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Excited Title! Two-Part Episode Name!

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Sounds... exciting...

Anime episode titles, especially for shounen and Magical Girl Warrior series, tend to be two exclaiming sentences (sentence fragments are also common). The sentences are typically unusually descriptive by Western standards (but see In Which a Trope Is Described), and can reveal crucial plot details or work as an out and out summary of the episode. Generally, the format is a summary of the episode with exclamation points, followed by a comment on the episode that sounds as if it was something one of the main cast would say.

(Oddly, the manga so many of these shows are based on rarely if ever do this; their chapter/issue titles are usually equivalent to those of American comics, describing no more than a central item, theme, or quote. Sometimes, the anime's episode titles will mash together two - or more - such titles from the manga chapters they're adapting.)

In dubbing, these are sometimes changed to something else entirely, usually a pun of some sort.

A variant of this has the narrator be confused rather than hyperactive, as in the title format "_____? _______!"

If Western fiction used the same style of titling, we'd probably have "Battle in the Cloud City! Luke's Father Revealed!" in place of The Empire Strikes Back. Bonus points if the title does all the revealing on its own.

A specific form of Idiosyncratic Episode Naming.

Compare Colon Cancer. A subtrope of Punctuated! For! Emphasis!.

See also Short Title: Long, Elaborate Subtitle, Either/Or Title, and In Which a Trope Is Described.

Examples! Of various mediums!

