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    Films — Animation 
  • The yeti in Abominable is named Everest, not "Abominable".
  • The panda in Kung Fu Panda is named Po, not "Kung Fu Panda".
  • There's no Princess Frozen; the film's two female leads are called Princess Anna and Queen Elsa.
    • "Frozen" isn't the name of the snowman, either; his name is Olaf.
  • The Lion King is a term that describes, at various points in the movie, Mufasa, Scar, and Simba. At no point do any of them use it as a title (and, of course, it's never their actual name).
  • The Aristocats doesn't refer to every cat in the movie - rather Duchess and her three kittens.
  • Pixar films suffer from this a lot:
    • The family from The Incredibles are the Parrs. "Mr. Incredible" is merely Bob Parr's superhero codename. And his wife Helen is Elastigirl, not Mrs. Incredible. Mirage almost says " Hello, you must be Mrs. Incredible," but Helen punches her out mid-sentence.
      • Although, since DC already trademarked the name "Elastigirl", she is referred to as "Mrs. Incredible" in merchandise, causing further confusion.
    • Ratatouille is simply a cute pun for the title of the film, and the featured dish at the film's climax, not the name of any of the rats actually in the movie. The main rat character is named Rémy.
    • People mistakenly refer to the princess from Brave as Brave, as if it's her name. Her name is Merida.
    • Coco: The child protagonist of the film is named Miguel. Coco is actually the name of his great-grandmother.
  • The main character from Rio is named Blu, not Rio. The name refers to the city, Rio De Janeiro where most of the film takes places in.
  • In Disney's Sleeping Beauty, the princess's name isn't "Sleeping Beauty." Her name is Briar Rose when she's in hiding, while her birth name is Princess Aurora.
  • The main protagonist in Tangled is Rapunzel, not "Tangled".
  • In Disney's version of The Little Mermaid, the main character is named Ariel, not "Little Mermaid".
  • The protagonist of Encanto is named Mirabel. Encanto is the name of the town where she lives.

    Films — Live-Action 
  • The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert: Priscilla is the bus, not one of the main characters. Of course it makes role association jokes easier (a Brazilian magazine once said that Agent Smith's greatest flaw is: "Honestly, can you trust on someone who dressed himself as Priscilla, Queen of the Desert?")
  • "Xenomorph" (literally: "alien form") was used as a placeholder term to refer to the then-unclassified Aliens, but the species is never actually named in the films. Within the Alien universe, "Xenomorph" is a catchall term for any unclassifiable alien life form. It has been picked up as a fan term for convenience's sake since "the aliens from Aliens" is too clunky to use in discussion, but taking this to be the actual name is like thinking "UFO" only refers to the flying saucers from Independence Day.
  • All About Eve puts Bette Davis on the poster and bills her above the title. Davis's character is Margo Channing, but she's mistakenly thought to be Eve.
  • Avatar: The Na'vi are not avatars. Jake is not the only person with one, neither is he one all the time.
  • Beetlejuice is not the name of the character. It's "Betelgeuse" but pronounced "Beetlejuice," just like the real-life star. And yet, a set of the lyrics in the STAGE musical still prefer its pronunciation as the proper way to spell his name. Makes you wonder who you're supposed to believe.
  • Benny & Joon does not refer to the romantic leads, but the brother and sister. Johnny Depp is NOT the titular Benny (his character is named Sam), but this mistake is made often.
  • Mighty Mack in Blues Brothers 2000 is sometimes mistakenly referred to as Big Mack.
  • The movie Breakfast at Tiffany's has the same problem as the book, with people thinking Tiffany is the main character, instead of a company. Holly Golightly is the name of the main character.
  • Many people believe that the title character of The Big Lebowski is that played by Jeff Bridges. The plot is driven by a case of mistaken identity between Bridges' character and another character also named Jeffrey Lebowski, played by David Huddleston. However, Bridges' character repeatedly insists that he is properly called "the Dude," and refers to Huddleston's character as "the big Lebowski" several times throughout the film.
  • Whenever Mel Gibson's portrayal of William Wallace in Braveheart is spoofed, odds are he'll get called "Braveheart" rather than Wallace. To make matters worse, some sources hold that in real life it was an epithet (albeit a posthumous one) of Robert the Bruce.
  • In Bride of Re-Animator, the eponymous Bride is being constructed for Herbert West's heartbroken assistant, not for Herbert West the Re-Animator himself.
