanese, the word "aimai" means "ambiguous" or "vague" which, given the plot, makes a good deal of sense. It still doesn't explain the "Strawberry Eggs" part, though.
102* ''Literature/StrawberryPanic'' takes place in the Strawberry dorms and many characters end up in a panic about things.
103* ''Manga/StrawberryMarshmallow'' refers to the nicknames Nobue calls the girls, Strawberries, and the song Marshmallow, by Tamio Okuda.
104* ''Manga/StrawberryOneHundredPercent''. The incident that starts the series is the main character looking for a beautiful girl with strawberry-print panties he happened to see on the school roof.
105* ''[[Manga/Reborn2004 Katekyo Hitman Reborn!]]'', which complete title, ''Katekyoushi Hitman Reborn!'' means Home Tutor Hitman Reborn. To explain: a renowned Hitman becomes the protagonist's home tutor, and his name is Reborn!. Once you know that, the title can also be read "My Hitman Home Tutor, Reborn."
106* ''Manga/OnePiece'' suffers from this, particularly because in many languages, including English, it can refer to, ahem, clothing. Fortunately, though, the explanation comes in the very first scene - the dying Pirate King states "I left all my treasure in '''one piece'''." and from there, "the One Piece" becomes the name of the treasure that the main characters are racing to find.
107* The "gray" of ''Manga/DGrayMan'' supposedly comes from the color motif of black and white in the series, and the fact that the hero ends up being neither with the Order, neither with the Noah (thus, "gray"). The meaning of the "D." has been made slightly less obscure by chapter 218 (it was apparently [[MysteriousMiddleInitial a part of Mana's name]])
108* ''Franchise/GhostInTheShell'': The 'ghost' part refers to the part of a person that makes them human, which, in a world where the entire human body, including the brain, can be replaced with cybernetic substitutes, is pretty important in separating cyborgs from straight-up robots. And of course, the shell more than likely stands for a cyborg body.
109** ''Anime/GhostInTheShellStandAloneComplex'': Episodes in the first season are separated into "complex" episodes, which are part of the show's overarching plot, and "stand-alone" episodes, which aren't (they stand alone from the rest of the plot, and thus can be watched without any knowledge of the overarching story.) Near the end of the season, the term Stand-Alone Complex is also coined to refer to [[DeadUnicornTrope copycats copying an original that doesn't actually exist.]]
110* ''Literature/HighSchoolDXD''. D×D (pronounced "Dee-dee") is an in-universe title, short for [[RedBaron Dragon of Dragons]], that the lead eventually takes on. Issei himself is still in high school, hence, ''High School D×D''.\
111There is a second, equally in-universe explanation; the protagonist team also call themselves D×D collectively (as they're such a mishmash the usual system of identifying oneself by [[AllMythsAreTrue myth of origin]] falls apart), and they're based out of Kuoh High School.
112* ''Anime/TokyoMarbleChocolate'' a RomanticComedy anime: "Tokyo" refers to the backdrop setting and the Tokyo Tower, "Marble Chocolate" is the name of the cafe the girl, Chizuru, works on but it can also be a reference to a white chocolate, which is a traditional romantic gift from a girl to a guy.
113* ''Literature/MyriadColorsPhantomWorld'', in which humans gain the ability to see magical phantom creatures. What "Myriad Colors" is supposed to mean isn't entirely clear.
114* ''Literature/TheTestamentOfSisterNewDevil'' has some seriously bizarre grammar, but was at least meant to make sense. It's a battle-{{ecchi}} involving demonic stepsisters, one of whom is the newly-appointed Demon Lord. "Testament" was probably a [[GratuitousEnglish poorly-chosen word]] for the contract the hapless male hero accidentally makes with them.
115* ''Anime/PsychoPass'': It sounds random but does turn out to mean something: [[spoiler:it's a pun. The mind-scanning system that all citizens must "pass" is powered by the disembodied brains of psychopaths. A Japanese speaker would pronounce "psychopath" as "psychopassu."]]
116* ''Anime/ShowByRock'' is apparently a recursive-translation of "rock concert," or something analogous. The protagonist joins a band and uses ThePowerOfRock to defeat baddies.
117* ''Literature/DeathMarchToTheParallelWorldRhapsody''--"death march" refers to an overly-long coding marathon, after which the main character inexplicably jumps to a ParallelUniverse. "Rhapsody" is just there to complete the mad-lib fantasy title, vaguely linking back to "march" (both relate to music).
118* ''Anime/DevilmanCrybaby'', an adaptation of the manga ''Franchise/{{Devilman}}''. The addition of "crybaby" pushes it into this trope; as incongruous as it sounds, it's [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin almost self-explanatory]]. The hero is a [[ManlyTears sensitive man prone to crying]] who obtains demonic powers.
119* ''Manga/PokemonGoldenBoys'' tries to have a TitleDrop at the start but it still doesn't make any sense. Nowhere else, even in the manga itself, does anyone call a Pokémon trainer a "Golden Boy" (and it's noted that ''girls'' can be "Golden Boys" too). The manga's name comes from it being a ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' adaptation based off of ''VideoGame/PokemonGoldAndSilver''. The two main characters are boys, with one being named "Gold".
120* ''Anime/ActionHeroineCheerFruits'': an "Action Heroine" is a performer in a [[{{Toku}} Power-Rangers-style]] stage show, and "Cheer Fruits" is the GratuitousEnglish name of the lead group.
121* ''Anime/SSSSGridman'' is nearly a WordPureeTitle, but does have an explanation. "Gridman" is the main HumongousMecha, and "SSSS" is a reference to ''Series/SuperhumanSamuraiSyberSquad'', the western adaptation of the [[Series/DenkouChoujinGridman live-action series]] the anime is a spin-off of. The final episode, however, reveals the "SSSS" to have an in-universe meaning: "'''S'''pecial '''S'''ignature to '''S'''ave a '''S'''oul", the Access Code required to transform Gridman into his [[StealthSequel original Tokusatsu form.]]
122* ''Anime/FutureCardBuddyfight'' and its [[OddlyNamedSequel various oddly-named sequels]]. It takes place TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture, where people compete in [[GratuitousEnglish "Buddyfights"]] using magical cards.
123* ''Anime/MeowMeowJapaneseHistory''. A more literal translation would be Cat Cat Japanese History, which makes it slightly more obvious that it's a retelling of Japanese history starring cartoon cats.
124* ''Manga/MagicalGirlSpecOpsAsuka'': Asuka is the main character, a MagicalGirl with a militaristic flavor ("spec ops" is an abbreviation for special military operations/operatives).
125* ''Manga/TheLuciferAndBiscuitHammer'' has an unusual word order; it would typically be ''Lucifer and the Biscuit Hammer'' [[RuleOfCool but the former looks cooler]]. The "biscuit hammer" is an enormous hammer in space that could destroy the world. "Lucifer" refers to [[spoiler:Samidare, one of the main characters]], though she doesn't have much in common with her Biblical namesake.
126* ''Anime/PanzerWorldGalient''. This show features a HumongousMecha or [[AMechByAnyOtherName Panzer]] called "Galient", and the setting is an alien world.
127* ''Literature/ACertainMagicalIndex'' and its spinoff ''Manga/ACertainScientificRailgun''. The "magical index" is a [[PhotographicMemory human library]] of magical tomes who goes by the name Index. Railgun is the nickname of a girl with [[ShockAndAwe electricity powers]] who likes to use that electromagentism to launch coins at incredible speed, and "scientific" refers to the non-magical tech-wizards of the setting. The "A Certain" part is just a [[IdiosyncraticEpisodeNaming naming quirk]] of the franchise.
128* ''Literature/OthersidePicnic'' is a title-reference to ''Literature/RoadsidePicnic'', another word-salad title but with an in-story explanation (in the latter's page quote) as a metaphor for regions of deep space full of surreal artifacts. Similarly, ''Otherside Picnic'' takes place in a ParallelUniverse full of strange objects and mythical creatures.
129* The titles of each Part of ''Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventure'' seem like rather strange collections of words, but they tend to vaguely describe the events of each Part. Starting with Part 3, the titles reference the protagonist's Stands- for example, ''Manga/JojosBizarreAdventureStardustCrusaders'' is a reference to Jotaro's Star Platinum, and the protagonists are sometimes unofficially referred to as the "Stardust Crusaders."
130[[/folder]]
131
132[[folder:Comedy]]
133* Mitch Hedberg's comedy albums were named for jokes, but not jokes on the album.
134* Creator/GeorgeCarlin's 1975 album ''An Evening With Wally Londo, Featuring Bill Slaszo.''
135[[/folder]]
136
137[[folder:Comic Books]]
138* ''ComicBook/AlbedoErmaFelnaEDF'': The name "Albedo" is an astronomic term for the reflecting power of a surface, in this case of the light reflected by the planets from a star. In a metaphorical sense, the name is an allegory of how the problems of the [[WorldOfFunnyAnimals anthropomorphic society]] somewhat "reflects" the ones the human society also have, albeit in a warped way. "Erma Felna" is the name of the female protagonist and "EDF" is the acronym of "Extraplanetary Defense Force", the military organization the titular protagonist belongs to.
139** As an interesting note, the whole comic was originally named "Albedo Anthropomorphics", since the comic originally began as an anthology of many [[UsefulNotes/FurryFandom furry comics]] written by many authors, and the Erma's one was just named ''Erma Felna EDF'' without the ''Albedo'' moniker at first. The name became an ArtifactTitle when the anthology part disappeared since the second StoryArc onwards and only the ''Erma Felna EDF'' story was the only one published there, but the name ''Albedo'' still remained relevant in the ''Erma Felna EDF'' saga because [[spoiler:it was used as a TitleDrop later when they find out a derelict spaceship, who was tripulated by ''humans'']]. By 2016, the author definitively changed the name of the comic to the current one since that name was used by the fans from many years ago, averting IAmNotShazam altogether.
140** The name of the sequel ''Birthright'' was named because the titular hero, Alfon Koshaka, wants to reclaim his "birthright", in this case, reclaiming his homeland who was invaded by foreign invaders.
141[[/folder]]
142
143[[folder:Comic Strips]]
144* ''ComicStrip/{{Peanuts}}'' was supposed to be a term for young children, as in the "peanut gallery" on ''Series/TheHowdyDoodyShow.'' It was [[ExecutiveMeddling thought up and forced on Charles Schulz by the publisher]]; Schulz had initially called it ''Li'l Folks.'' Charles Schulz himself hated the title and in a 1987 interview, he said: "It's totally ridiculous, has no meaning, is simply confusing, and has no dignity - and I think my humor has dignity." Sunday strips feature the subtitle "Good Ol' Charlie Brown."
145* ''ComicStrip/TomTheDancingBug'' feature no characters named Tom, nor are there any dancing bugs. According to the creator it's because the newspaper editor said the strip needed a title, so he came up with the most nonsensical name he could think of.
146[[/folder]]
147
148[[folder:Fan Works]]
149* The first story in the Fanfic/ElementalChessTrilogy, ''Flowers of Antimony'', and all of its chapter titles (e.g. "Fixity") might at first seem like complete nonsense. But it's cleared up in the author's notes on the first chapter - they're all terms from traditional alchemy, which makes sense since it's a {{continuation}} of ''Anime/FullmetalAlchemistBrotherhood''.
150* ''Fanfic/TheMiserySenshiNeoZeroDoubleBlitzkriegDebacle'': The tile refers to several things within the story, specifically with "Neo Zero" referring to a prototype fighter jet of the same name.
151[[/folder]]
152
153[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]
154* One of the main reasons given for ''Film/TheShawshankRedemption'' failing at the box-office was the opaqueness of its title: it makes perfect sense in context, but as "Shawshank" is a fictional prison, you have to have seen the movie or read the book to even know the gist of what's going on.
155** In one of the few happy cases of changing the film's original name in Mexico, the movie was renamed ''Dream of Flight'', which is more appropriate.
156** Ditto for the Swedish title: Nyckeln till Frihet -- "The Key to Freedom" (you know, hope.)
157** One can debate whether the Danish title is that appropriate, as it is called "A World Outside" (of the prison walls, that is).
158** The German title is ''Die Verurteilten'', meaning as much as ''The Condemned''. Considering that the German title of the short story upon which the film is based, i.e. ''Hope Springs Eternal: Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption'', is simply ''Pin-Up'', that's actually an improvement.
159** The Brazilian title is a combination of the two above: ''A Dream of Freedom''.
160** Then again, the title in Finland was "Rita Hayworth -- avain pakoon" [[spoiler:which is pretty much a spoiler to the movie plot, meaning "Rita Hayworth -- the key to escape"]]
161** Russian title of the movie means "Escape from Shawshank", both spoiling the ending and moving it to the category ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin.
162** The Hungarian title provides an interesting twist: ''Prisoners of Hope''. It's actually an interesting title, which makes you curious about the movie.
163** The French title is "The Escapees", which has about the same effect as the Russian one and lets you believe it's just some kind of ''Film/EscapeFromAlcatraz'' movie.
164** The Norwegian title translates to "Rain of Freedom". This is not a well known type of rain; you'd have to watch the movie to know what the title is talking about.
165* The Creator/CoenBrothers seem to have a particular fondness for this trope, to the point that it's become one of their {{Creator Thumbprint}}s over the years. A huge chunk of their films have titles that seem completely nonsensical if you don't know anything about the plot.
166** ''Film/OBrotherWhereArtThou'', named after a line in the 1941 film, ''Sullivan's Travels''.
167** ''Film/TheHudsuckerProxy'', so called because Tim Robbins' character acts as a stand-in decision maker (proxy) for Hudsucker Industries' executives and shareholders.
168** ''Film/TheBigLebowski'', so called because there are two different characters in the movie named "Jeffrey Lebowski", one of whom ([[IAmNotShazam the one who's NOT the protagonist]]) is an enormously wealthy businessman with a huge ego. It's also a hat-tip to ''Film/TheBigSleep'', of which it's a loose adaptation.
169** ''Film/RaisingArizona'', so called because it's about a married couple kidnapping the infant son of a man named Nathan Arizona and attempting to raise him as their own child.
170* The Japanese release of ''Film/ArmyOfDarkness'' was called "Captain Supermarket". This sort of makes sense, since Ash starts out as an ordinary guy who works at an S-Mart and becomes more superheroic as the story goes on.
171* ''Film/Breakin2ElectricBoogaloo''. The film is about dancers, and [[OddlyNamedSequel2ElectricBoogaloo "Electric Boogaloo"]] is a style of funk dancing. In keeping with the theme of funny-ass names, the main actors of the film series also happen to be nicknamed "Shabba-doo" and "Boogaloo Shrimp."
172* ''Film/BladeRunner''. The term is the nickname used for bounty hunters who identify and kill renegade androids posing as humans. Is it because they live within the razor's edge between humanity and machine? Is it because they practice unsafe scissor usage? No, it actually doesn't have any deeper meaning. The filmmakers lifted the term from an unrelated book (about medical supply smugglers) because it [[RuleOfCool sounded cool]].
173* The soccer movie title ''Film/BendItLikeBeckham'' confused many American viewers, who at that point had never heard of David Beckham. And many of those who had at least a vague idea of who he was had no idea what "it" was, or how Beckham bent "it."
174* ''Film/ChittyChittyBangBang'' is actually a VehicleTitle, in that the title of the movie is the name of the (unexpectedly) flying car which is the primary MacGuffin of the story. The car itself was named by the owner's children for the noises that its engine makes.
175* The title of the British movie ''It's All Gone Pete Tong'' makes little sense unless you know it's an example of BritishEnglish/CockneyRhymingSlang based on the name of the British DJ Pete Tong. Tong does appear in the movie AsHimself, but the expression in the title is never explained.
176* ''Film/MarthaMarcyMayMarlene''. Martha is the protagonist's real name and "Marcy May" is what the leader of the cult she joins christens her upon her induction. Additionally, when answering the phone, all male members of the cult are instructed to use the name "Matthew Lewis" so as to avoid revealing their identities, while all female members are to go by "Marlene Lewis".
177* ''Film/AugustUnderground'' was originally going to be called ''Peter'', but it was changed fairly late to a title that was the random combination of August (when filming took place) and underground film.
178* ''Film/FiveAcrossTheEyes'' - There are five main characters, and they're travelling through an area nicknamed "the Eyes".
179* ''Film/StepsTroddenBlack'' takes its title from a line of a Robert Frost poem (albeit slightly paraphrased). It relates to the main character's coming of age arc, and his being hung up on making decisions. On a more literal level, the film takes place in the woods and the title sounds scary.
180* ''Film/TheyMightBeGiants'', based on a play of the same name. Who are "they," and are they giants or not? The title doesn't have anything to do directly with the plot. It's taken from a short monologue in which the main character argues that people need to think of things "as they might be" rather than just "as they are." He references ''Literature/DonQuixote'', stating that Don Quixote was mad because he thought the windmills ''were'' giants when he should have thought, "They might be giants." In other words, embrace open-mindedness and curiosity.
181* ''Film/UpstreamColor'': The film is about a blue substance that inhabits a number of hosts throughout its life cycle. At one point, it's washed upstream and turns some riverside orchids blue.
182* In ''Film/StrawDogs2011'', David compares the locals to [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_dog straw dogs]], saying that the men are treated reverently when they are football stars in high school but are "trash" afterwards. [[spoiler: Such feelings make sense, considering how he treats them later. Or throughout the film, for that matter.]] The [[Film/StrawDogs1971 original film]] gives no explanation for the title.
183* ''Film/ZeroDarkThirty'' sounds like this, but it's, in fact, a military term for 30 minutes after midnight. That's not the actual time Osama bin Laden's death took place but refers to the darkness and secrecy surrounding his search and eventual killing.
184* ''[[Film/EightAndAHalf 8 1/2]]'' was so named because it was Fellini's "eight and a halfth" film. The "half" film was a short.
185* ''Film/MoulinRouge'' has the song Elephant Love Medley (medley used here to mean the same thing as Salad in this trope. Elephant Love Salad anyone?). Two characters are singing a medley of songs related to love, in a building shaped like an elephant.
186* ''Film/{{Zoolander}}'' manages to do this with a single word. It's the last name of the protagonist, not that anyone would guess that since it's a name the writers made up to be deliberately silly.
187* ''Film/SpaceJam''. Out of context, the title makes no sense, and certainly doesn't indicate that the film is a crossover between the UsefulNotes/{{N|ationalBasketballAssociation}}BA and ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes''. However, the movie's antagonists are from space and the word "jam" is sometimes used in contexts relating to sports.
188* ''Film/LicoricePizza'' is named for a California record store chain that existed from the 1970s through the 80s. That said, it's also a TrivialTitle, since the movie takes place in 1970s California but the record store in question is never seen or spoken of.
189[[/folder]]
190
191[[folder:Literature]]
192* ''Literature/TheCatcherInTheRye''. Holden remembers the poem "comin' through the rye", and thought the words "if a body meet a body" were "if a body catch a body". He imagined that he was in a gigantic field of rye where thousands of children were running around playing a giant game of itdoesntreallymatter. The field was on the edge of a cliff, and Holden had to catch any kids that got too close to the edge. Crazy, but there you go.
193* ''Literature/TheMockingProgram'' by Creator/AlanDeanFoster is something of a subversion in that it makes perfect sense after TheReveal and is completely appropriate to the plot. Given how late TheReveal is in the story, however, one can't help but suspect the book would have benefited if it had been subject to ItWasHisSled.
194* ''Literature/TheSilenceOfTheLambs'' refers to Starling being haunted by the memory of lambs screaming as they were slaughtered, and Lecter's suggestion that saving Catherine Martin might help put an end to that.
195* The title of Creator/StephenFry's novel ''The Stars' Tennis Balls'' is from a metaphor used in ''Theatre/TheDuchessOfMalfi'': "We are the stars' tennis balls, struck and bandied which way please them," meaning, "We have no control over our fate."
196* ''Literature/WutheringHeights'' sounds a bit like gibberish to modern audiences due to the fact that the esoteric word "wuthering," meaning in effect "stormy," is not widely known. The book's title is the name of the inhospitable location of the story, and also refers to the volatile emotions of the plot.
197* ''Literature/AClockworkOrange''. The "clockwork" part clearly has something to do with the way the treatment makes Alex programmable, but Burgess has given several different explanations for what the title is supposed to mean:
198** The phrase comes from "as queer as a clockwork orange," a phrase Burgess claimed to have heard, but of which there is no record of ever being used before he wrote the book.
199** "Orange" is a pun on the Malay word for man. Burgess also wrote ''the Malayan Trilogy'', in which some characters do speak Malay (Bahasa), though there are no other Malay words used in ''this'' novel.
200** "Orange" refers to the human capacity for "color and sweetness." Oranges are natural, clockwork is not (like brainwashing).
201** Burgess also once explicitly stated that the "clockwork orange" was a metaphor for human behavior, in that while an orange may appear to be very simple on the outside, they are much more complex and intricate beneath the rind.
