New Season, New Name

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.
Anonymous Carler: "Aqua United Patrol Squad 1" is not at all a stupid title for the new season of "Aqua Teen Hunger Force" which everybody knows and loves and why you gonna mess with SOMETHING THAT AIN'T BROKE?!
—Promo for Whatever The Hell Title They're Calling It This Season

A title change in an ongoing series, prompted by some plot event, a break in production or switching between publishers. Frequently, but not always, involves adding a new subtitle or suffix. Despite the name, does not have to occur at the start of a new season.

For odd sequel titles, see Oddly-Named Sequel 2: Electric Boogaloo. See also Officially Shortened Title.

Examples of New Season, New Name include:


Anime

  • The seasons of Sailor Moon were, in order, Sailor Moon, Sailor Moon R, Sailor Moon S, Sailor Moon SuperS, and Sailor Moon Sailor Stars. It is important to note that these actually mean something, or at least the last three do (Super [the form that Sailor Moon achieves], Supers [the others upgrading to this form], Stars [a reference to either the Sailor Starlights or the fact there are hundreds of Sailor Senshi in the universe]). The R in the second season title is widely debated by fans; popular candidates are "Romance" or "Return" (the latter of which would be a logical pick as this was the season in which Usagi must return to being Sailor Moon because of a new evil that has come to Earth), but there is no Word of God to answer this one.
    • I thought Word of God said it meant both of the above, plus "Rondo" ?
  • Black Lagoon was renewed as Black Lagoon: The Second Barrage.
  • The Trigun manga was renamed "Trigun Maximum" when it continued into another magazine. This naming was kept in the American version.
  • The manga Gensoumaden Saiyuki became Saiyuki Reload when it switched magazines, and then the subtitle changed again to Gunlock.
  • Higurashi no Naku Koro ni is a prime example of this. The series became Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Kai in the second season. Then the first OVA was renamed Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Rei and the second OVA Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Kira. A bit of a mouthful, isn't it? Also, each arc has a different name, which surely doesn't help relieve the confusion of new audiences. The sequel, Umineko no Naku Koro ni is sometimes accompanied by the subtitle of "When They Cry 3", but there's hardly any relationship between Higurashi kai and this theoretical third season.
    • This is because the original visual novels are numbered that way, Higurashi (ep 1-4) is When They Cry 1, Higurashi Kai (5-8) is When They Cry 2, Umineko (1-4) is 3 and Umineko Chiru (5-8) is 4. There are so far no outright statements that they are linked but there are hints (especially the Bernkastel/Rika and Lambadelta/Takano thing) towards a connection and there are some theories that it will be a total of 4 series ( When They Cry 5&6 and 7&8) because Higurashi contained 8 episodes and Umineko is now confirmed to be finished with episode 8.
  • Axis Powers Hetalia became Hetalia World Series in its third season.
  • Dragon Ball became Dragonball Z just before Radditz' appearance to emphasize the shift from "freewheeling adventure peppered with the occasional fight scene" to the Trope Codifier of all Shonen Anime that came after, and the anime-only series that followed that was called Dragon Ball GT, short for "Grand Tour".
  • After The Original Series of Lyrical Nanoha, the following seasons were titled Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha StrikerS, and currently manga-first fourth season Magical Record Lyrical Nanoha Force. There is also a Spin-Off, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha Vi Vid.
  • Hidamari Sketch's second season appends ×365. The third season exchanges it for ×Hoshimittsu (Three Stars).
  • The Slayers at 26 episodes a season, with later seasons named NEXT, TRY, Revolution and Evolution-R (the latter two basically being a typical 26-episode season split in two).
  • Digimon Xros Wars, unlike the preceding Digimon series, split itself into two seasons to reflect a change in the story arc; episode 31 marked the start of said second season, retitled "Digimon Xros Wars: The Evil Death Generals and the Seven Kingdoms". In the original Japanese version, the six series of Digimon are all distinctly separate series, not individual seasons of one overarching show, so they don't fall under this trope; in the US, the first four series were all dubbed as individual seasons of one show, but it was all called "Digimon: Digital Monsters" with no individual season names.
  • Manga example: Strawberry Shake became Strawberry Shake Sweet when it moved from Yuri Shimai to Yuri Hime.
  • The second season of Mahoromatic is Mahoromatic: Something More Beautiful.
  • Season 2 of UFO Princess Valkyrie is titled UFO Princess Valkyrie: December's Nocturne.
  • Rozen Maiden: Träumend, season 2 of Rozen Maiden. The Prequel is named Rozen Maiden: Ouvertüre.
    • Although Ouvertüre is explained, as it means opening, as in beginning. Träumend, which means dreaming, isn't too much, though.
  • The Pokémon anime changes its name when it adapts the plot from the latest games released at the time. In the original Japanese, this practice actually began in Generation III, while the dub began this practice earlier with the Generation II games, with changes for every 52 episode broadcast season.
    • In Japan there's the original Pocket Monsters for the first two generations of games, then the subtitle Advanced Generation for Generation III, Diamond & Pearl for Generation IV, and Best Wishes! for Generation V.
    • Pocket Monsters was dubbed as Pokémon for two seasons, then was subtitled with The Johto Journeys, Johto League Champions and finally Master Quest, one season each.
      • Later DVD releases of the Pokémon anime gave the first two seasons new subtitles: Pokémon: Indigo League and Pokémon: The Adventures In/On The Orange Islands, respectively.
    • Advanced Generation was subtitled Advanced, Advanced Challenge, Advanced Battle, and Battle Frontier in the dub.
    • Diamond & Pearl, is subtitled as Diamond and Pearl, Diamond and Pearl Battle Dimension, Diamond and Pearl Galactic Battles, and Diamond and Pearl Sinnoh League Victors in the dub.
    • Best Wishes! is subtitled as Black and White and Black & White: Rival Destinies.
  • Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex combined this with Colon Cancer: the second season is titled Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex: Second Gig.
  • The second season of The Familiar of Zero was The Familiar of Zero: Knight of the Twin Moons; the third was The Familiar of Zero: The Princess' Rondo; and the fourth was The Familiar of Zero F.
  • Ojamajo Doremi had a new title for each subsequent season: Ojamajo Doremi #, Mo~tto Ojamajo Doremi and Ojamajo Doremi Dokkan! An OVA titled Ojamajo Doremi Naisho came out, but it's set during the third season.
  • Code Geass became Code Geass R2" in its second season.
  • Mobile Suit Gundam 00 became Mobile Suit Gundam 00 Second Season.
  • A borderline example, but when Strike Witches got a second season, it was named Strike Witches 2, complete with a new logo.
  • Super Robot Wars: Divine Wars became Super Robot Wars: The Inspector because the first season focused on the war against Divine Crusaders while in the second season a group of aliens called the Inspectors attacked. Neither group are the final bosses of the season though.
  • The last few issues of 20th Century Boys are titled 21st Century Boys.
  • The second season of Squid Girl is titled "Shinryaku!? Ika Musume". Notice the question mark?


