Embarrassing Middle Name

"Having perhaps the most unfortunate middle name that someone who dedicated his life to interacting with children could possibly have, it's no surprise that Fred McFeely Rogers was known to all of us by his more formal title: Mister Rogers."

- From this article from Cracked.

Sitcom characters have a tendency to have embarrassing middle names that they keep a deep, dark secret from everybody.

Also can apply when a newlywed woman appends her husband's name to her own, creating a funny combination.

Often comes out when a character's mother, wife, or other significant figure launches into a Full Name Ultimatum. It can also be used as a retort to Metaphor Is My Middle Name.

Similar to, but easier to hide than, the Embarrassing First Name. Could be a component of an Unfortunate Name. See also Tomboyish Name.

Once the name is revealed, another character often repeats it immediately after. Usually in a humorously questioning tone.

There are examples of this in Real Life -- some cultures believe that to publicly reveal the name of their newborn child will curse them (or attract unwanted infernal attention); their solution is to give the child a 'placeholder' name that is purely humorous or inappropriate, and allow them to take their 'real' name when they reach a certain age.

It's also common in some cultures for infants to be named in honor of ancestors (typically grandparents) or as part of a multi-generational naming tradition. This can result in embarrassment as names become unfashionable or strongly associated with a certain gender over time (e.g., Meredith, Hilary, Ashley). May also lead to a Who Names Their Kid "Dude"?.

Anime & Manga
""Don't ask what the "B" stands for; it's an embarrassing name my father came up with when he was drunk.""
 * Mahou Sensei Negima has the powerful, legendary, Noble Demon vampire Evangeline A. K. McDowell. According to Albireo "Colonel Sanders" Imma, The K stands for Kitty. Of course, it actually stands for Katherine.
 * Evangeline also has the Meaningful Name shtick going with her first middle name, Athanasia.
 * Katherine is probably also intended to be meaningful as a reference to Hecate, a Greek Goddess associated with Witchcraft.
 * Yu-Gi-Oh!: Marik Ishtar's middle name, according to The Abridged Series, is Sebastian.
 * It's a title rather than a name, and it only appears in the novels, but Lina Inverse, star of The Slayers, has the official Wizard Guild title of "Lina the Pink Sorceress". Seeing as how she's a tomboyish Chaotic Neutral Tsundere, this embarrasses the hell out of her.
 * William B. Baxter, a minor character in Eureka Seven

Comic Books
"Computer: Identity confirmed: Anthony Edward Stark.
 * Iron Man is a bit defensive about his middle name.

Spider-Man: Anthony Edward Stark?

Iron Man: You got a problem with that?

Spider-Man: Nosir."


 * In the Archie Comic adaptation of Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic's middle name is Maurice. His parents call him by that name, but he dislikes it. (His first name is implied to be more embarrassing.)
 * It is. Word of God said that it's "Olgilvie". Don't worry, they've promised that they'll never, ever bring it up.
 * OK, it's an embarrassing last name, but seriously: The Hitler-like dictator of Britain in V for Vendetta is named Adam Susan? No wonder they changed his name into Sutler in The Movie.
 * The Flash: Wally West's full name is Wallace Rudolph West.

Fan Works

 * Mephisto Marley in Sara's Girl's Foundations. In his archaic pureblooded family, it's tradition that the second child gets the mother's first name as their middle name. Mephisto is the second child. His mother's name is Florence. At one point, Harry calls him "Flo" as revenge for him calling Harry "Wonder Boy" all the time.
 * DARCUS TAYLOR YAGAMI!
 * Sirius Valentine Black.

Film

 * In the film/play/now a film again The Producers, Adolf Hitler's middle name is revealed to be Elizabeth. ("Many people don't know diss, but ze Fuhrer vass descended from a long line of English kveens.") Coincidentally, director and English (drag)queen Roger DeBris in the same movie shares this middle name.
 * In Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, you learn Dumbledore's full name, all of which are Meaningful Names: Albus ("white") Percival (a knight of the Round Table) Wulfric (a famous healer in the 11th century) Brian ("exalted; high-minded") Dumbledore (Old English for "bumblebee"). In the movie, he proudly rattles off his name until "Brian" comes up, which he mutters, picking up the volume for his surname.
 * Rodgers & Hammerstein's Cinderella does this with the entire royal family, giving them each an embarrassing (or rather, disarmingly prosaic) antepenultimate name. For example, the crown prince is "Christopher Rupert Windemere Vladimir Carl Alexander Francois Reginald Lancelot Herman Gregory James."
 * Which makes one wonder...who would torture a child with a middle name like Windemere?
 * His parents have "Sidney" and "Maisie" as their respective embarrassing names.
 * Weirdly, the king actually refers to the queen as "Maisie" when they are alone, despite the fact that it's unusual and is neither her first nor her last name.
 * You could call it weird, or you could call it incredibly adorable. It would be embarrassing if someone else called her that, but since it's her husband and they're totally in love, he can call her by her embarassing middle name as an endearment.
 * Mel Brooks' character in High Anxiety is renowned psychologist Dr. Richard H. Thorndyke. The "H" stands for "Harpo."
 * The Right Stuff. Astronaut Virgil "Gus" Grissom's middle name is Ivan.
 * The extended scenes shot for the TV showings of John Carpenter's Halloween reveal The Shape's full name to be Michael Audrey Myers. We now know the real reason behind his homicidal rampage.
 * In House Party, Kid asks Sydney what her middle name is. She says it's LaToya, obviously not liking the name much. Kid then says, "'Sydney'... that's a nice name."
 * In Meet the Parents, Pam's middle name is Martha, which was fine until she got engaged to Gaylord Focker.
 * In Alfred Hitchcock's North By Northwest, Roger Thornhill's middle initial is O, making his initials R.O.T. Doesn't stop him from having his matchbooks monogrammed, though.