  • The lead female character in Chasing Amy is named Alyssa. Amy, who never appears in the film, is Silent Bob's ex, whom he brings up to draw parallels to the main character's relationship with Alyssa.
  • Although the villain has become known as 'Chucky' (possessed by a man named Charles Lee Ray), the name of the physical doll from the Child's Play series is actually called a Good Guy Doll.
  • The monster in Cloverfield is not named Cloverfield. It was called "Clover" in film production and "LSA" for "Large-Scale Aggressor" by the military in the film.
  • Comic Book The Movie features an in-universe example of the trope's title example: a woman is condescendingly corrected by her four-year-old that the action figure his father has just bought is Captain Marvel, not Shazam.
  • An interesting in-movie example occurs in Destroy All Monsters. During one scene, when all the monsters are attacking various cities, a news reporter claims that Baragon is attacking Paris, France. The problem? That's not Baragon attacking Paris but rather Gorosaurus. Interestingly enough, Toho did originally want to use Baragon in the scene, but the suit was too badly damaged so they used Gorosaurus instead. Why they still mistakenly referred to Gorosaurus as "Baragon" is unknown.
  • The protagonist of the Christmas comedy Elf is named Buddy, not "Elf," and technically he's not an elf; he's a human.
  • Should be obvious but in some regions people think The Exorcist actually refers to the girl, Linda Blair's character, and not to the older priest. This is probably because as weird as it may sound, not everyone knows what an exorcist is.
  • Pop culture osmosis of the Boris Karloff version of Frankenstein (1931) is what brought the masses to assume that the creature is called Frankenstein rather than the scientist who creates him. The creature has no name, but is commonly called "Frankenstein's monster." He's never referred to as a "monster" in the original novel. He's referred to as a "creature," and Mary Shelley also referred to him as "Adam." This trope was acknowledged in the 1939 film Son of Frankenstein when the character of Wolf von Frankenstein directly states that people had begun to refer to the monster by the name Frankenstein. As it happened, with the exception of film titles, the only major film in which the monster appears and is referred to directly by the name Frankenstein was the 2000s homage/mashup Van Helsing.
  • In Freddy Got Fingered, "Freddy" is the name not of the title character (his name is Gord), but of his brother — and the title refers to an incident in the movie that none of the trailers showed (which was only an accusation by Gord, and never actually happened in the movie's continuity).
  • The eponymous whale of the film Free Willy was not named "Free Willy". The whale was named simply Willy; the title comes from a scene where Jesse says "let's free Willy!" It doesn't help that the sequels used "Free Willy" in their titles.
  • The General is the train, not Buster Keaton's character. In fact, Johnnie Gray is only shown enlisted to be a lieutenant at the end.
  • Glengarry Glen Ross does not feature anyone named Glen Ross among its characters; "Glengarry" and "Glen Ross" are the name of two developments owned by the real estate firm that the main characters work for.
  • Godzilla (2014) features a Covert Group called MONARCH. However, it was misidentified by the public as being named "M.U.T.O." in the months leading up to the film's release. This confusion can be blamed on the M.U.T.O. Research website set up as part of the Viral Marketing. M.U.T.O. stands for "Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organism" and refers to the Kaiju that is being researched. But the name of the website accidentally implied that M.U.T.O. referred to the organization of researchers itself. Funnily enough, some of the text responses refer to certain activities being "reported to MONARCH," but this whole confusion led people to speculate that MONARCH referred to either A) the codename for an individual within the organization, or B) the name of some fictional security software.
  • The title of Highlander refers to Connor (and later Duncan) McLeod's origin as a Scottish Highlander, not to the race of immortals (who are simply called that, "Immortals") that he turns out to be part of. Similarly, the villain of that film is not named Kurgan. He is from a tribe of people called "the Kurgans," and all Immortals refer to the character as "the Kurgan." (In real life, scholars do not speak of a Kurgan tribe but of a Kurgan culture, a material culture or cultural horizon that flourished in the area north of the Black Sea from the 5th to 3rd millennia BC. It's therefore a modern, academic name, coming from a Turkish word for a single-person burial mound. The Kurgan culture is the most widely-supported candidate for that of the proto-Indo-Europeans.)
  • What most people think of as "Harry Potter's Theme" is officially called "Hedwig's Theme."