202* Creator/RobertLudlum's "The Propername Abstractnoun" {{Mad Lib Thriller Title}}s are notorious for sounding fancy while telling you nothing.
203* ''Literature/NegativeHappyChainsawEdge''. The villain uses a {{chainsaw|Good}}, and his strength is dependent on the lead female Eri's happiness, or lack thereof.
204* ''Literature/TuckEverlasting'': Tuck is the surname of a family who have [[WhoWantsToLiveForever become immortal]]. It still doesn't make much grammatical sense once you know that.
205* ''The Amazing Book Is Not On Fire'' by Dan Howell and Phil Lester: It makes sense if you know that the co-authors are better known as Website/YouTube vloggers and that their respective channels are called [=TheAmazingPhil=] and [=DanIsNotOnFire=].
206* ''{{Literature/Trainspotting}}'' has absolutely nothing to do with trains and train enthusiasts. Rather, the title is an ArtifactTitle from the original "Trainspotting at Leith Central", the meaning being that Leith Central Station is abandoned, derelict, and squalid, and going there to trainspot is a stupid, filthy and completely pointless activity... much like the protagonists' lives.
207[[/folder]]
208
209[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
210* The Franchise/SuperSentai Series in Japan is pretty guilty of this as it's impossible to translate most titles as anything but these. ''Series/KaizokuSentaiGokaiger'' translates as Pirate Squadron/Taskforce/Team Gokaiger. Gokai meaning misunderstanding is a pun on Goukai meaning heroic and <-ger> as in ranger which makes this series translate as Pirate Squadron/Taskforce/Team Misunderstanding Ranger/Misunderstandingger.
211* ''Series/{{Battlestar Galactica|1978}}''. As silly as it sounds, it makes sense in context. The show is about a starship named ''Galactica'', which is a Battlestar, a portmanteau of ''battle''ship and ''star''ship. It is in the same format as ''Film/{{Battleship Potemkin}}''.
212** In Finnish it is translated as ''Taisteluplaneetta Galactica'' ("Battle planet Galactica") which makes no sense whatsoever.
213*** But then, taken literally, "Battlestar" is an even stranger name for a spacecraft than "Battleplanet." At least a planet can have people living on it.
214** In Russian the word "Galactica" ("галактика") means simply "galaxy", which originally led to names like ''Battle of Galaxies'' or ''Battle for the Galaxy'', as well as direct translation of ''Battle Star Galactica'', which sounds rather weird. Eventually, the series ended up known as ''Star Cruiser "Galactica"''.
215* ''Series/TheNakedBrothersBand'' has used the TagLine "Real band, real brothers. Not really naked". [[WordOfGod Polly Draper]] has gone on record as stating that they ''did'' [[SingingInTheShower "perform" naked as toddlers while she was trying to bathe them]]. Ladies and gentlemen, the Lifetime Achievement Award [[AmazinglyEmbarrassingParents for Embarrassing Your Children]]!
216* The show ''Series/{{Stella|US}}'' took its name from the original comedy group, which named itself after the unborn daughter of the club manager who booked their first show. It does not refer to any of the members (three men named Michael, Michael and David) or characters involved in the show, nor is it spoken at any point in the series. They do say it in several of the 26 short films, but only in reference to the name of their group/act.
217* ''Series/TheMightyBoosh'' is named after a childhood memory of co-creator Noel Fielding, when a 6-year-old Portuguese friend of Michael Fielding (who plays Naboo on the show) described Michael's large hairstyle as "a mighty boosh." Ironically, Noel's character Vince Noir has a large, distinctive hairstyle that is the subject of many jokes, while Naboo's hair is almost always covered by a hat.
218* The lyrics to the end credits theme of ''Series/{{Frasier}}'', "Tossed Salads and Scrambled Eggs", sound nonsensical, like any good jazz lyrics should. The title has been explained as referring to the "confused" callers Frasier gets on his radio show, as well as the situations he's in which can't be undone.
219* ''Series/ThirtyRock'' is impossible to parse unless you know that it's an ''address'': 30 Rock[efeller Plaza, New York, NY][[labelnote:*]]10112[[/labelnote]] (also known as the location of Creator/{{NBC}}'s studios). The abbreviation is famous in the TV business. And to be fair, the opening titles do make this fact explicitly clear, and the place is referred to as 30 Rock by characters on rare occasions.
220* ''Series/BreakingBad'' is likewise difficult to make sense of if you haven't run across that particular bit of slang (it refers to a good or at least conventional person suddenly going off the rails), however, Jesse does use the term in the first episode.
221* ''Series/TattooedTeenageAlienFightersFromBeverlyHills''. And yes, [[ExactlyWhatItSaysontheTin it's exactly what it sounds like.]]
222* Although not exactly a working title, in an episode of ''Series/TopGear'' (U.K), the trio of presenters attempt to build an electric car (I mean, [[RunningGag how hard can it be?]]). They name their second prototype the "Hammerhead Eagle i-Thrust". Admittedly, a more impressive sounding name than their first prototype, which was called [[http://www.topgear.com/uk/videos/brand-new-clip-the-hammerhead-eagle-ithrust-part-1 Geoff]].
223* ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'' lampshaded this during the KTMA version of "Fugitive Alien."
224-->'''Joel:''' I think they just stuck two words together that sounded cool.\
225'''Servo:''' You mean, like "Mystery Science"?
226* ''Series/OrphanBlack'' refers to Sarah's existence outside the system ("in the black") before she was adopted by Mrs. S. Lampshaded in the series finale where it's the title for Helena's memoirs, and none of the other characters can figure out what it means.
227* The British show ''Series/PeakyBlinders'' can come across this way, particularly to Americans. A "peaky" is an old-fashioned kind of hat with a peak. The series concerns a gang whose members stick razor blades in the seams of their hats so that they can whip them at an enemy's eyes as a surprise attack.
228[[/folder]]
229
230[[folder:Music]]
231* Strawberry Alarm Clock! [[WatchItStoned Who cares what games we choose? Little to win but nothing to lose...]]
232* Motion City Soundtrack
233* [[Music/BlueOysterCult Blue Öyster Cult]] (both the band name and most of their lyrics) ''appear'' to be an example. However, all of their trademark cryptic lyrics combine to form a long, sprawling mythology, as most of them are taken from ''Imaginos'', a mock-mythic cycle of epic poetry created by Sandy Pearlman before the band was even started. You've heard of concept albums; Blue Öyster Cult was supposed to be a concept ''band''.
234** The name of the band is an anagram of Cully Stout Beer, which the members of the band claim to have been drinking while they brainstormed. (The [[HeavyMetalUmlaut umlaut]] is just [[RuleOfCool cool]].) However, there's no evidence whatsoever that such a (redundantly named) stout beer ever existed.[[note]]The band is from Long Island, New York. Which boasts both an Oyster Bay and a town called Blue Point, that gave its name to a much-sought-after edible mollusk. Blue Point Oysters from Oyster Bay, which connoisseurs would sell their souls for. A (foodie) cult venerating a blue oyster. Go figure. [[/note]].
235*** The band name was parodied in ''VideoGame/StrongBadsCoolGameForAttractivePeople: Episode 3 (Baddest of the Bands)'', when Strong Bad has to come up with a name for his band, comprised of himself, [[OddballDoppelganger Homsar]], and [[BigEater the King of Town]]. Here, however, the words were selected at random, so the end band name is something like "Degenerate Oatmeal Itch-Machine" or "Deluxe Omlette Insomniacs".
236* Many Music/OfMontreal's songs have titles that kind of make sense if you stand at just the right angle, squint a bit, and then give up and read some interviews. One of the most prominent examples is "Heimdalsgate Like a Promethean Curse (Chemicals)," which is apparently about how the enthusiasm for his music had, like Prometheus's fire, cursed him, estranging him from his wife, with whom he'd lived on a street in Oslo called "Heimdalsgate." Neither Prometheus nor Heimdalsgate is ever directly mentioned in the lyrics.
237* Music/RedHotChiliPeppers's ''Music/BloodSugarSexMagik''. Apart from the title track, it also includes the song "Mellowship Slinky in B Major," a song which fulfills none of the things implied by the title.
238* Music/PanicAtTheDisco's first album ''A Fever You Can't Sweat Out'' had a lot of examples of this trope: "London Beckons Songs About Money Written By Machines", "There's a Good Reason These Tables Are Numbered Honey, You Just Haven't Thought Of It Yet", "The Only Difference Between Martyrdom And Suicide Is Press Coverage", "Nails for Breakfast, Tacks for Snacks".
239** Many of their song titles and lyrics are actually book or movie quotes, and more impressively, they've even spanned two songs "Lying is the most fun a girl can have without taking her clothes off" is followed by the song "but it's better if you do" (creating a full line from the movie ''[[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0376541 Closer]]'').
240** "...Press Coverage" is a quote from the Creator/ChuckPalahniuk novel ''Literature/Survivor1999''.
241** Panic's sophomore album didn't fare any better: "Nine in the Afternoon" only makes sense after WordOfGod explains that they were stuck in a windowless rehearsal space and were trying to determine what time it was without the use of, you know, a watch or clock. Genius, boys. Genius.
242*** As well as the rest of the tracks on "Pretty. Odd.", such as "From A Mountain In The Middle of the Cabins"?!
243** Many of the Decaydance bands, like Panic!, are known for this. The Cab ("Zzzzz") and Cobra Starship ("Send My Love to the Dance Floor, I'll See You in Hell (Hey Mister DJ)") are repeat offenders.
244*** Fall Out Boy were obviously the main influence on all of these bands, considering such gems as "Reinventing the Wheel to Run Myself Over", "'Tell That Mick He Just Made My List of Things to Do Today'" (an inexplicable quote from ''Film/{{Rushmore}})'', "Seven Minutes In Heaven (Atavan Halen)", "Get Busy Living or Get Busy Dying (Do Your Part To Save the Scene and Stop Going to Shows)", "I've Got a Dark Alley and A Bad Idea that Says You Should Just Shut Your Mouth (Summer Song)", "Don't You Know Who I think I am?", "I'm Like a Lawyer With the Way I'm Always Trying to Get You Off (Me & You)", "Disloyal Order of Waterbuffaloes", etc.
245*** Speaking of Fall Out Boy- Bang the Doldrums, anyone?
246* Indie horror-rock band the pAper chAse fills their albums with such gems as: "Abby, You're Going to Burn For What You've Done to Me", "The House is Alive and the House is Hungry", and "Throw Your Body On the Apparatus". It's possible "The House is Alive and the House is Hungry" was based off the novel ''Literature/HouseOfLeaves.''
247* New York band Music/CoheedAndCambria have put out four albums as of this writing. They are named, in order of publication: ''The Second Stage Turbine Blade'', ''In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3'', ''Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV, Volume One: From Fear Through the Eyes of Madness'', and ''Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV, Volume Two: No World for Tomorrow'', and number one, ''Year of the Black Rainbow''.
248** They all make sense if you know the Coheed and Cambria mythos -- album titles are the ''ONLY'' part that makes sense--
249*** ''Second Stage Turbine Blade'' refers to Claudio's (Sanchez) dad's old job. It also refers--as far as I can tell--to Coheed's arm blades and the fact that this is the second time that he's used them.
250*** ''In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3'': it refers the planet of Silent Earth: 3 (presumably the planet Paris: Earth post-[=MonStar=]), and Inferno's Pioneers' struggle to keep themselves a secret, including a character being blinded, drilled through the hand, cut up, burned, and thrown in the streets--and rebuilt.
251*** ''GAIBSIV: Vol One: From Fear Through the Eyes of Madness'' is a reference to Claudio's (Kilgannon) promise at the end of ''IKSSE: 3'' to "Burn Star IV", the centre of the storyline's fictitious solar system. ''From Fear Through the Eyes of Madness'' is about the Writer (the character of the writer, not Claudio S.) writing his girlfriend into a story for ''fear'' of losing her, and he's soon ''inside'' the story, seeing it through his ''madness''.
252*** ''No World For Tomorrow'' is a continuation of Claudio K attempting to burn Star IV, and ''No World For Tomorrow'' is the fate of Heaven's Fence.
253* The band Music/JimmyEatWorld. The name came from the caption on a crayon drawing by guitarist Tom Linton's younger brother Ed in the aftermath of one of Ed's fights with their other brother, Jim, depicting...[[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Jimmy eating the world.]] Linton saw AGoodNameForARockBand and went with it.[[note]]It's important to note that Tom's brother Jim is not same Jim that is the member of the band and would become the band's main vocalist.[[/note]]
254* The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. They got their name by tacking words onto a wall and picking them at random.
255* Bang Camaro got their name by finding the two sexiest words in the English language.
256* Though some might think it was meant to be deep, the Grateful Dead literally pulled their name out of a dictionary open at random.
257* Jaime Brockett's "Talkin' Green Beret New Yellow Hydraulic Banana Teenybopper Blues"
258* Relient K loves this trope. They have albums called ''The Anatomy of the Tongue in Cheek'', ''Two Lefts Don't Make a Right...But Three Do'', and ''Five Score and Seven Years Ago''. They can mostly be understood/explained. And then there's two songs: "Crayons Can Melt on Us for All I Care" and "The Only Thing Worse than Beating a Dead Horse is Betting On One." Again...understandable. Eventually.
259* Music/TheNewPornographers write their ''lyrics'' as Word Salad more often than not. ''Letter From an Occupant'' seems to be most famous for this.
260** Carl Newman's songs represent this. Dan Bejar's songs, on the other hand, only seem like WordSalad: It's often implied that there is some metaverse that has formed out of Bejar's lyrics.
261* The Mars Volta's lyrics also seem to be made of word salad (as well as their titles), but after a few late nights of research on the fan forums, you can begin to deduce the meanings.
262** Of course, in their case, the lyrics are literally supposed to evoke bizarre imagery in order to decipher the meaning of the song; they can still make your brain hurt, though.
263* Norwegian metal band Dimmu Borgir's album titles: ''Enthrone Darkness Triumphant'', ''Godless Savage Garden'', ''Spiritual Black Dimensions'', ''Puritanical Euphoric Misanthropia'' (possibly the worst offender), ''Death Cult Armageddon''.
264* Another Norwegian band, Music/{{Aha}}, had a downplayed version of this for its breakout hit, "Take on Me". While the song is coherent, the title is a literal translation of the Norwegian phrase ''ta på meg'', which idiomatically means "touch me". Interestingly, the latter English phrase would serve as the opening words of the band's follow-up single, "The Sun Always Shines on T.V."
265* Music/ToriAmos' "In the Springtime of His Voodoo", "Programmable Soda", and "The Power of Orange Knickers" kinda make sense after a few hours of studying and dissecting the lyrics.
266* The Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band exemplify this trope. They were originally called the Bonzo Dog ''Dada'' Band, but Vivian Stanshall got tired of having to explain Dadaism to every other fan that he talked to and proposed a name change to their final name Music/TheBonzoDogBand.
267* 65daysofstatic in band name, which has never been clearly explained, as well as such song titles as "The Distant and Mechanized Glow of Eastern European Dance Parties" and "Install a Beak in the Heart That Clucks Time in Arabic".
268** This is very common in post-rock.
269** A Silver Mt. Zion, Stars of the Lid, Labradford, God is an Astronaut, Explosions in the Sky, Gastr del Sol, The Sea and Cake, Do Make Say Think, Lounge Piranha...
270** ''Godspeed You! Black Emperor'' was the title of an old Japanese film about bikers.
271* Music is Music as Devices are Kisses is Everything.
272* Current 93 in general. It might make sense if you have a Ph.D. in religious studies.
273** Album titles:
274*** Swastikas for Noddy
275*** Cats Drunk on Copper
276*** Black Ships Ate The Sky
277*** How I Devoured Apocalypse Balloon
278*** Aleph on Hallucinatory Mountain
279** Songs:
280*** Antichrist and Barcodes
281*** This Autistic Imperium is Nihil Reich
282*** Aleph is the Butterfly Net
283* Music/CamperVanBeethoven's ''Telephone Free Landslide Victory'' (the band name may come off as one too, but it's actually a pun) - the originally intended title was "Telephone '''Tree''' Landslide Victory", but promo copies contained a misprint, which the band ran with because it was supposed to be a nonsensical title anyway.
284** The title of the ''Vampire Can Mating Oven'' EP is sometimes mistaken for an anagram of the band name. In truth, it's just word salad that's supposed to ''sound'' like it's an anagram of "Camper Van Beethoven". Most of the same letters are in both, but if you tried to rearrange the title back into the band name, you'd end up with something like "Camper Van Maiingtoven".
285** ''Our Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart'' looks like one at first glance, but it's actually an AlbumTitleDrop from "Tania" (about [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patty_Hearst Patty Hearst]]).
286** David Lowery's other group, Cracker, have the album ''Kerosene Hat'', which is an in-joke-y nod to the early days of the group. When they started the band, Lowery and guitarist Johnny Hickman were living together in a dilapidated house that only had two kerosene heaters for warmth; when they ran out of kerosene, Lowery would have to bundle up, walk to the nearest gas station and buy more - the wool hunting cap he would put on for these excursions was thus his "kerosene hat". However, the TitleTrack, which has WordSaladLyrics, doesn't mention the original context ("Here come ol' Kerosene Hat, with his earflaps waxed, courtin' his girl").
287* "Learnalilgivinanlovin" by Music/{{Gotye}}. Almost a combo of this and WordPureeTitle. But it still essentially makes sense though the reason it's all one word is unknown.
288* Music/ThePolice had two albums titled with GratuitousSpanish (''Music/OutlandosDAmour'', which actually isn't correct Spanish, or French) and GratuitousFrench (''Regatta de Blanc ''). For the third, they opted for a word salad, ''Zenyatta Mondatta'' (apparently two invented portmanteau words, hinting at Zen, at Jomo Kenyatta, at ''monde'' - French for world -...and Reggatta, the previous album). Rejected titles included ''Caprido Von Renislam'' (referring to the street, Catharina van Renneslaan, where the studio was located) and ''Trimondo Blondomina'' (suggesting three blonds dominating the world).
289* Muscle Museum was supposedly named by taking a dictionary word either side of Music/{{Muse}}.
290* The Music/KingCrimson song "The World's My Oyster Soup Kitchen Floor Wax Museum" sounds like nonsense, and it is, but both the song and lyrics are word-associations with each word (or phrase, as in "The World's My Oyster") related to the next in some way. So while saying it "makes sense" might be overstating, it at least is ''explainable'' in context.
291** "Mother Hold the Candle Steady While I Shave the Chicken's Lip" - an instrumental improvisation, so it needn't make sense.
292* Music/PinkFloyd. The name itself doesn't make any sense. There is no band member named "Pink" or "Floyd" (but see below).
293** ''Music/TheDarkSideOfTheMoon'' (a voice notes at the end that "there is no dark side of the moon")
294** ''Music/TheWall'' lampshades this with "Pink" being the lead character.
295** "Have a Cigar" alludes to this with the line "By the way, which one's Pink?"
296*** Actually "Pink Floyd" is a shortened version of their earlier name: "The Pink Floyd Sound", derived from the names of two blues musicians founder Music/SydBarrett liked: Pink Anderson and Floyd Council.
297** Other albums with such titles include ''Music/{{Ummagumma}}'', ''Music/AtomHeartMother'', and ''The Division Bell''.
298* Music/FrankZappa's albums tend to have this, such as ''Music/UncleMeat'', ''Burnt Weeny Sandwich'', ''The Grand Wazoo'', ''Music/ZootAllures'', and ''Music/SheikYerbouti''.
299** ''Zoot Allures'' is actually a bilingual pun, on the French expression ''Zut alors''! - which, if you're curious, is the closest expression the French have for [[GoshDangItToHeck "Gosh darn it!"]]. As for ''Music/SheikYerbouti''...[[StealthPun well, just say it really slowly,]] [[ShakingTheRump and you'll get it]]. Zappa said that ''The Grand Wazoo'' would be the guy in any kind of [[BrotherhoodOfFunnyHats fraternal lodge organization]] with the biggest, stupidest hat.
300** ''Music/WeaselsRippedMyFlesh'' is a reference to the cover for the September 1956 issue of the adventure magazine ''Man's Life''.
301* Post-rock band Giraffes? Giraffes! (punctuation sic) love this trope. Song names like "Fucking ants man! Where they coming from? (Let's hang the Carroll footnoteitsists)" are generally a clue.
302* "Strawberry Letter 23" by Shuggie Otis, made famous by The Brothers Johnson. Despite sounding like pure word salad, the title means [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin exactly what it sounds like]]: Otis' girlfriend had written letters to him, presumably 22 of them, on strawberry-scented paper.
303* The first two Music/MyChemicalRomance records ( ''I Brought You My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love'' and ''Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge'' were chock full of these. The third one, slightly less. They blame it on [[Music/TheSmiths Morrissey]].
