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Brought To You By The Letter S
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Why 'S'? Why not 'S'?
Superheroes are in many ways much like athletes. Both frequently perform amazing physical feats we envy; both often collect themselves into teams with fancy names; both wear colorful, form-fitting uniforms.
And both have a tendency to adorn those uniforms with single letters of the alphabet. Stumped for a Chest Insignia? Just style up the first letter of your Code Name in sufficiently distinctive typeface, and have at it!
Examples:
Anime and Manga
- Ichi of Ichi The Killer wears a big "1" on his back, since his name means "one" in Japanese.
- Similarly, Ah My Goddess's Keichi, when he took part in the drag bike race,wore a jacket with "K-1" on the back.
- The Big Red R for Rocket of Team Rocket, general bad guys of the Pokemon series. (Of course, there's also Teams Magma, Aqua, and Galactic - these three are a bit more original, but there's still the 'M', 'A', and 'G'.)
- Gai Shishioh from Gao Gai Gar wears a large "G" on the right side of his chest.
- ** "G" is for
Cyborg Guy the entire Gutsy Galaxy Guard. "J", likewise, is for the J-Ark Fleet, manned by Soldat J cyborgs. In both cases, the letter appears inside their Power Crystals (the G-Stone and the J-Jewel) when they get a powerup.
- "G" is for...Speed Racer (he also wears an "M" on his helmet to represent Racer Racing), because his name in the original anime is Go Mifune. His girlfriend Trixie has an "M" on her blouse, for Michi Shimura.
Comic Books
- In The DCU ...
- "A" is for Aquaman and Animal Man. Anarky also wears this letter, though as part of the "Anarchy-is-order" Circle-A.
- "E" is for Element Lad.
- "G" is for Green Arrow — some artists draw his belt buckle with a noticeable "G" shape.
- On the other hand, maybe it's just a belt buckle — when his former sidekick, Speedy/Arsenal/"Red Arrow", adopted a red version of GA's costume, it included the "G"-shaped buckle, which elicited some commentary in the comics blogosphere.
- Nope, now that the Red Arrow costume and moniker are official, Roy's belt buckle is now distinctively an "R". Wonder how many people will mistake him for Robin?
- "GF" is for Geo-Force.
- "i" is for Invisible Kid.
- In Legion of Super Heroes "Z" is also for...well, the guy wearing it is named Drax, but considering Drax is a kid from the Phantom Zone, a safe guess would be "General Zod," presumably his father figure.
- "P" is for Phantom Girl.
- "R" is for Robin. The resemblance of the original "R" logo to the official "registered trademark" symbol is uncanny, and has been the source of some humor in the past.
- 'Registered Sidekick — all rights reserved'...
- "S" is for Superman (and "family"). He may possibly have been the Trope Namer, since he is such a prominent example. Bizarro uses a reversed (twisted in the DCAU) "S".
- Oddly enough, Superman's Jewish parody (ignoring that Superman's creators were Jewish) Shalomman uses the Hebrew letter shin, which is the initial letter of the word "Shalom." His bizarro-equivalent had the Hebrew letter sin, which in addition to being a backwards shin also made a pun on the word "sin."
- Sin is not a backwards shin. In traditional writing (with no vowels), the two are indistinguishable and can only be told apart by context; the more modern style has the dot on a different side (on the right for shin, on the left for sin. No idea if this has anything to do with being sinister.)
- In some esoteric circles, the letter shin (the i pronounced as a long e sound in both cases) represents good, and sin represents evil; the puns just happening to be available, and not originally intended.
- No, Superman, the "S" does
 not stand for Shakespeare!
- "S(blank)" is for too many homages/parodies of Superman to count.
- "T" is for Tasmanian Devil (of the Global Guardians and Justice League Europe) and Red Tornado. The current Mr Terrific has a T-shaped mask.
- "W" (and occasionally "WW") is for Wonder Woman, when she's not using an eagle insignia. In a few continuities, like Kingdom Come, the two are combined: a stylized eagle that happens to resemble a W.
- "F over A" is for The First American from Alan Moore's Tomorrow Stories published by America's Best Comics. An imprint of Wildstorm
- "Omega" is for Omega Effect, so Darkseid's most recent costume has a Greek letter Omega as a Chest Insignia.