    open/close all folders 

    Anime and Manga! Cartoons And Comic Books From Japan! 
  • Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo: Many examples in the anime series, one of them both in the official Japanese and English titles: "The Mysterious Boy's True Form and Fart Shinken! Eat Asparagus!" or "Gasser Up! I'm Ready To Drive!"
  • Pokémon:
  • One Piece is the king of this trope: "Monsters Appear! Don't Mess with the Whitebeard Pirates!" 298 out of 329 episodes (90.5%) of the translated titles, at the time this was written, are like this.
    • While the exact percentages are unclear, One Piece now has over 1075 episodes, the overwhemling majority of which stil use this title formula.
  • Fist of the North Star utilizes this for nearly every chapter/episode, and also towards somewhat... violent terminology ("Villains! Say Your Prayers Before You Die!"). In the 1984 anime at least, the only episode to not utilize this formula is the second episode of Fist of the North Star 2 ("When will he awaken?").
    • "Strike the Hidden Power Point! No Requiem for the Wicked!"
    • "I am Death! I'll Chase You to the Ends of Hell!"
    • "Farewell, Toki! A Man Only Cries Once!!"
  • Mazinger Z did this in approximately one third of all episodes. It was especially usual in the last season. To name a few:
    • Episode 12 gave us Traitor! The Giant Robot Bikong!
    • Episode 14: Rage! Sleeping Titan Spartan!
    • Episode 22: Ambush!! The Great Underwater Fortress!
    • Episode 26: Clash! Samurai Koji vs Ashura's Mecha-Beast!, featuring the first time Ashura fought Kouji using his/her/its own Humongous Mecha
    • Airstrike! Baras K9 In The Sky's Limit! in episode 33
    • Episode 43: Assault!! Surprise Attack Of The Parachutist Squad!
    • Episode 54: Explosion!! The Power Of The Rocket Punch!!
    • Rest In Peace!! The End of Aphrodite A!! in episode 74 which spoiled what was going to happen for those who watched it for first time
    • Episode 81 with Burn In Hell!! Kouji Kabuto!!
    • The heart-wrenching episode 90 Shiro's Rage!! Defeat Your Fake Mother!! where Shiro showed beyond any doubt he was an Iron Woobie
    • And the two-episodes Grand Finale, Last Chance!! Dr. Hell's Battle to the Death!!, and Death Match!! Revive Our Mazinger Z!!.
    • And then is the infamous episode title "Koji Kabuto Dies in Lava!". He didn't.
  • Ranma ½ did this. 46 out of 173 (26.5%) of the episode titles are in this form.
  • Powerpuff Girls Z! Even the title's excited.
  • All four Slayers anime series have this. In fact, the first and fourth did it alphabetically.
  • There was a big upset during the run of Digimon Tamers because of how spoilery these titles can be. Especially when one episode title was "The Kindhearted Hero!! Leomon Dies!"
    • One episode of Digimon Frontier has the dub title "It Can't Be! Lucemon Reappears", which is roughly what its original title translates to. No dub episodes before or after feature an Excited Episode Title, though. Also, while some dub titles throughout the series are puns, overt references to songs, literature, or other works are much more common.
    • While Digimon Savers having these in their Japanese titles is pretty standard Digimon fare, the English dub, Digimon Data Squad, seems to have exclamation marks at the ends of many of their episodes for some reason - even the ones that don't have names anywhere near their Japanese counterparts.
  • The episode titles in Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi are usually something like "Adventure! Sword and Sorcery Shopping Arcade!"
  • This is even parodied in some anime series. In Magical Witch Punie-chan (a Black Comedy Magical Girl Parody), there's an episode called "Holy Crap, Decisive Battle of Breakfast?! If you don't pray you'll be killed, Cuckoo-san!" The title has nothing to do with the episode. The titles in the series get progressively longer and more absurd, until "You had swept your bangs back for the first time when I saw you under the apple tree. The flower-comb in your hair, I thought you were a flower, too." Yes, that entire thing is the episode title.
  • Nearly every Sailor Moon episode had a title like that. 86% of them, to be exact. The original English dub, however, replaced them all. Viz Media translates the original titles, but replaces the "!" with a ":".
    • The most spoiler-filled of these being the second to last episode of the first series, otherwise known as The Sailor Senshi Die! The Tragic Final Battle! Some prefer the name "Day of Destiny", even though that particular dub episode is the definition of Macekre.
    • However, the more recent Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon and Sailor Moon Crystal avert it.
  • Naruto, in 44.6% of episode titles. The second series, Shippuuden, is much more subdued.
    • This also happens a lot with manga chapters, which often have an/multiple exclamation point(s), an exclamation point and a question mark, or two exclamation points usually with an ellipses between it and any of the actual words. (i.e., "The Sharingan Revived!!", "Iruka vs. Kakashi?!", or "A Secret Plan...!!")
  • The only Yu-Gi-Oh! episodes not to have titles like these in Japan are the season-enders. A random example: "The Strongest! The Magnificent! Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon!". One of the only non-season ender titles is also spoilerrific: "Jounouchi's Death" (an extremely clever subversion, as Jounouchi doesn't die.)
  • The TV series of Ah! My Goddess has those a lot, usually starting with the exclamation "Ah!", for instance "Ah! A Demon has Come and is Creating Calamity!"
  • Maison Ikkoku also has a lot of excited spoiler-type episode titles, like this one: "Kyoko's Heart Goes Pitty-Pat! Godai is put to the Test".
  • Tokyo Mew Mew has a bunch of examples, too.
  • Blue Seed: In the French version of the anime, none of the titles are translated, but there are definitely many exclamation marks among the Japanese characters. In the American version, the titles are translated, usually three sentence fragments from the main character, and keeping the exclamation points. For example, "It's Spring! It's the Capital! I'll Do My Best!"
  • Marmalade Boy was also a repeat offender of this trope.
  • Most titles of episodes for the anime adaptation of Mitsuru Adachi Touch (1981) were in this form.
  • Several episodes of Lovely★Complex as well.
  • Bleach usually has two-part episode titles, but it's very rare for both parts to be exclaiming titles. Usually, the title is either a single exclaiming title or a two-part title with only one exclaiming part. Some of the few examples include:
    • Episode 18: "Reclaim! The Power of the Shinigami!"
    • Episode 54: "An Accomplished Oath! Get Back Rukia!"
    • Episode 228: "Summer! Sea! Swimsuit Festival!!"
  • Sonic X does this sometimes. For example, "Clash! Sonic VS Knuckles!"
    • The Minigames in Sonic and the Secret Rings also followed this naming pattern, which was retained in the English translation, oddly enough.
  • Zatch Bell! does this a lot as well, especially in its third season where virtually every episode title was made up of three phrases, two of them having exclamation marks.
  • Every Koi Koi 7 episode title is both excited and very long. "Glamor Galore! Hot Body Contest: Pierce the Skies of Odaiba" is one such example.
  • The Soul Eater anime did this quite often, but more oddly every title had a first part that may be a statement or exclamation and a second part that was always phrased as a question (even if it made no sense). The manga chapters, on the other hand, are usually descriptive without being excited, and are shorter.
  • Inuyasha: A short and sweet example is "Tessaiga Breaks!" More typical titles are along the lines of "The Mystery of the New Moon and the Black Haired Inuyasha," "The Deadly Trap of Kagura the Wind Sorceress," "The Panther Tribe and the Two Swords of the Fang," and so on.
  • YuYu Hakusho is similar to the previously mentioned Bleach, using exclamatory titles in the original version ("Koenma of the Spirit Realm! A Trial Toward Resurrection") and shorter ones in the dub ("Koenma Appears").
  • Virtually every episode title of Shugo Chara! has at least one exclamation mark, many have two, and the !? combination is not uncommon.
  • Sometimes they'll even be complete sentences. An episode of Transformers: ★Headmasters is entitled "The Emperor of Destruction Vanishes on an Iceberg".
    • Another example from the same series is " Ultra Magnus Dies!!". Guess what happens in that episode.
    • Then Transformers: Super-God Masterforce took this to its logical extreme, in which every single episode except for the very last one was two sentence fragments with at least one exclamation mark, and sometimes as question mark as well. Transformers Victory carried on this tendency, but was more restrained.
    • And it's not just the episodes. The Japanese dubbers didn't find the series title "The Transformers'' to be Excited enough, and inflated it to "Fight! Super Robot Lifeform Transformer." After the post-movie Time Skip, it becomes "Fight! Super Robot Lifeform Transformer 2010."
    • Even the American cartoon ran into this with the episode "Kremzeek!"
    • The Japanese release of Transformers: Prime gave every episode this kind of title.
  • Happens occasionally in the Negima! Magister Negi Magi manga.
  • Saint Seiya: All episodes, except possibly for one or two. Usually following the pattern of "Verb! Something happens"
  • Pulled off like an art form in the Japanese airings of Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z and Dragon Ball GT, which did lead to quite a few spoilerriffic episode titles. The English dub usually shortened them to smaller, more serious one sentence names. Similarly, the Japanese titles for each DBZ Non-Serial Movie were by and large excited two part titles as well, albeit general statements telling little of the movie's plot, which the Funimation dub also changed to smaller, to-the-point titles (usually an Antagonist Title). By the airing of Kai and Super, thanks to a more experienced dubbing crew, the English episode titles were now just like their Japanese counterparts, excited punctuation and all.
    • A few of the Ocean dub Z episode titles use a similar format, such as “A Fight Against Gravity...Catch Bubbles!”
  • Ouran High School Host Club has these for a lot of its episodes. The title of the first episode is: "Starting Today, You Are a Host!" Each title is also read by the host Fujioka Haruhi usually in an excited voice.
  • Episodes of Honey Honey were often like this, and the English dub played with it. The hammy announcer would often exclaim! every title, the first episode's being "The CAT ate the RING?!?!"
  • Kenichi: The Mightiest Disciple also has a bunch of them.
  • And then we have Gintama. Episode 37 was a two-parter. Part one was called “People Who Say that Santa Doesn’t Really Exist Actually Want to Believe in Him”, while part two was "Prayer Won't Make Your Worldly Desires Go Away! Control Yourself.” Not really excited, but damn long-winded.
  • Parodied in He Is My Master.
    • "The Sawatari Izumi Contest Series!! A Daring Test of Courage!! An Express Train to a Secret Hotsprings in the Northeast, a Mother-in-law Murdered in the Mist, a Madonna Teacher from an Elite Family Burning with Desire as They Watch a Housewife Battle for Control of Her Troubled Mansion!!"
  • Many of the Japanese episode titles from Kirby: Right Back at Ya! are like this.
  • Very common for Pretty Cure series many of which are just blatant spoilers for the episode. HeartCatch Pretty Cure! goes to town with this.
    • Even the dubs get in on this, as the English dub title of Episode 9 of Futari wa Pretty Cure is "Get Him Back! Operation Rescue!", and the English dub title of Episode 3 of Smile Pre Cure (a.k.a Glitter Force) is "We Want Peace! Glitter Peace!".
  • Being a Super Robot series, Mobile Fighter G Gundam has quite a few. For example, "Beautiful fighter! Dangerous Allenby!" Every episode title is yelled by Domon at the beginning, for added excitement.
  • From season five of Hetalia: Axis Powers:
    • "Go Forth! Newspaper Club!!"
    • "Brother! We are...!!"
    • "Keep on Moving!! March Forward, Sealand!"
  • In a sense: the Japanese dub of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic uses these; sometimes the second part is the original American title.
  • The majority of episodes in each season of every Tamagotchi anime. Even done in the English dub.
  • Most of the episodes from Inazuma Eleven have excited titles, some of them are also two-parts titles. For example, "Clash! God vs Devil!!".
  • Every single episode of Yuri!!! on Ice. Special mention goes to Episode 5, also known as "Face Beet-Red!! It's the First Competition! The Chugoku, Shikoku, and Kyushu Championship".
  • Occasionally used in My Hero Academia, such as "Bizarre! Gran Torino Appears" and "Listen Up!! A Tale from the Past", both from season 2. Oddly, both of these are low-excitement character development episodes.
  • Hunter x Hunter (1999)'s first episode uses a variation with the franchise's trademark "x"s: "A Boy Setting Out for a Journey × Leaving Behind the Sound of the Wind"

