Elvish Presley



"Elvis" sounds a lot like "elvish" or "elves", making for a comedically useful stock pun. The incongruity between the decidedly ethereal and long-lived elves and the earthy and very much mortal and hedonistic Elvis Presley arguably just makes it funnier. Sometimes they're actually fusions of the two concepts. Sometimes they're just Incredibly Lame Puns.

Advertising

 * An advert for Yellow Pages had a man at a fancy dress party dressed as an elf, surrounded by other people dressed as Elvis. He mentions that "[his] invitation definitely said elves, OK?"

Comic Books

 * Elf Quest included one reference to "Elfis" at some point in a parody version of itself.
 * The Elvis Impersonator from Gold Digger isn't an elf, but his music is Magically Delicious to women.

Literature

 * One of the earliest examples is Emma Bull's War for the Oaks, where the rock band has Elvish lead guitar and bass players, and a faerie roadie.
 * In Soul Music, everyone keeps asking Buddy (a parody of every dead rock star, ever, but especially Buddy Holly) if he's elvish. (Which is worrisome for Buddy in certain kinds of company, because dwarves and trolls have a standing blood feud against elves.) At the end of the book, someone comments that there's a new guy working in the chip shop, and she could swear he looks elvish.
 * In the Animated Adaptation, he looks and dresses like Elvis.
 * In The Dresden Files, Harry Dresden once went on a tangent on how more than one Elvis could be worded as Elvises and then noted how that sounded like he was talking like Gollum trying to say "Elves."
 * The short story "The Return of the King" by Susan Wade and Don Webb.
 * In Quantum Gravity, Zal does just about every genre of music, but is referred to as a rock star. And the incongruity earns him little love back home.

Live Action TV

 * Muppet Classic Theater: The last story is "The Elves And The Shoemaker". Rizzo the Rat exclaims "A story about Elvis?". Gonzo tries to correct him, but sure enough in the story, the elves all look and act like Elvis. And they make blue suede shoes.
 * In the Due South episode "Gift of the Wheelman", where the robbery suspects are dressed as Santas, the police accidentally round up Elvis impersonators for questioning instead of Christmas elves.

Magazines

 * Mad Magazine had a comic in which Santa Claus put out a Help Wanted ad for new elves, but it was misspelled and he ended up with a bunch of Elvis impersonators instead.

Miscellaneous

 * If "Elvis" were a Latin noun, it would probably be in the third declension; therefore, the nominative plural would indeed be "Elves."
 * In The Lord of the Rings Chilean parody "El Señor de los Ladrillos", the Elves became "the Elvis".

Newspaper Comics

 * This cartoon.
 * An installment of Moother Goose and Grimm

Radio

 * The Mark And Brian Radio Program gives us Elfis.

Tabletop Games

 * The Magic: The Gathering card "Elvish Impersonators". ("Elvish Impersonators" is also an EverQuest guild, though it's unclear if there's any causal connection between the two.)
 * Murphy's Rules (a compendium of nonsensical rules, funny errata and other game weirdness) included Elvish Presley in a list of annoying NPCs for players to encounter (along with Sailbad the Sinner and Uselysses).

Video Games

 * Kingdom of Loathing has "Elvish Sunglasses". Among other things, they give you the "Rock Out" ability while you're wielding a musical instrument. The Mysterious Island Arena also gives you the Elvish effect for 20 adventures if you choose the option Try To Get Into The Music.
 * In Discworld Noir, Lewton will say "Thank you very much" with an Elvis accent when a wizard informs him that glamours are "an elvish thing".
 * In Warhammer: Age of Reckoning, the player can grow Elvish Parsley.
 * In World of Warcraft, one April Fools joke introduced the Bard class - a new hero class which would attack enemies via Guitar Hero minigame. Had this actually been introduced, one could have expected to find lots of Night Elf or Blood Elf rockstars Bards. As a Shout-Out to this trope, the Bards on the World of Warcraft announcement were Blood Elves.
 * My Sims Kingdom. Forest Of The Elves. One is your classic wood elf, the other IS A ROCK STAR!!!
 * Serious Sam II has planet Ellenier, populated by Elvians. Just look at their King!.
 * In a bonus level in Gex 3: Deep Cover Gecko, there's a poster of a Christmas elf resembling Elvis named Elfis.

Webcomics

 * This Elf Only Inn strip.

Web Original

 * This webpage.
 * Dorf Quest Feature's "Presley", the Shadar-Kai bard.

Western Animation

 * Larry's silly song in Veggie Tales's Lord of the Rings parody had him dressed as Elvis (and emulating his style) while singing a song about being in love with a girl who speaks Elvish. The reaction from the Legolas parody? "You're not a real elf! You're an Elfish Impersonator!"
 * Melfis, the leader of the Elves in the videogame of Faxanadu was in two episodes of Captain N: The Game Master. He shared some facial features (not to mention the wardrobe) of the singer, but with...blue skin.

Real Life

 * For one of his early TV appearances in 1956, Elvis Presley was mistakenly referred to as "Elvin Presley." Some viewers might well have misinterpreted that as "Elven."