Characters from Superhero Games Who Need Better Names

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

Yeah, I have one character who I named Tarantula Hawk (It's a kind of wasp) but I realised that it wouldn't stick and T-Hawk was born.

Makes me wonder about a character named "Murder Hornet". He's probably a villain.

We are encountering the "All the good names have been taken" meme.

[ak_aramis]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

No, it's because he hasn't got a secret identity. His name is simply Thor.

"What's your name?"
"Thor."
"Hi, Thor."

"What's your name?"
"Hammer Man."
"I can see that, but what's your name?"

Now I'm not up on comic books, but isn't Marvel's Thor actually supposed to be the mythological Thor and not just resemble him? He's not taking on the identity of a mythological figure; he is that mythological figure.

Not quite. On both Earth 666 and Earth 199999, the superhero is whomever wields Mjolnir. In Asgard, and to a certain number of followers, Thor Odinsson remains that... but is shamed without Mjolnir.

And thus, Marvel THor is just as much a morality play as the historical tales about him.

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Makes me wonder about a character named "Murder Hornet". He's probably a villain.

Perhaps a Japanese villain whose nom du cap was literally translated. Alternatively, a villain who is or seems to be Japanese, who ended up with the name due to some resemblance.

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

We are encountering the "All the good names have been taken" meme.

We are a bit, yeah.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Þorkell

FWIW, which isn't much since I know this is MCU Thor, not mythology Thor. But in the mythology Thor is a redhead, or at least red bearded.

Presumably, the mythology in Marvel's world(s) described Thor as having blond hair while Mjolnir was described as a short-handled maul with an oversized head, rather than our mythology which has him with red hair while Mjolnir looked something more like this. So the idea that the people call him Thor on account of him looking like the mythological description (because he was, in fact, the basis of said mythological description) makes sense in-setting - it just doesn't track quite as well in our world (or, rather, it didn't - I suspect rather more people think of Thor as blond than as a redhead these days, in no small part because of the success of the MCU).

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Makes me wonder about a character named "Murder Hornet". He's probably a villain.

We are encountering the "All the good names have been taken" meme.

Reminds me of Lord Bravery, who (following a trademark dispute with Lord Bravery Bakery and a search that determined there was literally only one name that wasn't taken) had to change it to Lord Smoked Meats and Fishes. Didn't want him to show up at the scene of an emergency, and someone mistakenly try to order a scone.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Makes me wonder about a character named "Murder Hornet". He's probably a villain.

We are encountering the "All the good names have been taken" meme.

I've been compiling quite a long list of names that have not been taken (in the sense that when I googled "Able Archer comic book character" no superhero or supervillain showed up on the first page who had that name. Of course they don't stay untaken. For example Miss Murder has been on my list for five years and DC just introduced one. Mines better.

Honestly though there's no need. Names can't be copyrighted. Marvel has a Rampage. It's a suit of power armour. DC has a Rampage. It's a golden-skinned giantess who is a lot like the Hulk. The Transformers have six Rampages that include a feline robot, a robot king crab, and a bulldozer. GI Joe has a Rampage too.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by RyanW

Reminds me of Lord Bravery, who (following a trademark dispute with Lord Bravery Bakery and a search that determined there was literally only one name that wasn't taken) had to change it to Lord Smoked Meats and Fishes. Didn't want him to show up at the scene of an emergency, and someone mistakenly try to order a scone.

Way back in the day, when City of Heroes was fairly new, I decided to name my hero The Green Shadow, which was the name of a superhero I had come up with years before... and found someone else had already taken the name. I think I tried a few more before finally just going to an English to Japanese dictionary (the character was a ninja anyway) and mashing the best-sounding words I could find for "Green" and "Shadow" together to make him Ryokukage*, which fortunately was not taken. Honestly, I think I ultimately liked that name more. And that's potentially an option if the name you want is taken - see if there's a thematically-relevant language you could translate it to, then just have the name in that. The Batman is taken? Become Die Fledermaus (which is technically The Bat in German - etymologically "The Flying Mouse" IIRC - but works fine here; also apparently it's a reference to an operetta of the same name from the 1870's).

*I'll note ryoku is an uncommon pronunciation for the relevant kanji in Japanese (it's normally midori), being more akin to the way that character is pronounced in Chinese. I opted for it because a) I thought it sounded better than midori and b) it's a homologue to a pronunciation of the kanji for Power, which with Ryo's name being written in the Roman script rather than kanji resulted in a bit of a pun, with the first part of his name potentially meaning either green or power (translating his name as Powerful Green Shadow wouldn't have been entirely inappropriate). Of course, kage is pretty standard for Shadow, particularly when talking about ninja.

[Irish Wolf]

Originally Posted by Varyon

Way back in the day, when City of Heroes was fairly new, I decided to name my hero The Green Shadow, which was the name of a superhero I had come up with years before... and found someone else had already taken the name.

That's one way in which the successor game, Champions Online, is superior - your character name is rendered unique in that the computer references your screen name as part of it (for instance, the character appearing on everyone's screens as Hypernova is known to the server as Hypernova.jonsi11s), so multiple people can have characters with the same "name". There's actually an ad-hoc group base on this, because according to the guy who created him Brigade pops off more Brigades, each with their own powers and appearance, united only by the costume. If you want to be part of that, just get the Brigade costume specs, name your own toon Brigade, and you're off to the races!

Other hand, you can't name a character Die Fliedermaus, because that was the name of the Tick character who became Batmanuel in the TV adaptation. Cryptic Studios is very sensitive to potential trademark infringement, ever since the suit filed against City of Heroes by Marvel (settled out of court after it was revealed that all the data files being presented as evidence by Marvel were created by their own employees, thus making it more of a murky area legally), and as a result have a large file of names players can't use for their characters encompassing every professionally-published comic book the developers were aware of. (I've learned about some pretty obscure heroes and villains while trying to figure out why some names were blocked...)

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

Honestly though there's no need. Names can't be copyrighted.

They cannot, which is how DC Comics has a Captain Marvel. But there are things you can't really do with a name if someone else got there first - note that the comics (and movies, etc) starring Captain Marvel wind up having to be called Shazam! instead. In a lot of modern semi-deconstruction superhero stories, the superhero's name is a brand, with associated merchandise, sponsorships (which may involve the super doing advertising for their sponsors), etc. And that is something that you need an exclusive name for.

[Irish Wolf]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

Names can't be copyrighted.

They can, however, be trademarked. Maintaining a trademark involves something called "vigorous defense"; it's why Bayer lost the trademark to the name "Aspirin", and why Kimberly-Clark will sue anyone who calls their soft facial tissues "Kleenex". Usually, it's a good idea to avoid a superhero name that's being used by one of the major corporations, as they have the wherewithal to vigorously defend their trademark.