    Asian Animation! From the Rest of the Asian Continent Besides Japan! 
  • A large number of episodes of GG Bond have a title with two parts to them, the first part ending in an exclamation mark. So, for instance, Season 12 episode 41 is titled "Overcoming! Get Over the Pre-Competition Anxiety".
  • The Noonbory and the Super 7 episode "Luky's Bubble Trouble" is known in the original Korean as "Catch It! Bubblegum Balloon".
  • The title of Pleasant Goat Fun Class: Sports are Fun episode 6 is "Dashing for It! Tennis!"

    Fan Fics! Made-Up Stories of the Well-Known! 

    Films! Into the Big Screen! 

    Literature! Words On The Page! 

    Live-Action TV! Real Life You See On the Small Screen! 
  • The Aquabats! Super Show!, and every episode title thereof (Laundry Day! Haunted Battle Tram! Show Time! etc.).
  • Doctor Who: "Kerblam!" Named after the largest retailer in the galaxy, which the episode is centred on, which actually has the exclamation mark at the end of its name in-show.
  • An episode of Gilmore Girls was titled "Keg! Max!" because it had a house party and the return of Max Medina. However in this case both were letdowns that didn't deserve the exclamation mark (It was Jess's second last episode as a regular and Max was gone after that episode.)
  • While Super Sentai and Kamen Rider titles are often down-to-Earth unless it's part of a gag, Metal Heroes titles could get insane. Some gems from Space Sheriff Gavan:
    • "The Beauty's Cries That Cut Through the Night! The Phantom Coach in the Fog,"
    • "Mystery? Emergency Hospital! Humanity's Great Collapse Approaches,"
    • "When I Returned from School, My House was a Makuu Base."
    • And no, not one of these was a "one kanji in Japanese makes five words in English" case.
  • While not every Super Sentai series does this, Juken Sentai Gekiranger is one that does. "Zowa-Zowa! Five Venom Fists!" The first exclamation of every Gekiranger title, by the way, is total nonsense, even in Japanese. They're words made up by "tiger boy" Jan/GekiRed.
  • Many of the older entries in the Ultra Series liked to use this kind of title, particularly in the 70s when the franchise became especially kid-oriented.