- Depending on the costume, the Elongated Man has an E and an M.
- And what does that spell? Only the Great Old Ones know for sure.
- In the Marvel Universe ...
- "A" is for Captain America (on his head, which does not stand for France) and Apocalypse (on his belt buckle, also kind of illogical since the character predates the Latin Alphabet - maybe it's a pyramid logo?).
- Of course, it is possible he updated his outfit when he got tired of people asking what the weird pictographs meant.
- In-story explanation: he's a shapeshifter who adjusts his appearance for psychological impact on the culture he's trying to scare, just as his real name isn't classical Greek. Real Life explanation: he was a last-minute replacement character to fill a deadline, and not all aspects of his appearance or history were planned out until after his first appearance.
- "D" is for Demolition Man (sometimes just called "D-Man"). Two means Daredevil, though.
- "F" is for Flatman, a member of the less-than-astounding Great Lakes
Avengers X-Men Champions Initiative.
- "G" is for Galactus (on his belt buckle in his first appearance); also really illogical, considering the character predates the universe the Latin Alphabet originated in. Later retconned that whoever looks at him sees their own image.
- "H" is for Hawkeye.
- "I" is for Mr Immortal, the Man Who Can't Die No Matter How Much He Really Wants To, and leader of the aforementioned Great Lakes Initiative. His 'I' is in multiple places, with 'Mr.' written inside the letter itself, since it's just a big rectangle anyway.
- "N" is for Nomad.
- "P" is for Puck (of Alpha Flight).
- "S" is for Sentry (on his oversized belt).
- "T" is for Thor (sometimes — it's on his belt buckle in the Silver Age) and, by extension, Thunderstrike.
- These days, Thor's belt buckle is the rune uruz (basically the letter "u") for some reason.
- "W" is for Wonder Man (when he's not using Civvie Spandex).
- "S" is for Spider Man. No wait—no it's not.
- "X" is for Professor Xavier — but not (usually) directly. Rather, it's worn by virtually all of the numerous mutant heroes he's trained or sponsored. He has occasionally been known to sport a large X reaching from shoulders to thighs on his rare field assignments, usually if he's been temporarily un-crippled. It may seem like massive ego, but he never intended the X to stand for his name, but rather the genetic "X-factor" that made mutants different.
- In the very first X-Men comic evar, Professor Xavier explained that he called them the X-Men because their mutations gave them an "eXtra" power. No, seriously.
- In a What If...? issue, which shows Xavier teaming up with Magneto to create the X-Men (with Mystique on the team, mind you), he says, out of the blue, that since X is normally used to refer to unknown things, there would be no one better to fight for an uncertain future than a band of X-Men. Don't know if it falls into Incredibly Lame Pun as well, or even at all.
- Not a letter, but each member of the Fantastic Four goes into battle with a large "4" emblazoned somewhere on their uniform.
- "MM" is for Miracleman/Marvelman
- Jughead Jones typically wears a sweater with the letter "S" on it...the meaning of which is known only to Jughead.
- "S(blank)" is for too many homages/parodies of Superman to count.
- In Johnny Saturnthe Utopian, as an example, wears a stylized "U" on his chest. A variation of this would be Titanium Tom, who wears a patch on each shoulder with Ti— the symbol for titanium.
- The Chinese character for the number "7" is for: the Great Ten's Seven Deadly Brothers
Film
- In The Incredibles:
- "i" — distinctly lowercase with a prominent dot — is for Mr. Incredible, and later his whole family, from the Disney/Pixar film The Incredibles
- "EG" is for Elasti-Girl; she dropped this after the intro of the movie, for plot-explained reasons.
- "S" is for Syndrome, from the same movie.
- "G" is for G-Girl, from My Super Ex-Girlfriend. G-Girl was notable for not having just one costume but (being a hip New Yorker) a whole closetful, each distinguished only by a "G" motif.
- Interestingly, she never explains what the G stands for.
- "1" in an "engraved" style similar to that on the one dollar bill for U.S. Bill of The Specials
Literature
Live Action TV
- "?" is used by the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Doctors in Doctor Who, despite the fact the character is not actually identified as Doctor Who, but simply "the Doctor".