  • The hotel in Hotel Rwanda isn't actually called "Hotel Rwanda", it's called "Hôtel des Mille Collines" (French for "Hotel of a Thousand Hills").
  • I, Frankenstein plays with this trope the same way the original Captain Marvel did. So many beings call Adam Frankenstein he decides to take the name and make it his own, hence the title.
  • A strange inversion: while Ichi the Killer is the name of the main character in the film, the character who appears predominantly on the posters, DVD covers, and other promotional images is actually the antagonist Kakihara, who is often mistaken for Ichi.
  • The Indiana Jones movies have a variation on this. The name of the protagonist is indeed Indiana Jones, but his famous theme music is officially called "The Raiders March", not "Indiana Jones Theme". His first movie, after all, was simply called Raiders of the Lost Ark, without the "Indiana Jones and the..." prefix that subsequent movies would use.
  • While It's All Gone Pete Tong does feature a brief appearance by the real-life DJ Pete Tong, he isn't relevant in any real way to the plot, which is about a fictional DJ named Frankie Wilde. In context, the title is actually a reference to a bit of cockney rhyming slang meaning "It's all gone wrong," which things decidedly do for Frankie very early on.
  • Jason's cyborg form in Jason X has the official name of Uber Jason, not Jason X. There was a comic called Friday the 13th: Jason vs. Jason X which does refer to him as that, but his official name is definitely Uber Jason.
  • Jaws is not the name of the shark in the movies of the same name, despite what a lot of pop-culture would have you believe. The shark doesn't have a name at all, although on the set the mechanical shark used for filming was referred to as "Bruce", after Spielberg's lawyer. When it comes to official merchandise as well as film articles, the shark is usually referred to as simply, "The shark from JAWS", or occasionally, "The Great White Menace from JAWS". Peter Benchley called the shark "The Great Fish" or simply "The Fish" in the original novel. The Jaws name was a last second decision for a title before the book went to print. Curiously, the NES game based on the movie actually names the shark "Jaws".note 
  • The main character of Kikujiro is not named Kikujiro. We don't know who it is before the ending, which is a simple but brilliant twist. Even if the DVD case may tell you who it is actually.
  • Johnny Mnemonic is not the name of its main character - he's just Johnny. Or "Just Johnny."
  • Some people think that Uma Thurman's character in Kill Bill is actually Bill. Her character name is never said in dialogue — only referred as "The Bride"note  — but officially it's "Beatrix Kiddo."
  • In all three versions of the movie, King Kong is the show name for the giant gorilla when he is brought back to New York — his real name is just "Kong".
  • As with the book, The Last of the Mohicans refers to Chingachgook, not the hero Hawk-Eye / Nathanael.
  • The title of the film The Last Samurai actually refers to the entire group of fighters at the end of the movie, but Japanese nouns are both plural and singular. Thus, many think it refers exclusively to Tom Cruise's character, especially given that he is the only one to survive. This misinterpretation crept into at least one international translation of the title, in a language that does make a distinction between singular and plural for "samurai."
  • The Legend of Frenchie King: Her name is Louise Leroi, not Frenchie King. Sure, Frenchie King IS her Red Baron, but it's still jarring to see how many plot summaries refer to Louise as "Frenchie."
  • The title character of Local Hero is never explicitly stated. Mac, the main character, is not local nor particularly heroic, but he does help get the right people together to save the town and the whole point of the film is how he becomes a part of the town by the end, in spite of leaving for home. The soundtrack song titles do refer to him as a local hero. However, many people feel that the Ben, the old beach bum who stands against the oil company and convinces the company's CEO to drill elsewhere is the local hero, and the more clear candidate, since he's both local and a hero.
    • The phrase "local hero" is not used in the film, but it appears once in the novelization — oddly, in reference to the African-born reverend, Murdo.
  • The name of the main antagonist in Men in Black is "The Bug," not "Edgar." Edgar is the name of the farmer whom the Bug kills and disguises himself as. (Oddly enough, action figures and even the cartoon spin-off refer to the Bug as "Edgar.")
  • People who are not familiar with the film tend to assume that David Bowie's character is the eponymous "Mr. Lawrence" in Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence. Bowie's character is in fact called Captain Jack Celliers. Mr. Lawrence is another POW, the camp's translator and the only surviving member of the main cast at the end of the film.
  • The Mexican refers to the name of the legendary gun at the heart of the story and is not referring to Brad Pitt's character.