    Music! The Catchy Stuff You Hear! 
  • Devin Townsend has Addicted! An album whose titles all end in !, except for the final track, which is Awake!!
  • The Blackout have an album called "The Blackout! The Blackout! The Blackout!"
  • Hellogoodbye's album "Zombies! Aliens! Vampires! Dinosaurs!" also qualifies.
  • Swedish band bob hund's album Jag rear ut min själ! Allt ska bort!!! (My Soul Is On Sale! Everything Must Go!!!)
  • The Hives first EP was titled Oh Lord! When? How?
  • Oasis have a song called "Can Y'See It Now? (I Can See It Now!!)"
  • Scottish prog-metal guitarist Sithu Aye has the song "Lights! Camera! Explosions!"
  • Sufjan Stevens has released, among others, songs named "Say Yes! to M!ch!gan!" and "They Are Night Zombies!! They Are Neighbors!! They Have Come Back from the Dead!! Ahhhh!"
  • Post-rock band Godspeed You! Black Emperor are particularly fond of this trope. Aside from their band name, they also have an album called "'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend!" and a song called "Peasantry or 'Light! Inside of Light!'"
  • Los Campesinos! has a single from their debut album titled "You! Me! Dancing!"
  • Jessie Ware's fifth album was called That! Feels Good!

    Pinball! Games Played Using a Ball! 

    Podcast! Internet Distributed Radio! 
  • The Cool Kids Table game Here We Gooooo! is spelled with an exclamation point at the end.
  • Pokémon World Tour: United names most of it's episodes similarly to the Japanese Pokemon anime ("A Blue Day: Showdown at the Viridian Gym!"). Those that don't end in an exclamation point will usually have one after the first part of the episode instead ("Gift Shop Escapades! Arrival in Pewter City").
  • Gilmore Ball Z uses these, taking the Dragon Ball Z Kai episode titles and making them about Gilmore Girls

