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"I got my middle name from somebody who obviously didn't think I'd ever run for President." — Barack Hussein Obama, 2008 Al Smith Foundation dinner
Meg: Mr. Penisberg, I quit.
Peter: Penisberg?
Mr. Penisberg: Yeah, go on, get it out of your system...
If you ask someone their name, and they give you an answer that fits this trope, chances are you won't take them seriously. You will then find out that yes, that really is their name. No joke. Or it may be a joke, but it still is seriously their name.
Characters under this trope are saddled with a name that realistically, you'd wouldn't expect a parent to name their kid or, for someone who's of a certain name, they'd choose to go by. This is the kind of name that gets kids made fun of in school — which leads them to snark " Never Heard That One Before" when the jokes continue into adulthood.
Yet, it also happens to be Truth In Television, in many unfortunate cases. Generally, when imposed (fictionally or otherwise) on someone, this will lead to a Who Names Their Kid Dude.
Comes in a variety of forms:
- Double Entendre — The name is one that fits into the Double Entendre trope.
- Phrase Name — Where the first name and/or last name may sound perfectly normal on its own, but put them together and they make a phrase that sounds like a joke, a trait you wouldn't want to be associated with, or sounds just plain stupid.
- Pop Culture Name — An example of this trope being the result of someone being named after a famous pop culture character whose name would ordinarily not enter consideration for use. Such as Optimus Prime, Kal-El, or ESPN. In this case, it only counts if for the circumstance, the name is already popular and isn't a name that you'd think to call someone under regular circumstances
- Rhyming Names — Names that when said together, first and last rhyme.
- Unfortunate Coincidences — Regular names that happen to match coincidentally with famous or infamous figures from real life.
- Unfortunate Meaning — someone thought the name sounded nice, but apparently had no clue that the name they gave their child describes a disease or a woman's genitalia. (Many of these are urban legends or outright deliberately racist comments; in this troper's experience, the more defensive the teller gets about these, the more likely he knows they're false.)
- Have A Gay Old Time — Linguistic drift can hit names quicker than some folks would like. If a name later gets adopted for a sexual term, those who had the name before the drift run afoul of this (those named after, however, run into one of the above issues instead).
Only goes for examples where the name is the character or person's legal given name, or the name they most commonly go by. Not examples where someone uses it as a temporary alias.
If just the first or middle name is unfortunate, then it's an Embarrassing First Name or an Embarrassing Middle Name. If a character chooses this name as a superhero or villain alias, it's Fail O'Suckyname. There's also Names To Run Away From Really Fast, where your name isn't so much embarassing as deeply scary.
Will frequently intersect with Punny Name. When those with Unfortunate Names pronounce them counterintuitively (whether in an effort to save themselves the embarrassment or not), they'll feel compelled to inform people that It Is Pronounced Tro-PAY.
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Examples:
Anime and Manga
Comic Books
- Archie Comics: Something like "I'm Mr. Chovy, and I want to know why my daughter Ann didn't make it into the yearbook."
- The Archie comics continuity saddled poor Sonic The Hedgehog with the name Olgilvie Maurice Takeshi Hedgehog.
- The DCU has poor Empress, from the former Young Justice. Real name: Anita Fite.
- Namor the Sub-Mariner of Marvel Comics. While there's nothing wrong with his name proper (Namor meaning "Avenging Son", appropriately enough) he has an unfortunate nickname: Subby. It's worth noting that it's a short list of people who get to call him "Subby" without having a hole punched through their head, mostly people he served with in World War II.
- The Crush!Yiff!Destroy!
 review of Extinctioners said it best: "Each character is also burdened with a ridiculous name — look, there's a gorilla named Warfare! And a panda named Pandamonium! And a phoenix named Phenix!"
- Marvel Comics' Nova. His name is Richard. Richard Ryder. Now what do people call Richard for short?
- The titular character of The Adventures Of Tintin can be considered this in certain parts of the Philippines. Specifically the parts where the local language's (the Philippines has several) colloquial term for, well, the penis sounds exactly like Tintin's name.
- There's a great example in the comic strip Watch Your Head, a female basketball player named Takoma Washington.
- Les Moore, from Funky Winkerbean.
- Hell, Funky himself.
- Funky me? Naw, you don't understand — it's FUNKY YOU!!!
- When Spider-Man villain Shocker was first named, it didn't have any other connotations. Of course, now that it's slang for a sexual act, you'd think he'd change his name.
- Golden Age British space hero Dan Dare had an eager youthful sidekick named Flamer (because he had red hair). The term didn't have the same, um, connotations back then.
- Young Avengers member Asgardian (who didn't even have anything to do with the Norse pantheon) was advised by his teammates to change his hero-name almost immediately after he went public with his relationship with male teammate Hulkling.
Films
- Pick a James Bond movie. Any James Bond movie. Chances are good at least one of the Bond Girls will have a name that fits this trope.
- Pussy Galore comes to mind immediately...
- As well as Holly Goodhead, Plenty O'Toole, Xenia Onatopp, Octopussy for crying out loud...
- This is played with and lampshaded in the newest film Quantum of Solace, as redhead Agent Fields is very insistant about being called by that, and not revealing her first name Strawberry.
- Hot Fuzz had someone named P.I. Staker (pisstaker), and Nicolas thought it was a joke.
- Fook Mi and Fook Yu from one of the Austin Powers movies.
- Not to mention Felicity Shagwell, Alotta Fagina, Ivana Humpalot, and Robin Swallows (née Spitz). All, needless to say, spoofing the use of this trope in James Bond films.
- Felicity Shagwell and Ivana Humpalot are Shout Outs to porn stars. OR SO I HEARD.
- I don't know about the first one but the secong, most definately.
- Gaylord Focker from Meet the Parents.
- Pretty much anyone named Gaylord these days. It was once a respected name, now it's fodder for Beavis and Butthead.
- In Charlies Angels Full Throttle Dylan revealed her name, before going into Witness Protection, was Helen Zass. This resulted in a Hurricane Of Puns from the other two Angels.