304** ''Honey This Mirror Isn't Big Enough For the Both Of Us'', ''Headfirst For Halos'', ''It's Not A Fashion Statement, It's A Fucking Deathwish'', ''You Know What They Do To Guys Like Us In Prison'', ''I Never Told You What I Do For A Living''
305* Brand New on "Deja Entendu" and "Your Favorite Weapon"
306** ''Jude Law and a Semester Abroad'', ''I Will Play My Game Beneath the Spin Light'', ''Okay I Believe You But My Tommy Gun Don't'' (a quote from ''Film/{{Home Alone 2|Lost In New York}}'''s [[ShowWithinAShow film within a film]] ''Angels With Even Filthier Souls''), ''Good To Know That If I Ever Need Attention All I Have To Do Is Die''[[note]]A friend of the band hadn't been seen in quite a while, and there were rumors of his death; the song title was his response when he suddenly showed up at a social gathering and learned why everyone seemed so happy to see him[[/note]], ''Last Chance to Lose Your Keys'', ''Logan to Government Center'' (a reference to Boston's subway system - the lyrics do mention New England).
307** They continue it on later albums with titles like ''The Archers Bows Are Broken'', and ''(Fork and Knife)''.
308* Music/MindlessSelfIndulgence has a few of these. Not long titles, but titles that have nothing to do with anything. But considering who they are...
309* "Bruised Water" by Chicane and Music/NatashaBedingfield, named so since it's a mashup of Chicane's "Saltwater" and Bedingfield's "I Bruise Easily".
310* Music/{{Nightwish|Band}} has tons! "The Pharaoh Sails to Orion," "Ghost Love Score," "Deep Silent Complete," "Bare Grace Misery" and "Master Passion Greed," for example.
311* Canvas Solaris, a technical metal band from Georgia, names all their songs using seemingly random nerdy-sounding words/phrases and technical terms all thrown together. Examples include "Cosmopolysyndeton", "Conveyance of Flux", "Reticular Consciousness", and of course "Dark Matter, Accretion Disk, And Interacting Binary Neutron Star In A Self-Reproducing Inflationary Universe".
312* Chiodos seem to be fond of this trope. From ''All's Well That Ends Well'' we have ''No Hardcore Dancing In The Living Room'', ''There's No Penguins In Alaska'' and ''To Trixie And Reptile, Thanks For Everything'', and ''Bone Palace Ballet'' (and the UpdatedRerelease ''The Grand Coda'') brings us ''Lexington (Joey Pea Pot With A Monkey Face)'', ''I Didn't Say I Was Powerful, I Said I Was A Wizard'', ''Teeth The Size Of Piano Keys'' and ''We Swam From Albatross, The Day We Lost Kailey Coast''. The forthcoming third album ''[[PortmanTitle Illuminaudio]]'' has ''Stratovolcano Mouth'', ''Love Is A Cat From Hell'' and ''Hey Zeus! The Dungeon''.
313* ''Music/{{Polysics}}'' is known to do deploy this trope with certain song titles. For example, ''Colecanth is Android'' and ''New Wave Jacket''.
314* For a period of time, ''WesternAnimation/BluesClues''-host-turned-musician Steve Burns has a song title generator on his website that churns out song titles that're made of this trope.
315* An early EP by Super Furry Animals titled "[[OfficiallyShortenedTitle Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogochynygofod]] ([[JustForFun/RecycledInSpace In Space]])".
316* Music/DaftPunk got their name from a review in a newspaper.
317* The Swedish chiptune band [[https://www.youtube.com/user/rymdreglage Rymdreglage]] received complaints from international fans that their name is hard to spell and pronounce for non-Scandinavians, so they selected two English words at random from a cement mixer and came up with "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4cL_buCc7RQ Ninja Moped]]". They speculate on the name's meaning on [[http://www.rymdreglage.se/ their website]].
318* Dance Gavin Dance has their share of strange titles, such as "It's Safe to Say You Dig the Backseat", or "And I Told Them I Invented Times New Roman", or why not "Surprise! I'm From Cuba, Everyone Has One Brain".
319* younnat has song titles like "Cardiologists Decided Not To Go To Bed".
320* The video game cover band [[http://www.armcannon.com Armcannon]] has an album titled ''RETURN of the ATTACK of the LEGEND of PIZZOR''.
321* [[Music/TheReplacements Tommy Stinson's]] ''Village Gorilla Head'', as well as its title track. In one interview Stinson said that "Village Gorilla Head" was originally just a WorkingTitle for the song, which he thought sounded like a cross between the Music/VillagePeople, Music/{{Gorillaz}} and Music/{{Radiohead}}.
322* Music/{{Nirvana}}'s seminal song "Smells Like Teen Spirit". Music/KurtCobain took the phrase from some graffiti that a friend had scrawled on his wall: "Kurt Smells Like Teen Spirit", which poked fun at Cobain for having sex with his girlfriend so frequently that he smelled like her deodorant. Cobain didn't know what Teen Spirit was, so he thought the phrase had something to do with youthful rebellion. He didn't find out the phrase's real meaning until after he'd written the song.
323** Possibly worth mentioning that the friend and girlfriend in question were Kathleen Hanna and Tobi Vail of the seminal genre-naming Main/RiotGrrrl punk band: Music/BikiniKill, who have a host of Word Salad Titles of their own.
324** More often than not, Nirvana's songs were this (usually combined with NonAppearingTitle). "Frances Farmer Will Have Her Revenge on UsefulNotes/{{Seattle}}", "Very Ape", "Territorial Pissings", "Big Long Now", "Mexican Seafood", "[[Music/{{Aerosmith}} Aero]] [[Music/LedZeppelin Zeppelin]]"...
325* Imperial Teen's ''The Hair The TV The Baby & The Band'' sounds like a list of unconnected nouns, but actually describes what the members were doing during the five year gap between albums: One was a hair stylist, one was writing for television, one was raising a baby, and one was working on another musical project.
326* ''Music/TheyMightBeGiants'' takes their name from a play, which was later adapted into [[Film/TheyMightBeGiants a film]] as well. The main character thinks he's Franchise/SherlockHolmes and makes a speech about open-mindedness and curiosity in which he argues that Literature/DonQuixote should have thought that the windmills "might be giants" instead of being sure that they were.
327** There's also the title of their music video DVD ''Them Ain't Big Eye Ants'' - the title doesn't make any sense, but if you say it out loud fast enough it, of course, sounds like "They Might Be Giants".
328** A few of their album titles, as well, such as ''Mink Car'' and ''The Else''.
329* Music/MaximumTheHormone has a song called "Chu Chu Lovely Muni Muni Mura Mura Purin Purin Boron Nurururerorero". It is about...rape.
330* Plaid got the title of their album ''Rest Proof Clockwork'' via BlindIdiotTranslation - the phrase appeared in an instruction manual.
331* Music/LindseyStirling's "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxIOUJ7by6U Electric Daisy Violin]]". Bizzarely, the title fits rather well.
332* PostRock band Do Make Say Think were initially formed to compose music for a youth dramatic production - the elementary school classroom they rehearsed in had the verbs "do", "make", "say", and "think" painted on different walls, so they adopted that as their name.
333* The Buzz of Delight, an early project of Music/MatthewSweet, got their name from a conversation between [[Music/{{REM}} Michael Stipe]] and Linda Hopper of Magnapop (both of whom were friends of Sweet): Hopper was complaining about a buzzing light bulb in her kitchen and Stipe heard "the buzz of the lights" as "the buzz of delight".
334* Radio Birdman named themselves after a mondegreen of "1970" by Music/TheStooges: The lyric in question was really "Radio ''burnin''' up above".
335* Music/DirEnGrey, whose name is actually trilingual: "dir" in German is a second person dative pronoun and "en" = "in" in French. Consequently, the band's name is probably best translated as "To you in grey," though the use of the dative "dir" makes the exact meaning of the name a bit ambiguous.
336* Loose Fur is actually an obtuse [[PunBasedTitle pun-based band name]]: they wanted to call themselves Lucifer but found there were already several artists laying claim to that name.
337* The Velvet Monkeys have a name that sort of sounds like an arbitrary combination of an adjective and a plural noun. However, their name is meant to evoke two very different rock bands from the 1960s: Music/VelvetUnderground and Music/TheMonkees.
338* Swirlies' album ''Blonder Tongue Audio Baton'', titled after a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphic_equalizer#Graphic_equalizer graphic equalizer]] manufactured by Blonder Tongue Laboratories, which they used extensively during the recording of the album.
339* Music/ModestMouse has quite a few songs with Word Salad Titles: "Ocean Breathes Salty," "People As Places As People", "Teeth Like God's Shoeshine" and, more recently, "The Ground Walks, With Time in a Box", to name a few.
340* Music/DeathCabForCutie took its name from a song the Music/BonzoDogBand performed in Music/TheBeatles' TV special ''Film/MagicalMysteryTour''.
341* John Lennon released an album of past solo cuts. The album's title: "Shaved Fish."
342* Japanese GarageRock band Thee Michelle Gun Elephant have a name that sounds like pure GratuitousEnglish, but is actually a ShoutOut to two of their influences: An early demo recording of theirs featured {{cover version}}s of Thee Headcoats and songs from the album ''Machine Gun Etiquette'' by Music/{{The Damned|Band}}. A friend of theirs had trouble pronouncing "Machine Gun Etiquette" when referring to said demo, and they decided it sounded like a good band name.
343* Blonde Redhead's ''Melody Of Certain Damaged Lemons'' combines the titles of several songs on the album: "Melody Of Certain 3", "For The Damaged", and "Ballad Of Lemons". Their oxymoron of a band name comes from a song by [[PostPunk No Wave]] group DNA.
344* Music/ButtholeSurfers have a lot of song or album titles that are just plain bizarre, but at least one that has a bit of context to it: They titled an EP ''Cream Corn From The Socket Of Davis'' because they wanted the cover art to depict Creator/SammyDavisJr with his glass eye out and cream corn coming out of his socket. They ultimately went with a totally different artwork concept but kept the title.
345* The Asteroids Galaxy Tour. Their trumpet player stated that he'd like to be in a band with that name, and the rest of the band liked it.
346* Helms frequently use song titles that have nothing to do with the lyrics, though they've explained at least some of them as band in-jokes: For instance, "Sno-Cone Lizard" got its title from an incident where, as a teenager, a member surreptitiously put a Music/TheJesusLizard sticker on the bumper of the family car - his mother found the band's name offensive, and rather than have to scrape the whole sticker off, she just partially covered it up with a "sno-cone" sticker.
347* Letters to Cleo, who got their name from the fact that lead vocalist Kay Hanley had a pen pal named Cleo growing up. At one point Cleo moved without giving Kay her new address, so the letters started coming back 'return to sender'; Kay happened to find an old box marked "Letters to Cleo" while they were still deciding on a name.
348** The album title ''Wholesale Meats And Fish'' was supposedly something they saw on a sign and just decided would be an amusing thing to call an album.
349* Music/AlanisMorissette with her album title, ''Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie''.
350* Music/{{Sophie}}'s debut studio album is titled ''OIL OF EVERY PEARL'S UN-INSIDES''. This ''does'' have a proper meaning -- it's a reverse-mondegreen of "I love every person's insides," alluding to [[BeYourself themes present]] [[YouAreBetterThanYouThinkYouAre the album]] -- but the arrangement of the title itself is still really odd.
351* Music/IronAndWine: Sam Beam was once in a gas station where he noticed an aisle of old-fashioned home remedies and dietary supplements, including one called "Beef, Iron & Wine". Dropping the first word, he picked it as the name for his recording project because it suggested a certain "duality" to him, as well as because it was more interesting-sounding than just his own name.
352* Neon Trees named themselves for lighted palm trees in front of In-N-Out Burger restaurants. They just thought said trees looked cool, but by coincidence, they later found out band member Branden Campbell's father installed the trees in front of the In-N-Out in their home state of Utah.
353* Prog rockers Music/EmersonLakeAndPalmer had an album called ''Brain Salad Surgery''. It was reputedly a reference to a blow job.
354* Islands got their song title "Jogging Gorgeous Summer" from a post-it note Nick Thorburn's girlfriend had left him one morning (presumably meaning that the weather was beautiful, so she went jogging). The lyrics don't really have anything to do with summer or jogging, but it's a love song with a tropical, "summery" feel, so the title sort of fits.
355* The 1973 breakthrough album from Joe Walsh, soon to become even more famous as part of the Music/{{Eagles}}, was ''The Smoker You Drink, the Player You Get''.[[note]]Officially, it was by Walsh's then-current band Barnstorm, but it was promoted as a Walsh solo effort, and the cover names only him.[[/note]]
356* The Brian Jonestown Massacre song "Nailing Honey To The Bee" ended up with its title as an in-joke: Anton Newcombe was constantly changing the title and lyrics of the song, and at one point it had gone from being called "Did You See Them (Nailing Jesus To The Tree)" to "Like Honey To The Bee". Producer/multi-instrumentalist Rob Campanella jokingly called it "Nailing Honey To The Bee" and that became the new title.
357* The name of Canadian indie band Tokyo Police Club is pure word salad served up by a random band name generator website.
358* ''Choo Choo Hot Fish'' by The Stray Cats - it's a ShoutOut to a since-demolished soul food fish restaurant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, near where the album itself was recorded.
359* Nobody in Music/BillyTalent is named Billy Talent. Rather, they're named after a character from ''Film/HardCoreLogo''.
360* Many of Music/FlamingLips song and albums fall into this trope, with bizarre names like 'Hit to Death in the Future Head' [[note]]the only context is that most of the key words in the album title also occur in some of its song titles: "'''Hit''' Me Like You Did the First Time" ,"Talkin' 'Bout the Smiling '''Death'''porn Immortality Blues (Everyone Wants to Live Forever)", and "Hold Your '''Head'''"[[/note]] 'The Sparrow Looks Up at the Machine', 'The Train Runs Over the Camel, But Is Derailed by the Gnat', and 'Placebo Headwound', but two songs stand out for how straightforward their bizarre titles are when you listen to the lyrics:
361** 'Thank You Jack White (for the Fiber-Optic Jesus That You Gave Me)' off the Fight Test EP sounds like nonsense on the surface, until you realize it's a pretty straightforward song Lips frontman Wayne Coyne wrote to thank Jack White, the lead singer of Music/TheWhiteStripes for giving him a fibre-optic Jesus statue as a gift at a show the two bands played in Detroit.
362** 'The Big Ol' Bug Is the New Baby Now', the closing track off Zaireeka, seems like almost a tongue-in-cheek parody of The Lips' proclivity for nonsense titles, as the majority of its lyrics are Wayne Coyne telling a story about his dogs, a stuffed animal and a box of plastic bugs that explains what the title actually means.
363* IdolSinger units in Japan could have a wiki on their own. One example among dozens can be [[https://jpop.fandom.com/wiki/Chameleon_Republic Chameleon Republic]], supposedly named after the concept of "continually transforming idols". Also counts as a NonIndicativeName, since nothing about them changed after their establishment.
364* Alternative rapper {{Music/JPEGMAFIA}} (he's one guy). Makes a ''tiny'' bit more sense if you know the origin- according to the most commonly accepted story, he was part of a rap collective in the vein of A$AP Mob (so members were called pngafia, datpiffmafia, etc). Still doesn't explain why they named themselves after file formats.
365[[/folder]]
366
367[[folder:Professional Wrestling]]
368* Wrestling/NewJapanProWrestling makes enough sense from the first reader. International Wrestling Grand Prix, while nonsensical given that it describes an athletic commission rather than a racing event, still gets the point across quickly. New Blood Evolution Valiantly Eternal Radical, or NEVER, not so much. NEVER's a BShow about young talents and independent wrestlers.
369* Several Japanese promotions have titles that only make sense if you're familiar with the promotion's history. [=AtoZ=] was intentionally named this way, for example. Some are a combination of poor [[SpellMyNameWithAnS translation/transliteration]] and GratuitousEnglish, such as Fighting Detective Team [=BattlARTS=]. Some have an inherently weird gimmick that's just hard to capture in words like Wrestling/FightingOperaHUSTLE. With some, such as Big Mouth Loud, you might as well forget trying to figure it out and just watch the matches.[[/folder]]
370
371[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
372* ''Ancient Ruler Dinosaur King [=DKidz=] Adventure'' - rather sensibly retitled ''Dinosaur King'' when released in English.
373* While the "Magic" part of it certainly makes sense, the latter portion of the title of ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering'' doesn't really mean anything at all. It was only added because "Magic" by itself was too broad a term to be copyrighted.
374* A card from ''TabletopGame/TheSpoils'', called "Exploding Sock Puppet!", is a WordSalad ShoutOut to the video game version of fellow card game ''TabletopGame/MagiNation''. The illustration is an actual sock puppet exploding, but the flavor text is "Taxi apple sponge! Skunks playing poker, basketball cheesesteak!" This gibberish was all that Magi Nation's protagonist could hear from the land's natives before they [[TranslatorMicrobes gave him some seeds to help translate.]]
375* There are many unofficial ''TabletopGame/CardsAgainstHumanity'' expansion packs, and most of them have names that can be initialized as CAH and have the same amount of syllables as the game, but otherwise make little sense: Crabs Adjust Humidity is one of the more nonsensical examples.
376* ''TabletopGame/GraveRobbersFromOuterSpace'', a card game parodying B-movies, starts the game by having the players draw a few random cards and make a title for the "movie" they're making by using random words on the bottom.
377[[/folder]]
378
379[[folder:Toys]]
380* ''Toys/{{Bionicle}}'''s meaning was defined as a {{portmanteau}} of "Biological Chronicle" -- the "chronicle" part has always been clear, but which part of "elemental-power wielding multicolor cyborgs fighting to awaken a comatose god" does "biological" refer to? 8 years into the story, it tuned out that god has been a HumongousMecha who [[GeniusLoci had housed the universe]] this entire time, and all the characters are part of ''his'' biology. [[FridgeBrilliance Then you realize]] that the heroes are basically white blood cells, their canisters are medicine capsules, Mata Nui (the giant robot) was taken down with a virus, some of the lands inside him are analogous to organs, etc. Also, co-creator Christian Faber came up with the concept during a medical treatment.
381* Cars from the ''Manga/BakusouKyoudaiLetsAndGo'' series and its sequels tend to have names that might come across as weird or incoherent to a native English speaker, like "Brocken Gigant" and "Gun Bluster" to name a few.
382[[/folder]]
383
384[[folder:Video Games]]
385* In and of itself, ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' sounds nonsensical, but is in fact short for ''Pocket Monster''. And the reason for ''Pocket Monster'' is that Pokémon are monsters that are kept in capsules that easily fit in the palm of your hand and can be shrunk to an even smaller size, which makes them very easy to carry around (and, in the meta sense, the games themselves were pocket-sized and exclusive to handheld systems until they were forced to upsize to the UsefulNotes/NintendoSwitch). Before you ask, the reason they couldn't just ''call'' the game "Pocket Monsters" outside of Japan is because of a competing trademark from ''Toys/MonsterInMyPocket''.
386** What's aggravating, the acute accent on the 'é' was added to emphasize the correct pronunciation -- not "pokey" or "poke" as in "jab with a finger" -- and it is ''still'' mispronounced (at least by English speakers, who generally aren't familiar with acute accents).
387* ''VideoGame/GuiltyGear''. While it is not about cogwheels or machinery with troubled pasts, the name itself refers to the protagonist who is a creature called a "gear" and is partially responsible for events that lead to the deaths of many people. In the first game, it even receives a TitleDrop, the protagonist referring to himself as such, in one of his endings.
388* The ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'' game called "Girlfriend of Steel" took place in an AlternateUniverse where the Jet Alone project succeeded in creating metal mecha in competition with the Evangelion. The title likely refers to Mana, a runaway pilot of one of these mecha. It's possible that "Girlfriend of Steel" is a poor translation of the English term "Iron Maiden." There was a sequel to this, which changes the genre of the ''Evangelion''-verse into that of a DatingSim. However, it was a sequel in name only, as it had nothing to do with the first "Girlfriend of Steel" game. So when a manga of this second game was produced, in the West, it was given the title "Angelic Days."
389** ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'' itself can appear to be this for those who don't know Greek since the "English" title is, in fact, a Greek title - the WordOfGod's translation of "Shinseiki Evangelion" - which is pretty close to literal; most native speakers of English and Greek, however, would have used ''Neo'' instead of ''Neon'', though they mean the same (Greek for "new").
390** Similarly, the official name of the first game was "Koutetsu no Girlfriend" (Steel Girlfriend). Iron Maiden is listed on the back cover. The second game has both English names on the front cover, right below the kanji. The comic was likely changed for the American release, so they wouldn't be sued into a hole.
