Brought to You by The Letter "S": Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

{{quote|'''Kari:''' What does the 'S' stand for? <br />

 

Superheroes are in many ways much like athletes. Both frequently perform amazing physical feats we envy; both often collect themselves into teams with fancy names; both wear colorful, form-fitting uniforms.

== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==

* Ichi of ''[[Ichi the Killer]]'' wears a big "1" on his back, since [[Meaningful Name|his name]] means "one" in Japanese.

** Team Rocket had a form of [[Lampshade Hanging]] of this in an episode. They set up a fake Pokemon Center by covering part of the letter 'R' painted on the wall with a piece of paper, making it look like the 'P' associated with Pokemon Centers.

** The late 80's comic version of ''Speed Racer'' by NOW Comics claimed that the "G" stood for Greg, which was Speed's real name in the comic (making him Greg Racer).

* [[Chargeman Ken]] has a large letter "K" on his orange sweater.

* ''[[Bleach]]'''s Ichigo Kurosaki has a 15 on his room's door. It becomes kind of a pun if you realize "Ichi" is 1 and "Go" is 5. Plus he's 15.

** His sister refers to him as 'Ichi-nii', which, while short for 'Ichigo-niisan' (big brother Ichigo), is also similar-sounding to ''ichi-ni'', which translates as "1-2". ''Ichi-niisan'' itself sounds a lot like ''ichi-ni-san'', which is "1-2-3".

** Luffy wears a '01' because he is captain or a '56' which reads 'go-mu'.

** Zoro, next in command wears '02'

** Sanji sports a '05' as well as '32' (San-ji) and '56' (Ko-kuu/kokku)

* Dr. Minami in [[Heroman]] has an M on his shirt. Wonder why.

** The "S" in later Asurada models stands for "Sugo", the racing team the main character, Hayato is in. Shoemacher/Osamu in 11, also has the letter "S" in his racing suit. And Kaga's racing suit has the letter "Z" in it, as he belonged to Aoi ZIP formula.

** Some of the team logos also has letters in it, like the "S" for Sugo and "Z" for Aoi ZIP.

 

== [[Comic Books]] ==

* In [[The DCU]] ...

** "E" is for [[Legion of Super-Heroes (Comic Book)|Element Lad]].

** "G" is for [[Green Arrow]] -- some artists draw his belt buckle with a noticeable "G" shape.

** "G" is for Galactus (on his belt buckle in his first appearance).

** "H" is for Hawkeye. And Hardball.

** "N" is for Nomad.

** "P" is for Puck (of ''[[Alpha Flight]]'').

** "X" is for the [[X-Men (Comic Book)|X-Men]]'s "x-factor" or "extra factor" in their mutated genes.

** Not a letter, but each member of the [[Fantastic Four (Comic Book)|Fantastic Four]] goes into battle with a large "4" emblazoned somewhere on their uniform.

* [[Archie Comics|Jughead Jones]] typically wears a sweater with the letter "S" on it...the meaning of which is known only to Jughead.

* In [http://johnnysaturn.com Johnny Saturn] the Utopian, as an example, wears a stylized "U" on his chest. A variation of this would be Titanium Tom, who wears a patch on each shoulder with ''Ti''-- the symbol for titanium.

* The revived ''[[Darkwing Duck]]'' comic books featured many Darkwings. If they were Darkwing versions of other heroes, they'd have a 'DW' or 'D' on them (such as the Incredibles version). {{spoiler|One exception is a result of the entry under Western Animation; one of the infinite Darkwings took over Gosalyn's identity of Quiverwing Quack.}}

* In ''Son o' God'' comics, [[Jesus]] wears spandex with a cape and a "JC" on his chest.

 

 

== Fan Fic ==

 

 

*** "EG" is for Elasti-Girl; she dropped this after the intro of the movie, for plot-explained reasons.

** "S" is for Syndrome.

** Interestingly, she never explains what the G stands for.

* "1" in an "engraved" style similar to that on the one dollar bill for U.S. Bill of ''[[The Specials]]''.