- To make this pun work in German, the dubbers had to rename her "Helen Sarsch".
- One of the engineers in Office Space was named Michael Bolton. He hates the singer who shares his name, but won't change it because, as he puts it, "He's the one who sucks."
- The focus of an especially funny scene in Monty Python's Life Of Brian.
- High School Musical's "Sharpay". Probably not intentional on the creators' parts, but all this troper can think of upon hearing that name are those really wrinkly dogs ("shar pei").
- Robin Hood Men in Tights had Latrine, the witch.
- Though that was what she changed it into. It used to be Shithouse.
- There are a couple of unfortunate nicknames(is there a trope for that?) in Star Wars and its EU. A scene cut from A New Hope has Luke's friends calling him "Wormy"; a comic where Biggs and Luke are together before Biggs leaves has Biggs use that name repeatedly while establishing poor Luke as a bit of a Butt Monkey. The X Wing Series comics show that Wedge Antilles used to be called "Veggies◊", but this seems less like a shameful name (family friends called him that when he was a kid, and he doesn't seem to mind) than like a childhood nickname.
- The first novel of the X Wing Series has Wedge assigned a new astromech droid. Like all astromechs except Luke's, it has a nickname, and this one is called Mynock. Wedge asks it if it got that name from drawing a lot of power(mynocks leech off of power supplies), and it tells him via text interface that a pilot it served previously said that "I screamed like a mynock when we were in combat. A slander, Commander." Wedge says he understands, and no one likes being thought of as a space rat. In combat Mynock does indeed scream incessantly, and eventually this annoys Wedge enough that he threatens to wipe the droid's memories. And he does. "Gate" is much quieter.
- And of course there's Han Solo and the Emperor's Hand.
Literature
- Discworld has Moist von Lipwig and Adora Belle Dearheart.
- Not to mention the Lancre family who named their daughters after virtues (Chastity, and so forth) then didn't get the clue and named their sons after vices (Bestiality, etc).
- They named their daughters after virtues in the hope that they would be the epitome of those virtues (they were anything but) so they actually did get the clue and named their boys after vices in the hope that the same would be true and they'd become the opposite of their names (it was, thankfully).
- How have we forgotten to include Queen Magrat and Princess Esmeralda Margaret Note Spelling of Lancre? "Magrat" came about because her mother couldn't spell "Margaret", so she tried to make sure the same thing wouldn't happen to her daughter, with the aforementioned disastrous results thanks to Lancre's inconvenient baptism traditions. She is comforted by the thought of a villager named Moocow Poorchick whose full name is "James What The Hell Is That Cow Doing In Here Poorchick", and the fact that long ago Lancre was ruled by King My God He's Heavy the First. Mention is also made of a little girl who was almost named Chlamydia, until her mother decided "Sally" was easier to spell.
- Mrs. Cake's spirit familiar, One Man Bucket, probably wins the contest. His tribe had a tradition that a kid is named after the first thing the mother sees after sticking her head out of the tepee. One Man Bucket's full name is "One Man Throwing A Bucket Of Water Over Two Dogs." His slightly older twin brother's name? Let's just say "He would have given his right arm to be called 'Two-Dogs-Fighting'."
- Ponder Stibbons and Carcer Dun both fit in the "words that aren't names" category, causing This Troper to wonder just how each of them came by those names.
- Carcer Dun at least has been explained. It appears to be a corruption of Carcharodon (shark), given said character's habits.
- Dun is a perfectly normal surname, Carcer is Latin for "prison". Meaningful Name, with the added bonus that it actually sounds namelike. (As well as the above, most likely.)
- Well, Ponder is a guy who like to ponder about the nature of the multiverse and such...
- We also seem to have forgotten Denephew Boot. His parents were expecting a girl.
- [A Date With Rosie Palms Rosemary Palm]].
- Cheery Littlebottom. Whose father was Jolly.
- And whose grandfather was Cheeky. Seems to be a bit of a family tradition.
- There's also Legitimate First from Night Watch. Even the other characters wonder at his name, and the explanation is, "Can't blame a mother for being proud."
- Making Money features Topsy Lavish, nee Turvy ("Topsy Turvy... it had kind of a music-hall feel to it")
- Good Omens has Pippin Galadriel Moonchild, better known as Pepper. Last name not given.
- In Good Omens, the female protagonist was named Anathema Device. Her mother had just liked the sound...
- Twilight A teenaged boy named Quil imprints on a toddler named Clare . . .
- A probably unintentional example in Lord Brocktree of the Redwall series: how did the author, an ex-trucker, think that "Stiffener Medick" was a sensible name to give to a character in a children's book?
- Oh, and then there's the fox named "Felch". One hopes it means something different in the Juska language.
- Non-obscene additions would be Jodd's full name and most of the vermin names, since vermin are usually Only Known By Their Nickname and tend to be nicknamed with unflattering physical descriptions - "Redtooth" isn't too bad, but "Halfnose" and "Stinky" are pushing it.
- While he was Captain of the Phoenix Guards, Khaavren had a subordinate called Sergeant, who was actually a lieutenant.
- This seems likely to be a Shout Out to Major Major Major Major from Catch 22.
- The Inheritance Cycle has an unintentional example in the form of Solembum. The author evidently didn't know what "bum" was used to refer to outside the USA.
- There is a children's book in circulation entitled My Pet Dick. Dick is a duck.
- Harry Potter's "Nymphadora Tonks." See Accidental Innuendo. She insists on being known only as "Tonks", but that isn't really much of an improvement.
- Are we sure it's accidental? *Guffaw*
- Possibly not. JK Rowling has been known to read some fanfic, and rumour has it that Tonks is a Mary Sue parody, what with the hair and eye colour-changing powers and everything, and the name was pretty clearly an attempt to sound ridiculous regardless of the potential double-meanings.
- And we all know of a certain other literary character who is plagued with clumsiness. Prophetic Take That?
- David Weber's Empire of Man series has the unfortunately named Ima Hooker. She is aware of the implications and so was her father when he named her.