Comic Books

  • Comic Books will sometimes continue the numbering of an old series with a new series. One recent example was The Incredible Hercules taking over numbering from The Incredible Hulk when Hulk relaunched with a new #1.
  • EC Comics was most Egregious about this. Moon Girl became Moon Girl Fights Crime in issues #7 and #8 and A Moon, a Girl...Romance from #9, finally becoming Weird Fantasy at #13.


Fan Works


Literature

  • The Warrior Cats series. Each story arc has a different name: Warriors (original), Warriors: The New Prophecy, Warriors: The Power of Three, and Warriors: Omen of the Stars.


Live Action TV

  • Part of season 3 of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers was titled Mighty Morphin' Alien Rangers, which goes under dispute as to whether it's its own identity or not. Following the third season of Mighty Morphin' we had Power Rangers Zeo, Power Rangers Turbo and Power Rangers in Space. After In Space tied up all the loose ends and Power Rangers Lost Galaxy serving as an epilogue/transition, the seasons continuing from there (beginning with Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue) became Sequel Series.
  • The Mystic Knights of Tir Na Nog was going to take a page out of the Power Rangers book by renaming itself Mystic Knights Battle Thunder for the next season. It was cancelled after its single season instead, however.
  • Big Bad Beetleborgs became Beetleborgs Metallix once they ran out of Juukou B-Fighter footage and switched over to B-Fighter Kabuto (which instead of using crayon box colors used precious metals...and purple).
  • The later seasons of Yes Minister were renamed Yes, Prime Minister, to reflect Jim Hacker's promotion to PM.
  • The Canadian sci-fi show Zixx appended Level One, Level Two and Level Three to its title to represent the current season.
  • From "The Day of the Eternal Song" onwards, Kate Modern changed its name to in the name of ...KateModern.
  • While it's not technically a sequel, the short-lived TV series James at 15 was renamed James at 16 as of the episode wherein he celebrated his 16th birthday.
  • After being just known as Red Dwarf for its first two series, the third series had an Opening Scroll that dubbed the series "Red Dwarf III", although the main title sequence and new logo did not incorporate the number (a few fans also list the third season as having a subtitle "The Saga Continuums", also taken from the crawl). For some reason the listings magazines picked up on this and from then on the show was renamed each series ("Red Dwarf IV", "V" etc). even though the opening titles did not reflect this. However, the covers of the video releases did. In fact, the later video releases of the first two seasons retitled them 'Red Dwarf I' and 'II', respectively.
    • This numbering was finally acknowledged in the opening titles when they slapped the Roman numerals onto the title screens of Series VII and a tally on Series VIII.
  • Each series of Babylon 5 has its own subtitle: 'Signs and Portents', 'The Coming of Shadows', 'Point of No Return', 'No Surrender, No Retreat' and 'The Wheel of Fire'. However, this subtitle does not appear in the credits and was strictly informal until the DVD releases, when the subtitle was included on the front cover packaging.
    • The season titles were also the titles of the most significant episodes in that season, which did appear on screen. Thus, Season I was named Signs and Portents after the episode that introduced Morden and really kicked off the Myth Arc, and so on.
  • A lot of location-based Reality TV shows do this to reflect the change in location for the new season: Survivor: Africa, Survivor: Thailand, etc.
  • Two Guys, a Girl And A Pizza Place became Two Guys and a Girl with the third season, which abandoned the pizza place setting.
  • Eight Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter became 8 Simple Rules after the death of John Ritter.
  • Valerie, originally named for its star, Valerie Harper, became Valerie's Family: The Hogans in the third season after Harper left the show. Thereafter it was called The Hogan Family.
  • Hannah Montana changed to Hannah Montana Forever in season 4.
  • Due to Disney's three seasons/65 episodes rule, after The Suite Life of Zack and Cody hit that mark, Disney Channel retooled the show, renaming it The Suite Life On Deck.