  • Much like King Kong, the "Mighty" part of Mighty Joe Young is not part of the full name; the character also being referred to as "Mr. Joseph Young", or "Joe" (in the remake, it's just "Joe").
  • The vampire's name is not Nosferatu. It's Count Orlok. Though according to the film itself, Count Orlok is a nosferatu, not a vampire, as the filmmakers mistakenly believed the word "vampire" was copyrighted. Some people even mistakenly say he's Dracula. Admittedly he is, and Orlok is them Writing Around Trademarks.
  • The main character in Ong-Bak is called Ting. Ong-Bak is a Buddha statue in his village temple.
  • A little complicated with Pan's Labyrinth. While Pan is definitely not the name of the main character, which is Ofelia, it's not the name of the Faun, either—its English title was just given due to concerns that people would mix up the words "faun" and "fawn," as in a baby deer. The Faun was called "Pan" in English-language interviews, but is nameless in the film, and the original Spanish title is just El Laberinto del Fauno ("The Labyrinth of the Faun").
  • Elliot of Pete's Dragon fame is sometimes mistaken to be the "Pete" in the title, when Pete is the name of the human boy in both the original 1977 film and its 2016 re-imagining while Elliot is the dragon, something not helped by Pete seldom appearing in merchandise based on the film while Elliot does. Egregiously, even the official audio-description track for Once Upon a Studio on Disney+ makes this error, calling Elliot "Pete the Dragon" when he appears in the short film.
  • Pet Sematary - the titular cemetery is not where the resurrections take place. This happens at the Micmac burial ground that lies some way beyond the Pet Sematary. When Mad TV parodied the 1989 film by mashing it up with Davey and Goliath, the Micmac burial ground is named as the Pet Sematary, although this was likely done to save going over the finer points of the film’s plot as opposed to a genuine error.
  • The Pink Panther refers to a gem in the first movie, not Inspector Clouseau, like some people think. The sequels largely turned the Pink Panther into an Artifact Title, with only some of the sequels actually featuring the gem in any capacity. By Son of the Pink Panther, even the filmmakers have given up; it features the son of Clouseau, and obviously not the son of the diamond.note 
  • The mad transvestite scientist from The Rocky Horror Picture Show is named Dr. Frank N. Furter. The "Rocky Horror" on the title refers to his creation, a muscleman he created to serve as his lover. Despite this, most of the promotional imagery feature Dr. Frank N. Furter and very rarely actually show the actual Rocky Horror.
  • An odd and minor example are the The Santa Clause movies: The title doesn't actually refer to Santa Claus (without the "e") but to the clause in the first movie that requires for protagonist Scott Calvin to assume the role of Santa after taking on the mantle. However, the title led to some people being confused about the question if "Santa Claus" is written with an "e" or without.
  • The protagonist of Saving Mr. Banks is not Mr. Banks, but author Pamela Travers. "Mr. Banks" is a fictional character loosely based on her father.
  • Many people who don't know the franchise think that "Saw" or by extension, "Jigsaw", is the name of the franchise's first main villain, or even the puppet that serves as its Mascot Villain. The villain's name is John Kramer, and the puppet is unnamed in the movies, but officially referred to as Billy by the producers; Jigsaw is the nickname given to John (and later wanted killers) by the press and police In-Universe, a fact that John himself points out in Saw II while adding that he never called himself Jigsaw.
    Eric: I thought you liked to be called Jigsaw.
    John: No. [laughs] It was the police and the press who coined the nickname Jigsaw. I never encouraged or claimed that.
  • The protagonists of the 1932 and 1983 versions of Scarface are both named Tony (Camonte in '32 and Montana in '83). They are never once referred to as "Scarface", though an officer does ask Tony how he got that "beauty scar" while being questioned at an immigration office in Miami. "Scarface" was the nickname of real-life mobster Al Capone, whom Tony Camonte was modeled on.
  • The killer in the Scream movies is named "Ghostface," not "Scream." Similarly, the iconic Ghostface mask that he wears is not called a "Scream mask," as it was sold in costume shops years before the film came out.
  • Seltzer and Friedberg films and their imitators will often do this intentionally with characters because they don't expect audiences to remember character names while parodying movies. Po is called "Kung Fu Panda", Giselle is called "Enchanted Princess." Meet the Spartans and Vampires Suck respectively feature "Ugly Betty" and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer."