- This could be related to the fact that his signature contains a question mark, however.
- "G" is for Super Grover; indeed, Sesame Street is the Trope Namer.
- "V" is for Major Victory, a season 1 contestant on Who Wants To Be A Superhero?.
- "S" is for Kamen Rider Stronger, with "T" used in sidekick Tackle's breast designs.
- "W" is for Kamen Rider Double (the letter "W" is often used in place of the word "Double" in Japanese, the series is even written as "Kamen Rider W"). Many other letters go for the eponymous heroes, the main villains and the Monsters of the Fortnight as well, along with , as each of the different Memories is signified by a both a word and a single letter.
- "T" is for Trigger, as well as Terror and Taboo depending on which character is in question.
- "L" is for Luna
- "C" is for Cyclone
- "J" is for Joker
- "H" is for Heat
- "M" is for Metal
- "S" is for Smilodon. In the movie it is also used for Skull.
- "N" is for Nasca
- "C" is for Clay Doll
- "F" is for Fang
- "A" is for Accel
- "E" is for Engine
- Non-superhero example: In Laverne And Shirley, "L" is for Laverne DeFazio. She has a cursive "L" on every blouse, shirt and sweater she owns. This was carried over to her military uniform in the Animated Adaptation.
- In the 1970s PBS children's series The Electric Company, a recurring cartoon feature, "The Adventures of Letterman", had the eponymous hero sporting a different letter on his "varsity sweater" each episode; his power was the ability to change one object into another by replacing a letter in its spelling. When his arch-enemy, the Spellbinder, fired a dart at him, Letterman replaced the 'd' with a 't', turning it into a tart, which he then ate.
Professional Wrestling
- "H" is for Hurricane, former resident superhero of the WWE. "R" is for Rosey, his boy (well, 300-pound Samoan who acts like a boy) sidekick.
- Scott Steiner used the Superman S — actually the full Superman logo, until the expected legal action forced a change to an S in an ellipse.
Real Life
- Anne Boleyn famously had a necklace with the letter B.
- Betty Suarez of Ugly Betty wears an identical "B" necklace.
Video Games
- "M" is for Mario, "L" is for Luigi, "W" is for Wario, and logically enough, "Γ" is for Waluigi. All these symbols appear on characters' hats, rather than on their chests.
- Unfortunately for Waluigi, people have pointed out that the letter above is Cyrillic, and pronounced in Russian as 'gay'.
- More like 'ga', but still.
- Isn't that letter also the Greek gamma?
- Gay Luigi?!
- Actually, according to a letter to Nintendo Power, the existence of Waluigi means you can replace the R in "Roman" with a W. Somehow, the writer proved Luigi = Woman.
- It could also be an upper case gamma, which is what the Cyrillic letter is based on anyway.
- Or an L but vertically flipped, just like Wario's W is Mario's M but vertically flipped.
- City Of Heroes' ridiculously extensive costume creator gives you a choice of the entire uppercase Latin alphabet and figures 0–9. After six months of subscription, players get to access all letters of the Greek alphabet, uppercase and lowercase.
- Although ironically for a superhero game, not many players follow this trope.
- Klavier Gavin in Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney has a G pendant.
- DK! Donkey Kong! On his tie, uniquely enough, but it's also his only piece of clothing.
- Samus Aran's logo is a stylized S, although it is more associated with her signature Screw Attack move.
- Okay, that sounded way dirtier than it should.
- Amusingly, the "Screw Attack S" icon never appears on any of her equipment, not even the Screw Attack itself, which is just a lightning bolt on a circle; nor does it appear anyplace else in most of the games. Exception: an SAS icon is used to symbolize each of the suit upgrades in the Prime series, but no such icons ever appear on those suits. It also appears on the mission complete screen in Super Metroid. The S icon is really more of an out-of-game Cool Logo than anything.
- Boss rooms, though not the bosses themselves, in the early Mega Man games were all prominently signed "W" for Dr. Wily.
- Mega Man games also used C for Dr. Cossack and L/R for Dr. Light/Right. The Mega Man X series continued with a Sigma sign during the Boss Intro, a DD for Doctor Doppler, an R for Repliforce, a different R for Red Alert, and an L for Lumine.