- Slartibartfast tries to downplay his own ridiculous name in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Douglas Adams explained that he had wanted a name that sounded very rude but could still be broadcast on the radio: he started with Phartiphuckborlz, and worked upwards.
- Also appearing in the same episode as Slartibartfast are the philosophers Vroomfondel and Majikthise, and a computer programmer who isn't named in the radio version but appears in other versions as Fook.
- And, of course, Ford Prefect. Not as dirty but still unfortunate.
- There's this guy who was named Apropos at birth. He was knighted, but had no land to rule. Thus, Sir Apropos Of Nothing.
- Dick and Jane. Just Dick and Jane.
- In Oliver Twist, there's a character named Charley Bates. He's referred to numerous times as "Master Bates".
"Wipes," replied Master Bates; at the same time producing four pocket-handkerchiefs... Master Bates saw something so exquisitely ludicrous in this reply, that he burst into another laugh; which laugh, meeting the coffee he was drinking, and carrying it down some wrong channel, very nearly terminated in his premature suffocation. — p. 76 of Oliver Twist
- "There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it."
- The Dean Koontz novel Life Expectancy features a villainous clown by the name of Konrad Beezo. He wanted his son to follow in his footsteps (the kid was a hopeless clown but an equally good villain) and saddled him with the name of Punchinello Beezo, which would frankly be enough of a Freudian Excuse on its own without all the rest of the hell the poor kid went through.
- Maximum Ride features a mad scientist whose last name is ter Borcht. Yes, it's pronounced like the soup. Yes, there's at least one "soup doctor" joke. To compound the agony, his physical description is a near-match for Arnold Schwarzenegger, his first name is Roland, he's burdened with an accent that could strip paint, and he spends all his screen time in the books being tormented by Max. And the fans wonder why Max has a substantial Hatedom.
- This troper believes that ter Borcht and anybody else evil that Max is impudent to deserves it. They just automatically assume that they'll do anything they want, even when they protest.
- The hobbit-like Soddits in The Soddit, who earned their popular name because the explorer that first discovered them was so traumatized by the experience he could only shudder and mumble "sod it" into his next tankard of ale.
- A very not funny example from Warrior Cats: Lostface. After she got half her face permanently disfigured from a dog mauling. Yes, Bluestar was deliberately being cruel. Thankfully, she got renamed a few books later.
- The series has many funny examples too though: Runningnose, Loudbelly, and Heavystep, to name a few.
- A few of the names from Nick's list of Gatsby's guests from July 5th: The Leeches, the Fishguards, the Ripley Snells, Mrs. Ulysses Swett, S.B. Whitebait, Maurice A. Flink, Gulick, James B. "Rot-gut" Ferret, the Scullys, S.W. Belcher, and the Smirks.
- J.R.R. Tolkien and a couple unintentional ones. There's Gróin (Gimli's grandfather) and the Telerin translation of Celeborn's name, Teleporno.
- In Tolkien's defense, the vast majority of his dwarfs' names are lifted wholesale from the Elder Eddas. He didn't make that one up.
- Not to mention that "Gróin" isn't pronounced like that at all.
- Spellsinger's Jonathan Thomas Meriweather, a.k.a. Jon-Tom, isn't acknowledged as having an unfortunate name in the books as far as this troper remembers, but since "John Thomas" is slang for penis in some parts of the world ...
- In Isaac Asimov's The Caves of Steel, the protagonist's wife is named Jezebel. She prefers to be called Jessie.
- Only after her husband (named Elijah, of course) tried to convince her the historical Jezebel wasn't as bad as her reputation. She had been proud of the name.
- The Gods of the American Gods universe sometimes end up with names like this out of their efforts to disguise their identity through Stephen Ulysses Perhero type names. One is Mr. Nancy/Anansi. The title Anansi Boys is a play on the term "a nancy boy", a derisive term for homosexuals, and the fact that Anansi has taken this name is probably a testament to his comfort with his sexuality. There's also the matter of Shadow's real name as revealed in a side-story Balder Moon which besides being the kind of name you wouldn't want to saddle your child with, makes you wonder why he didn't previously realize his identity.
Live Action TV
- The IT Crowd gave us Peter Phile, who was unfortunate enough to be paged over an airport loudspeaker.
- On Murphy Brown, Corky Sherwood married a man whose last name was Forrest, making her married name Corky Sherwood-Forrest. Rather ironically, the actress who played Corky, Faith Ford, was married at the time to a man whose last name was Nottingham.
- In Scrubs, one of the reasons Jordan divorced Dr. Cox (at least according to her) was because his name is, well, Dr. Cox. The problem with this is illustrated in this clip.
- And let's not forget Keith, whose last name is Dudemeister. "It's German, it means master of the dudes."
- Cox is a actually a common Irish surname (and is the 64th most common surname in the US).
- Robin Charles Scherbatsky Jr. is the king of this trope. Why? Because the name belongs to a girl.
- Chrissy from Threes Company? Her full name is Christmas Snow.
- In Alien Nation, a ship full of alien refugees with unpronounceable names arrives on Earth and all are assigned human names. Naming thousands of people can get pretty tedious, so the ones near the end of the line ended up with names like Sam Francisco, Rudyard Kipling, etc.
- The names were somewhat difficult but not prohibitively so: George Francisco (formerly Sam) was Stangya Soren'tzah and Cathy Frenkel was Gelana Vray, for example. Also, the names were selected not only for absurdity or evocation of famous humans, but also with irony or malice: a not-so-bright Tenktonese was called Albert Einstein, and another one interested in having an electric articles store was named Thomas Alva Edison. And, strangely, years after the descent, the immigration office still is funny with names: in the TV movie Dark Horizon the newly arrived Aphossno is named Norman Conquest.
- Since the film was implicitly referencing Ellis Island clerks who "Americanized" immigrant names they had trouble pronouncing (anything more complex than "Smith", basically) this was probably intentional.