  • No one in The Shawshank Redemption is named Shawshank. It's the name of the prison in the film.
  • The camp where the murders happen in Sleepaway Camp is not named "Sleepaway"; it's "Camp Arawak". The title actually refers to the term 'sleepaway camp'; meaning the summer camp is one in which the children stay overnight.
  • Karl Childers is not named Sling Blade.
  • Star Kid is about a comic book geek who finds a suit of alien Powered Armor. Based on that title and description, you'd probably assume that he becomes a superhero named Star Kid, right? Wrong—he's never called that at any point in the movie, and for that matter only has one public act of heroism that doesn't really affect the rest of the plot.
  • Star Wars:
    • The titular "phantom menace" of The Phantom Menace isn't Darth Maul; it's his master, Senator Palpatine (secretly Darth Sidious). The term "phantom menace" means an unknown evil; in the film, none of the protagonists are aware that Palpatine is secretly the villain, and his identity isn't revealed to them until the third episode of the saga.
    • In The Last Jedi, Canto Bight is the name of the city Finn and Rose visit, not the planet, which is named Cantonica.
  • The team of supervillains in Suicide Squad (2016) is named "Task Force X". Will Smith's character Deadshot asks at one point if they are "some kind of Suicide Squad" - that's as official as the title goes. However, most general audience as well as the marketing and merchandise would refer to the team as Suicide Squad rather than Task Force X. In the comics the movie is based on, the name of the field team actually is the Suicide Squad, while Task Force X refers to the entire government organization that the Squad is a part of.
  • The "Thin Man" referred to in the title of the first The Thin Man film refers to the victim (due to his being contrasted with another character who's fat), but is often erroneously assumed to refer to Nick Charles, one of the heroes. (That detective Nick Charles was played by William Powell probably encouraged the confusion.) The sequels included references to "the Thin Man" in their titles to use the misconception to help brand the series.
  • The Dog-Thing from The Thing (1982) is not named "Jed," and neither is "the Norwegian sled dog." Jed is the name of the wolf-dog who played the Norwegian sled dog. "Jed" and "Jed-Thing" are fan names given to the character and creature because it's less of a mouthful than "Norwegian sled dog" and "Norwegian sled dog-Thing". It may also be a reference to the fact that John Carpenter and Kurt Russell simply refer to the dog as Jed in the DVD commentary.
  • To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar refers to the framed photograph Vida steals from a restaurant wall. Julie Newmar does appear briefly at the end, while Wong Foo never appears nor is it explained who he is.note 
  • Specific to France, Chaplin's Tramp character is known as "Charlot" (the French counterpart to "Charlie," both being a familiar nickname for "Charles"), not "the Tramp" — presumably because the thing that's written in big letters in the credits of any movie featuring the Tramp is "Charlie Chaplin," not "The Tramp." The name just sounded too funny for people to understand that it was really the name of a person, not the character's.
  • The creatures from the movie (and television series) Tremors are called "Graboids." So many viewers have called the creatures "Tremors" that this has been brought into the series; at one point a tourist mentions a "Tremor," prompting a main character to exclaim in exasperation, "They're called Graboids!"
  • The main characters in Cheech & Chong's Up in Smoke are actually called Pedro and The Man (although Man's real name is actually Anthony Stoner). The subsequent Cheech & Chong movies subvert this by actually naming the main characters Cheech and Chong.
  • The villain in Wishmaster is sometimes referred to as being "Wishmaster" by people describing the film. The villain is not called Wishmaster; that's just a role he fulfills. He's the Djinn.
  • The World of Kanako: People have assumed that the protagonist is called Kanako. This is wrong, his name is Akikazu, Kanako is the name of his daughter (she plays an important role but is not the protagonist).
  • Yojimbo means bodyguard. While the character is No Name Given, he identifies himself as Sanjuro. Zatoichi Meets Yojimbo gets double points for this (since "Zatoichi" is actually named Ichi), although kind of justified in that while Mifune is obviously playing the same character as he did in the two Kurosawa films, for legal reasons, he's called something else.
  • Sean Connery's character in Zardoz is Zed, not Zardoz. Zardoz actually is The Wonderful Wi ZARD of OZ.
  • In the Zatoichi series, the protagonist's name is Ichi, Zato refers to a historical guild for blind men. Ichi should be called Zato-no-Ichi, but this is shortened to Zatoichi.


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