- Don't forget Zero's stylized "Z".
- Nor the Omega (later W/V) symbols for the Mega Man Zero series.
- Marisa Kirisame's redesign for the 12th Touhou game, Undefined Fantastic Object, gives her an apron with a large "M" on it.
- In Space Channel 5 Part 2, "P" stands for Purge.
Web Animation
- In Homestar Runner, "M" is for Strong Mad. Coach Z wears a medallion with a stylized letter "Z" on it, while Homsar simply has his name written on his shirt.
- The Ambiguously Gay Duo have G for Gary and A for Ace. Unsurprisingly, there happened to be times when they had to stand next to something large and Y-shaped.
Webcomics
- In PS 238, a Batman-like hero called The Revenant wears a stylized letter "R" on his chest.
- Mister Mighty, of Everyday Heroes, of course wears a gold "M" in an oval.
- His teammate, Dot Dash, wears a dot-and-dash on her chest; Morse code for the letter "A". This is one of the most convoluted Punny Name references ever: The dot is for her first name Dorothea, the dash is for her super-speed, the "A" is for her maiden name of Axel, and Morse code for her married name of Morse.
- In The Inexplicable Adventures Of Bob, after Bob very briefly becomes a Super Hero and then loses his powers, he says his one real regret is that he used a permanent laundry marker to make the "B" logo on his shirt.
- Evan from The Wotch always wears a shirt with a capital "E" on it. Lilly wears a dress with a lil' 'e' on it instead.
Web Original
- 'P' for Phase, in "Boston Brawl II" of the Whateley Universe. Since Phase is a density changer like the Vision, the 'P' starts out dense at the top and fades away at the bottom. Phase hates it.
Western Animation
- "A" is for Alvin, as in Alvin And The Chipmunks.
- "R" is for Richie Rich, at least as Hanna-Barbera animated him.
- "M" is for Marvin White, the aspiring superhero in the first season of Superfriends.
- "J" and "Z" are for Jayna and Zan, the Wonder Twins.
- In the classic BugsBunny short "Super-Rabbit", "S" stands for Super too.
- All Canadians on South Park have either the first letter of their name (T for Terrence, P for Phillip, etc.) or their position (f for fans at a football game) on their shirt.
- I.R. Baboon from I Am Weasel has an upside-down "IR" scribbled on his shirt.
- After fiddling around with casual outfits for José Carioca's comic book series, they eventually settled on a T-Shirt with a "Z" on it, for "Zé".
- "8" is for Manic 8-Ball, a one-shot villain from The Venture Bros.
- "DP" is for Danny Phantom (the "P" is inside the "D").
- "F!" is for Freakazoid.
- "H" (inside a male symbol) is for Captain Hero of Drawn Together. It's actually his real name, though (Leslie Hero).
- "A?" is for a character appearing extremely briefly in an episode of Eek The Cat, and whom this troper's fading memories of the early '90s have decided must be named "Canada Man." (Get it? "A?" Of course you do.)
- "A" is for Atom Ant.
- "C" is for Coil Man of the Impossibles and for Curly Howard of the Robonic Stooges.
- "CR" is for Captain Rescue.
- "D" is for Dynomutt.
- "DM" is for Danger Mouse.
- "F" is for Fluid Man of the Impossibles, for his namesake of the Super Globetrotters, for Frankenstein Jr. and for Blue Falcon.
- "G" is for Gizmo Man of the Super Globetrotters.
- "L" is for Larry Fine of the Robonic Stooges.
- "M" is for Multiple Man of the Impossibles, for his namesake of the Super Globetrotters and for Moe Howard of the Robonic Stooges.
- "SD" is for Scooby Doo (on his engraved dog-tag).
- "SG" for Super Goof as he appeared on House Of Mouse and in the comics.
- "U" is for Underdog.
- "N" is for Captain N The Game Master. It's actually a Varsity letter on a Letterman jacket, so In Universe, it's more of a convenience that his school's name and the company that produced his favored console (and the fact that Videoland is populated pretty exclusively by characters from or inspired by that company's games) share an initial letter.
- "KP" is for "Kim Possible". She doesn't wear the insignia, but it does appear on the screen of her Kimmunicator.
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