- Also, in The Film Of The Series, Sam Francisco comments to Sykes (after he had said Sam's name sounded embarrassing) that "Sykes" sounds like the aliens' word for "shithead".
- On Married with Children, Marcy Rhodes takes the news that she got married to a man she doesn't remember meeting in a ceremony she also doesn't remember surprisingly well... but she's much less pleased to learn that her name is now Marcy D'Arcy.
- The generally unfortunate Doctor Who companion Peri Brown's real first name is Perpugilliam. (Yes, she's from Earth.)
- A Monty Python sketch had "A Sniveling Little Rat-Faced Git" and his wife "Dreary Fat Boring Old Git". The Gits had named their children "Dirty Lying Little Two-Faced" and "Ghastly Horrible Spotted Vicious Little". They do recognize that it's unfortunate for them to have a surname like "Git", but they're not about to change it.
- On 30 Rock, a newly engaged Cerie gushed about her future children: "I already have all the names picked out. If it's a girl, 'Bookcase'. Or 'Sandstorm'. Or maybe 'Hat'... but that's more of a boy's name."
- A segment on Have I Got News For You centered around the very poorly named Randy Bumgardner.
- They also noted that his mother's maiden name was Mincey, so he could potentially have become a Mincey-Bumgardner.
- The Depressed Persian Tow Truck Man's full name is Mofaz Idi Amin Pulpat Stalin Bin Laden Manson Johnson Always.
- With Wings.
- Supposedly there's a Hussein in there too.
- Arrested Development gives us Bob Loblaw, a lawyer.
- Saturday Night Live had a sketch called "The Life and Times of Johnny Hildo." The inability of everyone to understand that it's Hildo (with an H) drives him to commit murder. His cellmate is Larry Bagina.
- Mike Hayke. Try saying his name real fast.
Pro Wrestling
- Former ECW wrestler Balls Mahoney is an obvious example. According to his backstory, he learned to fight at a young age, fighting off bullies who picked on him because of his name. He seems to have embraced it as he got older, though, considering how Double Entendre-laced his promos were and his selection of AC/DC's "Big Balls" as his entrance theme.
Radio
- The final round of the Panel Game I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue is invariably "Late Arrivals", where the contestants come up with silly names for announcements of late arrivals at a ball for a specified demographic, usually (true to form) very bad puns. For example:
"Ladies and Gentlemen of the Interior Decorators' ball, please welcome Mr and Mrs Wall-Carpets and their son Walter Wall-Carpets."
- The "Who's on First?" radio routine by Abbott and Costello.
- Who's on first, What's on second, I Don't Know is on third, Why's the left fielder, Because is center field, Tomorrow's the pitcher, Today's the catcher, and I Don't Give A Damn is the shortstop.
- But those are explicitly called nicknames, not given names.
- Their names coulda been worse. For example, check out the amusing parody of this sketch by Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal. The first baseman is named "I *bleep*ed Your Mother" and it only goes downhill from there.
- Not forgetting Radio Active's Mike Hunt.
- The Adventures In Odyssey episode "Merchant of Odyssey" introduced an IRS agent with a name Edwin Blackgaard (not the most fortunate name to begin with) had to feel pity for.
Harold Leech: My name is Leech.
Edwin: I'm so sorry.
Tabletop Games
- This thread is full of examples. Unfortunately, the mage Koakmasheen wasn't a potions specialist.
- It's the players who do it on purpose that you need to watch out for...
- Actually discussed in the GURPS suppliment GURPS Mixed Doubles, filled with sample Super Hero characters. One mentioned, Streaker, went into retirement in part because his crimefighting pseudonym (originally from the streaky afterimages from his Super Speed) was adopted as a term for running through a public place naked.
Video Games
- Grand Theft Auto: Vice City has Lance Vance, which he got mocked for in high school. Tommy Vercetti says it all: "Lance Vance. Poor bastard."
- Vercetti uses the name as a Berserk Button to wreck Vance's concentration during their final battle; Vance's last words, accordingly, are "I said I had enough of that in school!"
- One of the mock commercials in You Don't Know Jack: Fifth Dementia is for "The Society for People With Unfortunate Names", including such members as Eileen Dover and her husband Ben.
- Super Robot Wars 4Koma comics often make fun of how Aya Kobayashi may be related with Zeta Gundam's Katz Kobayashi. Aya does NOT take that treatment well.
- In Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney, there is an aging security guard who just can't shut up. Her name is Wendy Oldbag.
- Ty The Tasmanian Tiger has "Bush Rescue". Perfectly accurate for the Australian Outback, but a poor choice nonetheless.
- Poor Guybrush Threepwood is the running joke of the Monkey Island series.
- A man in the first game who mocks his name is called Mancomb Seepgood.
- This one has a strange backstory, though — his original name was "Guy", and the bizarre image editor they used gave him the extension ".brush." After a bit of thinking, they decided to just keep calling him that, but they put out a call for a last name, and someone suggested "Threepwood". Apparently it's a reference to something.
- Of course, if we're going to mention Monkey Island, we have to mention Haggis McMutton from the third game:
Haggis: "Well, Haggis is only my nickname. My true name is 'Heart Lungs And Liver Boiled In The Stomach Of The Animal McMutton'."
Guybrush: "Oh, so your parents were expecting a girl."
Haggis: "Aye"
- EarthBound: Poo.
- Possibly some of the characters from the StarFox series: First names of Fox, Wolf, Panther and Pigma (who names their kid that?) and last names of Toad, Hare, and Pepper.
In a Super Smash Bros. Brawl conversation:
Solid Snake Colonel, there's a guy in here who looks like a wolf...
Colonel Roy Campbell: You mean the fighter named Wolf.
Solid Snake: "Wolf." Real imaginative name.
- An old DOS game (which had cutscenes animated by the same studio that made some CD-i games featured a titular villain named I.M. Meen.
- Sniggerbobble, a character from a few series of Mario World hacks as seen in that video. Apart from setting off a few word censors, the name itself is just... incredibly difficult to take seriously. Especially anything else named after it, which added said name in front of a normal word.