 

== [[Literature]] ==

{{quote| '' 'You haven't got a letter on yours [Ron],' George observed. 'I suppose she thinks you don't forget your name. But we're not stupid -- we know we're called Gred and Forge.' ''}}

* The eponymous letter in ''[[The Scarlet Letter]]''. It's a red 'A', which is supposed to stand for "adulteress", but since Hester, the woman sentenced to wear it, is so helpful to the people in her community, they start to believe it stands for nicer things, such as "admirable".

 

* "CH" is for [[El Chapulin Colorado|Chapulin Colorado]].

* "G" is for Super Grover.

* From ''[[Kamen Rider]]'':

** "V3" is for [[Kamen Rider V 3]] (the 3 is tiny on his belt buckle, but it's there)

*** "F" is for [[The Berserker|Fang]].

*** "G" is for [[Biological Mashup|Gene]].

*** "I" is for [[An Ice Person|Ice Age]] and [[Invisibility|Invisible]].

*** "J" is for [[Good Old Fisticuffs|Joker]], [[Master of Illusion|Jewel]], and [[The Power of Rock|Jazz]].

*** "Q" is for [[Big Badass Bird of Prey|Quetzalcoatlus]] and [[Royals Who Actually Do Something|Queen]].

*** "R" is for [[Rocket Jump|Rocket]].

*** "T" is for [[The Gunslinger|Trigger]], [[Super Speed|Trial]], [[Emotion Bomb|Terror]], [[Cute Monster Girl|Taboo]], [[Tyrannosaurus Rex|T-Rex]], and [[Stock Dinosaurs|Triceratops]].

*** "U" is for [[Reality Warper|Utopia]] and [[Unicorn]].

** "D" is for [[Gosei Sentai Dairanger|Dairanger]]. Its counterpart, ''[[Mighty Morphin Power Rangers]]'' Season 2, dropped this but added a villainous version with "Z" for Zedd.

** "N" is for Ninjaman (in ''[[Ninja Sentai Kakuranger]]'') and Ninjor (in ''[[Mighty Morphin Power Rangers]]'' Season 3). Oddly, when Ninjaman powers up into Samuraiman he changes his emblem, yet it still resembles an "N" instead of an "S". (''Power Rangers'' doesn't have this problem because Ninjor keeps his name in both forms.)

** "C" is for [[Gekisou Sentai Carranger|Carranger]]. (''[[Power Rangers Turbo]]'' ignores this completely and it's just a generic logo.) Also (in both shows), "S" is for Signalman and Blue '''S'''enturion.

** "M" is for [[Denji Sentai Megaranger|Megaranger]] (again, just a generic logo in ''[[Power Rangers in Space]]''). This also shows up on the mecha in non-logo forms, though the later ones' "MV" and "MW" (Mega Voyager and Mega Winger) do apply to ''Power Rangers'' as those names weren't changed. In addition, "N" is for Negiranger, but this also is ignored in the US as we call them the [[Psycho Rangers]] instead.

*** ''SPD'' only: A Ranger wannabe wears, appropriately enough, 0.

** "M" is for [[Mahou Sentai Magiranger|Magiranger]] and [[Power Rangers Mystic Force|Mystic Force]]. In the same series, "W" is for Wolzard and Knight '''W'''olf and "S" is for Magi'''S'''hine and Solaris Knight.

** The [[Samurai Sentai Shinkenger|Shinkengers]] and [[Power Rangers Samurai|Samurai Rangers]] wear the appropriate Japanese kanji (火 fire, 水 water, 木 wood/forest, 土 earth, 天 sky, and 光 light) on the visors of their helmets.

* [[Seiun Kamen Machineman]] has "M" for the titular character, in both his superhero form and his [[Cool Car]]-[[Cool Plane]] vehicle.