391*** As stated above in Anime, ''Neon'' is "New One" so it becomes ''New One Gospel of Creation'' or directly as ''New One Origin Gospel''. In either case [[spoiler:it seems to be more accurate to the aftermath of [[MindScrew episode 26]]]].
392* Original title of ''VideoGame/{{Pathologic}}'' is "Мор. Утопия/Mor. Utopia" -- Russian for "Pestilence. Utopia". It really makes sense in context, because the game is about plagued city and utopist ideas play a very significant part in the plot. This is also a ShoutOut to he work ''Utopia'' written by UsefulNotes/ThomasMore.
393* ''VideoGame/SpiritualAssassinTaromaru'', though in all fairness you're a ninja with psychic powers.
394* ''VideoGame/SplinterCell: Pandora Tomorrow''. Parodied in ''Webcomic/PennyArcade'' with rejected titles, such as ''Splinter Cell: Peanut Butter Monkey'' and ''Splinter Cell: Puppy Helmet''. In some circles, Penny Arcade's point was accepted with such vigor that the game was more often referred to as ''Puppy Helmet'' than by its actual name. Swedish PC Gamer jokingly referred to the game as ''Splinter Cell: Flundra Okänd'', which translates to "Splinter Cell: [the] Flounder [is] unknown". "Pandora Tomorrow" makes sense if you play the game: [[spoiler: "Pandora Tomorrow" is a code phrase used by the terrorists in the game as a DeadMansSwitch; everytime the call is made, they delay the opening of ''Pandora's'' box (a weaponized virus set to go off at LAX) to ''tomorrow'' (if the leader is killed or arrested, the phone call isn't made and the weapon is released)]].
395* ''VideoGame/BatenKaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean''. Not sure 'bout the wings bit, but the world once had an ocean that was swallowed by an evil god and [[spoiler:now resides inside the Queen of Wazn]]. Yeah, this game was made on LSD.
396** The title of the prequel, ''Baten Kaitos Origins,'' before localization effectively shoved its predecessor aside. ''Baten Kaitos II: The Beginning of the Wings and the Heir of the Gods''. Although both are sort-of explained, it isn't by the main story- it's explained in a subplot that takes place [[spoiler:''1000 years in the past inside the [[NoFourthWall player/guardian spirit/afterling/Marno]]'s memories'']].
397* ''VideoGame/MakaiKingdom'' may seem like an example at first, until you learn that "makai" is what is translated (but not literally) as "the netherworld" in Creator/NipponIchi games, so it is actually GratuitousJapanese.
398** Would you rather have it as ''Phantom Kingdom''? For those that don't know, that's the game's original name in Japan.
399* ''VideoGame/ValkyrieProfile'': It's the profile of a Valkyrie. Maybe several valkyries. "Profile" meaning "a short biographical account of somebody" in this case. It could also refer to the side view used for normal gameplay since a view of someone from the side is called a profile view.
400** Most sources cite the latter explanation, that it refers to the side-scrolling dungeons, which makes it an ArtifactTitle with ''VideoGame/ValkyrieProfileCovenantOfThePlume''.
401* ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid''. Metal Gear is the nuke-firing mech Snake must prevent the activation of, whose name isn't actually explained all that well to begin with (and the Metal Gear featured in this game is actually called Metal Gear ''REX''). "Solid" refers to the lead character Solid Snake (whose name is meant to be a contrast between sneakiness and strength) and that it was the first game in the series to feature [=3D=] graphics, and hence "solids". It was also the third installment of the series, following the first two [=MSX2=] releases.
402* ''VideoGame/SyphonFilter''. For some reason, the virus which plays a part in at least the earlier games is called the "syphon filter" virus, as though it was derived from something deadly to tank-kept fish. Late 1990s to early 2000 stealth games seemingly had a word salad title as a TRC. The Syphon Filter virus is able to target "...any specific demographics, ethnic groups. It can wipe out all continents, except those who are chosen to survive." A siphon sucks liquid from a place to another; a filter keeps undesirable elements away. The similarity? ''Cleansing''.
403* ''VideoGame/SamuraiShodown'', although it does have samurai and is a fighting game, it also has {{catgirl}}s, ninja, fat guys, nature spirits, kabuki actors, and cranes disguising themselves as maids as playable characters. The samurai class was the warrior class, not the "we have to dress in a specific type of armor and use a katana" class. Granted, historically most ninja were not from the warrior class but it's still a fitting title because once you get rid of the class system, a samurai is simply a warrior.
404** The original title is ''Samurai Spirits''. The implication is that they have the ''mindset'' of a samurai... be strong, be brave, fight to the death, stand up to evil, etc... but are not literally samurai. This makes sense, as the time period (the late 18th century) would be well beyond the era of bushido-bound loyal-unto-death noble warriors. One of Galford's prefight quotes even lampshades this: "My eyes are blue, but I have samurai spirits!"
405** You can also argue that this is an ArtifactTitle from the first and second Haohmaru-centric (well, kinda) games, as Haohmaru definitely is a samurai (well, kinda).
406%%* ''Gunforce: Battle Fire Engulfed Terror Island''.%%
407* ''Real Bout VideoGame/FatalFury Special: Dominated Mind'': The Platform/PlayStation port of ''Real Bout Fatal Fury Special'', which is an {{Oddly Named Sequel|2ElectricBoogaloo}} to ''Real Bout Fatal Fury'' (and not really a sequel, strictly speaking), itself an {{Oddly Named Sequel|2ElectricBoogaloo}} in the series lineup. The port gets its own name because it gets [[UpdatedRerelease lots of extra stuff, including a story]]. The "dominated mind" in question is Billy Kane, whom White brainwashes into fighting you.
408* ''Franchise/TouhouProject'': While the main part of the games' titles usually references the BigBad or final stage in some way, the English subtitles (by which they are better known in the West) tend to be like this. For instance, ''Touhou Kaeidzuka[[note]]"Flower-viewing Mound"[[/note]] ~ Phantasmagoria of Flower View''. Well, Phantasmagoria means something like a hallucination of some sort so it all boils to seeing flowers that aren't really there, which is somewhere around half-way to what the plot's actually about. And this is just the start - no, ''Shoot The Bullet'' is not about what you think [[ShootTheBullet it is about]].
409** The average ''Franchise/TouhouProject'' game title typically does not make any sense until after beating the game or fighting a certain boss and is rarely as simple as stated. Examples include ''Touhou Koumakyou[[note]]"Scarlet Devil Land"[[/note]] ~ the Embodiment of Scarlet Devil'', ''Touhou Youyoumu[[note]]youyou = pronounced "gradual", but replacing the "you" character with the one from {{Youkai}}; mu = "dream"[[/note]] ~ Perfect Cherry Blossom'', ''Touhou Chireiden[[note]]Palace of the [[FireAndBrimstoneHell Earth Spirits]][[/note]] ~ Subterranean Animism'', and ''Touhou Shinreibyou[[note]]Mausoleum of Divine Spirits[[/note]] ~ Ten Desires''. The few straightforward games include ''Yousei Daisensou[[note]][[Film/TheGreatYokaiWar "The Great Fairy War"]][[/note]] ~ Manga/TouhouSangetsusei'' and the incredibly flexible ''Touhou Fuujinroku[[note]]Wind God Chronicles[[/note]] ~ Mountain of Faith''.
410** This led to a curious incident where so many Westerners ''expected'' the game ''Touhou Hisoutensoku ~ Choudokyuu Ginyoru no Nazo o Oe''[[note]]"Unperceiving of Natural Law: Chase the Enigma of the Gargantuan Guignol"[[/note]] to have an English subtitle that for a while a large number of people were convinced it was called "Unthinkable Natural Law", an early translation of the first part of its title (which is actually a {{Pun}} on the previous fighting game ''Hisouten'' and [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gakutensoku Gakutensoku]], the first Japanese robot).
411* ''VideoGame/ArmoredCore''. "Nine Breaker?" "For Answer?" You can ''sort of'' justify them--"Nine Breaker" is an in-universe title given to a Raven who beats the #1 pilot in the arena, who's usually called ''Nine'' Ball, and "For Answer" is just an incredibly lame {{pun}}, as it's the follow up to ''Armored Core '''4'''''. But even then, they're still just weird, and they're still broken English.
412* ''VideoGame/BlazBlueCalamityTrigger''. Not a disaster movie about blue fire, but one of the names of the ArtifactOfDoom the protagonist possesses. As for the "Calamity Trigger" part; considering it's an ArtifactOfDoom, that would certainly trigger a calamity.[[spoiler: Could also be explained by the fact that said protagonist is a part of an EldritchAbomination that caused TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt in the game's backstory, and at the end of his story mode, he is thrown into some sort of time portal into the past with the other half of said Abomination, where she fuses with him against his will to become [[EldritchAbomination the Black Beast]]. Thus, '''Triggering''' a '''Calamity'''. (He gets better...[[StableTimeLoop sorta]].)]]
413* The ''Franchise/AceAttorney'' series pulled out one of these to break up what was becoming a string of ColonCancer titles: ''Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth''. It makes sense in context, as the game focuses on an "ace" attorney, Miles Edgeworth, who solves murders through investigations.
414* ''VideoGame/SilhouetteMirage: Reprogrammed Hope''. Outside Japan, the title was shortened to Silhouette Mirage. This one makes sense in context. Silhouette Mirage refers to the two character alignments, the brawny Silhouettes and the brainy Mirages. Reprogrammed Hope is a bit stickier, but given that the game takes place inside a series of computer programs and that the protagonist is attempting to repair it, the elements are there.
415%%* ''Magic Planet Snack''.%%
416* ''VideoGame/FearEffect'' and its sequel ''[[VideoGame/FearEffect2RetroHelix Retro Helix]]''. "Fear Effect" refers to the gameplay element in which your character's health and vulnerability are affected by fear. "Retro Helix" refers to a type of DNA that is connected to EINDS, an AIDS-like disease, in the game.
417* ''[[VideoGame/{{X}} X3: Albion Prelude]]''. "Albion" refers to the player ship of the (currently unreleased) ''X Rebirth'', the ''Albion Skunk'', while "prelude" refers to the fact that this expansion is a prelude to the [[PortalNetwork gate system]] shutdown that precedes the thousand-odd-year timeskip between ''[=X3:AP=]'' and ''XR''.
418* In ''VideoGame/AlphaProtocol'', all of Steven Heck's names he give to operations in Taipei. Operation Turbo Panther. Operation Latex Turtle. Operation Angry Bees. Operation YYYEEEAAAHHH!!!
419* ''VideoGame/NinjaBaseballBatman''. Yes, this is a real game, and yes, it makes sense in context. But the Dark Knight is nowhere to be found in this game. Well, you see, the title is not referring to Batman, but a bat man, as in a man who carries a baseball bat. So, in fact, this game is ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin: Ninjas with baseball bats go around beating the shit out of things.
420* ''Drunken Robot Pornography'', by Dejobaan games. It centers around fighting a series of [[TechnologyPorn visually-astounding]] and incredibly defective robots in an arena. The rest of the title is ''vaguely'' explained by the fact that the BigBad was a former barman robot who gained sentience, and the 12 bosses are called also "Centerfolds". It doesn't affect the gameplay in any way (it can be described as [[FirstPersonShooter first person]] BulletHell) and the "Centerfolds" aren't humanoid in the least.
421* The UsefulNotes/ZXSpectrum game ''Fat Worm Blows a Sparky''. The player character is a worm, and "sparkies" are the ammunition it fires at bugs.
422* ''Franchise/MassEffect'': The title plays on the consequences your choices will have in the series, but the words also refer to how the universe's {{Phlebotinum}} causes an object's Mass to reduce to nothing, allowing FasterThanLightTravel, ArtificialGravity, and pretty much everything else that makes the universe work the way it does. Fortunately, this is quickly explained in the game's ''Franchise/StarWars''-esque opening crawl, leading directly into the TitleDrop.
423* ''VideoGame/BanjoKazooie'' is made from the names of the two lead characters. Its sequel ''Banjo-Tooie'' has "two" mixed in for flavor. SpiritualSuccessor ''VideoGame/YookaLaylee'' is the same, while also being a pun on "ukulele".
424* A [[ShoddyKnockoffProduct knockoff]] of ''VideoGame/PumpItUp'' is currently making rounds in certain arcades in Asia whose owners are too cheap to buy the real deal. It's called ''King Of Dancer''. Yes, it's pretty clear that they are trying to ape VideoGame/TheKingOfFighters' title, but it just pushes the title of the knockoff into this trope due to the broken grammar.
425* ''VideoGame/TokyoMirageSessionsFE'': It takes place in Tokyo, Mirages are spirits that you team up with or fight against, and Sessions are the combos you initiate when you hit an enemy's weak spot (or fulfill other requirements). The "sharp" symbol is because the story revolves around the IdolSinger business. FE stands for ''Franchise/FireEmblem'', because the game is a crossover between it and ''Franchise/ShinMegamiTensei''. So why isn't ''SMT'' alluded to in the title? It is, actually; ''Tokyo Mirage Sessions'' can be shortened to ''TMS'', which is ''SMT'' backwards. But without all this context, this game has one hot mess of a title.
426* Similar to the Shawshank example listed in the Film section, the title of ''VideoGame/HorizonZeroDawn'' can seem confusing until you actually start the game and get far enough in to learn about Project Zero Dawn.
427* ''VideoGame/AlwaysSometimesMonsters'' seems like a title that makes little sense on reading. It does make sense later in the game, as it becomes clear the story is about the fact that people will always do things wrong sometimes in order to get by.
428* ''VideoGame/Runaway2TheDreamOfTheTurtle'' ''looks'' like this at first, but eventually, the meaning behind the title is explained. [[spoiler: "Dream" is what the Trantorians call the suspended animation animals are subjected to while on route to their Zoo. Each mission is subsequently named after this and the animal they are after, with the current one literally being ''The Dream of the Turtle''.]]
429* ''VideoGame/{{Tobal}} No. 1'' seems like a redundant case of Title1 in an otherwise-nonsensically titled franchise, but A) Tobal is a planet within the game's setting, and B) Tobal No. 1, in particular, refers to a fighting tournament taking place there.
430* ''VideoGame/AnotherEden'' isn't explained initially, but eventually you find out that Eden is a person. How and why there's "another" one becomes complicated and spoilery. The game also has the subtitle ''The Cat Beyond Time and Space''; the "Beyond Time and Space" part is because the game involves time travel, and there does turn out to be a cat involved but that's another spoiler.
431* ''VideoGame/XenobladeChronicles'' may seem like a confusing title for people with little familiarity with the series, possibly only knowing it exists thanks to ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros'' However, there is actual meaning behind the title. The “Xeno” prefix, means “strange,” or “foreign,” and in the main games, the main character wields a magic sword that is integral to the main plot, so in a way, the games are called, “The Chronicles of the Strange Blades.” This is even further evident since the first game was originally called “Monado, Beginning of the World” with the Monado being the sword in question.
432* ''VideoGame/SwordOfRapier'': The game's title is not only redundant, but makes it almost impossible to distinguish itself from actual swords and rapiers.
433[[/folder]]
434
435[[folder:Web Animation]]
436* The title of ''WebAnimation/PorkchopNFlatscreen'' does seem weird, but it makes sense when you realize it refers to the, er, sizes of the two main characters (Porkchop = Ayane, Flatscreen = Mai).
437* ''WebAnimation/DSBTInsaniT'': The Special Info Episode reveals that [=DSBT=] stands for [=DylSchoolBlindTure=], which is a mashup of two story titles.
438[[/folder]]
439
440[[folder:Webcomics]]
441* ''Webcomic/BobAndGeorge'' is a completed SpriteComic that for the first ten or so story arcs contained no characters named Bob and no characters named George. This is because it evolved from a filler comic that was shown while the author was trying to make a hand-drawn comic, but said attempts at the hand-drawn comic ultimately failed three times, and what once had been filler became the main comic while retaining the other comic's title. The titular characters eventually made their way into the sprite comic, finally giving the name an in-universe explanation.
442* ''Webcomic/ElGoonishShive'': In-universe: As part of the {{Masquerade}}, spellbooks have an enchantment that gives them fake titles, intended to make them look like regular books to the casual observer. Unfortunately, the titles are created automagically, so we get things like [[http://egscomics.com/comic/2016-06-29 "The Tacos Of Yesteryear"]] and [[http://egscomics.com/comic/2010-07-12 "The Ecology of Anteaters"]].
443* ''Webcomic/FlakyPastry'' is an UrbanFantasy {{Sitcom}} which has nothing to do with baking like the title would imply. However, it's named after how the barriers between different planes are like a flaky pastry with holes and tunnels that can be travelled through.
444* ''Webcomic/{{Homestuck}}'''s title is somewhat confusing, but makes ''slightly'' more sense in context; several characters are indeed stuck at home at various points in the story.
445** Some of the chapter titles fall into this, such as 'penis ouija' and 'I'M PUTTING YOU ON SPEAKER CRAB'. However, the majority of them turn out to be phrases which [[TitleDrop come up somewhere in that chapter]].
446* ''Webcomic/MobPsycho100'': The protagonist is such a GenericGuy that he could disappear in any crowd, hence his InSeriesNickname "Mob". "Psycho" refers to his PsychicPowers, as well as the fact that he goes [[TheBerserker berserk]] when his emotions "top out" (represented by a scale of zero to one hundred). The title could also be a play on the phrase "mob psychology", which fits with how many people seem to start blindly following Mob for one reason or another, with him even getting his own ''religion.''
447* ''WebComic/ThePhoenixRequiem'' has no phoenix in it. And no requiem, for that matter. It is, however, about a guy who can't die (he keeps rising from the dead, essentially) and is a walking psychopomp.
448* ''Webcomic/SluggyFreelance'', the strangeness of which was {{lampshade|Hanging}}d time and time again in the comic itself for most of seventeen years, turns out to be a fair description of the strip's premise: [[spoiler:the adventures of Sluggy, exiled God of Power, going freelance, Torg Sluggy (it's his middle name), freelance web designer, and Riff aka agent Sluggy, whose cover is "freelance bum"]]. It's been ArcWords for some time [[spoiler:due to the machinations of time-spider Googol, who gathers all Potentials in one place to ensure K'Z'K's ultimate defeat]].
449* Fans always assumed that ''Webcomic/StickyDillyBuns'' referred to the lead character, the good-looking CampGay Dillon, and his butt, but nobody knew for sure; some saw it as almost a WordPureeTitle. Then, well into the comic's second volume, [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/sticky-dilly-buns/what-is-the-password one strip confirmed the meaning of the terms,]] and [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/sticky-dilly-buns/just-what-i-like-to-hear another strip a few days later]] provided further confirmation with a full TitleDrop.
450* ''Webcomic/{{Vinigortonio}}''. The name is a mashup of the names Vinicius, Igor, and Antonio, even though only the first two are actual characters in the comic. Antonio is never mentioned at all.
451[[/folder]]
452
453[[folder:Web Original]]
454* ''Literature/ChaosFighters'' has two examples: ''Cyberion Strike'' refers to the name of [[spoiler: the attack launched by the BigBad at the end]] and ''KIMIA'' which refers to potassium (kalium as of IUPAC official name) iodide which declared as being in MIA status.
455* ''Literature/TheSagaOfTuck'' has a band named ''Stepwise Pagoda''. The members admit that they made up the name by picking words at random from a dictionary.
456* The various installments of ''WebOriginal/SpaghettiIce''. The work's titles are written as if they were [[spoiler:a cryptic CrosswordPuzzle clue, and thus, are meant to be decoded to reach their true meaning]].
457** ''Awkwardly Step Around Him for a Fresh Herb''
458** ''It's Cardinal He's in the Common Era''
459[[/folder]]
460
461[[folder:Web Videos]]
462* ''WebVideo/Lonelygirl15''. Fans from before the videos were hosted on lg15.com will know that lonelygirl15 was original protagonist Bree's screenname on [=YouTube=] and Revver, but she is never called that in the series itself. Also an example of ArtifactTitle.
463* ''Tay Zonday'' (Adam Nyerere Bahner), composer of [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwTZ2xpQwpA Chocolate Rain]] said [[http://video-creativity.blogspot.com/2010/05/behind-name-tayzonday.html "I wanted a catchy artist name that had zero search results on Google"]]
464* ''WebVideo/MarbleHornets'', in-universe, is the student film that Jay and Alex were making. In reality, it is just the first two things the creators saw when brainstorming the title. Many fans have pointed out that the 2000 novel ''Literature/HouseOfLeaves'', which shares many stylistic and atmospheric elements with the series, conspicuously uses the term "marble horses" at one point, possibly inspiring the title.
465[[/folder]]
466
467[[folder:Western Animation]]
468* ''WesternAnimation/TheAmazingWorldOfGumball'': "The Console" has Gumball, Darwin and Anais sucked into a game called "Inverted Paradox: The Enemy Within." Gumball considers it this trope until it's revealed the main enemy is the game they've been playing the whole time.