- EVE Online has the Thukker Tribe. Yes. Really. Some of the system names aren't much better, and even the random alphanumeric 0.0 system names have a few
wall bulkhead bangers.
Web Comics
Web Original
- In the Whateley Universe, there's a teenager at Whateley Academy named Harry Wolfe. He looks like a werewolf. His family is cursed, so the boys look like werewolves. Who the heck gives his kid a name like that under those circumstances?
- Survival of the Fittest's answer to this trope is Adonis Zorba. Utter Narm.
Western Animation
- In The Simpsons episode Flaming Moes, when Moe's bar is actually popular. Bart makes a prank phone call for a "Hugh Jass" (Huge Ass), and to his surprise, there actually is a guy with the name of Hugh Jass.
- In another episode, Cletus reveals that he names his kids after what they think will happen to them when they grow up. Isn't that right, Getsstabbedinprison?
- The Venture Brothers "Phantom Limb" "Dr. Girlfriend" "White Noise" "Major Tom" and "The Action man" are old friends of Dr.Jonas Venture. One episode opens with a communication between The Action Man and Major Tom that copied lyrics from a classic David Bowie tune.
- Looney Tunes used to play with this, the initials I.M. before a name suggesting their profession.
- Woody Woodpecker once had a character named Ivan Awfulitch.
- In an episode of SpongeBob SquarePants where SpongeBob and Squidward were trying to name all the customers that come to the Krusty Krab, they come across a guy that they don't know, so they ask his name. He keeps saying "Whatsit Tooya". Turns out it was his real name.
- Smittywerben Jeggar Manjensen. Full stop.
- Played with in an episode of Family Guy: Peter tries to drum up support for a new pro-smoking bill. He then encounters (real-life) House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-TX) and laughs hysterically at his name, refuses to believe it is his real name and then mocks him asking if his wife is called "Vagina Coastguard".
- "Hello, my name is Larry Littlejunk." The names go downhill from there.
Real Life
- A Cherokee man, who's last name was "Pickup", named his son "Chevy Ford". His son had a very hard life and is now in prison. What a dick.
- Nick Cage named his son after Superman.
- Nicolas Cage is actually a member of the Coppola family. He chose this name for himself after Luke Cage, Marvel Comics' Power Man. Ironically, Luke Cage wasn't his real name either; he changed it from Carl Lucas after he got out of prison by smashing through the wall.
- Several cases where parents have named their kid ESPN. After the cable network.
- The Chinese warlord Cao Cao's personal name (the second Cao) is in modern Chinese one of the many characters for "fuck", and is part of the infamous "grass mud horse" meme.
- A judge intervened, removed custody from her parents, and allowed a nine year old girl an early name change, because her parents named her "Talula Does The Hula From Hawaii".
- There is a phenomenon quoted by New Scientist of Nominative Determinism — they list examples of people called De Ath becoming Undertakers, that kind of thing.
- There is also a psychological aspect in which children are named for the aspirations they want their child to live up to:
- Cristal... you know? Like the Champagne?
- Children named Mercedes, Miata, Porsche or Portia.
- "She called her daughter A-Lexus" - Kanye West
- Although considering Mercedes is the name of Edmond Dante's Fiancée in The Count Of Monte Cristo, does that make this Older Than Radio?
- People got their first. Karl Benz named his car company after his daughter, Ms. Mercedes Benz.
- In Spanish-talking countries, it's a common name, and it's usually abbreviated to "Meche".
- As was Portia — it's a Shakespearean character.
- Porsche is a surname, but using surnames as first names and vice versa is common in some countries: Gordon, Lindsay and Leslie are common first names and surnames in Scotland, for example.
- Children named Maximilian.
- David Letterman had a Top Ten List about funny names, and the people there showed their driver's licenses to prove them. Names like Theodore Bear, Richard Hurtz, Richard Head, Harold Dong, and Justa Duck.
- The city of Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, which chose to rename itself after the TV show.
- And yet Richard Branson is still building a spaceport there.
- Texas art collector and daughter of the Governor Ima Hogg.
- There are baseball players named Milton Bradley (also the name of a board game company) and Coco Crisp (sounds a hell of a lot like a cereal).
- Coco Crisp's real first name is Covelli.
- There's also a pitcher named Grant Balfour.
- Filmmaker Kevin Smith named his daughter Harley Quinn Smith. Yes, after that Harley Quinn.
- At least it's not as bad as the name of Jason Lee's son: Pilot Inspektor (sic).
- There was a cartoon in the National Lampoon about a guy whose last name was Kismias (I may be wrong about the spelling, but either way the pronunciation is what you'd expect). He kept bungling social situations, getting in trouble with the cops, etc., but he got his revenge by marrying and begetting a lot of little Kismiases.
- After Alex Haley's Roots came out, there were many children named Kunta Kinte. Kunta Kinte is a real name in Africa, but it was not one that was in common use in the USA until then. It is not in common usage in the USA now, so it is a tweaked example.
- And then there's Dick Van Dyke...
- Similarly, Alan Tudyk. Heh. Tudyk.
- And (now-retired) NASCAR driver, Dick Trickle (who was more known for being Keith Olbermann's go-to NASCAR quip than his win/loss record).
- He was the inspiration for the name of the NASCAR driver played by Tom Cruise in Days of Thunder: Cole Trickle.
- And there's the Nutt brothers of college sports: Ole Miss head football coach Houston, and his younger brother, Arkansas St. A.D. and basketball coach, Dickey. (Yes, "Dickey Nutt".)
- At least there wasn't a brother named Buster.
- Michael Hunt is another one along similar lines to Richard Head. http://www.yournotme.com tells us that both are more common than you'd
hope expect.
- Yahoo Answers: What's the most unfortunate name you ever heard?
- Stephen Bond has written about the social implications of his surname.
- Try being the ornithologist who James Bond was named after.
- This editor actually worked with a gentleman whose real name was "James Bond".