Literature
""That is true," answered the little Wizard; "therefore it will give me pleasure to explain my connection with your country. In the first place, I must tell you that I was born in Omaha, and my father, who was a politician, named me Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkle Emmannuel Ambroise Diggs, Diggs being the last name because he could think of no more to go before it. Taken altogether, it was a dreadfully long name to weigh down a poor innocent child, and one of the hardest lessons I ever learned was to remember my own name. When I grew up I just called myself O. Z., because the other initials were P-I-N-H-E-A-D; and that spelled 'pinhead,' which was a reflection on my intelligence.""
 * In the Discworld novel Carpe Jugulum, thanks to the christening being performed by a flustered and absent-minded Omnian priest, Magrat's daughter is accidentally named Esmerelda Margaret Note Spelling of Lancre. (Her mother was trying to make sure he said "Margaret" rather than "Magrat".)
 * The same novel had a passing reference to a former ruler of Lancre called King My God He's Heavy the First, and a man called James What The Hell's That Cow Doing In Here Poorchick (or Moocow Poorchick to his friends). The culture has a rule that whatever is actually said at the christening must become their permanent, official name, with no allowance for error or provision to change it.
 * There's also One Man Bucket, or to give him his full name, One Man Throwing A Bucket Of Water Over Two Dogs. His tribe names children after the first thing the mother sees when she looks out of the tent after the birth. Apparently his twin, born a few minutes earlier 'would have given his right arm to have been called Two Dogs Fighting' (an oblique reference to an ancient and very non-PC American joke.)
 * Also, Miss Dearheart's full name is Adora Belle Dearheart. Really, it's little wonder that her fiance calls her 'Spike'.
 * Lord Peter Wimsey's middle name is Death, though he doesn't seem particularly embarrassed by it; in Murder Must Advertise, he even uses it as an alias.
 * Death from de'Ath (Ath is a town in Belgium).
 * Not necessarily - it could come from playing Death in nativity plays (like Angel or Life), or an old word for a leatherworker.
 * Incidentally, "Death" is a quite genuine surname, though most people afflicted with it understandably prefer to spell it like the town in Belgium.
 * In the McGurk mystery series by author E. W. Hildick, the character Jack P. McGurk's middle name is outed as being Perseverance.
 * In Stephen King's The Dark Tower series, Eddie Dean's middle name is Cantor. He asks Jake not to spread it around.
 * In Species Imperative: Survival, the main character typically goes by "Mac". When dealing with an alien species that places honor on long names, she is forced to intro herself fully as "Mackenzie Winifred Elizabeth Wright Connor" -- in front of her best friend, who nearly bursts out laughing.
 * The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was stuck with a slew of these in the original Oz novels as he explains to Princess Ozma in this quotation from "Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz":


 * Polly in The Old-Girl Network has the middle-name Esther, which doesn't sound embarassing. Until you find out that Polly's father gave her that middle-name after a hippie friend named his daughter Silke, and you try saying Polly's name fast.
 * Good Omens gave us a young girl named Pippin Galadriel Moonchild, who is perfectly happy to flatten anyone who doesn't call her Pepper.
 * PG Wodehouse was very fond of embarrassing names, first, middle, or otherwise.
 * Bertie Wooster's middle name was Wilberforce (his father won money on a horse named Wilberforce), which seemed to cause him varying levels of discomfort depending on his mood.
 * Lemuel Gengulphus Trotter.
 * The protagonist of The Fools in Town Are On Our Side by Ross Thomas hates his middle name of Clarence. So much that he actually prefers (barely) his first name: Lucifer.
 * In The Sherwood Ring,.
 * Nymphadora Tonks from the Harry Potter novels doesn't like it when people use her first name, and is thus only called "Tonks". When a fan asked J.K. Rowling why Tonks doesn't use her middle name instead of her first, the author revealed that Tonks' middle name is "Vulpecula", in keeping with the Black family tradition of naming children after constellations, stars, and other heavenly phenomena.
 * Nita Callahan of the Young Wizards series inexplicably hates her middle name, Louise. Carmela, on the other hand, doesn't mind her own middle name ("Emeda") at all, despite the incredibly weird story behind it.
 * In the YA novel Soul Beach by Kate Harrison the main character's middle name is Florence because her parents conceived her in an Italian hotel on their wedding anniversary. It's not as bad as her older sister's middle name, which is London. It could've been worse though, because her elder sister's middle name was supposed to be 'Shepherd's Bush', but apparently her "mother knew that would be a step too far."
 * Discussed in Septimus Heap, where Merrin meredith takes on a pseudonym because he's embarassed of the "Meredith" part in his name.