 

 

== [[Tabletop Games]] ==

 

 

== [[Video Games]] ==

* "M" is for [[Mario]], "L" is for Luigi, "W" is for Wario, and logically enough, "Γ" (capital Gamma) is for Waluigi. All these symbols appear on characters' [[Nice Hat|hats]], rather than on their chests.

* ''[[City of Heroes]]''' ridiculously extensive costume creator gives you a choice of the entire uppercase Latin alphabet and figures 0–9. After six months of subscription, players get to access all letters of the Greek alphabet, uppercase and lowercase.

** Although ironically for a superhero game, not many players follow this trope.

* DK! [[Donkey Kong]]! On his tie, uniquely enough, but it's also his only piece of clothing.

** Hina Kagiyama, a curse/misfortune goddess, has a stylized kanji 厄 (''yaku'') on her dress, meaning "misfortune".

* In ''[[Space Channel 5]] Part 2'', "P" stands for Purge.

* ''[[Twilight Heroes]]'' features the "letter shirt" for its superheroes, which can be customized to show any capitalized letter in the English alphabet.

 

 

 

== [[Web Comics]] ==

* Mister Mighty, of ''[[Everyday Heroes]]'', of course wears a gold "M" in an oval.

** His teammate, Dot Dash, wears a dot-and-dash on her chest; Morse code for the letter "A". This is one of the most convoluted [[Punny Name]] references ever: The dot is for her first name Dorothea, the dash is for her super-speed, the "A" is for her maiden name of Axel, and Morse code for her married name of Morse.

* In ''[[The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob]],'' after Bob very briefly becomes a [[Superhero]] and then loses his powers, he says his one real regret is that he used a permanent laundry marker to make the "B" logo on his shirt.

** The actual trolls themselves are this as well, in a strange and roundabout way. The symbols the trolls wear on their shirts are twelve out of thousands which just so happen to coincide with our own zodiac symbols. Each color acknowledged by the hemospectrum has a library of hundreds of symbols associated with it; every troll is assigned one after they pupate, and they must wear it somewhere upon their person their entire lives. This symbol acts as a single-character signature for them and they may, in fact, sign documents with it.

 

* "A" is for Alvin, as in ''[[Alvin and The Chipmunks]]''.

* "R" is for [[Richie Rich]], at least as [[Hanna-Barbera]] animated him.

** "J" and "Z" are for Jayna and Zan, the Wonder Twins.

* In the classic [[Looney Tunes|Bugs Bunny]] short "Super-Rabbit", "S" stands for Super too.

* I.R. Baboon from ''[[I Am Weasel]]'' has an upside-down "IR" scribbled on his shirt.

* After fiddling around with casual outfits for José Carioca's comic book series, they eventually settled on a T-Shirt with a "Z" on it, for "Zé".

* "8" is for Manic 8-Ball, a one-shot villain from ''[[The Venture Bros]].''

** And [[Opposite Sex Clone|Dani]] [[Distaff Counterpart|Phantom]].

* "H" (inside a male symbol) is for Captain Hero of ''[[Drawn Together]]''. It's actually his real name, though ([[Embarrassing Middle Name|Leslie Hero]]).

* "A?" is for a Canadian superhero appearing extremely briefly in an episode of ''[[Eek the Cat]].'

* "CR" is for [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMyqHhfwgGc Captain Rescue].

* "D" is for Dynomutt.

* "F" is for Fluid Man of the Impossibles, for his namesake of the Super Globetrotters, for Frankenstein Jr. and for Blue Falcon.

* "G" is for Gizmo Man of the Super Globetrotters; [[Inspector Gadget]] also has a few of these, most notably on his [[Cool Car|Gadget-mobile]].

* "M" is for Multiple Man of the Impossibles, for his namesake of the Super Globetrotters and for Moe Howard of the Robonic Stooges.

* "Q" was (briefly) for Quiverwing Quack; [[Darkwing Duck]]'s daughter really wants in on the family business.

* "SG" for Super Goof as he appeared on ''[[House of Mouse]]'' and in the comics.