- The name of the photographer that took pictures during the 1947 Roswell Incident was named James Bond Johnson. He preferred to be called J. Bond Johnson though, and Ian Fleming's James Bond wasn't created until 1952.
- Ross Perot's choice for Vice President in 1992 was named James Bond Stockdale. Best known for forgetting where he was during the middle of a debate.
- Batman bin Suparman would have been the coolest superhero in the history of comics... if not for the fact that he exists in Real Life.
- There is a singer named Crystal Waters.
- ... And the Lear family (of Lear Jet fame) named one of their daughters Crystal Shanda.
- A speaker at an Asian conference congratulated Western delegates for pronouncing his name Lee Bum Suk correctly, and not making it Lee Boom Sook (according to a newspaper clipping reprinted in Fortean Times).
- Freakonomics devotes a chapter to the reasons names are chosen, and the effects their bearers' lives, including Winner Lane, remarkable only for his criminal record, and his brother Loser, a commended police officer.
- And let's not forget poor little shit-HEED...
- Jamaican Olympic Sprinter Usain Bolt is considered one of if not the fastest man alive.
- People who share a namesake with a Hurricane or Cyclone, particularly if the storm in question was really destructive:
- Andrew
- Charley
- Gloria
- Ivan
- Katrina
- In fall 2005, the woman by that name who owned the URL katrina.com turned down all offers (some presumably quite lucrative) to purchase the domain name, and instead put a hotlink to the Red Cross website at the top, in a personal Crowning Moment Of Awesome.
- Rita
- This troper has a friend named Rita, whose sister is named Katrina... and their brother, Kenny, was apparently a typhoon out in the Pacific that same year, although he doesn't seem to have done as much damage.
- Roxanne
- Wilma
- Celebrities seem to consider it a prestige thing to give their children Unfortunate Names.
- Gwen Stefani has two sons — Kingston and Zuma Nesta Rock.
- Bruce Willis has three daughters — Rumer Glenn, Scout LaRue, and Tallulah Belle.
- Dweezil and Moon Unit are the children of Frank Zappa, though Dweezil was a nickname the kid picked himself.
- Frank actually wanted to name the kid Dweezil but they wouldn't let him.
- Sylvester Stallone's children are Sage Moonblood and Seargeoh. His daughters are Sophia Rose, Sistine Rose and Scarlet Rose.
- Cher's son is Elijah Blue.
- Her
daughter Chastity son's name is Chaz.
- Your Milage May Vary; Robert Rodriguez' sons Rocket, Racer, Rogue, and Rebel (his daughter's name is Rhiannon).
- The Phoenix family has River and Rainbow.
- And Leaf. Though he now goes by Joaquin.
- Their younger sisters are named Liberty and Rain.
- Penn Jillette defended naming his son Zoltan as follows: "It's a proper Hungarian name, and my wife's maiden name. It's also the name of Dracula's dog."
- He doesn't have such a good excuse for naming his daughter (Zoltan's older sister) "Moxie CrimeFighter", however.
- This troper can confirm that defense is quite good, as a very good friend of his is a Hungarian man named Zoltan, who professes to hate his name due to its incredible commonality.
- The lead singer of Korn, Jonathan Davies, has named two of his sons Pirate and Zeppelin.
- Ironically a lot of people have commented on the unfortunate and strange names Will Ferrel gave his sons. They are named Magnus and Matthias, two names extremely common in his wife's native Sweden. Needless to say, Swedes don't get what people find so odd about the names.
- Nor do English speakers who know that both are uncommon but perfectly legitimate names in English.
- Football player Magnus Hedman named his first son Lancelot, which is fairly okay. However he named his second son Tristan From Avalon. Especially stupid since in the Arthurian legends, Tristan wasn't even from Avalon...
- Actress Kimberly Elise apparently named her children AjaBleu and Butterfly. This troper doesn't know their genders.
- In an unfortunate coincidence, Olympic Gold Medalist Michael Phelps' father is named Fred Phelps, linking him to the controversial leader of the infamous Westboro Baptist Church.
- It's probably considered unfortunate now to be named Michael Jackson. In the UK, people with that name include a general and a TV executive.
- A black man by that name, though unrelated to the singer, ran for office in Louisiana's 6th Congressional district in 2008. Nearly every time the election was mentioned on the Swing State Project blog, references were made to Michael Jackson (the singer) songs. This troper's personal favorites include "This is Bad; he needs to Beat It."
- Speaking of which, MJ's children are named Prince Michael, Paris Michael (girl), and Prince Michael II (AKA "Blanket" or the-one-who-was-dangled-from-a-balcony). He ran out of ideas awfully fast.
- This troper does not know if it counts, but the Fox network's children's block back in the days was named Fox Kids. Did it not come up during the marketing meetings how that sounded?
- Dr. Cockburn, Urologist.
- This troper works at an academic health science and medical center in the US South. When he was first employed there, the head of the Urology Department in the College of Medicine was "Dr. Cox".
- This troper has a dentist whose last name is Driller. Also, a nearby company called Beenhakker (which translates as "Leg-chopper") makes wheelchairs...
- My family dentist is named Dr. Smolarz.
- The chiropractor in this troper's area bears the last name "Hollar" and displays it prominently on the sign outside their office.
- One in this troper's area is Dr. Payne.
- My mom used to go to an eye doctor named I. Doctor
- A podiatrist in this troper's home town was Dr. Foote.
- Barack Hussein Obama. What other politician has been accused of Islamic terrorism (admittedly by some very stupid people) solely based on his name?
- Stupid and racist, considering that "Hussein" is a perfectly respectable Arabic name, and, in fact, one of the most common names in the world, at least, so I've heard. This editor takes wicked delight in referring to President-Elect Hussein, just to piss-off people who think his name alone should somehow count as a point against him.
- Apparently his mother's name was originally Stanley Anne Dunham, because her father wanted a boy. Having Unfortunate Names run in the family is true misfortune.
- It's only unfortunate by context of comparison to that other guy. It means "beloved".