Live Action TV
"Marlene: I didn't know Rodney's middle name was Charlton.
 * On The Dick Van Dyke Show, Ritchie's middle name is revealed to be, for convoluted reasons, Rosebud.
 * Chandler Bing's middle name in Friends is Muriel.
 * "I can handle it. 'Handle' is my middle name. ...Actually, 'Handle' is the middle of my first name." (Sorry, I just had to.)
 * As brought up several times on the show, he technically has an Embarrasing First and Last Name too. (Same here.)
 * The Class: Richard Brittany Velch
 * Twice on Laverne & Shirley, Shirley Feeny was embarrassed to reveal that her middle name was Willamina.
 * Leonard Hofstadter from The Big Bang Theory has the middle name Leakey, after famous archeologist Louis Leakey. It's not related to his history of bedwetting, as Sheldon is eager to note.
 * Arnold J. Rimmer in Red Dwarf claims his middle name is Jonathan; it is actually Judas. Kryten the android also considers his own middle name (2X4B) to be a "jerky" middle name, although he claims to know a "poor sucker" with an even worse one: 2Q4B.
 * Drew Carey's middle name in The Drew Carey Show is Allison. (Also the actor's real middle name)
 * Mimi: "Wow, all three of your names are girls' names!"
 * Geoffrey, the butler on The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, has the unfortunate middle name of Barbara.
 * The characters from UK Sitcom Bottom have embarrassing names as it is - Richie Richard and Eddie Hitler - but in a possible nod to The Producers, Eddie's full name is Edward Elizabeth Hitler. (Also a subversion, in that he finds his middle name more embarrassing.)
 * Kurt from Series/Glee once signed his name "Kurt Elizabeth Hummel" though it's unclear whether or not this is a legit embarrassing middle name, or just one he's taken on himself and actually likes.
 * On Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Xander's middle name is Lavelle. As if he wasn't the Buttmonkey without that.
 * Sean Garrity's middle name on Rescue Me is Leslie.
 * On Greys Anatomy, Callie's middle name is Iphigenia.
 * And her first name is really Calliope. At least her parents were consistent in their love for classic, mythological Greek names.
 * MST3K's Dr. Forrester's full name was Clayton Deborah Susan Forrester. Of course, his mother had really wanted him to be a girl...
 * Rodney in Only Fools and Horses, as revealed at his wedding.
 * Rodney in Only Fools and Horses, as revealed at his wedding.

Del: Yeah, it was Mum. She was a fan.

Marlene: Of Charlton Heston?

Del: No, Charlton Athletic."

"George: What're we gonna call him?
 * A medium supposedly channelling Boycie's father reveals his middle name to be Aubrey.
 * On Eight Simple Rules, Cate's middle initial of S was revealed by her father not to stand for "Stacey," but "Stinky."
 * James Tiberius Kirk.
 * Though in the second pilot, Kirk's middle initial is given as 'R'. One might speculate that his birthname is so embarrassing that he changed it to "Tiberius". The "Tiberius" enters the Canon from the animated series. This actually started as a joke during the Q & A at a convention. (Dammit, Jim, I was THERE.) When asked "What does the T stand for?" Majel Barrett wisecracked "Tiberius"; and when we all groaned, retorted "Would you prefer Theobald?"
 * Will Riker hates his middle name. In a bit of a subversion though he has the rather conventional middle name of "Thomas."
 * Deep Space 9 - Captain Sisko's father reveals his son's full name to be Benjamin Lafayette Sisko in one episode, and the retired head of Cardasian intelligence reveals Julian Bashir's middle name to be Subatoi.
 * In a weird related Real Life semi-example, Russell Davies didn't have a middle name, but he decided to take an middle initial as to avoid being confused for another Russell Davies in television. It was only after he started becoming established that people kept going "Oh! Like James T Kirk!" Then he became embarrassed.
 * In Degrassi the Next Generation, J.T. Yorke's name is James Tiberius Yorke.
 * Lampshaded in the pre-boot.

Winona: We could name him after your father.

George: Tiberius? You kiddin' me? No, that's the worst!"

"Ronnie B: I knew a girl named Virginia Randy once. Dreadful business. She married a chap named Henry Drawers, so now she's -
 * Ted Eveline Mosby on How I Met Your Mother.
 * And Robin Charles Scherbatsky
 * And
 * Hey, that one's not embarrassing- IT'S AWESOME!
 * In Whatever Happened to The Likely Lads?, Terry goes to church in order to eavesdrop on his best friend Bob's embarrassing middle name, which he'd been trying to learn since he was a child. The middle name turns out to be Scarborough, after where he was conceived.
 * Polly from Major Dad, whose middle name turned out to be Esther. (Fine by itself, but Polly Esther...)
 * Emma Winifred Keane from The Bill.
 * Albert Ladysmith Steptoe of Steptoe and Son is a bit of a subversion on the grounds that it isn't the most embarrassing bit of data - or lack thereof - on his birth certificate... "Father ['s details]: I don't believe it... UNKNOWN! My father's a bast...!"
 * He was named after a battle in the Boer War.
 * He also lied about his age, even to his close family.
 * Doctor Who Expanded Universe character Bernice Surprise Summerfield. So named by her parents because her conception was, erm, a surprise.
 * On The Honeymooners, Ralph's best buddy is Edward Lilywhite Norton.
 * Out of This World: Troy Garland, alien visitor from Antareus, has the same middle name as his daughter: Ethel. (Though this may just be a riff on Donna's use of the Full Name Ultimatum as a Catch Phrase)
 * On 3rd Rock From The Sun, Don, trying to convince Sally of something, declared "I'm Don Leslie Orville... and, okay, telling you my middle name probably did not really help my case."
 * On That 70s Show, Jackie Burkhart's middle name is Beulah, which she tries to keep in secret.
 * In the wedding episode of Dharma and Greg (to be more precise, the second wedding episode, as they were actually married on their first date in episode 1), it is revealed at the altar that Dharma Finklestein's middle name is "Freedom". This fits her hippie parents and she does not find it embarrassing. Gregory Clifford Montgomery, however, is mortified, and his own wife can't stifle a giggle.
 * This leads to a funny scene later when they flee their own wedding reception, eventually collapsing in a heap together with Greg sighing "Oh, Freedom!" and Dharma snickering "Oh, Clifford".
 * Percival Ulysses Cox
 * While we're at it, Sam Perry Gilligan Dorian.
 * Special mention must go to Geraldine Granger, the titular character of the British sitcom The Vicar of Dibley, who has revealed her full name in two episodes, and qualified for both of these tropes. First she confessed that her real first name was Boadicea. In the final episode, this was ignored and her full name was given as Geraldine Julie Andrews Dick Van Dyke Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious Chim Chiminey Chim Chiminey Chim Chim Cher-ee Granger. Her mother was both a big Mary Poppins fan, and quite insane.
 * On an episode of Family Matters, Waldo amuses himself throughout the whole episode imagining funny names for (then) Ivana Trump, ending up with her divorcing Donald Trump and marrying, in order, Neil Diamond, Jack Nicklaus, and Ron Darling, coming to the conclusion her name would then be Ivana Diamond Nicklaus Darling.
 * A contender for embarrassing middle name himself, Waldo's full name is Waldo Geraldo Faldo.
 * Or Carl Otis Winslow.
 * Subverted right in the middle of a The Two Ronnies sketch about people with embarrassing names:

Ronnie C: Don't tell me... I can see it coming.

Ronnie B: Lady Fosgrove.

Ronnie C: Oh."

"Fran: Mr. Sheffield, the only thing that Andrew Lloyd Webber has that you don't is a middle name.
 * On an episode of Whose Line Is It Anyway, Tony Slattery was assigned "angry about his middle name" as his problem for the Bartender game and remarked, "I am, actually, it's Declan."
 * In an episode of the US version, one of the lines from Scenes From A Hat was "Embarassing Secrets About Our Host, Drew Carey". Ryan Styles walks on and says "What kind of a middle name is 'Alison'?" As noted above and below, this really is Drew's middle name.
 * In one episode of The Nanny, Fran and Maxwell are talking about Andrew Lloyd Webber:

Maxwell: I've got a middle name.

Fran: Well, there you are! What is it?

Maxwell: Beverly.

Fran: Moving on..."

"Chase: Hey, 'normal' is my middle name. Actually, it's Bartholemew. Don't tell people."
 * Chastity-Claire Babcock.
 * Dwayne Florenz Schneider, of One Day At a Time.
 * In an episode of Hey Dude, Ted's middle name is revealed to be Aloysius.
 * In Frasier, Frasier's son is Frederick Gaylord Crane.
 * Pat from Saturday Night Live has an embarrassing middle name. It's O'Neil!
 * Dr. Guy Valerie Secretan from Green Wing.
 * On Thirty Rock, Kenneth Parcel's middle name is Ellen.
 * In Zoey 101, Chase is embarrassed that his middle name is "Bartholemew".

"Pete: Can Ophelia boobies?"
 * Bones has Angela Pearly-Gates Montenegro; for added embarrassment, her middle name is revealed in the middle of a wedding that doesn't quite go off.
 * And then, during, it's revealed that this isn't her real name--actually it's even more embarrassing.
 * According to the official website,: Raymond Milton Carling.
 * On A Different World Dwayne Wayne's middle name is Cleophus, to his regret and Whitley Gilbert-Wayne's amusement.
 * A Mash episode has Hawkeye and Trapper crack up when they learn Frank Burns' is "Marion".
 * Stargate Atlantis subverts this. Rodney McKay chooses to go by his middle name, rather than use his Embarrassing First Name, Meredith.
 * "Eurydice Colette Clytemnestra Dido Bathsheba Rabelais Patricia Cocteau ...Stone" is Patsy's full name in Absolutely Fabulous
 * Hannah Montana: Jackson Rod Stewart. Who, of course, is the show's Butt Monkey.
 * Myka O. Bering of Warehouse 13 seemingly has a middle name so embarrassing that we don't even know what it is.
 * Yes we do, it's Ophelia.


 * Better Off Ted has Theodore Margaret Crisp. He's very insistent that it's pronounced "Mar-Ja-RAY".
 * In NCIS, Leroy Jethro Gibbs.
 * In Boy Meets World, Topanga's middle name is apparently so embarrassing she won't even reveal it. As another character points out, "Your first name is Topanga! How bad could your middle name be?" But she still won't tell.
 * In Cheers Woody's middle name is Tiberius.
 * In Happy Days, the Fonz's full name is Arthur Herbert Fonzarelli. If Potsie sniggers at your middle name, it must be pretty bad.
 * On Fringe, Lincoln Lee's middle name is Tyrone (in honor of his grandfather), and he hides it from Olivia. Olivia finds it out by asking Lincoln's Alternate Universe counterpart, who doesn't think it's a big deal.

Newspaper Comics

 * In Bloom County, Steve Dallas' middle name is revealed to be Milhouse, the same as former president Richard Nixon. However, he was called "Steven R. Dallas" at other points in the strip.

Radio

 * In Hancocks Half Hour we find Anthony Aloysius St. John [pr. Sinjen] Hancock; William Montmorency Beaumont Kerr; and Sidney Balmoral James. All named after their respective actors, but the middle names are fake.
 * In Hello Cheeky, Barry Cryer explains that his parents had a difference of opinion regarding his middle name, so they wrote their suggestions down and picked it out of a hat. As such, his full name is Barry Seven-And-Three-Eights Cryer.
 * To which John responds by saying that his full name is John "Glug, glug" Junkin. "The vicar fell in the font."