469* ''WesternAnimation/BigCityGreens'' is about [[CountryMouse a family of farmers moving to Big City]] ([[ADogNamedDog and yes, it really is called that]]), with the farmers in question being the [[MeaningfulName Green]] family. This means that, in a way, the show is called, ''The Greens in Big City''.
470* ''WesternAnimation/BoyGirlDogCatMouseCheese''. With that mouthful title alone, it would honestly be easy to assume the creators named the cartoon this way as an intentional misnomer, (sort of like ''Aqua Teen Hunger Force'' below) but [[ADogNamedDog it's actually the name of all six of the main cast.]] (who are noticeably the only characters in the entire show with this trope in effect)
471* ''WesternAnimation/EvilConCarne'': "Con Carne" is the ([[HarmlessVillain sort of evil]]) main character's surname, though it's also Spanish for "with meat", possibly a reference to him not only being a BrainInAJar but also having his stomach in a jar.
472* ''WesternAnimation/SuperRobotMonkeyTeamHyperForceGo'' sounds like a parody of anime titles, the ''Franchise/PowerRangers'' series, and a rip-off of ''WesternAnimation/{{Teen Titans|2003}}'' all in one...and that's before you actually watch it and see that it is indeed a show about a team of robotic monkeys (and one human kid) who pilot a {{Super Robot|Genre}} and are called the "Hyperforce" for short (maybe related to "masterforce" from ''Franchise/{{Transformers}}''). The "Go" is just something they shout out as a battle cry (and possibly a pun of the Japanese word for "[[OneTwoThreeFourGo five]]", as there are five monkeys).
473* ''WesternAnimation/{{Wishfart}}'' sounds like it's meant to be ToiletHumour, but it's a combination of "wish" and "brainfart", as the series is about a leprechaun who grants wishes [[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor that always screw up]]. Additionally, all episodes have non-sequitur names like "Clown Shoes Never Solved Anything", "And They Ate the Goldfish", and "Does This Please the Jigmaster?" -- all derived from actual lines uttered in the episode and taken out of context. Regardless, they add to the show's surreal nature.
474[[/folder]]
475
476[[folder:Real Life]]
477* There's an Australian city in the state of Queensland called the City of Townsville. Yes. [[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment The City of Town City]]. Or maybe [[StealthPun City Town Village]]. Makes sense when you realise it was founded by [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Towns Robert Towns]]. Rather than ''Franchise/ThePowerpuffGirls.''
478* ''Every'' single show dog and show horse must have a unique name. This leads to...unusual names. Also Thoroughbred racehorses, which gets odder because if a horse wins enough races, people allude to his name in naming his children. For example, one of Secretariat's sons was named "[[UsefulNotes/UnitedNations General Assembly]]."
479** In Japan, there is a horse named "Sumomomomomomomomo" (Japanese: "スモモモモモモモモ") which means "plums and peaches are both peaches," and is based off a tongue twister.
480* Someone unfamiliar with the Android operating system would have trouble with this headline: [[http://i.imgur.com/xe7Uw.png "Galaxy Nexus: Android Ice Cream Sandwich guinea pig."]] (Galaxy Nexus is a specific smartphone model, and Ice Cream Sandwich is the name of a then-recent version of Android, so the intended meaning is "this new phone is testing out the new version of Android.")
481* Another confusing headline: [[https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/interview/2019-10-04/raging-loop-scenario-writer-amphibian/.151598 "Raging Loop Scenario Writer Amphibian."]] ''Raging Loop'' is a VisualNovel and an example in and of itself. Its scenario writer--a somewhat obtuse term for the video-game equivalent of a screenwriter--goes by the nickname "Amphibian." The article is an interview with this person.
482* Yet another confusing headline: [[https://www.nature.com/articles/news030331-13 Artificial Nose Apes Dog Snout]]. "Apes" is being used as a verb here, as in "imitates" - the article is about an artificially constructed nose which detects scents by mimicking the snout of a dog.
483* Many fraternal organizations and titles can veer into this territory, like the "Improved Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World" and the "Ancient Egyptian Arabic Order Nobles Mystic Shrine."
484* Like the show dogs and racehorses example, forums and online games require all users to have a unique name. This naturally leads to this trope.
485* The tattoo style "Trash Polka": The artists who created the style initially called it "Realistic Trash Polka" because the style combined photo-realistic images with text and abstract strokes (or "trash") in an organized way, like a musical composition (or a "polka"). "Realistic" was dropped from the name because they thought it sounded like they were "setting rules" for the style.
486* On the eastern seaboard of the US is a regional grocery store chain known as Food Lion. The chain, founded in the late 1950s under the name Food Town, was rapidly expanding outside of its native North Carolina and running into areas that already had numerous stores named Food Town, necessitating a name change. When the name change to Food Lion was announced in 1982, the general American public was confused; where does one get a name like "Food Lion" from and what do lions have to do with groceries anyway? The answer: Food Town had been acquired years prior by the Belgian retail company Delhaize Group, which was known once upon a time as "Delhaize Le Lion" and had long had an abstract lion as their logo, while one of the co-founders of Food Town itself realized they could quickly change the stores' names by simply replacing two letters (the T and the W) and moving the O over one space, thus the name Food Lion was born.
487[[/folder]]
488
489!!Examples that [[MakesJustAsMuchSenseInContext Make Just as Much Sense in Context]]:
490
491[[folder:Anime and Manga]]
492* ''Anime/SuperDimensionFortressMacross'' is kind of on the borderline, since the titular warship eventually becomes a mobile space fortress (in the sense of protecting a vulnerable group of civilians inside) which is capable of faster-than-light travel (hence "super-dimensional", transcending the dimensions). The "Super Dimensional" part may have referred to the huge size of the ship, which was stated to be a rather large Supervision Army warship. That said, the "Super Dimension" tag was mostly appended [[ExecutiveMeddling at the request of the sponsor]] to tie it in with two unrelated series that would run in the same timeslot after Macross had finished its run. As for the "Macross"? That was a compromise between Creator/StudioNue and a producer from the sponsor, who was a big fan of Shakespeare. Had he had his way, the show would have been ''Choujikyuu yosai [[Theatre/{{Macbeth}} Makubesu]]''. Another working title was ''Palace Robo Dockingham''...
493** The ''Choujikyuu'' in the original Japanese title translates as "transcending space-time", as in physical concept, a rather fitting title to an SF show.
494** The show's name in English also allowed the title ship to be called the SDF-1, which is a play on the Japanese "Self-Defense Forces," the post-WWII Japanese military.
495* The second ''Super Dimension'' series, ''Anime/SuperDimensionCenturyOrguss'', also makes a bit of sense, as the plot revolves around a war between various alternate dimensions, with the main character piloting a mech called Orguss. The century part, less so, as the war only lasts for around 50 episodes.
496* ''Super Heavy God Anime/{{Gravion}}'' is curiouser still, especially since the kanji for "superheavy" can also mean "overweight".
497* ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight''. One translated version, demanding a title that made more sense, came out as ''The Night that Fate Stood Still''. This does not, however, explain the sequel, which is titled ''Fate/hollow ataraxia.'' Ataraxia means something like "tranquility" in Greek, making the title "hollow tranquility", or possibly "empty dream" (which ''does'' describe the situation perfectly).
498** "Fate" is often used as the name of the setting itself (as opposed to other Franchise/{{Nasuverse}} settings like ''VisualNovel/{{Tsukihime}}'' and ''Literature/TheGardenOfSinners''), which makes some of the titles (sequel ''Fate/hollow ataraxia'', light novel prequel ''Literature/FateZero'', and FightingGame spinoff ''VideoGame/FateUnlimitedCodes'') make more sense. Naturally, under this theory, "Stay Night" still requires some linguistic hoop-jumping...
499** It may start to make sense as the story goes on. The subject of "fate" recurs throughout the story (and there are MultipleEndings through three different routes, some endings being [[NonStandardGameOver Bad Ends]] and some being Normal/Good/True Ends), and "stay night" can refer to how large parts of the story take place at night as well as how each route branches off because of "staying the night" (''Unlimited Blade Works'' happens if Shirou tells Saber to stay put instead of going after Archer, and ''Heaven's Feel'' happens if Shirou stays the night with Sakura, so fate literally changes if you "stay the night"). It's also possible that "stay night" refers Shirou romancing a different love interest depending on with route he takes (and yes, maybe it's also referring to the sex scenes).
500** That's nothing compared to the MagicalGirl spinoff ''Manga/FateKaleidLinerPrismaIllya''. "Fate" makes sense as the setting, and Illya as she's the main magical girl, while "kaleid" references the [[SecretArt "Kaleidoscope" magic]] that [[AllPowerfulBystander Zelretch]] built into their wands, but "Prisma" is a bit unexplained (maybe it's an abbreviation of "prismatic"?) and "liner" is just an [[Franchise/NasuVerse extremely]] ''extremely'' [[Literature/AngelNotes obscure reference.]] Then again, [[AffectionateParody it's not exactly a terribly serious series.]]
501* ''Manga/{{Trigun}}'' is a non-sequitur, but far less mind-wrenching than the subtitle/genre description: "Deep Space Planet Future Gun Action!" The fact that this was perfectly accurate a descriptor of Trigun as anyone could come up with only makes things sadder. Various possible meanings of the actual title are hotly debated among fans. Some took the title to refer to the fact that Vash has three guns: the one in a holster, the cyberarm that turns into a gun in emergencies, and the Angel Arm cannon.
502* The original title of the ''Battle Angel Alita'' manga is ''Hyper Future Vision [[Manga/BattleAngelAlita Gunnm]]'', where "Gunnm" (properly pronounced "Gan-mu") stands for "Gun Dream", which makes sense, as we ''are'' talking about a hyper-violent dystopic manga. It might also refer to Alita's battle-and-gore fetish. Ironically, guns are actually ''outlawed'' in the ''Gunnm'' universe, or at least the region where the story starts. Quite common elsewhere.
503* ''Manga/{{Geobreeders}}'' ...no justification for the title has been found.
504* ''Anime/YesPrettyCure5''. Okay, "Precure" is established, and there ''are'' five of them, but "Yes"?
505* ''Anime/BlueGender''. "Blue" refers to the enemies, the Blue, but "Gender" only make any sense if you use its archaic meaning of "class/type", then it could refer to how [[spoiler:the Blue are mutant humans]].
506* The dubbed eleventh season of ''Anime/PokemonTheSeries'' is referred to as ''Pokémon: Battle Dimension''. Has absolutely nothing to do with other dimensions.
507* ''Manga/DGrayMan'': None of the main character's names starts with D. There's nothing particularly gray. There are men, though. The Noahs go kind of gray... WordOfGod is that it's from early drafts: "Gray" was Allen's name and the "D" stood for the Akuma, which were "dolls". The author liked the names and kept them for the title. Alternatively, it could be a(n unconscious) ShoutOut to ''Literature/ThePictureOfDorianGray'' due to the Akuma ability to retain their (borrowed) human forms after mutating and doing horrible things in the service of the [[BigBad The Millennium Earl]] and [[QuirkyMiniBossSquad the Noahs]] - at least for a while, but by the time they can no longer retain their old forms they don't care.
508** Another theory is that the D. stands for dolls, which was a potential name for the manga, Gray refers to the fact that people are neither white (good) or black (evil), but gray, and Man refers to humans.
509** In recent chapters it was revealed that D. is a part of a name: [[spoiler: Mana and Nea '''D.''' Campbell]].
510* ''Manga/{{Bakuman}}'' has this with [[ShowWithinAShow manga within a manga]]: the various fictional titles of manga run in ''Shonen Jump'' range from "Cheese Okaki" to "God of Catalogs John". Of course, it doesn't help that you have no idea what those series are about.
511* The original Japanese title of the {{shoujo|Demographic}} manga ''Mad Love Chase'', ''Harlem Beat wa Yoake Made'', translates as Harlem Beat Until Dawn. In the author's notes, Takashima cheerfully admits that she just liked the way it sounded.
512* ''Anime/PaniPoniDash'': The term "paniponi" is mentioned more than once throughout the series, but what is it supposed to even mean?
513* ''Manga/{{Blame}}'' doesn't actually involve any finger-pointing whatsoever. None. The lead characters rarely even talk. It's theorized the title is [[TyopOnTheCover a misspelling of]] "Blam!", an onomatopoeia for a gun firing, rather appropriate considering the amount of gunplay. This is further supported by another of Tsutomu Nihei's works, a ''ComicBook/{{Wolverine}}'' miniseries for Creator/MarvelComics, being titled ''Snikt!''
514* In-universe in ''Anime/PuellaMagiMadokaMagica'', Kyoko is shown playing a game called "Dog Drug Reinforcement." It's a BlandNameProduct of ''VideoGame/DanceDanceRevolution'', and doesn't look like it has anything to do with dogs, drugs, or reinforcement.
515* ''Literature/DateALive'': Can be [[JustForFun/XMeetsY described]] as ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'' meets ''Manga/TheWorldGodOnlyKnows'', [[QuirkyWork and is as weird as that sounds]]. While dating is sometimes involved, it's more likely to get the main character killed than keep him alive. Makes slightly more sense if you follow the Japanese pronunciation, where ''deitoaraibu'' is a clear {{Pun}} on "dead or alive".
516* ''Anime/AttackOnTitan''. The title ''almost'' makes sense, but grammatically just doesn't connect to the series. There ''are'' monsters called titans, and the characters ''do'' attack them, but the bizarrely-structured title treats "Titan" like a unique, proper noun, making it sound as though the show is about an assault on the ''moon'' Titan rather than an ongoing war with things called "a titan" or "the titan" when mentioned in singular. The Japanese title ''Shingeki no Kyojin'' translates to "Advancing Giants" (and later in the series turns out to be [[spoiler:the name of Eren's titan form, "The Vanguard Giant"]]) which makes infinitely more sense.
517* ''Anime/FlipFlappers'' zig-zags on this. It sounds like it has something to do with [[TheFlapper flappers]], and there's a vague connection there to its female protagonist getting dragged out of her comfort zone by a ManicPixieDreamGirl. But it really refers to "Flip Flap," the organization they work for. ''Except'' we are told that "Flip Flap" is completely meaningless--the heroes yell "Flip Flapping" to trigger their TransformationSequence because it helps them embrace absurdity and become their true selves. [[MindScrew So, the in-context explanation for the title is "it's nonsense."]]
518* ''Manga/PopTeamEpic'', [[{{UsefulNotes/Dada}} naturally]]. "Pop" probably refers to the pop culture references, but it contains nothing resembling a team or an epic, only a series of surreal postmodern NegativeContinuity skits. The Japanese title "Poptepipic" is some sort of reverse-romanization that doesn't mean much of anything. The anime has a StylisticSuck segment called "Bob Epic Team," which doesn't involve anyone named Bob.
519* The ShowWithinAShow in ''Manga/{{Nichijou}}'' known as "Helvetica Standard." [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helvetica Helvetica]] is a ''typeface'', and nothing that happens in this [[ThisIsYourPremiseOnDrugs bizarrified version of an already bizarre universe]] could be considered "standard."
520* ''Literature/FromTheNewWorld'' makes some degree of sense as a loose reference to ''Literature/BraveNewWorld'', in that both involve a future-{{dystopia}} with one civilized society and one uncivilized one, both of which have their own messed-up underpinnings. But it's unclear who or what is coming "from" the new world, or whether the "new world" refers to humans, the monster rats, or both. To make matters both more and less confusing, the title seemingly came from a symphony of the same name by Music/AntoninDvorak, which predates ''Literature/BraveNewWorld''--it's used liberally in the anime, but wasn't in the source novels, for obvious reasons.
521* ''Manga/GourmetGirlGraffiti'' does involve cooking and girls, but not UsefulNotes/{{graffiti}}. The English title is [[MarketBasedTitle somewhat different from the Japanese one]], but the latter also contains the word "graffiti" for no apparent reason, and "Koufuku Graffiti" doesn't even [[AlliterativeTitle alliterate]].
522* ''Anime/PlanetWith''. A lot happens in this series, but it never gets around to explaining the title, which literally stops short of making any sense.
523* ''[[https://www.crunchyroll.com/room-camp Room Camp]]'' doesn't have much to do with camping or any particular room. The title makes no sense unless you've seen/read ''Manga/LaidBackCamp'', which has bonus comedy segments called "Room Camp" covering the cast's non-camping activities. These later got made into a separate series of anime shorts.
524* ''Anime/WonderEggPriority'': The plot involves mysterious eggs, and a TitleDrop does occur, but beyond that the title is just GratuitousEnglish. It's ''really'' about [[spoiler:teen suicide]], with a large dose of MagicalRealism.
525* The 2019 ''Franchise/LupinIII'' movie, ''Anime/LupinIIITheFirst'' is pronounced "Lupin The Third The First".
526[[/folder]]
527
528[[folder:Asian Animation]]
529* The title of the ''Animation/PleasantGoatAndBigBigWolf'' season ''Happy, Happy, Bang! Bang!'' sure isn't the kind of gibberish that ties in with the season's two major story arcs (Wilie going to school and Paddi gaining strange powers).
530[[/folder]]
531
532[[folder:Audio Plays]]
533* The comedy troupe Creator/TheFiresignTheatre tends to give their albums weird titles. Some of them (like ''Don't Crush That Dwarf, Hand Me The Pliers'') fit this trope perfectly.
534[[/folder]]
535
536[[folder:Comedy]]
537* Some of the titles of Creator/RossNoble's tours and DVD releases are quite random (reflecting his style) such as ''Sonic Waffle''.
538[[/folder]]
539
540[[folder:Comic Books]]
541* ''ComicStrip/TomTheDancingBug'': There are no characters named "Tom", nor are there any dancing bugs. [[WordOfGod Creator Ruben Bolling says]] that his strip needed a title to get published, so he wanted the stupidest possible title; he was then inspired by [[LineofSightName noticing a bug which appeared to be dancing]] on a ballpoint pen.
542* One of the titles in Creator/MarvelComics' short-lived ''Razorline'' imprint was titled ''Hokum & Hex'', which was a bit puzzling since there's no characters {{Code Name}}d Hokum ''or'' Hex. Creator/CliveBarker, the creator of the ''Razorline'' comics, clarified in an interview with ''Wizard'' magazine that the title was meant to be descriptive; the comic was about magic (the "Hex" part) and was {{camp}}y (the "Hokum" part).
543* ''ComicBook/GiraffesOnHorsebackSalad'': Good luck trying to figure out what exactly is a "horseback salad". And while (flaming) giraffes appear, they're not directly related to the plot. Not surprising, given that this was originally a movie idea from ''Creator/SalvadorDali''.
544[[/folder]]
545
546[[folder:Fan Works]]
547* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciFTgXFvwrM Kawaii Quest Rainbow Cotton Candy Girls Ready Go]], a laughably bad amateur anime that basically spoofs every single MagicalGirl anime ''and'' fanime ever created. (And that video was just the ''intro.'' If you go to the creator's channel you can watch transformations and a commercial for this monstrosity.) Note the lack of cotton candy, rainbows, or any real quest...
548* ''Fuck The Jesus Beam'' and many of its chapter titles (for example "CHAPTER RAPE: SEX IS NOT RAPE").
549* The unbelievably disgusting ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' fanfic ''Rectified Anonymity'' has a title completely non-indicative of its content. It has since come to be called ''The Pokémon Story''; the original name has become something of TheScottishTrope.
550* Many [[GameMod ROM hacks]] made by Japanese people tend to have this.
551** ''VideoGame/RockmanNoConstancy''
552** ''VideoGame/RockmanDeusExMachina''
553** ''VideoGame/RockmanExhaust''
554** ''VideoGame/Rockman4MinusInfinity''
555* ''Fanfic/MyImmortal'' has nothing to do with the Music/{{Evanescence}} song, grieving (the subject of the song), or anyone being immortal. Although most of the chapters are titleless, some randomly have song title names which in no way reflect the content of those chapters.
556* ''Blog/AlwaysHavingJuice'' is a Franchise/SonicTheHedgehog AlternateUniverse CharacterBlog, and not a single one of the fifteen main characters is ever seen having juice even once. It was named after a song by Dan Deacon, but the song in question is a chiptune with no lyrics and no relation to the blog's actual content.
557%%* ''Naruto Veangance Revelaitons''. The one time Ronan is shown specifically fighting for revenge is Chapter 8, shortly after "da cooger's" ([[DeathIsCheap first]]) death. Granted, [[spoiler:Sasuke, like in canon, turned evil in the course of his quest for vengeance]], but the title still makes no sense.
558* Parodied in ''WebComic/LessBittersweet'' with the in-universe anime title ''Sword la Kill Love''. Of course, its contents aren't fully revealed, but it's a parody of this trope and the title doesn't even make grammatical sense, so it's not likely to make sense in context.