- On this editor's list of things to do if he ever gets the chance: ask voice actor Richard Cox if he had a rough childhood with that name.
- If he flies off the handle about it, just tell him, "SIT BOY!!!"
- Currently, a Scientologist named "Feline Butcher" is being prosecuted in Los Angeles for 18 counts of practicing medicine without a license. Kind of interesting considering that Scientology has a history of injuring and/or killing the pets of its critics to scare them into silence... Allegedly, of course.
- The last name of the bishop who was recently appointed as new chairman of the italian Episcopal Conference is Crociata, "crusade". Given the times, between more acute religious clashes and the backward conservatism of the current Pope...
- Speaking of Italy, the current leader of one of the national police forces is called Antonio Manganelli. Manganelli means "truncheons" in Italian.
- Sarah Palin's children Track Enfield, Bristol, Willow, Piper Indy Grace, and Trig Paxson Van. She has recently announced the intention to name a hypothetical sixth child Zamboni. (Apparently, though, that sort of thing is not uncommon in Alaska.)
- Bristol named her son Tripp, making it look like a family naming tradition in the works.
- Alice Cooper named his daughters Calico and Sonora Rose. His son was luckier: his name is Dashiell.
- Honda had to rename one of their car models, Honda Fitta ("small on the outside, but it feels big once you're in it!") when launching it in Scandinavia since "fitta" is the Swedish word for "cunt."
- Dick Butkus.
- Nothing says "I'm a Utah Mormon!" like naming your baby girl Vulva Mae. Really.
- A woman in South Carolina named Princess Killingsworth tried to kill her boyfriend by running him over with her car during an argument. Really.
- There is at least one British resident called Slobodan Milosevic, who needless to say was on the receiving end of quite a few prank calls during the Balkan wars.
- British tenor Paul Potts, whose name unfortunately sounds somewhat like the nickname of a certain Cambodian dictator.
- Hell, Potts itself is pretty unfortunate.
- Urhines Kendall Icy Eight Special K. But, recognizing how absurd this is, I have cited a source.
- Current British government ministers include Alistair Darling, Ed Balls and Stephen Ladyman.
Jeremy Clarkson: Our transport department is now being run by Darling and Ladyman.
- Truth In Television: Apparently, Sean Connery was once pulled over by a policeman named James Bond.
- By the way, connerie is a rude word in French (meaning "stupidity", more or less). He has been famous long enough for us to get used to it, but it must have been awkward at first.
- Similarly, Depp (as in Johnny) is German for "fool/idiot".
- The British Chief of the Defence Staff is named Graham Eric Stirrup, but he goes by the nickname "Jock". That's right: Jock Stirrup. The Daily Show had a field day with this.
- That's Sir Jock Stirrup thank you very much. As his name was typically displayed during occasional interviews.
- Mongolian names, for complicated cultural reasons, often translate as things like "Who's That?" or "Bad Dog." That Other Wiki says it has to do with misdirecting evil spirits.
- Tim Allen was born Timothy Allen Dick; you think that's bad, pity his Uncle Richard.
- Academy Award-nominated actor Richard Dix, anyone?
- Some girl was named "Shadynasty". No, it's not pronounced "shady-nasty". (It's "sha-dynasty".)
- Likewise, the name LaDynasty is not unheard of in at least one rural area of southern Louisiana.
- Too much children of celebrities. Oh so many.
- Former House Majority Leader Dick Armey. It Got Worse when he started funding tax protests that became known as "teabaggers" for their original plans to send teabags to the White House, and David Shuster took full advantage of this in a Double Entendre-laced rant: "And in Cavuto‘s defense, if you are planning simultaneous teabagging all around the country, you‘re going to need a Dick Armey."
- Late Rep. Tom Lantos (a real-life Bad Ass, in this troper's opinion) had two sons-in-law named Timber Dick (now also deceased) and Dick Swett.
- There is a mountain in Bavaria called "Wank". Partially Clips had some fun with this here.
- Similarly, Wankdorf is a suburb of the Swiss capital Berne. It's best known for the football stadium.
- A football stadium which is home to the Young Boys.
- I'd heard of the Young Boys, but when I clicked that link, I was sure that it was a joke article. Seriously, were they just trying to cram more Double Entendres into that headline because they figured there was no way to save it?
- In Cincinnati, Ohio and surrounding areas, there is a dish which consists of spaghetti noodles, Cincinnati-style chili, and grated cheddar cheese. Its name? "Three-Way".
- If you add onions or beans it is called a four way. If you onions and beans it is called a five way.
- Although it doesn't really count as 'unfortunate' since the guy wanted this, but back in 2003, a National Guardsman legally changed his name to Optimus Prime.
- Three highly unfortunate kids in New Jersey were named Adolf Hilter, JoyceLynn Aryan Nation, and Honszlynn Hinler Jeannie. They made national news after their mother and father threw a fit over being refused a birthday cake for young Adolf. Full story here: [1]
- Wasn't there also a girl named Dresden?
- Strangely, Indian politician Adolf Lu Hitler Marak does not seem to suffer from the same problems.
- A postman in Harrow, made briefly famous by Twitter, who embraced the jokes by adding his middle initial to his name badge: "Chris P. Bacon".
- Fucking, Austria. The town spends considerable money replacing a street sign bearing the town's name because it is constantly being stolen.
- Beulah Grapes. Most of you kids probably haven't ever seen the Mae West film I'm No Angel. Yeah, me neither. However, it contains the somewhat famous line "Beulah, peel me a grape," which is to this day sometimes used Just For Pun. She got her name before said movie was ever made, poor thing.
- P.G. Wodehouse's name was Pelham Grenville. A popular rumor is that he refused knighthood for years to put off being known as Sir Pelham.
- Dick Sprang: Legendary Golden Age artist who designed the Riddler alongside Bob Kane and pretty much defined the art style for the Caped Crusader during the fifties (incidentally enough, he did not do the artwork for the infamous "Joker's Boner" story.)
- New Hampshire senator Jeanne Shaheen. And the man she ran against was named John Sununu.