Tabletop Games

 * Penny Arcade: Jim Darkmagic's middle name is Winifred

Video Games
"Matt: Just be careful, okay?
 * LA Noire has the homicide investigator named "Rusty" Galloway, who is Only Known By His Nickname.
 * The full name of the Big Bad of the Crash Bandicoot series is Neo Periwinkle Cortex. A rare case, as he doesn't find it very embarrassing.
 * According to Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction, Captain Qwark's full name is Copernicus Leslie Qwark. He just uses "Copernicus S. Qwark" in A Crack in Time.
 * Guybrush Threepwood's middle name is stated to be "Ulysses". For obvious reasons, this doesn't bother him.
 * Kimberly Ray Eckman
 * In combat, Pokémon Gold and Silver Gym Leader Pryce says his middle name is Willow. However, he isn't embarrassed by this fact; he's proud of it.
 * We find out that Jim Raynor of Starcraft fame has a pretty embarrassing middle name in a secret mission:

Jim: Hey, "careful" is my middle name.

Matt: I thought your middle name was ?

Jim: ...shut up, Matt."

Webcomics
"Tom: Ohmygod -- you have the worst name ever."
 * El Goonish Shive has Tedd Drew Verres, (Tedd D. Verres) which isn't all that bad but embarrasses him anyway. The author has noted that a tortured resemblance to "Teddy bears" was completely fortuitous. Note that Tedd has never been called "Teddy" by anyone except Grace, who presumably can get away with it.
 * It's inverted with Tiffany "Susan" Pompoms, where the middle name is the only bit that doesn't completely mortify her.
 * the Narrator ofBooks Don't Work Here has threatened to make Robin Galling's middle name start with a C, although it hasn't actually happened yet.
 * Dave Prescott Davenport of Narbonic. In the Spinoff Babies strip Li'l Mell, we get another: Melody Wildflower Kelly.
 * Helen's full name is Helen Beta Narbon. This is mostly embarrassing because
 * Basic Instructions has some advice for you.
 * "CHARLIE MOONBEAM TRUEMAN!" from Khaos Komix


 * In this page of Lint, Derf has to guess the middle name of the King Incognito, Sangwine, in a game of trivial pursuit with one of the villains. It would take too long to explain.
 * Dawn of Dawn of Time finds Gideon's middle name (Algernon) hilarious... even though she doesn't speak his language (and it's debatable if she understands it).
 * Everyday Heroes gives us Thomas Humperdinck Sharpley ("Thump" to his friends).
 * Something Positive's Davan: "Oh hell no! That's humiliating!" Negotiations ensue.
 * Played with in Questionable Content: When Mrs Reed gives Marten a Full Name Ultimatum, she calls him "MARTEN TIBERIUS REED!" However, Tiberius isn't really his middle name ("It WOULD be, if his father weren't such a stick-in-the-mud!")
 * While he thinks it's an embarrassing name (and clearly so did his dad), his mom and friends all think it's Awesome McCoolname.
 * Hanna Is Not a Boys Name brings us paranormal investigator Hanna Falk Cross. Oddly, he doesn't seem to realize how embarrassing his first name is.
 * In Kagerou, Red's full name is . Not exactly the kind of middle name most people would want, especially not Red.

Web Original

 * Referenced on Homestar Runner in Marzipan's Answering Machine 15, where the King of Town accuses Marzipan of letting it leak that his middle name is Wad.
 * In the Whateley Universe stories, heroine Chaka (Toni Chandler) does the 'my middle name is danger' schtick and then admits that her middle name is Marc.
 * In the League of Intergalactic Cosmic Champions Sailor Evil's full name is Griselda Ethylene Evil & she didn't want to be known as Sailor Ethylene as it made her sound like an unleaded gasoline.
 * Simon Fordwith Drake. Only admits to the "Ford" bit.
 * Captain Isaiah Jameson Clarabell Puddykins Gunnelsworth III absolutely insists on being addressed only by his rank. Commodore Terrence Bags has a case of really poor initials, but has a similar method of identification.
 * Not Always Right has a guy who gave himself one while drunk. At least, it "certainly helps in the identification process".