    Video Games! Playing On The Screen! 
  • Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan and its sequel do this liberally. They retained this approach in Elite Beat Agents, which is basically a localized version of Ouendan.
  • World of Warcraft has at least one quest named this way: "Vile Satyr! Dryads in Danger!"
  • Super Mario Bros.:
    • Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island : The Japanese version names the final non-bonus level this way. There's also a level in the GBA remake called 'Go! Go! Morphing!'
    • Yoshi's Island DS: There are a lot of levels with this sort of naming, including At Last, Bowser's Castle!, Quit It Already, Tap Tap!, Yikes! Boiling Hot!. And the final level's excited title is the same as the equally excited title used for the final level in the first game's Japanese version.
    • Super Mario 64 has a star named "Express Elevator—Hurry Up!". Though it's played a little more straight on its Japanese name, "Hurry Up! Elevator Inside the Net".
    • Super Mario Sunshine:
      • Done a lot in the Japanese version. Every level has at least one episode with this kind of title, and often two. Examples include "Open the Way to The Big Windmill!", "Go! Go! Squid Surfing" and the overly excited "Pound the Shaking Mirrors!!"
      • The English version has "Mirror Madness! Tilt, Slam, Bam!"
    • Super Mario Galaxy: The Spanish and Italian versions do this with many of the Prankster Comet missions, usually with the format "[Comet's effect]! [Name of the mission that is being remixed]"
  • Moero! Justice Gauken (Burn! Justice Academy) more commonly known as Project Justice, did this with their title. Heck, Justice High actually burned down. And a certain Ensemble Dark Horse died in one of the game's Downer Endings: Hyo, Kyosuke's twin.
  • Bangai-O, due to its mecha anime influence, normally has its levels prone to the following naming scheme: "Name of place. Useful advice to follow!"
  • In Persona 3, the Show Within a Show Phoenix Ranger Featherman R has these kinds of titles, probably to make it seem incredibly campy. It has been around since Persona 2, after all. Justified considering the episode titles are based off of the corresponding episodes of Choujin Sentai Jetman.
  • Every level (except level 6) in Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game. For example, Lucas Lee's level is "Movie Madness! Follow that Star!" while Todd Ingram's level is "Evil Ex Crossover! Take Down Clash at Demonhead!"
  • In Pokémon X and Y, Super Training courses use this title structure. All of them use exclamations, and some high-level courses use the two-phrase structure. Examples include "The Troubles Keep On Coming?!", "Catch It! Noivern's Wild Wind!", "Shoot Back! Get the Giant Wailord!"
  • Lisia from Pokémon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire loves to invoke this trope a lot while following the player's progress during contests:
    Lisia, after the player wins their first contest: Wow! Gratz! I watched it all! You were great! "I Really Did It! A Star Is Born!" That's what I'm calling it!
    Lisia, if the player loses their first contest: Aww… That's a real shame about today… Oh! That's it! Your story today is… "I Won't Give Up! The First Tears Fall…"
  • The puzzle spinoff of the Mighty Switch Force! series, Mighty Switch Force! Hose It Down!, qualifies as this.
  • All of the single-player levels in Splatoon follow this formula. Examples include "Octotrooper Hideout! Catch That Zapfish!" and "Inkling Is On The Menu! The Ravenous Octomaw!"
  • Monster Maulers has all of its stages titled along these lines in the Japanese version (Kyukyoku Sentai Dadandarn). Many of the exclamation marks were Lost in Translation, as was the enthusiastic announcer accompanying the Episode Title Card.
  • In Evil Zone, at least in the Japanese version, Midori Himeno and Erel's scenarios uses excited two-part episode titles as a rule.
  • Kirby:
  • Used in Starbound for the title of the hidden in-game visual novel arcade game, Beautiful Attempt! Sakura Shrine Maiden Hearts+.

    Webcomics! Comic Strips From the Internet! 

    Web Original! Shows From the Internet! 

    Western Animation! Non-Japanese Cartoons! 
  • Clerks: The Animated Series may not be anime, but its titles get progressively longer with each episode, culminating in "Dante and Randal and Jay and Silent Bob and a Bunch of New Characters and Lando, Take Part in a Whole Bunch of Movie Parodies Including But Not Exclusive To, The Bad News Bears, The Last Starfighter, Indiana Jones and the Temple Of Doom, Plus a High School Reunion."
  • M.O.D.O.K. (2021): With such gems as "Beware from What Portal Comes!" and "If Bureaucracy Be Thy Death!", each episode has an overwrought Silver Age style title that begs to be read out loud in the hammiest voice possible.
  • Star Blazers, the American version of Space Battleship Yamato, has a slight variation of this. In the DVD collections and the straight-from-the-TV-screen illustrated comic collections from W.C.C. Animation Comics, the episode titles do indeed follow this format, but the episode titles listed in the IMDB look more like the American standard. The show itself doesn't even display the titles, so it's unclear which is considered the official titles.
  • Season 2 of the Clone High reboot has an episode titled "Don't You Get It? Sports Are Huge in This Town" (most other episodes of the series have Subtitle or Colon Cancer titles, while most reboot season 1 episodes had more conventional few-word un-punctuated titles).

    Real Life! Stuff Out of the TV! 

End of Trope Page!! The Indexes Revealed!!?

Alternative Title(s): Excited Episode Title

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