559[[/folder]]
560
561[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]
562* The title of Salvador Dali's French impressionist film ''Film/UnChienAndalou'' translates as "A Dog from Andalusia" (Andalusia is a region in Spain). The film is said to have been inspired by the non-sequitur nature of dreams as nothing in the film relates to anything else or was intended to appeal to rational analysis. As it was meant to be dream-like in nature, the film has the quality of being a total [[MindScrew mind-bendingly weird]].
563* ''Geek Maggot Bingo''. That's not even the full title, either. The full title is ''Geek Maggot Bingo: The Freak From Suckweasel Mountain''. Just...what?
564* ''Film/ReservoirDogs''. Creator/QuentinTarantino has given conflicting explanations for the title. In one, his girlfriend suggested that he watch the French movie, "Au revoir, les enfants" (Goodbye, children), and he misheard "Reservoir Dogs." Another explanation he gave is that the phrase is a slang term for rats, which is how he saw the characters. Of course, for all we know, [[UnreliableNarrator neither story is true]].
565* ''Film/StrawDogs'' was originally called ''The Siege of Trencher's Farm'', a bland and overly descriptive title, so director Peckinpah created an informal contest for a new name. A friend suggested ''Straw Dogs'', referring to the Chinese tradition of creating animal figures out of straw as religious offerings. Straw dogs were given special treatment during religious ceremonies, then discarded with the rest of the trash, mirroring the impartiality of the universe. However, even the producer of the film admitted that the term means nothing in the context of the film. The remake explains the reference in dialogue.
566* ''Sex Is Zero'': A South Korean gross-out/sex comedy roughly equivalent to "American Pie." It has been suggested that they were trying to get at something along the lines of "free love," but you really can't be sure.
567* ''Film/TheRoom2003'' mostly takes place in a two-floor apartment, but no particular room is given any specific plot importance or thematic weight. A far more appropriate title could be ''The Building''. Writer/Director/Star Creator/TommyWiseau's rambling, barely coherent explanation is that he had the idea of a room people could relate to that was a place of privacy and safety where they could go to revel or brood. Of course, how this ties to the actual events of the film is still anybody's guess. Greg Sestero, the actor who played Mark claimed that the film was originally written as a play, and all of the action would take place in a single room, which is at least a WordOfSaintPaul.
568* ''99 and 44/100% Dead'': a 1974 crime thriller. The title is a parody of the long-standing slogan of Procter & Gamble's [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivory_Soap Ivory Soap]], which was advertised as "99 & 44/100% pure" and still has that written on the packaging.[[note]]Well, "99.44% pure clean & simple"[[/note]] Ivory has been a fairly small brand (well, small for P&G) since the middle of the 20th century, marketed mostly to Americans of modest means. (So that's where Film/{{Willy Wonka|AndTheChocolateFactory}} got that combination from!)
569* ''Film/TheLivingDaylights'' (which takes its title from a line Film/JamesBond says) was called ''Death Has the Scent of Roses'' in Japan, which makes no sense as there are no roses anywhere in the film and no one says anything even remotely approaching that line.
570* The classic Creator/FrankCapra romantic comedy ''Film/ItHappenedOneNight'' takes place over several nights, and no one of them is more significant to the plot than any other. So what is the "It"?
571* A lot of the newer Bollywood movies borrow their titles from old songs. The title is generally loosely related to the actual movie (for instance a romantic movie might be titled based on a popular romantic song).
572* Band names that follow this trope (see Music, above and below) get spoofed in ''Film/HighFidelity'' when the garage band that [[Creator/JackBlack Barry]] joins late in the movie calls itself "Sonic Death Monkey". When they go to perform at [[spoiler:Rob's release party for [[ItMakesSenseInContext the former shoplifters' album]]]], Barry mentions they are no longer called "Sonic Death Monkey", and are on the verge of being called "Kathleen Turner Overdrive". Then they avert it with their ''current'' band name:
573--> '''Barry:''' But for tonight, we are "Barry Jive & the Uptown Five".
574* ''Johnny Sunshine Maximum Violence''.
575* ''Automaton Transfusion''. It's about teenagers battling zombies.
576* Nobody knows what the title of the serial killer film ''10 to Midnight'' is supposed to be referring to. It's not even clear what time is being referenced: is it 11:50 PM or the range 10:00 PM-12:00 AM?
577* The sixth Franchise/{{Godzilla}} film has been called several names, but for whatever reason, the studio has settled on ''Film/InvasionOfAstroMonster'' as the official international title despite it not making much sense (there's a monster from space but no he's not called "Astro-Monster"). It's very common for viewers to assume it's supposed to be ''Invasion of '''the''' Astro-Monster'' and the DVD case just has a typo, but that's how the title appears in all official sources. The Japanese title translates to ''The Great Monster War,'' the original English version was called ''Monster Zero'' (which ''is'' a name actually given in the movie) and most VHS copies are labeled ''Godzilla vs. Monster Zero'', all of which are much saner titles.
578* ''Film/WhiteGod'': the title has no apparent relation to the plot, which is about a girl's stray dog being abused and leading a prison break from the local pound. It might be a reference to ''Film/WhiteDog'', another film about an abused dog.
579* ''Film/ItComesAtNight'': The title (and a lot of the marketing material) would have you believe that the film features some sort of nocturnal predator. It doesn't. The title seems to have no specific relation to the plot at all.
580* ''Film/{{Skinamarink}}'': The title is a nonsense word that originates from a children's sing-a-long rhyme, but at no point is the song referenced in the movie. The only vague connection it has to the song is that the two main characters are small children.
581* ''Film/{{Cloverfield}}'': "Cloverfield" is the in-universe designation for the events of the movie, but there's no confirmed source on what, if anything, it has to do with the plot itself. Although the monster (unnamed in the film) was given the production name "Clover" from the title. It's theorized that the name came from Cloverfield Boulevard, a street that Abrams passed frequently driving between the studio and his house.
582[[/folder]]
583
584[[folder:Literature]]
585* ''[[Literature/TheSagaOfTuck Stepwise Pagoda.]]'' "Well, we took a dictionary and opened it twice..."
586* ''Literature/NakedLunch''. As [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons Nelson]] said walking out of [[Film/NakedLunch the film adaptation]], "I can think of at least two things wrong with that title."
587* ''Literature/AngelasAshes'' contains a character named Angela, but it's not clear where the ashes come in.
588* ''Literature/TheChrysalids''. This one does make a bit of sense if one squints, though. "Chrysalid" is another form of the word "chrysalis," meaning the stage a caterpillar goes into when it changes into another form (i.e., a butterfly). The book deals with mutations, so a slightly less oblique version of the title would be "The Changed Ones." The American edition of the novel was re-titled ''Re-Birth''.
589* The second volume of ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'' is called "The Two Towers". Based on events in Book 3, it seems certain that one of the towers is Orthanc. It's less clear what the other one is. Of the ''four'' other towers mentioned in the novel, the two most likely candidates are Minas Morgul and Barad-dûr.
590--> "I am not at all happy about the title 'the Two Towers'. It must if there is any real reference in it to Vol II refer to Orthanc and the Tower of Cirith Ungol. But since there is so much made of the basic opposition of the Dark Tower and Minas Tirith, that seems very misleading." ([[WordOfGod The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien No 143, dated 1954]])
591** It doesn't help that in the movie, Frodo and Sam don't take the pass of Cirith Ungol at all (it's moved to the next movie), so a character explicitly refers to "the union of the two towers" of Sauron and Saruman instead (Orthanc and Barad-dûr).
592* ''Literature/ThePostmanAlwaysRingsTwice'' contains no postmen and no doorbells. It is a metaphor for fate. At the time the book was published, the title phrase would have been [[Administrivia/PeopleSitOnChairs transparently obvious]] to the reader. Now that mail carriers don’t come to the door at all, let alone ring the bell--not so much.
593* ''Literature/DragonsLexiconTriumvirate''. There's dragons, there's a lexicon, and there's sort of a trio of main characters if you turn your head and squint a bit, but the title doesn't really mean much, especially not stuck together like that.
594* Creator/UmbertoEco's novel titles like ''Literature/TheNameOfTheRose'' and ''Literature/FoucaultsPendulum'' are weird stealth-, meta-versions of this trope. They look like normal titles, and you can see there's a Foucault pendulum in the book named after it and everything. But Eco believed an author should not guide a reader's interpretation even in the book's title, so he picked titles that were ''supposed'' to be meaningless.
595* Creator/EdwardGorey was fond of these, with many of his stories, poems, and collections having titles that have nothing to do whatsoever with their actual contents. Just as an example, the collection containing ''Literature/TheGashlycrumbTinies'' is called ''The Vinegar Works'', something that appears precisely nowhere in it.
596[[/folder]]
597
598[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
599* ''Series/MontyPythonsFlyingCircus'' was selected from a long list of names produced in a brainstorming session involving the whole group. The "Flying Circus" part was the result of the BBC having to call the forthcoming series *something* for their internal schedule paperwork. BBC management took a cue from the way the Pythons rampaged through Television Centre and titled it "Circus", which ultimately led to the group coming up with "Barry Took's Flying Circus" (Barry Took was the comedy adviser who brought the group to the BBC, and the "Flying Circus" was the nickname of the WWI attack squad lead by Manfred von Richthofen, the original RedBaron) or some similar variation. The group liked the "Flying Circus" part and thought the title should represent a shady con-man-type's attempt at a cheap variety show and cast about for a sleazy-sounding name. Creator/JohnCleese eventually came up with the last name "Python" and Eric Idle suggested "Monty" (after a patron from a pub he frequented), which also sounded like the typical first name of a small-time theatrical agent.
600* Entirely lampshaded in ''Series/TheOfficeUS'', when lead character Michael Scott (Creator/SteveCarell) finally shows his long-awaited dramatic film titled "Threat Level: Midnight."
601* ''Radio/HelloCheeky'' [[NoTitle didn't give titles to any episodes]]. When they moved to TV, they gave the episodes intentionally confusing Word Salad Titles instead. ("Quarter-Final Second Leg", "Episode 214", "Unabridged Version" etc.)
602[[/folder]]
603
604[[folder:Music]]
605* Music/BrianEno does this a lot, with both titles and lyrics--the title of his first album, ''Music/HereComeTheWarmJets'', is fairly typical. One of his best examples, however, is a subversion: "The Paw Paw Negro Blowtorch" which is not word salad[[note]]the ''[[WordSaladLyrics lyrics]]'' on the other hand...[[/note]] as "the Paw Paw Negro Blowtorch" was an actual black man from Paw Paw, Michigan by the name of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A._W._Underwood A. W. Underwood]] who was supposedly [[PlayingWithFire pyrokinetic]]. (He was probably just rubbing phosphorous and doing a bit of sleight-of-hand to hide this.)
606* Much of Music/{{CAKE}}'s discography: ''Motorcade of Generosity'', ''Fashion Nugget'', ''Comfort Eagle'', ''Pressure Chief''.
607** Though ''Prolonging the Magic'' is full of breakup and torch songs.
608* Most of Music/OwlCity's early works.
609** WordSaladLyrics too.
610** But sometimes, believe it or not, it actually [[ItMakesSenseInContext makes sense in context]].
611* Music/BlindGuardian avoids this in their songs and albums but makes up for that with [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yhvrbe-6QtE "Drei Schuesse im Leberknoedel"]] ("Three Shots in a Liver Dumpling"). It's an epic video about a group of minstrels who, in a desperate attempt to get an evil king to listen to their music, compete against him and his minions in a bean-eating contest, a death-metal-listening contest, a drinking contest, and a sword-fight.
612* Music/DreamTheater (who could count for this trope themselves) often name albums by taking a random phrase from a song in the album that they think sounds good. The exceptions to this are Falling Into Infinity (the phrase never comes up in any song on the album) and Systematic Chaos, which is a variation of the line "Insane random thoughts of neat disorder" from Constant Motion.
613** Perhaps "Falling into Infinity" could symbolize the fact that their careers and personal lives were pretty much in freefall due to Kevin Moore suddenly leaving the band right before the release of their previous album, Mike Portnoy being a raging alcoholic, James [=LaBrie=] almost throwing up his own larynx during a bad case of food poisoning, permanently damaging his voice in the process, and the whole band being royally [[ScrewedByTheNetwork Screwed By the Record Label]].
614** The name "Dream Theater" itself came from a closed-down theater in California.
615** Their spin-off band Music/LiquidTensionExperiment also counts, especially considering the songs are all instrumentals.
616*** And then came a drumming DVD by Mike Portnoy showcasing several songs from each band, entitled...''Liquid Drum Theater''. [[ItMakesSenseInContext Yeah]].
617* Symphonic metal band Nightwish is fond of song titles that read like a bunch of random gothy words were drawn from a hat: "Ghost Love Score," "Bare Grace Misery," "Deep Silent Complete," etc.
618** Compared to English or any other Indio-European language, the band's native Finnish might as well be a StarfishLanguage.
619* The Music/DavidBowie song "Fall Dog Bombs the Moon" from his album ''Music/{{Reality}}'' is a perfect example of both this ''and'' WordSaladLyrics.
620* Music/DiabloSwingOrchestra does this on pretty much ''all'' of their songs. Some examples include "Stratosphere Serenade", "Exit Strategy of a Wrecking Ball", "Poetic Pitbull Revolutions", and "[[IntentionallyAwkwardTitle How To Organize a Lynch Mob]]".
621* Music/{{Chumbawamba}} has issued conflicting stories as to the origin of their name. One story is that one of the band members had a dream in which he had to use a public restroom and the restrooms were marked "Chumba" and "Wamba" and he didn't know which one to enter. A slightly less interesting one is that one of the band members sat down at a typewriter (no, not a computer, ''a typewriter'') and closed his eyes and just started typing randomly, and they picked out that relatively pronounceable 11-letter string from among the gibberish. Officially, though, it doesn't mean anything, and they're rather happy it does: many other bands in their genre (anarcho-punk) formed at the time they did (the early 80s) have names that [[UnintentionalPeriodPiece link them to that time and genre]] (Their official FAQ mentions how lucky the members of Thatcher On Acid were that she was in office for eleven years instead of eighteen months). "Chumbawamba", being nonsense, makes their name at once timeless (making it easier to put out new material that attracts new listeners) and genreless (allowing them to change direction without looking incredibly bizarre--can you imagine if a band called "The Disease" or something like that came out with "Tubthumping"?).
622** Hoobastank has also given conflicting stories for their name's origin, including a gas station in Germany and an old Chinese guy yelling gibberish insults at them.
623* While a lot of band names seem rather arbitrary, bands in the Elephant 6 collective [[ExaggeratedTrope seem to take this to extremes]]. Music/NeutralMilkHotel and Music/TheOliviaTremorControl spring to mind; it's been hypothesised that they were formed from reading out the results of a game of Scrabble. Jeff Mangum claims there's a deep, long story behind the name "Neutral Milk Hotel" but he doesn't want to tell anyone due to its personal nature.
624** This got lampshaded in the Elephant 6 art exhibit at the Georgia Museum: the official title for the exhibit was "The ...of Elephant Six," with a random and changing jumble of words in place of the ellipses at the actual exhibit.
625* Wishbone Ash
626* German band called "We Butter the Bread With Butter", which, depending on one's interpretation, might even overlap with ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin.
627* The Fucking Champs! Their song titles include such wonders as: ''These Glyphs Are Dusty'', ''I Am The Album Cover'', ''Atop The Pyramid that is You'', ''I Love The Spirit World And I Love Your Father'', ''Crummy Lovers Die in the Grave'', and can't forget ''Thor Is, Like, Immortal''.
628* At least half (if not more) song titles of Music/GuidedByVoices, along with various side projects of their frontman Robert Pollard. Examples: "The Goldheart Mountaintop Queen Directory", "Showbiz Opera Walrus", "Some Drilling Implied", "Burning Flag Birthday Suit", "Squirmish Frontal Room", "Man Called Aerodynamics", "14 Cheerleader Coldfront", "Glow Boy Butlers", "Soul Train College Policeman" (this could go on all day)
629** The title of the album ''Bee Thousand'' at least sort of has an explanation - Supposedly Robert Pollard passed a theater that was showing ''{{Film/Beethoven}}'', but on the marquee the title was misspelled as "Beethouen" [[note]]Most likely the theater just didn't have any v's left among its sign letters[[/note]]. "Bee-thow-en" stuck in his mind, and then gradually turned into "bee thousand". Another motivation for the title choice was an obtuse ShoutOut - "Bee Thousand" sounds similar to [[Music/TheWho Pete Townsend.]] And ''Vampire On Titus'' is sort of SelfDeprecation - Pollard lived on a street called Titus Avenue, and someone he knew referred to him derogatorily as "the vampire on Titus."
630* The bulk of Florida IDM musician Otto Von Schirach's songs and albums have word salad titles:
631** Album examples:
632*** Chopped Zombie Fungus
633*** Global Speaker Fisting
634*** Maxipad Detention
635** Song Examples:
636*** Invincible Meat Boy
637*** Fractal Nut Vinigrette
638*** Swollen Whale Abdomen
639* Pick a modern Doom Metal band, any modern Doom Metal band. These tend to be high masters of [[IceCreamKoan meaningless but superficially deep titles.]] Some examples:
640** It Took the Night to Believe, by Music/SunnO; instrumental.
641** Crooked Axis For String Quartet, by Earth; instrumental, with nothing resembling a string quartet involved.
642* "Deep Blue Something" was the exact response one of the founding members gave when put on the spot to come up with a band name.
643* Many Japanese musicians and artists, when they write an album title in English, can come up with some very weird things, such as Japanese HarshNoise musician Variations of Sex's "[[ThePornomancer My Cock]] [[ChaoticNeutral is Beyond Good And Evil]]."
644* BT's "Deeper Sunshine", "Flaming June", "Mercury & Solace", "The Meeting of a Hundred Yang", "The Rose of Jericho", etc.
645* White Zombie produced a song called "El Phantasmo and the Chicken Run Blast-O-Rama". No, we have no idea either.
646* Example by Music/JimiHendrix: "Spanish Castle Magic" from ''Music/AxisBoldAsLove''. It comes from a club called "Spanish Castle" where Hendrix used to play before he got famous.
647* By Music/PinkFloyd: The album ''Music/AtomHeartMother''. According to WordOfGod, it got its name from Ron Geesin pointing to an ''Evening Standard'' headline reading "ATOM HEART MOTHER NAMED" (it was about a woman fitted with a nuclear pacemaker or something like that), but otherwise it means nothing.
648* The Fall Of Troy loves these. ''F.C.P.S.I.T.S.G.E.P.G.E.P.G.E.P.'' still has no official meaning. (And the fan meaning was shot to pieces with the remake, ''F.C.P.R.E.M.I.X.'') then there's ''The Hol[ ]y Tape'', ''Cut Down All the Trees and Name the Streets After Them'', ''Straight-Jacket Keelhauled'', ''Semi-Fiction'', etc. The titles on Phantom On The Horizon are justified in that the POV character is [[spoiler: apparently going insane]].
649** "The Hol[ ]y tape" is a reference to ''Literature/HouseOfLeaves'', as is "You got a death wish, Johnny Truant?"
650* Some early [[Music/SixteenHorsepower 16 Horsepower]] songs titles, like "The Denver Grab" and "Ditch Digger", really have nothing to do with the lyrics.
651* Wilco's ''Yankee Hotel Foxtrot''.
652** Though this could just be NATO speak for YHF. ...Whatever that is. Ypsilanti Heritage Foundation?
653** Presumably a broadcast from a {{numbers station|s}}. Jeff Tweedy has expressed enthusiasm for the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Conet_Project Conet Project]], a collection of numbers stations recordings, and sampled a piece of the collection on YHF.
654* Music/TheDevilWearsPrada tends to name their songs with this combined somewhat with RuleOfCool or RuleOfFunny.
655* The production music company Pfeifer Broz. Music is really, ''really'' notorious for this trope. Their song names are literally words slapped together. How else can names like ''Absolute Anthropoid'', ''Hubris Mine'', ''Crown Detonator'' and ''Alpha Bag'' be explained?
656* Shudder To Think's debut album ''Curses, Spells, Voodoo, Mooses''. Vocalist Craig Wedren is somewhat embarrassed about the title, and offers no explanation beyond "I was 17 and it seemed funny at the time". They ''may'' have just been going for the ArsonMurderAndJaywalking effect.
657* Who the hell calls their [[http://www.lesbianbeddeath.net/ band]] Lesbian Bed Death? Moreover, who chooses that name when the original lineup is ''all male''?
658* Also worthy of mention is the death metal band The Tony Danza Tap Dance Extravaganza.