Western Animation
"T.J.: Hop on, Jasper, I'm built for climbing!"
 * On The Simpsons:
 * Fat Tony's middle name is Marion.
 * Bart Simpson's full name is Bartholomew Jojo Simpson.
 * Bart's Bizarre Adventure?
 * "Homer J. Simpson. The J stands for Jay."
 * Homer's middle name isn't really embarrassing, he just didn't know it until later.
 * Heck, he was excited when he found out.
 * Milhouse Mussolini Van Houten.
 * Robert Underdunk Terwilliger, a.k.a. Sideshow Bob.
 * Though that's actually the surname of his mother, as heard in the 'Funeral for a Fiend' episode.
 * Amber, the Vegas showgirl Homer accidentally married when he was drunk, had the middle name Pai-Gow.
 * On Family Guy:
 * Peter Griffin's middle name is Lowenbrau. For those who don't know, it's a German beer. Peter pronounces it LOW-en-brow (as did Miller Brewing Co., which made and advertised a licensed version of the beer in the US till 2002), but the German pronunciation is LOOV-en-broy.
 * Technically, the German pronunciation of Lowenbrau would be LO-ven-brow; the actual name of the beer has umlauts over the O and A which change the pronunciation.
 * Or maybe it's just a play on the term "lowbrow."
 * Stewie's middle name is Gilligan.
 * Chris' middle name is Cross, as in the singer Christopher Cross.
 * Actually, it's a play on words. "Criss-cross." Get it?
 * Eddy, of Ed, Edd n Eddy, has the middle name Skipper, Edd's middle name is Marion, and Ed has the middle name Horace.
 * In Flushed Away, Spike announces that Danger is his middle name. It's actually Leslie.
 * In Antz, Woody Allen's character Z tells Princess Bala "Trouble is my middle name... actually, my middle name is Marion, but I don't want you spreading that around."
 * That's a Shout Out to Woody Allen's 70's movie Manhattan, where Ike (Allen) jokingly tells "Trouble is my middle name" to Mary (Diane Keaton).
 * In a Shout Out to Trek, the titular hero protagonist in Duckman was eventually "fully" named Eric Tiberius Duckman. His partner had both an embarrassing middle and first name: Willibald Feivel Cornfed.
 * In an episode of American Dad, Stan says that he had to give up his search for Oliver North's gold when his kids were born, to which Hayley responds, "Is that why my middle name is Dreamsmasher?"
 * Steve's middle name is Anita.
 * Balactus, Minoriteam's black stereotype parody of Galactus, has a real name so embarrassing that invoking it is the only way to defeat him. We don't get to learn the whole thing, but it starts with "Leslie Ira".
 * An episode of The Mighty B revolves around the main character's pseudo-Hindi middle name, "". Turns out "not only is it embarrassing, it's cursed". Go figure.
 * Rufus B Hardacre, Corrupt Corporate Executive Big Bad of the Australian cartoon Crocadoo, tends to use less embarrassing names for his middle initial throughout the series (such as 'Blockbuster'), until his mother reveals it in the finale, eliciting shocked reactions whenever she says it.
 * Douglas Yancey Funnie, anyone? Made even worse because his guidance counselor called him by this name almost exclusively.
 * Thanks to being named by a real-world contest winner, his infant sister has a worse name - Cleopatra Dirtbike Funnie.
 * Barbara Ann Bunny.
 * In Ben 10 Alien Force, Kevin's middle name of "Ethan" is embarrassing for him, because it means his full name is "Kevin E. Levin".
 * Ben's middle name is Kirby. He just thinks it's kind of dumb-sounding.
 * In The Replacements, superspy Agent K's middle name is Mildred.
 * Lucky Piquel, from Bonkers, has Shirly as his middle name. He said that it was his father's name.
 * The Daria character Michael Jordan Mackenzie, whose name was changed to this by his father after a Chicago Bulls playoff game.
 * Total Drama Action reveals Harold to have several middle names, one of which is "Doris." Cue Duncan calling him that repeatedly. This actually embarrasses Harold, which seems odd, since he's usually too clueless to know when he should be humiliated.
 * During the The Backyardigans episode "Whodunnit?", Austin's surname was... Frothingslosh. .......You can stop laughing now.
 * On the show Recess, T.J. Detweiler's first name is Theodore, but the J is a mystery. It's implied that this stands for something embarrassing, since another character once tried to blackmail him with the knowledge. It's eventually revealed to be Jasper.
 * It's worth noting that in the episode "The Biggest Trouble Ever" as the gang prepares to climb the statue of previous mayor Thaddeus T. Third III, after Mikey mentioned what the statue metaphorically said to him, T.J. had his own thoughts and, in revealing them, called himself Jasper. Perhaps the fact the name is supposedly embarrassing is only believed to be so by the briber.


 * On Phineas and Ferb, Candace's middle name is "Gertrude".
 * On Jimmy Two-Shoes, Beezy's Mysterious Middle Initial is eventually revealed to stand for Jo-Jo.
 * In Static Shock, Virgil's middle name is Ovid. He provides one of the page quotes.
 * Cranky Doodle Donkey from the My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic episode "A Friend In Deed". "Nobody calls me Doodle!"
 * This is appearently more of a personal thing rather than embarrassment, as he doesn't mind when a specific somepony calls him that. Specifically,

Other

 * There's a popular bit of Les Misérables Fanon that insists that Inspector Javert's full name is "Shnookums Q. Javert".
 * British comedian Alexei Sayle had a joke that his name in full is Alexei Lenin Molotov Sputnik Grain Harvest Glorious Five Year Plan Sayle. It's not, but his parents really were?
 * According to a contest circa 1998, the middle name of Cracked magazine's mascot Sylvester P. Smythe was "Phooey."
 * Barbie's full name is Barbara Millicent Roberts.

Real Life
"Clarissa Dickson Wright: And thank God she pulled out Richardson's Clarissa, and not the Encyclopaedia Britannica. And then I think they were so delighted they'd finally found a name, they got pissed on the way to the church!"
 * Benito Amilacre Andrea Mussolini.
 * YMMV, Andrea is a boy's name in Italy.
 * Richard Tiffany Gere.
 * The name "Tiffany" has a weird history. It started off as a Greek girl's first name (Theophania), then became a saint's name in about 300 AD, then entered English through French, then became a surname (probably of those who revered the saint in question), then became a brand name of lamp. Only in the 1970s did it become a girl's name again.
 * Harry S Truman's middle name-was "S"! But before you assume his parents were really dull people, they just wanted to keep both sets of grandparents happy, and the "S" fit both of them. (The names of his grandfathers were "Solomon" and "Shippe", respectively. Shippe? I guess things could've really been worse.)
 * Giving a child just a middle initial like that to make more than one relative happy used to be fairly common.
 * Ulysses S(impson) Grant was really named Hiram Ulysses Grant (note the initials). West Point got it wrong, accidentally mixing in his mother's maiden name, and he kept it, partially because it made him "US Grant".
 * To be more precise, Hiram Ulyssess would have got him called "Hug" while "Ulyssess Simpson" got him called "Sam" (as in "Uncle Sam"
 * Barack Hussein Obama. Compounded by Obama's race, many ignorant Americans fully believed that Obama is a crypto-Muslim due to his Arabic middle name and the trivial similarity of his surname to "Osama." The "Birther" movement continues to use his name as ammunition to claims that he's actually a native Kenyan. Obama once quipped, "I got my first name from my father, and I got my middle name from somebody who obviously didn't think I'd ever run for president."
 * Not to mention Joseph Robinette Biden.
 * Dan Whitesides, the drummer for The Used, has the middle name Leslie, which is a commonly known unisex name.
 * Clarissa Theresa Philomena Aileen Mary Josephine Agnes Elsie Trilby Louise Esmerelda Dickson Wright, any one of which on its own would not be easily owned up to, let alone when all ten middle names are put together.
 * In an interview on Desert Island Discs, she was asked about her name. She replied that her parents had had a great deal of difficulty deciding on a first name for her, and eventually her mother was blindfolded and sent into the family library (yes, they were that posh) to pull a book off the shelves.