- In a similar vein, this troper saw lawn signs for the election campaign of Jacqueline Schnackertz.
- In The Nineties, Virginia Bottomley was a minister in John Major's cabinet in the UK.
- There is a person in this troper's school with the last name "Wanko". It's not pronounced the way it's spelled, but not even the teachers seem to care..
- Max Wanko worked on the sound department for quite a few Uwe Boll films, and this troper still remember the first time his brother noticed this. It's like some superhero name, and now the mental image of the Spiderman scene where he accidentally wrecks his room by shooting sticky strands of goo from his wrists will not leave his head.
- In a thread for Unfortunate Names, Something Awful goons found the Social Security Death Index and went to town. They generally agreed that "Science Thompson" was one of the best names.
- The name of a contestant on an early series of Big Brother — however, it was later revealed to be a nickname derived from what had been his best school subject and his real first name was the more ordinary Kieran.
- Someone named Robert Burns called Car Talk. Click and Clack (the hosts) always refer to him as "Rrrrrrrrrroberrrrrrrrrt Burrrrrrrrrns," with an exaggerated Scots accent. (My friend said he'd never call that show if that was his name.)
- Drew Peacock
- This troper had a college classmate called Chris Peacock. His nickname, predictably, was "Crispy".
- I knew someone with the same name who had been foolish enough to become a high school teacher. The poor guy got no respect at all.
- For a catalogue of these names, see Baby's Named A Bad, Bad Thing, with real baby names among the likes of "Tegwin", "Timmy Tinkletop", "Scatman", "Bubba", and "Alexander Scott Smith", which doesn't sound bad on its own, but...
- Tom Raper is an RV salesman in southeastern Indiana. It's hilarious hearing radio ads saying "Save today, Tom Raper's way!"
- There's a politician in the area with the last name of Crooks. Leading to many a joke.
- Peter Fanning isn't so bad — but then he named his daughter Amy Iona.
- Finnish Sissi commandos. They're not what you think.
- While reading the credits of a Saved By The Bell rerun (not much else at 3:00 AM), some guy just happened to be named Dick King. I forgot what he did on the show, because I was too busy going "LOL, Dick King".
- One of my friends' mom is a nurse, who works with obstetric patients. She was chatting with one lady, and asked, "Now that you know it's a girl, what do you think you'll name your baby?" The woman paused and said, "Well, I was looking at this poster for a charity at my doctor's office, and I thought it had a pretty name. The Chlamydia Foundation." I can only pray that the nurse gave the lady a talk she probably missed in eighth grade.
- Is my family the only one who was hoping that swimmer Misty Hymen would leap off the block too soon just to hear what the announcer would be forced to shout?
- In New York State in the 1940's and 50's, there was a man. A man who was appointed Head of Middletown State Homeopathic Hospital. This was, however, not just any man. This man was Dr. Hyman Pleasure.
- I know a guy whose name is Richard Seaman. And he actually goes by the name that is short for Richard.
- When NASCAR racer Dale Earnhardt finally won the series most popular race, the Daytona 500, he appeared on David Letterman the next night to give the "Top 10 Reasons It Took Me 25 Years To Win The Daytona 500". I can't remember the exact number, but one of them was Dale saying: "Who cares if it took me 25 years to win, at least my name's not Dick Trickle."
- While watching the extras for The Lord Of The Rings, I giggled at the name of Whakapapa state park. To add to this immaturity, I recently learned that in the Maori language whs are pronounced as fs.
- Harry Baals, Mayor of Fort Wayne, IN (1934-1947, 1951-1954).
- I know a kid named Jay Walker and another named Sam Sung.
- Gerard Way named his daughter Bandit. I'm so very disappointed.
- There is a children's author named Mc Phail.
- The first female MP in the Canadian Parliament was named Agnes Mac Phail.
- Goodluck Jonathan, Vice President of Nigeria.
- I can't believe no one has mentioned John Dickson Stufflebeem, formerly a Rear Admiral.
- It just has to be awkward to dub Anime with the name Yuri Lowenthal.
- With a voice actor named Rodger Bumpass, no wonder Squidward is such a grouch.
- One of the Deans of the School of Arts and Sciences at Rutgers University is Muffin Lord.
- Benno Baksteen (litterally translated Brick) was a Dutch airline pilot and for nearly a decade, the president of the Dutch federation of airline pilots, and as such, appeared on national television various times.
- One of the associate producers on Firefly - and some other programmes, presumably - has the unfortunate name of Brian Wankum.
- A Gay History of Britain: Love and Sex Between Men Since The Middle Ages was edited by Harry Cocks. You'd think he'd become an expert on something else, or at least start going by Henry.
- It may not sound unfortunate, but woe betide the man whose parents give him the middle name "Wayne."
- This troper went to high school with a boy named Murphy La.
- Try being Miroslav Satan - a legitimate Slovak name that when Anglicized becomes the name of Old Scratch himself.
- Particularly amusing: note the database ID he was given on the Yahoo Sports site.
- A book of the top worst British surnames gave their top nominations to Potty, Fartwell and Knob.
- This troper's aunt works at a day-care centre and keeps a list of the worst names of children passing through there. The runner up? Gavin Gob, the winner? Rocko Plonker. As well as this a (foreign) boy in this troper's school was named Wakaz (pronounced "Whack Ass").
- Ben Cheese.
- Believe it or not, John Cleese's father was born Reginald Cheese— a perfectly Pythonian name if there ever was one. Reginald changed his surname by one letter upon joining the army, and the new name was passed on to his son.
- There is actually (at least one) an american doctor named Doom.
- A Japanese family with the last name Oke decide to name their daughter Carrie.
- This troper knows a person named Fu Keung Man (say it fast).
- This Troper's name is Richard Stump. There are at least 8 more guys with the same name.
- In UK, there's a school called The Perse School for much hilarity to the finns, because perse means arse in finnish.
- What about a urologist named Dick Chopp? Specializing in vasectomies, no less.
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