659* Music/CaptainBeefheart: ''Music/TroutMaskReplica'', ''Music/IceCreamForCrow'', ''Music/ShinyBeast (Bat Chain Puller)''[[note]]The parenthesis in this one does actually have an explanation: ''Bat Chain Puller'' was (and still is) the title of an album he recorded, but then this recording was trapped in legal issues (and remains so to this day). So he decided to record a new album of the same songs, and call the rerecording ''Shiny Beast'', with ''(Bat Chain Puller)'' as a reference to the album it was based on. And there is still the possibility that ''Bat Chain Puller'' may be released from legal limbo and published someday...[[/note]] - and that's just album titles.
660* Music/FrankZappa was also fond of those: ''Music/UncleMeat'', ''Music/TheGrandWazoo'', ''Music/WakaJawaka'', ''Music/BongoFury'', ''Music/ThingFish'', ''Music/ZootAllures'', ''Music/StudioTan'',...
661* Most of Music/{{Versailles}}'s song and album titles make relative sense. "DRY ICE SCREAM!! [Remove Silence]" is just incomprehensible gibberish.
662* Music/ToadTheWetSprocket took their name from a Creator/MontyPython sketch on ''AudioPlay/MontyPythonsContractualObligationAlbum'' in which a newscaster mentions a band called Toad the Wet Sprocket. Creator/EricIdle said that he deliberately tried to think of a name no one could ever possibly use. When he happened to hear Toad the Wet Sprocket's single announced on the radio, he said he nearly drove off the road.
663* Experimental musician Matthew Villani is quite fond of this trope. Song titles include "Here's The Waw Voice", "Off The High Dirve, Into The Empty Pool", "Loudness Capacity Test", "The Drunk Elephant's Night On The Sea", "The Fiery Lava Rains Down On The Dead Land", and "Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!". It seems that if his songs aren't this, they're given number series titles like "Experimental Midi #7", "Project Song #1", "Composite Song #2", or "Fantasy Music #3".
664* Music/GodspeedYouBlackEmperor: Both the band name itself (taken from an old Japanese documentary about a biker gang) and some of their album titles: ''All Lights Fucked on the Hairy Amp Drooling'', ''Slow Riot for New Zerø Kanada''.
665* Music/SystemOfADown's name comes from a poem that one of them wrote called "Victims of the Down" (which makes about as much sense).
666* Japanese NoiseRock band Melt-Banana is...well, they're called Melt-Banana, for starters. Their album ''Cell-Scape'' includes some impressively long word salad examples in its song titles, such as "Shield for Your Eyes, a Beast in the Well on Your Hand" and "A Hunter in the Rain to Cut the Neck Up in the Present Stage".
667* Rocket Juice & The Moon, a {{Supergroup}} featuring [[{{Music/Gorillaz}} Damon]] [[{{Music/Blur}} Albarn]], [[Music/RedHotChiliPeppers Flea]] and [[Music/FelaKuti Tony Allen]]. Even the band themselves don't know what, if anything, their own name means, as they didn't pick it - They finished their debut album without having come up with a band name and opted to let the person who designed their album artwork put whatever name he liked on the cover.
668* An instrumental track on one of Music/{{Steppenwolf}}'s albums was called "Hodge, Podge, Strained Through a Leslie." At least part of the title makes sense in context though - the song prominently features a Hammond organ played through a Leslie speaker.
669* Altar of Plagues' third album, ''Teethed Glory and Injury'', is both an example of this trope and contains several more: "Twelve was Ruin", "Reflection Pulse Remains", "Scald Scar of Water" and "Found, Oval and Final" in particular.
670* Early in their recording career, Minus The Bear were very fond of using strange, {{Non Appearing Title}}s for their songs, such as "Monkey!!! Knife!!! Fight!!!" and "I'm Totally Not Down With Rob's Alien". Sometimes the titles ''vaguely'' line up with the lyrics - "Absinthe Party At the Fly Honey Warehouse" at least mentions drinking absinthe, but no parties, "fly honeys" or even warehouses appear in the song's content. They fully broke with this tradition entirely starting with the 2005 album ''Minus El Oso'', where all of the songs have proper title drops. While the titles still have nothing to do with the content, a trio of instrumentals with the word "bug" in their titles are all [[ShoutOut direct quotes from]] ''Film/StarshipTroopers'', where the protagonists refer to the aliens they're fighting as "bugs": "You Kill Bugs Good, Man", "Damn Bugs Whacked Him, Johnny", and " You're Some Sort of Big, Fat, Smart Bug, Aren't You?".
671* Music/SixtyFiveDaysOfStatic has several songs and albums that are little more than jumbles of words strung together (including their band name, incidentally enough). ''We Were Exploding Anyway'', ''Another Code Against The Done'', "I Swallowed Hard, Like I Understood", "Install a Beak in the Heart that Clucks Time in Arabic", and "Radio Protector" are good examples.
672* Music/ManMan has a lot of these, especially in their earlier albums, like "Banana Ghost", "Ice Dogs", and "Harpoon Fever (Queequeg's Playhouse)" to name a few.
673* Music/{{Stereolab}}: Some of their titles ''look'' like this, but are actually {{Line of Sight Name}}s from instruments or recording technology, or are just very obscure {{Shout Out}}s. But there's also titles like "Italian Shoe Continuum", "Hillbilly Motobike", "Fractal Dream Of A Thing", "Three Longers Later", "Black Ants In Sound-Dust", "Slow Fast Hazel"...and so on...
674* Let's Active named themselves after GratuitousEnglish text on a t-shirt - the t-shirt slogan in question was probably intended to be "let's go!".
675* Music/BobDylan: One song is titled ''Rainy Day Women #12 & 35'' (yes, the hashmark is part of the title!). This is the song with the refrain "EverybodyMustGetStoned."
676* Favorite Atomic Hero claim their name was the result of "a rather involved drinking game" - they were originally billed as Static, [[WritingAroundTrademarks until the name was deemed to be too close to]] Music/StaticX.
677* Wet Leg got their name from a game members were playing revolving around trying to make band names out of randomly chosen emoji combinations; at one point they got the pairing "💧 🦵". There's no meaning beyond that, though they have said having such a silly name helps them not take themselves too seriously.
678* Music/FoxyShazam used to claim that, when vocalist Eric Nally was attending high school, his fellow students had taken to referring to stylish shoes as "foxy shazams" - they later admitted that they had made this up in an early interview because it was a better story than the truth, which was that they'd just thrown two cool-sounding words together. There's also their debut album ''The Flamingo Trigger''.
679* Most of Lauren Bousfield's song titles - a recurring theme on the albums ''Palimpsest'' and ''Sales Force'' is song titles that read like [[ClickbaitGag clickbait articles]], spam email, or press releases mixed with WordSaladHorror - examples include "Debtors Prison Click Here Disney Needs To See This" and "Clean Strategic Narratives With Relatable Messaging Murder Them Violently Make Their Children Watch".
680[[/folder]]
681
682[[folder:Pinball]]
683* Good luck trying to figure out what a ''Pinball/TXSector'' is, or what it has to do with {{Cool Gate}}s.
684[[/folder]]
685
686[[folder:Podcasts]]
687* ''Podcast/NitroGameInjection''. How the hell does one inject nitro into games?
688* ''Podcast/HouseToAstonish'': It ''kind of'' conveys "this is a podcast about comics" in that it sounds ''almost'' like it could be a comic book title (it actually comes from a proposed title for an Comicbook/AmalgamUniverse book that would have combined ''Tales to Astonish'' and ''House of Mystery''). Al used to make an attempt to portray the House as an actual location, but it never really worked.
689[[/folder]]
690
691[[folder:Professional Wrestling]]
692* Quite a few wrestling moves come off like this if you're unfamiliar with them. What's a "Northern Lights Suplex," for instance? Or a "Death Valley Driver"? Or a "[[Wrestling/JeffHardy Whisper in the Wind]]"? Or a "[[Wrestling/JushinThunderLiger Shooting Star Press]]"?
693* The STO is a fairly common move but commentators always use the acronym instead of the full name: "Space Tornado [[Wrestling/NaoyaOgawa Ogawa]]".
694* Several Japanese promotions, possibly due to poor understanding of English: Wrestling/DramaticDreamTeam, Wrestle and Romance (which became Wrestle Association R), and Big Mouth LOUD.
695* [[Wrestling/ImpactWrestling TNA]] renamed 'The James Gang' the 'Voodoo Kin Mafia' so they could [[TakeThat/ProfessionalWrestling do an angle attacking]] Wrestling/{{WWE}} owner [[Wrestling/VinceMcMahon Vince Kennedy McMahon]] ([[FunWithAcronyms VKM]]). The fact that the group had nothing to do with voodoo or the mafia and only marginally involved kinship didn't seem to matter. Later, "Voodoo Queen" Roxxi [=LaVeau=] was introduced as their valet in a vain attempt to justify the name; this didn't help as much as they thought it did.
696[[/folder]]
697
698[[folder:Radio]]
699* There was an English sketch comedy show entitled ''The Long Hot Satsuma''. It lampshaded this trope by explaining, at the start of some episodes, that it was actually a cool, short, non-citrus-fruit of a program.
700* Parodied on ''Radio/ImSorryIHaventAClue''. The regular round "One Song to the Tune of Another" is as self-explanatory as you can get, and yet the chairman acts as if the title is a word salad, and every time the game is played he introduces it with a [[OverlyLongGag highly elaborate]] [[{{Metaphorgotten}} metaphor]].
701-->'''Humphrey Lyttelton''': Now I can see from their look of puzzlement that the teams are anxious to know what in blue blazes this could be all about. Well, it's actually not nearly as complicated as it sounds, teams. You might like to think of your tune as a house, and the words as the interior decor, which of course can be changed - a sort of musical version of ''Changing Rooms'', if you will. That's where two couples swap houses and redecorate them in the style of a Dutch brothel or Bombay public toilet. Now, I know what you're thinking, teams: "Thank goodness that's all sorted out, except he's forgotten to explain where Handy Andy comes into this." Well, we don't need a Handy Andy banging away on his own in the background, trying to destroy a perfectly good piece of furniture...[[TakeThat not when we have Colin Sell at the piano...]]
702** By contrast, the game of "Cheddar Gorge" (which involves the teams making a sentence by saying one word at a time, with the object being not to complete the sentence) is treated as if its title is perfectly self-explanatory and clearly outlines the rules.
703[[/folder]]
704
705[[folder:Theater]]
706* "La Cantatrice Chauve" (''Theatre/TheBaldSoprano'') {{lampshade|Hanging}}s this trope. The title bears no relationship to the content of the play, and the [[TitleDrop one time somebody quotes the title]], it almost sounds as though he's [[BreakingTheFourthWall inquiring about the name of the play he's in]].
707* In the play ''Say Goodnight, Gracie'' by Ralph Pape (not the One Man Show with the same name about George Burns) Gracie Allen's name only comes up once, and nobody says goodnight.
708* ''Theatre/TwelfthNight'' was written to be performed as part of a Twelfth Night celebration that was part of the Christmas holiday at the time. Note that the full title is ''Twelfth Night, or What You Will.'' In other words, call it whatever you like.
709* ''Theatre/SpiderManTurnOffTheDark'' offers no explanation for the subtitle.
710[[/folder]]
711
712[[folder:Video Games]]
713* As far as we can tell, the title of ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight'' is complete nonsense.
714* ''Videogame/AmongTheSleep'' never offers a direct explanation for its title, but considering how you play as a straight up two-year-old progressing through a world of surreal PsychologicalHorror, it may be intended to evoke a developing mind still learning how to string their words together.
715* ''VideoGame/SuperRobotWarsOriginalGeneration'' is {{justifi|edTrope}}able, but when the anime based on the game is called ''Super Robot Wars: Original Generation Divine Wars''? That gets to the point where the point of a long title becomes moot, as using the whole name will get you all of nothing, and putting in only parts of the title gets you googleplexed. (Don't even ''think'' of trying to search for SRWOGDW.) This is made worse by the fact that there is very little agreement between fans on where the spaces/colon(s) should go, not to mention the whole ''Super Robot Wars/Super Robot Taisen'' issue. Variations SRWOGDW, SRW:OGDW, SRW:OG:DW, SRWOG:DW, and SRW:OG DW, and a plethora of others, are seen.
716** It's not the only long name in the series. How about ''VideoGame/SuperRobotWars'' {{Gaiden|Game}}: Masoukishin: The Lord of Elemental?
717* ''Super VideoGame/StreetFighterII [[CapcomSequelStagnation Turbo HD Remix]]''. ''Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo'' even more so, as there is no Puzzle Fighter I.
718* ''VideoGame/NoMoreHeroes'' features a [[ShowWithinAShow Show Within A Game]] MagicalGirl anime titled ''Pure White Lovers Bizarre Jelly''. Parts of it might make sense, given that it's explicitly a {{moe}} series and the girls are named after berries, but the rest is word salad. Ironically, the similarly named ''Pure White Giant Glastonbury'' makes almost perfect sense, being about a white HumongousMecha named Glastonbury.
719** The title for Speed Buster's theme, ''Mach 13 Elephant Explosion'', also qualifies.
720* The play that Luigi takes part in ''VideoGame/PaperMarioTheThousandYearDoor'' is called "The Mystery of the Fiery Hat of Social Awareness".
721* ''Alpha Black Zero: Intrepid Protocol'' fits this trope like a glove.
722* ''Hoyle Casino Games 2009'' is ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin, until you get to the slot machine called ''Alien Disco Safari''. There are aliens and disco, but no safari in sight.
723** Said slot machine is based on [[http://www.gamefaqs.com/computer/doswin/home/938807.html a completely separate bargain-bin game of the same title]]. But at least, in this case, the title is justified, as the game involves shooting the aliens.
724* The original name of ''VideoGame/EternalSonata'' is ''Trusty Bell: Chopin's Dream''. The "Chopin's Dream" part makes plenty of sense, but what's a "trusty bell" and what does it have to do with anything?
725** The [[UpdatedRerelease PS3 port]] added the word "Reprise," which fit the context but just made the name more salad-y.
726* ''VideoGame/TalesOfSymphonia'' has nothing to do with music or anything called Symphonia.
727** The word symphony, depending on the context, can imply harmony. And given that [[spoiler:a major part of your quest is resolved with the harmonious merger of two worlds,]] it makes some sense. It's been confirmed that the [[spoiler:reunified world]] is called Symphonia before its name is changed to [[spoiler:Aseria.]]
728** The same applies to ''VideoGame/TalesOfPhantasia'', there isn't anything called like that in the whole game. Later titles in the series avert this trope by using concepts important to the plot ([[VideoGame/TalesOfDestiny Destiny]], [[VideoGame/TalesOfRebirth Rebirth]], [[VideoGame/TalesOfInnocence Innocence]]).
729* ''VideoGame/{{Tetris}} Friends'' forces players to do this to name their Arena rooms. Room names are of the format <adjective> <adjective or noun adjunct> <noun>, with a separate list of words to choose from for each, as well as a button to randomize all three. (On the off chance more than room has the same set of 3 words, a number is appended to the end, without a space.) This tends to result in very silly names, such as "Drab Tomato Uprising" and "Cryptic Purple [=Hunters2=]". Very rarely does a room name actually make any logical sense.
730* Word-salad titles are a SignatureStyle of video game composer Stephen Rippy, who's provided the soundtracks for games like ''VideoGame/AgeOfEmpires, VideoGame/AgeOfMythology,'' and ''VideoGame/HaloWars.'' A few examples include [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPhJWlURRVM Shamburger;]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xjgjgPauBg Six Armed Robbing Suit;]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3fIiKDf_n8 Last Name Crane, Ichabod]]; [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnPrRFlYHpg Pudding Pie;]] and [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wtK_qLR3Hg Eat Your Potatoes.]]
731* ''Retieval Mankind's Batman'' is the name of one of the [[ShoddyKnockoffProduct PopStation]] handhelds. Good luck making any sense of this one.
732** Might be a BlindIdiotTranslation and they meant ''Batman Saves Humanity".
733* ''Hotdog Storm'', a 1996 arcade ShootEmUp whose title continues to confound gamers two decades later. The only thing within the game even approaching an explanation of the title is the image of the squadron's badge on the title screen, which features a prominent illustration of a hot dog.
734* ''VisualNovel/AnalogueAHateStory'' was titled as such only to parallel Christine Love's previous visual novel, ''VisualNovel/DigitalALoveStory.''
735* The [[http://earthboundcentral.com/reshuffler/ EarthBound Reshuffler]] is a hacking utility that randomly changes around various things in ''VideoGame/EarthBound1994''. Appropriately, each hack is given a subtitle comprised of two ''literally'' random words: Examples include ''Earthbound: Taco Puppy'' and ''Earthbound: Mug Friend''.
736* The original Japanese title of the 8-bit era side-scroller ''The Astyanax'' was "The Lord of King."
737* ''VideoGame/HalfMinuteHero'''s UpdatedRerelease on Xbox 360 gained the subtitle ''Super Mega Neo Climax''. The PC release took this further with ''Super Mega Neo Climax Ultimate Boy''. It ''might'' have to do with said release being officially described as the "ultimate version" of the game.
738* ''VideoGame/InfiniteUndiscovery''. When one [[MeaninglessMeaningfulWords faux-profound word-concoction]] isn't enough, why not make it infinite?
739* The ''[=SHPDMBGWL4:PISSI&SOTA64DS=]'' (''Super Hyper Paper Deluxe Mario Bros. Galaxy World Land 4: Partners in Sunshine [=SuperStar=] Island & Saga of Time Advance 64 DS'') fangame series is this taken to ridiculous, blatantly parodic extremes. The later games include:
740** Super Hyper Paper Deluxe Mario Bros. Galaxy World Land 4: Partners in Sunshine [=SuperStar=] Island & Saga of Time Advance 64 DS 2: Mario's X-Cellent Mango Adventure through Sea-Bass World and Beyond
741** Super Hyper Paper Deluxe Mario Bros. Galaxy World Land 4: Partners in Sunshine [=SuperStar=] Island & Saga of Time Advance 64 DS 3: One step beyond Mario's X-Cellent Mango Adventure through Sea-Bass World and Beyond: A Ducktale of Epic Proportions against an Evil Space Korean Government
742* When Creator/HelloGames were trying to determine what they'd name their upcoming Science-Fiction game, one developer suggested a name that had a nice, sci-fi novel style to it: ''VideoGame/NoMansSky''. The developers have no intention of ''No Man's Sky'' meaning anything; the phrase's similarity with "no man's land," transplanting the concept of a stretch of unexplored and unclaimed wilderness into a sci-fi setting, was an added bonus.
743* ''VideoGame/YuGiOhNightmareTroubadour'''s title is famous for making no sense. A troubadour is a writer and performer of songs or poetry in the Middle Ages. What this has to do with Duel Monsters is anyone's guess.
744* The two ''VideoGame/SenranKagura'' games for [=PlayStation=] systems are titled ''Shinovi Versus'' and ''Estival Versus''. These almost make sense to the plots - the first is based on a free-for-all between Shino'''b'''i teams, and the second around a '''F'''estival. And that's not due to a BlindIdiotTranslation, either; the games have a competent and consistent sub. It turns out these are the closest way possible of communicating something in the Japanese title, "Senran" is similarly misspelled (technically, it's two kanji that make perfect sense in context, but form a gibberish word when compounded). Ironically, Shinovi Versus's Japanese subtitle, ''Proof of Life'', makes complete sense in both languages.
745** "Estival" is also an archaic word roughly meaning "summery," which fits the setting like a glove.
746* The ''Super Mario World'' [[GameMod ROM hacking]] supplementary tool "Gopher Popcorn Stew." It was named that because, during its creation, the discussion of possible names involved a suggestion to just name it something ridiculous and random (for want of anything better), and [[SureLetsGoWithThat the name stuck]].
747* The Videogame/{{DOOM}} random WAD generator, Space Llama Interment Gazelle Expert -- or SLIGE, for short.[[note]]Slige is also a community term for the damaging floors in the game -- a combination of "slime" and "sludge". The aforementioned word salad is a {{backronym}}.[[/note]]
748* Non-story missions in ''VideoGame/XCOMEnemyUnknown'' have names randomly generated from two separate lists. While some can make sense, others won't: Operation Burning Mother, Operation Vengeful Pipe, Operation Vengeful Vengeance, etc; one of the community's favorite things to do is share humorous instances of [[MonkeysOnATypewriter the RNG accidentally spitting out something coherent, or that turns out to be a rather apt description of something that happens in the following mission.]]
749* What exactly does the name ''VideoGame/{{Borderlands}}'' refer to? The location is the alien planet of Pandora, but as it's a desolate wasteland there aren't any clear "borders" of anything anywhere. Is Pandora at the "border" of human discovery? Maybe, but the series never references any other known planets (not even Earth) [[WhereTheHellIsSpringfield And the exact location of Pandora is never revealed.]]
750* There are a couple of stages in ''VideoGame/TheBattleCats'' where in their names make no sense whatsoever. Examples include “Revolving-Door Floats”, “Gestalt, Decay”, “Chupacabra Love” and “Blockchain Twilight”
751* ''VideoGame/BetOnSoldier'' is already a pretty odd title to parse for English ears, but its final expansion pack upgrades it to full word salad status with the name ''Bet-On Soldier: Black Out Saigon''.
