Seems like People Sit On Chairs: Alliterative Name

There might be a trope here somewhere, but the examples seem to be people whose names happen to be alliterative for no reason whatsoever.

Well, it's certainly invoked. Comic books in particular do it to make their characters' names catchy.

• Nearly every Superman character: Clark Kent, Lois Lane, Lex Luthor, Lana Lang, Lori Lemaris...
• Spider-man: Peter Parker, Otto Octavius
• Hulk: Bruce Banner
• Fantastic Four: Reed Richards
• Daredevil: Matt Murdock
• Doctor Strange: Steven Strange

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I even know two characters it was specifically invoked for in homage to the trope:

• Nova: Richard Ryder
• The new Ulimate Spider-man: Miles Morales

Both of their names were chosen this way in homage to Spider-man.

edited 10th Feb '12 8:31:34 PM by KingZeal

It is a purposeful comicbook trope. I'm not certain that any other medium uses it to the same degree though.

Reality is that, which when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away. -Philip K. Dick

Hmm... maybe change the name to Comic Book Writers Like Alliterative Names or something, then limit examples to Comic Books and homages to comic books?

edited 10th Feb '12 8:53:44 PM by Servbot

I've seen it in parodies of superhero comics.

Fight smart, not fair.

Pattern? Yes; alliterative first-last name combinations can be catchy, and appear especially often in comic books. Trope? No; no meaning. Chairs.

Becky: Who are you? The Mysterious Stranger: An angel. Huck: What's your name? The Mysterious Stranger: Satan.

According to Stan Lee, it makes the character's name easy to remember, especially when you have Loads And Loads Of Characters.

Restricting it to comics will probably focus the page better. The Harry Potter list looks pretty significant though. Comics and fantasy? All of speculative fiction?

Regardless, the Real Life section, currently the largest folder, definitely has to go.

Support zapping the Real Life section.

Maybe restricting it to meaningful alliterative names?

I moved it to discussion for now. Here's the list of them:

I okay with scratching the Real Life section, but I think this is a valid example of Naming Conventions for use if fiction.

Naming Conventions need not always have some serious symbolic significance for it to count as such.

BTW,

Alliterative Name found in: 1068 articles, excluding discussions.

Since January 1, 2011 this article has brought 3164 people to the wiki from non-search engine links.

That is some very impressive stats. I would really be against cutting this entirely. At worse, you could move it to Trivia, but even that I think is not really needed.

edited 11th Feb '12 4:18:53 AM by Catbert

It's a tool used by a writer to make a character's name more memorable and catchy. That makes them stick better in the reader's mind and helps them differentiate between characters. That's a trope, regardless of medium it's used in.

I think it appears more often in comic books because a) I think one of the majorly influential writers loved it and b) they tend to have Loads And Loads Of Characters, making it very important to remember who's who.

I believe there's also some vague "rules" about numbers of syllables in first and last names that can make a name more catchy, but it's been a while since that writer's workshop.

I imagine that the parents of the real life individuals deliberately went with an alliterative name, so it's not a coincidence that they're named that way. That said, the list doesn't add anything to the trope, so axing it will make the page cleaner.

edited 11th Feb '12 6:05:44 AM by ccoa

Waiting on a TRS slot? Finishing off one of these cleaning efforts will usually open one up.

Then the description should at least show that.

and : I agree 100%.

Better?

EDIT: I think I remembered the rule. Multi-syllable first name with one syllable last name OR one syllable first name with multi-syllable last name. It makes a name more catchy. Think that's worth YKTT Wing, if only as a definition?

edited 11th Feb '12 6:37:14 AM by ccoa

Waiting on a TRS slot? Finishing off one of these cleaning efforts will usually open one up.

Looks good to me.

Page looks much better. We should probably add a No Real Life Examples Please to the page or they're going to grow back.

Reality is that, which when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away. -Philip K. Dick

Added. Anything else to do?

"If you aren't him, then you apparently got your brain from the same discount retailer, so..." - Fighteer

Nope. I think we can call this fixed.

I actually think that real life examples are OK, as long as the names are not real names but Stage Names.

I was just thinking of that while reading this. In that case, examples should make clear it is a stage name, or else it will turn out a mess again.

The Internet misuses, abuses, and overuses everything.

We could use a "Pen Name" section.

Fight smart, not fair.

I believe that's Sesquipedalian Smith.

That's one of them, anyway. I suppose I'll do the inverse. And that one's description needs clarification, too.

EDIT: On second thought, I'll just TRS that one and try to broaden it. That's way too narrow.

edited 12th Feb '12 5:59:23 AM by ccoa

Waiting on a TRS slot? Finishing off one of these cleaning efforts will usually open one up.

@23: Never, ever use more than two ^'s at a time. If you need to reference something that far back, do @username and/or @postnumber instead.

edited 12th Feb '12 10:43:07 AM by Stratadrake

An Ear Worm is like a Rickroll: It is never going to give you up.