  • When The Torkelsons got a Retool in its second season, it was also renamed Almost Home.
  • By the end of the first season of Cougar Town, the producers felt that the name no longer fit the show's premise, but couldn't come up with a new name. So in the first episode of the second season, the title card reads (Still) Cougartown. The subtitle became a Couch Gag in subsequent episodes - (Badly Titled) Cougartown, (Titles Are Hard) Cougartown, etc.
  • Season two of Zoe Duncan Jack And Jane got renamed to Zoe..., pronounced "Zoe dot dot dot."
  • Originally, the name of the fifth and final live-action Star Trek series was just Enterprise. They added "Star Trek" back into the title in the third season.
  • The TV adaptation of Goosebumps was renamed Ultimate Goosebumps for seasons 3 and 4. The show was named Goosebumps when it aired on Cartoon Network during Halloween (including the "Ultimate Goosebumps" episodes)
  • Saturday Night Live: Yes, the show that has saw many changes in cast, crew, directors, and writing teams has had its title changed a few times.
    • Back when the show first started, it was called NBC's Saturday Night (Lorne Michaels wanted his show to be called Saturday Night Live right off the bat, but ABC already had a variety show with that name—this one had Howard Cosell—who later hosted the last episode of SNL's tenth season—as a permanent host).
    • In its second season, the "NBC" part was dropped and the show was just called Saturday Night, at which time, the ABC version of Saturday Night Live was flopping and Bill Murray (a cast member from that SNL) was hired as a replacement for Chevy Chase (who left the NBC SNL for a girl and a movie career). By season three of the NBC SNL, the ABC SNL was canceled and Lorne Michaels could finally call the show Saturday Night Live.
    • During the 1980-1981 season, the show was retitled Saturday Night Live '80 to separate this season from the first five. This, much like Jean Doumanian's tenure during that season, didn't last and wasn't looked at favorably among fans. When Dick Ebersol was hired as Doumanian's replacement, the show was changed back to being called Saturday Night Live, though its Weekend Update segment went through many title changes under Ebersol's reign as executive producer (it was called SNL Newsbreak in season seven, then Saturday Night News in seasons 8, 9, and 10).
      • From season seven on, Saturday Night Live has kept its name, though most fans today (and in a lot of commercial bumpers from season 22 to now) refer to the show as SNL due to ease of reference.
    • Saturday Night Live in its 15th, 20th, 25th, and 35th seasons have been referred to as Saturday Night Live or SNL plus the respective number (SNL 15, SNL 20, SNL 25, and SNL 35) to commemorate the show staying on the air for 15, 20, 25, and 35 years.
  • The Canadian sketch show SCTV became SCTV Network 90 in 1981 when it expands to 90 minutes and broadens its audience to Americans.
  • Sonny With a Chance was changed to So Random! in its most recent season, focusing on the Show Within a Show that is titled as such. This was done due to the lead actress Demi Lovato going to rehab.
  • Almost-example: Had Threshold not been cancelled, series two would have been called "Foothold" and series three "Stranglehold". Both names would have represented the progress of the aliens in taking over the world.
  • Another almost-example: Stargate SG-1 was nearly renamed Stargate Command for its ninth season, in recognition of its major cast changes (including a new lead actor) and new main villain (the Ori). Ultimately they kept the original title.
  • 19 Kids and Counting started out as 17 Kids and Counting in 2008, but the Duggars had two more kids since then (and have another on the way).
  • Among the many changes that came with the second season of War Of The Worlds was to relabel it War of the Worlds: The Second Invasion.
    • The rub is that while this made a kinda sense at first, poor writing led to a continuity collapse that ultimately showed that there was never a "first" invasion.
  • All Quiet On The Preston Front became simply Preston Front after its first season, since everybody called it that anyway.
  • Homefront: Inside Out dropped the "Inside Out" part of its title after the original Homefront show it spun off from was axed.


Western Animation

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