752* ''VisualNovel/SteinsGate'' is name-dropped constantly by protagonist Okabe Rintarou. (In-game, it's just "Steins Gate", the semi-colon is a quirk of the [[VisualNovel/ScienceAdventureSeries series]].) Okabe himself admits at one point that it’s just one of his made-up {{chuunibyou}} phrases. Pretty nicely summed up by an exchange in the true ending:
753--> [[spoiler: '''Beta!Suzuha:''' There lies a worldline [[ScrewDestiniy unaffected by any attractor field]]. A worldline knows as Steins Gate.]]\
754'''Okabe:''' ''But that's the chunni name I pulled out of my ass! It doesn't even mean anything!''
755* ''VideoGame/GravityBone'' is a short and surreal secret-agent story, having nothing to do with gravity or bones. The creator is apparently fond of this naming scheme, having also produced the similar ''Videogame/ThirtyFlightsOfLoving'', and the less-similar ''Videogame/QuadrilateralCowboy'' (a "twentieth-century cyberpunk" game involving hacking with now-outdated technology).
756* ''VideoGame/RiskOfRain'' is about a game where you play as a survivor of a space shipwreck and battle through a planet with EverythingTryingToKillYou, hop between regions via teleporters, and make your way back to the ship to escape the planet. Nowhere in the game is there any rain. And no, it's not the name of the ship, either. WordOfGod says the game was named that just to make it easily searchable on the internet.
757* ''VideoGame/BrainDead13'' is a spoof of old-style horror/sci-fi movies and, as such, has a title that sounds creepy but has little to do with the actual content (though the BigBad ''is'' a BrainInAJar).
758* ''VideoGame/AceCombatAssaultHorizon''. "Assault Horizon" is likely a pun on the word "Event Horizon", the part of black holes that once crossed no object can escape from. However there's nothing story wise to alluding to this other than fighter jets launching assaults.
759* ''Narbacular Drop'', the spiritual predecessor to ''VideoGame/{{Portal}}'', had its name chosen because it would be easy to find in online search engines.
760* Being a Creator/{{Nintendo}} [[MascotFighter crossover]] FightingGame, ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros'' doesn’t seem to have much meaning behind the title. It seems to be a play on ''Franchise/SuperMarioBros'', just with the word “Smash” thrown in. It has nothing to do with brothers.
761* ''VideoGame/AVeryLongRopeToTheTopOfTheSky'': The Developer's Note on Boomerang:
762--> I don't know why this song is called "Boomerang." Seemed like the right choice at the time.
763* There was a now defunct MMORPG called ''VideoGame/{{Yogurting}}''. Your guess is as good as ours as to what the hell "Yogurting" is supposed to mean.
764[[/folder]]
765
766[[folder:Web Animation]]
767* ''WebAnimation/HomestarRunner'':
768** Homestar Runner means nothing to someone who isn't familiar with the cartoons, but it's the name of the supposed main character. It originated when the brothers' friend (James Huggins of Music/OfMontreal) imitated an old-timey baseball announcer and referred to a player as "the home star runner." The brothers found the garbled phrase hysterical.
769** The trope is parodied when Strong Bad names his "crazy cartoon" Sweet Cuppin' Cakes, because "Crazy cartoons usually have titles that have nothing to do with the cartoon itself." The one full episode of said crazy cartoon seen (a ChristmasEpisode) is titled "Cactus Coffee and the No-Tell Motel."
770* ''YouTubePoop''. This is lampshaded in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRIe14eH2_U one poop]] where [[WesternAnimation/{{Ratatouille}} Linguini]] wonders why they call it that. It could refer to such videos allegedly being the bottom of [=YouTube's=] video barrel, but considering that some of them are comedy gold, this interpretation may or may not fit very well.
771[[/folder]]
772
773[[folder:Webcomics]]
774* ''Webcomic/AllOverTheHouse'' - ''what'' is? The name is completely random.
775* ''Webcomic/AntiheroForHire'' has a villain whose name is like this, in the form of a character called Baron Diamond who's actually named Baron Orange Earthsmantle Von Potatoflight. This is mostly so that Shadehawk can [[LampshadeHanging mock it.]]
776* ''Webcomic/AwkwardZombie'' has very little to do with zombies, although there are a few times that there has been a TitleDrop in the form of a StealthPun.
777* ''Webcomic/BloodyUrban'' takes place in an urban environment and is occasionally BloodyHilarious but other than that the title has little to do with the comic.
778* ''Webcomic/BugMartini''. Originally just called "Bug," because the humanoid characters have insect-like antennae. It has no particular association with martinis.
779* ''Webcomic/ButtercupFestival'' is not about a festival which celebrates buttercups. It's a disconnected series of [[DadaComics obtuse and/or philosophical]] comics, starring a cheerful and [[NoNameGiven nameless]] little [[TheGrimReaper Grim Reaper]] who never does any reaping.
780* ''Webcomic/{{Buttersafe}}'' has nothing to do with butter or safety, and the name sounds like a kitchen appliance from a bizarre alternate universe. The many one-shots are mostly DadaComics, though, so in that sense the name is appropriate.
781* ''Webcomic/TheDawnChapel'' was originally the name of an unrelated project that the author never got around to starting. When the author began the webcomic they had already registered the dawnchapel.com domain, so they decided to use that as the title instead of coming up with a new name and registering another domain.
782* ''Webcomic/DresdenCodak''. Being primarily a QuirkyWork, this actually makes a bit of sense, such as it is.
783** Less so, given the comic's recent CerebusSyndrome. One possible meaning is that it refers to the Allied firebombing of Dresden in WWII, widely considered one of the greatest WhatTheHellHero moments in history, likening it to the morally questionable actions of the main character in her attempts to bring about TheSingularity.
784** Another theory is that it's named for the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_codices Dresden Codex]]. The frequent Mesoamerican motifs make this rather plausible, though the codex itself has yet to appear.
785** A minor character wore a nametag reading "T.UD", which some fans consider a [[WildMassGuessing reference to the codex's location in Dresden]].
786** Dresden Codak is actually the nickname of the comic's author, Aaron Diaz. The title is best thought of as "Comics By Dresden Codak." Sure, the problem is now explaining a Word Salad Name, but Diaz said that it's just the name of the Dresden Codex plus RuleOfCool. It also avoids using his real name, which he was concerned would cause confusion with a certain Latin-American pop star.
787* ''Webcomic/ElGoonishShive'' is named for its author, Dan Shive, but otherwise has nothing to do with the comic. [[http://www.egscomics.com/?date=2003-08-13 He even gives it a]] LampshadeHanging [[http://www.egscomics.com/?date=2003-08-11 or two]]. He does explain the rationale [[https://www.egscomics.com/faq#name_EGS here]].
788* Both played straight and subverted with ''Webcomic/FruitIncest''. Initially, the title had nothing whatsoever to do with the comic and was simply meant to be an eye catcher, and then the fruit people showed up. Also ironic since the comic itself is usually squeaky clean.
789* The supporting cast of ''Webcomic/{{Goats}}'' does intermittently include a goat; [[http://goats.com/archive/970403.html Jon Rosenberg explains]]: ''We had already named the strip Goats, so I felt the need to justify the name. Toothgnip was introduced [in the third strip].'' (Thor's chariot is drawn by goats named Toothgnasher and Toothgrinder; Toothgnip is the spare.)
790* ''[[http://www.jspowerhour.com Junior Scientist Power Hour]]'' has nothing to do with any of those words. Most of the comics are mildly surreal portrayals of [[SliceOfLife the author's everyday life]]. She ''was'' an undergrad student of biology when the comic started, but the plot of the comics generally has nothing to do with this, making it an ArtifactTitle at best.
791* ''Webcomic/{{Lackadaisy}}'' refers partly to the protagonist's attitude and partly to the name of the speakeasy where he works.
792* ''Webcomic/LightningMadeOfOwls'', natch. The title's not about anything. Also, ''Webcomic/SquareRootOfMinusGarfield''--it does involve {{ComicStrip/Garfield}}, but the "square root of minus" part makes very little sense. It's essentially ''Webcomic/GarfieldMinusGarfield'' combined with the mathematical concept of the imaginary number "i," defined as [[LogicBomb the square root of negative one]], but what the hell does ''that'' mean? Maybe the "i" stands for InteractiveComic? One comic "explains" the title as [[LiteralMinded "will eat or make a 2D cross-section which, when multiplied by itself, is the opposite of a lasagna."]]
793* ''[[http://mountaincomics.com/ Mountain Time]]'' has nothing to do with Mountains or the Mountain time zone (though a handful of mountains do appear as scenery (and sometimes bit characters)). More notably, almost every comic on the site has a completely inane title, such as "Witchcraft for Skiers", "Cheesecake Bang Bang Chicken Avocado Woo Key Lime Pie", "Puddle Inaccuracies" and "Not a Gila Monster"--though, to be fair, it ''isn't'' a Gila Monster.
794* ''Webcomic/OctopusPie'' is a story about two women in Brooklyn and their relationships therein, and does not contain an octopus.
795* ''Webcomic/PennyArcade''. Throughout the whole series, there are very, very few references to pennies or an arcade. Gabe and Tycho are fans mostly of console games (and the occasional MMORPG).
796** However, it could be explained in context as a reference to coin-operated "games" (certainly not video games) that were popular in the early 20th century. The cost of the games was in pennies, and the localities where they were placed were called "arcades" (and were the precursor of later Video Arcades). [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penny_arcade#Penny_arcade The other wiki]] has a short history of the name.
797* ''ComicStrip/ThePerryBibleFellowship'' has ''nothing'' to do with Christianity (or anyone/anything named Perry, for that matter). On the site's FAQ page, the author states that the title was chosen to be ironic.
798* ''Webcomic/{{xkcd}}'' is not an acronym for some little-known computer protocol, it is merely a nerdy webcomic. That doesn't stop it from making several comics about what XKCD is or suggesting weird backronyms such as "eXcellence Kriegsmarine College of Demolitions" and "{{Xtreme|KoolLetterz}} Kansas College of Dentistry." See also WordPureeTitle...
799** WordOfGod has it that Randall before he even thought of a webcomic, wanted to come up with a short string he could search that could ''only'' link to something to do with him (or to mojibake). This is still true...it's just that a lot more sites have something to do with him now.
800** In one of his books, he says that xkcd were random letters he chose for a domain name he had bought long before and kept for no particular reason.
801[[/folder]]
802
803[[folder:Web Original]]
804* Parodied with the [[MemeticMutation the little meme]] [[http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/make-your-own-album-cover Make Your Own Album Cover.]]
805* [[InvokedTrope Every]] [[ThemeNaming organization]] listed at [[JustForFun/TheArchiveOfBellicoseLexiconEntities TABLE]].
806* If there's any deep meaning behind the phrase ''[[Literature/PayMeBug A Rake by Starlight]]'', it has yet to be revealed.
807* [[http://videogamena.me/ This site]] generates random video game-esque titles that have one thing in common: they're always complete nonsense. It's given names like Presidential Cheese Hoedown, Intelligent Bedtime X-treme, and Ebony Shopping Lord.
808* The Flash animation lolicatgirls.swf, posted frequently on Website/FourChan's /f/ board, contains neither [[LoliconAndShotacon lolis]] nor {{catgirl}}s, just [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=844plbHuW84 dancing delinquents]] from ''WesternAnimation/GIJoe''.
809[[/folder]]
810
811[[folder:Web Videos]]
812* Parodied on Website/YouTube series ''Gorgeous Tiny Chicken Machine Show''.
813* The MerchandiseDriven Website/MySpace web series ''Let's Big Happy''. A common target when making fun of Website/MySpace.
814* ''[[WebVideo/BackstrokeOfTheWest Star War The Third Gathers: Backstroke of the West]]'' is a TranslationTrainWreck and RecursiveTranslation of ''[[Film/RevengeOfTheSith Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith]]''. It has spawned several memes, especially [[http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/do-not-want DO NOT WANT]]. Its {{Fan Sequel}}s ''WebOriginal/TheStarWarGatherings'' are no better.
815* In ''WebVideo/AtopTheFourthWall'', whenever Linkara does Event Comics Month, he tends to combine event titles for to make a unique subtitle. He bemoans this after the fourth one, titled "Secret Metal Armageddon II"[[note]]''ComicBook/SecretInvasion'', ''ComicBook/DarkNightsMetal'', ''ComicBook/{{Armageddon 2001}}'' and ''ComicBook/CivilWarII''[[/note]], wishing for better coherency.
816[[/folder]]
817
818[[folder:Western Animation]]
819* An in-universe example from ''WesternAnimation/RegularShow'': "Planet Chasers: Starlight Excellent" (or Planet Starlight Chasers: Excellent) is an anime series that- quite literally- renders the viewer mindless.
820* ''WesternAnimation/FriskyDingo''. The title is entirely meaningless, although the writers eventually {{handwave}}d an explanation into the series. Note, originally the writers wanted to call the series "Whiskey Tango" but ran into legal problems as there was a band by that name. In frustration, they "jokingly" said they may as well call it "Frisky Dingo." The phrase does end up coming into play in the last episode of season 1. [[spoiler:It's the password to control the Anihilatrix]]. It's also lampshaded later when someone mentions this, another person asks what it means.
821** Just for the record, "Whiskey Tango Foxtrot" is a military aviation term. It means "Could you repeat that? I don't believe what I think I heard you just say." or more literally "What the Fuck, Over?"
822*** "Whiskey Tango", minus the foxtrot, also means "white trash" in military slang.
823* ''WesternAnimation/AquaTeenHungerForce''. To quote from the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aqua_Teen_Hunger_Force Wikipedia entry]]: "The title of the show is largely a misnomer: the characters have no major affiliation with water aside from frequent occurrences involving their neighbor's pool. They are not teenagers per se and have somewhat frequently issued conflicting statements regarding their ages. They are food (hence the reference to hunger), but rarely, if ever actually do anything about hunger, and are rarely shown acting as any kind of a force." TheMovie sorta gives an origin to the phrase, but this is long after the show began; and like everything else, the canon erodes quickly into madness.
824** The title made more sense for the early version of the characters that appear in the ''WesternAnimation/SpaceGhostCoastToCoast'' episode "Baffler Meal", where they were mascots for a fast-food chain called Burger Trench who sought to make teens hungry for Burger Trench. The "Aqua" part still didn't make any sense though.
825*** Likely the "Trench" part, since the trenches are the deepest part of the ocean. Also, in the early episodes of ATHF, they are a detective team which refers to themselves as "The Aqua Teen Hunger Force".
826*** The detective team story was a throw-away premise to get the show produced, since "a group of anthropomorphic food items fight crime" sounds like more of a show than "a group of anthropomorphic food items do a bunch of random things for 15 minutes." The title might have simply been part of that.
827*** The Live Action episode, "Last Last One Forever and Ever" (which reveals that the show is essentially a script written by a struggling writer...or maybe not, this is an Creator/AdultSwim show we're discussing here.), has the gang moving out of their house. As they pull away, Carl sends them off by uttering "Truly, they were an Aqua Teen Hunger Force." Of course, even with the [[TitleDrop title now spoken in the show itself]], there's still no clear meaning behind it.
828** The show's title has officially changed three, first to "Aqua Unit Patrol Squad 1", later to "Aqua Something You Know Whatever", and then to "Aqua TV Show Show".
829* ''WesternAnimation/RobotChicken.'' The title is only referenced in the opening sequence; the show appears to be the hallucinations of a chicken going insane from being forced to watch too much TV, with all the shows starting to blur together. The chicken's presence is hardly the point, however; indeed, the actual content of the show is generally restricted to [[GagSeries non-stop silliness]] with action figures and masturbation jokes. The name ''Robot Chicken'' was chosen mainly due to the barmy image it projects; similarly to ''Creator/MontyPython'' (above) most of the other episodes are given similarly random titles that were originally considered for the show as a whole, then rejected ("1987", "Federated Resources", "[[WhatCouldHaveBeen A Kick In The Nuts]]", etc.). It's been explained that the name of the show came from when Creator/SethGreen and Matt Senreich saw the name on a Chinese restaurant menu.
830* ''WesternAnimation/ElephantsDream'' is about neither elephants nor dreams. The working title for the short film was ''Machina'', which suits it much better.
831* ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'' started out with deliberately irrelevant ''film noir'' thriller-ish episode titles (like "I Never Met the Dead Man" and "Mind Over Murder") before abandoning them because no-one in the crew could keep them straight.
832* Early [[WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes Merrie Melodies]] were named after a song used in the cartoon. For example, WesternAnimation/PorkyPig's first short was called "I Haven't Got a Hat," after the song of the same name - but the plot was a bunch of kids putting on a pageant at school.
833* ''WesternAnimation/KingOfTheHill'' has absolutely nothing to do with the children's game it was named after. It's just a reference to the main character's last name, and he's not even a "king" in any sense. It is, however, appropriate in the idiomatic sense of the term. At least compared to his dysfunctional neighbors, Hank is the big fish in a small pond, and he is the patriarch of the Hill family.
834* The Creator/AdultSwim show ''Brad Neely's Harg Nallin' Sclopio Peepio''. [[WordOfGod According to Brad Neely himself]] the title is "intentionally meaningless"; it's just arrangement of the staff's "favorite collection of syllables".
835* This is just one of the many criticisms that people have with ''WesternAnimation/HighGuardianSpice''; The characters attend a WizardingSchool where they train to become guardians, even though they don’t “guard” anything. The characters are not named after spices, but instead, are named after herbs.
836* ''WesternAnimation/WinxClub'': In the show, ''winx'' has no meaning--Bloom just made it up. (The [[Creator/FourKidsEntertainment 4Kids]] dub changed it to the term for fairy magic.) Apparently, though, it's derived from the English word "wings."
837[[/folder]]
838
839[[folder:Real Life]]
840* The name of the website Slashdot was chosen to make its address as confusing as possible when spoken: h-t-t-p-colon-slash-slash-slash-dot-dot-org. Not that anyone speaks the "[=http://=]" part aloud anymore.
841* In Austria, someone managed to register the domain dotat.at. It became really weird, when the user account "dot" got email (try enunciating dot@dotat.at). You might call it do-tat-dot-a-t though.
842* The name of the 1910s-1920s cultural movement UsefulNotes/{{Dada}} was allegedly chosen randomly from a dictionary. "Dada" means "hobby horse" in French, "Yes, yes" in Romanian and Russian, "Daddy" in some dialects of English and some other languages, and "nanny" in Hungarian, but also sounds like gibberish, which fits when you consider what Dada was.
843* Dada artist Marcel Duchamp created a sculpture titled "The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even". Though the piece does depict what appears to be a bride and her bachelors, any resemblance to the title ends there.
844* This trope is partly responsible for the phenomenon known as RecursiveAcronym.
845* There is a freeware file extractor called "Free RAR Extract Frog". Yes, you read that right, Free RAR Extract ''Frog''. There is a picture of a frog on the interface, but beyond that, no frogs.
846* {{Shoddy Knockoff Product}}s often try to skirt around trademark law by changing a word into something that ''sounds'' similar or trying to use synonyms. This is how products and brands like the Nintendo Poly Station (Platform/PlayStation knockoff and not affiliated with Nintendo in any way), Arm and Hatchet (Arm & Hammer), Michael Alone (UsefulNotes/McDonalds), and Cavern Kernel (Calvin Klein) manage to exist.
847** Similarly, sometimes a business that used to be part of a chain will lose their license but keep operating under a slightly different name, leading to things like a former Baskin-Robbins continuing to serve ice cream and yogurt under the name of "[[http://notfoolinganybody.com/basket-rabbit/ Basket Rabbit]]".
848* When they aren't [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin blatantly descriptive]], candy varieties often get their names from completely arbitrary sources. Snickers, Mars Bar, [[Creator/BabeRuth Baby Ruth]], Milky Way. Others less familiar to Americans include Prince Polo, Lion Peanut, Oh Henry!, and Violet Crumble. Showing some awareness of this nonsense, one is literally named "Whatchamacallit." All those are variants on "rectangular lump of candy covered in a layer of chocolate."
849** The creators of the Baby Ruth candy bar actually claimed that it was named after UsefulNotes/GroverCleveland's daughter, Ruth. This is dubious, seeing as how Ruth Cleveland died in 1904 and the candy bar wasn't named until 1921, the same time that Creator/BabeRuth was becoming famous. It's almost universally believed that the Ruth Cleveland story was just to use what was ''almost'' Babe Ruth's name without paying him royalties.
850* In the mid-2000s, ''Newsweek'' had a short column about a computer algorithm designed to predict whether books would sell well based on their titles. The most-successful title, according to the algorithm, would be the nonsensical “Killing Naked Roses”.
851[[/folder]]
852

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