""What kind of a middle name is Allison?""
 * Robert Strange McNamara, Secretary of Defense during the JFK and LBJ administrations. Mc Namara shared an anecdote in which his fiancee's parents asked for his middle name by telegram for the marriage invitations. She sent back, "IT'S STRANGE." They sent a reply insisting that they didn't care, they just needed to know what it was.
 * Dido's full name is Dido Florian Cloud de Bounevialle O'Malley Armstrong.
 * "Funny Weddings" is a recurring sub-bit of the classic Tonight Show bit "Headlines", in which newspaper headlines that display humorous married name combinations are shown.
 * Without a Trace star Poppy Montgomery's birth name is Poppy Petal Emma Elizabeth Deveraux Donahue. Montgomery was her mother's maiden name, which she used for acting. Her sisters are named Rosie Thorn, Daisy Yellow, Lily Belle and Marigold Sun, and her brother's name is Jethro Tull.
 * Thomas Alva Edison. It was after an aunt.
 * Warren Gamaliel Harding.
 * Richard Milhous Nixon.
 * There are a lot of Spanish men with the middle name of Maria (Former Spanish PM Jose Maria Aznar comes to mind).
 * So might Tuco Benedicto Pacifico Juan Maria Ramirez.
 * Weirdly, Erich Maria Remarque, the author of All Quiet On the Western Front, chose Maria as a middle name; he was born Erich Paul Remark.
 * German too, as in Rainer Maria Rilke (whose actual full name is Rene' Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke).
 * Also Christoph Maria Herbst and Markus Maria Profitlich.
 * Same goes for Italy (actors Gian Maria Volonté and Enrico Maria Salerno come to mind), to the point that sometimes the first name "Gianmaria" is used as a mash-up of "Gian Maria" or "Giovanni Maria". It's not supposed to be embarrassing at all, since it's a sign of devotion/dedication to That Famous Mary; since the use of such names is fading, though, it's beginning to be considered embarrassingly old-fashioned.
 * In Mexico is not actually considered an embarrasing middle name. There's also the reverse name, "Maria Jose" which is a perfectly socially acceptable girl's name. It's a catholic devotion thing, and you could even find a guy called "José María de Jesús" or a girl called "María José del Jesús" (the whole holy family in one!).
 * There is the same thing in Brazil. It should be noted this isn't a 'middle name'. It is a composed first name (same in Spanish, I believe).
 * Not exactly embarassing, but... James Riddle Hoffa.
 * Fairly embarrassing, Jimmy Riddle is cockney rhyming slang for 'piddle', otherwise known as piss.
 * More of a Meaningful Name, considering what happened to him...
 * John Ronald Reuel Tolkien. Actually pronounced Raoul. And he gave it to all four of his children as a middle name to boot. (Tolkien himself actually went by Ron.)
 * Count Jefferson-Friedrich Volker Benjamin Graf von Pfeil und Klein-Ellguth. Very very long name and quite fun to say. By the way, if you were wondering, he's the son of Count Friedrich-August Rüdiger Albrecht von Pfeil und Klein-Ellguth and is married to member of the Danish Royal Court Princess Alexandra of Sayn-Wittgenstein-Berleburg; thus he is a member of the Danish Royal Family.
 * CS Lewis. The C.S. stands for Clive Staples. No wonder he went by Jack...
 * Speaking of inanimate-object middle names, the singer of "Cruel To Be Kind"'s full name is Nicholas (Nick) Drain Lowe.
 * As noted above, Drew Allison Carey.

"Even though it's an honor to be named after my grandfathers, I can tell you that when you grow up in America in the 1970s with a name like Sigurd Johnny, you're going to get a lot of black eyes."
 * James Maury Henson. He effectively had a nickname for a middle name.
 * Oliver Hazard Perry was the Hero of Lake Erie in the War of 1812.
 * Although that could also be considered an Awesome McCoolname or Names to Run Away From Really Fast.
 * Penn Jillette's daughter: Moxie Crimefighter Jillette. So that, if stopped by police, she can say "I'm on your side! After all, "Crimefighter" is my middle name!"
 * Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle... the poor bloke. No wonder he usually dropped it when writing.
 * YMMV, to me, Ignatius is a pretty awesome middle name.
 * Dick Wagstaff Clark. As if his first name wasn't enough of a Double Entendre.
 * In Quebec, there was a Nazi Party in the 1930, led by a guy name Adrien Arcand. One of its members gave birth to a boy she named Adrien Adolf Benito (and a typical French-Canadian family name). There is no word on what the boy became, but one can only assume he mostly went with Adrien, as it's not very infamous and very common even today.
 * There is a Russian joke about Drew Barrymore marrying the Russian prize fighter Konstantin Tszu.
 * Capt. Sig Hansen's full name is Sigurd Johnny Hansen; he was named such after two of his grandfathers. While this seems not too unusual (at least in comparison with some of the other names mentioned in this article), Sig notes in his autobiography North By Northwestern that:


 * He may have chosen the name himself, but it might become awkward when hardcore brony Kim "Fluttershy" Dykas has to explain his middle name.
 * Reggae singer Judge Dread was born Alexander Minto Hughes.
 * British composer Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan (of Gilbert and Sullivan) understandably never used his middle name. Seymour isn't too bad, just that it made his initial ASS.
 * As the quote on top of the page says, Fred McFeely Rogers. You know, the guy who made a TV show for four year old kids!?

Film

 * In Meet the Parents, Pamela Martha Byrnes (Teri Polo) marries Greg Focker (Ben Stiller), and her parents realize this would make her Pamela Martha Focker.
 * Also Greg isn't his real name, it's Gaylord.
 * Subversion: in Dumb & Dumber, the female lead's first name is Mary, and the male lead's last name is Christmas, but they don't end up getting married.
 * Carry On Cleo - Senna was a nice name, until she married someone called Pod.
 * The Wedding Singer - Drew Barrymore's character, had she gone through with her intended marriage, would've been Julia Guglia (pronounced Goo-lia) during a scene in which she's practicing greeting her wedding guests in front of a mirror, she says the full name aloud and nearly bursts into tears.
 * Isn't it odd that she didn't try out the names together as soon as, or even before, Glenn Guglia asked her to marry him.
 * I imagine she did, but a silly name wouldn't stop someone marrying the man she loves. The reason she's crying is because she doesn't want to marry Glenn anymore - the name just tipped her over the edge.
 * Besides, she wouldn't have had to change her last name, or she could have gone with a hyphen.
 * It's a shout out to Jerry Hall being engaged to Bryan Ferry in the 80s. She didn't go through with it either.

Literature

 * Again in PG Wodehouse, Bertie Wooster is leery of marrying Gertrude Winkworth because then they'd "...be known to all and sundry as 'Bertie and Gertie', like some bad music-hall act."
 * Hating Alison Ashley has the mother marring into the 'Grub' family.

Live Action TV

 * Married With Children had next door neighbor Marcy (post-divorce) get married to Jefferson D'Arcy in an impulsive fit. She spent an episode lamenting the fact that she was now "Marcy D'Arcy."
 * Greys Anatomy: "Dude. She's Callie O'Malley."
 * Murphy Brown -- Corky Sherwood marries into the Forrest family, and hyphenates it to Corky Sherwood-Forrest.
 * In one episode of The West Wing, Sam reveals that before he joined the Bartlet campaign, he was engaged to a woman named Lisa Sherbourne. CJ asks if the reason they didn't get married was because her name would've been Seaborn-Sherbourne.
 * Subverted and lampshaded in The Office. From the beginning of the series to partway into it, Pam is engaged to Roy Anderson. When she eventually breaks up with him, she notes how close she came to becoming Pamela Anderson.
 * Discussed in What I Like About You, as one of Holly's reasons for not being interested in a guy; his last name is "Wood", which would make her married name "Holly Wood".

Newspaper Comics

 * One memorable Garfield strip had Garfield watching a TV show where a woman named Philomena Scott Aphat decides not to marry a man named Thaddeus Ramsbottom, because her name would become "Philomena Scott Aphat Ramsbottom".

Radio

 * The "New Zealand" episode of British radio series Giles Wemmbley Hogg Goes Off features Giles realising his friend is about to marry into the name Arabella Fonte, as in "daylight come and me wanna go home".

Truth in Television

 * The British politician Linda Chalker chose to use her maiden name, rather than her married name. This wasn't so much from any kind of feminist convictions as from the fact that her married name was the rather Tolkienesque Linda Landa.

Video Games

 * Gruntilda Winkybunion from Banjo-Kazooie is an (apparently) unusual case of an embarrassing, unmarried last name.

Webcomics

 * In Questionable Content, Raven is an inversion and a subversion. Her first name is Blodwyn (her parents are Welsh), which she avoids like the plague, so she uses her middle name instead. The subversion comes into play since she was originally introduced as an emo goth (before she became a Perky Goth), and Faye makes fun of her for naming herself after "a disease-carrying avian," unaware it is one of her birth names.

Western Animation

 * The Simpsons -- not exactly the same, but Selma has quite a name going at this point: Selma Bouvier Terwilliger Hutz McClure Stu. She cited this as her reason for refusing to marry Apu, saying that the last thing she needed was to add "Nahasapeemapetiwhatever" to the mix.
 * At that point, Selma was only Selma Bouvier Terwilliger Hutz McClure. Selma's current name is... Drum Roll... forgive me, it's probably not in order... Selma (Middle Name) Bouvier Terwilliger Hutz McClure Leonard Hombre Itchy Stu Terwilliger Simpson... thank you, thank you.
 * The Disco Stu Marriage was annulled – therefore no effective marriage took place.
 * An aversion in Phineas and Ferb. One would think that Charlene Doofenshmirtz would consider her married name embarrassing, but she fully embraces it, going so far as to keep the name even after getting a divorce.