Non-Indicative Name/Western Animation

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Examples of Non-Indicative Names in Western Animation include:

Wakko: (holding up a vomit bag) Hey, mister. What's this?
Bloski: A vomit bag.
Wakko: (looks into the vomit bag) Oh, poo! I got gypped; there's none in here!

  • Hello Nurse may dress like a nurse, but she never works as one; she's more of a Sexy Secretary.

Judge: In that case I sentence you to a lifetime of horror on Monster Island. (to Lisa) Don't worry, it's just a name.
[Cut to Monster Island; Lisa and others are chased by lookalikes of Mothra, Rodan and Gamera]
Lisa: He said it was just a name!
Man: What he meant is that Monster Island is actually a peninsula.

  • Also, in the Simpsons episode "The PTA Disbands", the PTA most emphatically does not disband (though at one point, a guy mistakenly believes it did, panics and jumps out a window. And jumps back in when informed of his mistake). The episode got its title because writer Jennifer Crittenden thought that that was the worst thing that could possibly happen to a school.
  • The Simpsons also lampshades this trope in "'Scuse Me While I Miss The Sky", with the Deadly Meteor Shower; people are apprehensive about this name, until Lisa explains that it was named after its discoverer, Professor Artemis Deadly - who was killed in the shower of 1853.
  • And in "The Color Yellow," Bart learns that the Underground Railroad was neither underground nor a railroad, and wonders why they didn't call it "the Above-Ground Normal Road."
  • Nelson and Bart go to the cinema to see a film named "Naked Lunch".

Nelson: I can think of at least two things wrong with that title..."

  • Reading the inscription on a statue in Futurama:

Fry: "Philip J. Fry, the Original Martian." Lies! Every word of it! He wasn't original, he wasn't a Martian, he wasn't Philip J. Fry, and since when is he a "The?"
Bender: You're twice the "The" he ever was!

Professor: ...in the darkest depths of the Forbidden Zone
Leela: Professor, are we even allowed in the Forbidden Zone?
Professor: Why, of course! It's just a name, like the Death Zone or the Zone of No Return. All the zones have names like that in the Galaxy of Terror!

  • The Cave of Hopelessness. Named after Reginald Hopelessness, of course.
  • Who, in a similar gag to the Simpsons one above, was the first man to be eaten alive by the Tunneling Horror.
  • In the Portuguese dub, apart from very poor acting and especially poor translation, all of the episodes are named in the most generic, unfunny and misleading ways possible. For example, "Jurassic Bark", "The Lesser of Two Evils", "The Cryonic Woman", "Teenage Mutant Leela's Hurdles" and "Roswell That Ends Well" (that's five different episodes!) are all renamed "Back To The Past", and only the latter has any time-travelling.
  • The Treehouse of Horror XVI story, "The Day the Earth Looked Stupid". Clever title there, yes, but the story is a parody of War of the Worlds, not The Day the Earth Stood Still.
  • South Park has the song "Kyle's Mom Is A Stupid Bitch In D Minor," which actually isn't in D-minor.
  • Transformers Armada: The Star Sabre has nothing to do with stars. The Skyboom Shield neither flies nor goes 'boom'. The Requiem Blaster is very loud when fired. Who named these things?
    • For that matter, the only thing that approaches an armada is Tidal Wave in his component parties.
      • The title "Armada" refers to the armada of Autobot and Decepticon ships during the Unicron battles, and the Requiem blaster does have a good chance of killing you.
    • Also, the Cyber Planet Keys are not actually keys, nor does the Omega Lock lock anything.
      • Many such oddities make more sense from a toy collector's perspective. Cyber Keys, for instance, are roughly key-shaped and are used to unlock various gimmicks. As for the Omega Lock, once all four keys are in place and it's put into its proper place in a temple on Cybertron, it unlocks the planet, allowing it to awaken and transform into the god Primus.
    • Some Transformers are named for features that later incarnations won't have. Armada Smokescreen doesn't have smoke (though he did once activate such a feature in the Autobots' base... something anyone could've done.) Energon Sixshot doesn't have anything to do with the number six (the original Sixshot had six forms, though the 'shot' is still a misnomer.) Cybertron Crosswise's name has nothing to do with him, though he is a 'monster hunter' and some monsters don't like crosses... but that's really stretching it. The first use of the name was with a guy in Transformers: Robots in Disguise who had a big X on his car hood. G1 Ramjet? An F-15, which doesn't use a ramjet. The list goes on and on.
    • Ramjet's name actually suits him pretty well, considering his penchant for ramming other aircraft out of the sky.
    • Whisper in Shattered Glass is LOUD! Mind you, it is SG. Of course, since the Decepticons are not only good but kind of foppish in the SG universe, this is definitely meant to be an ironic thng.
      • Speaking of Shattered Glass, the good/evil alignment flip means some of the Obviously Evil names wind up on good guys, and the other way around. First Aid, Defensor? Bad. Sinnertwin, Demolishor, Rampage? Good.
    • In the G1 episode Enter the Nightbird, the character who needs help jumping up a cliff is the guy named Cliffjumper.
    • Bluestreak is silver, and not blue. Ironically, the Diaclone toy he was redecoed from was blue, and his packaging art showed him as being blue. Due to trademark problems, he was renamed "Silverstreak" in the 2000's, which fits better. But his thing is that he never shuts up; he talks a blue streak. "Silverstreak" just describes his color and implies that he's fast.
  • SpongeBob SquarePants: Neither the eponymous SpongeBob, nor his pants, are actually square. He and his pants are rectangular prisms composed entirely of rectangular faces.
    • Also, Squidward is an octopus, not a squid.
  • In the Disney film The Great Mouse Detective, Padraic Ratigan actually ISN'T a rat; he's just a mouse drawn to look like a rat.
  • Asterix Conquers America: Asterix doesn't conquer America.
    • Though this is probably due to the translation having a Completely Different Title, since the original French title was Asterix et les Indiens (Asterix and the Indians)
  • The Princess and the Frog: Considering the movie takes place in America, the eponymous "Princess" isn't an actual princess, she's just mistaken for one,but becomes one at the end of the movie, considering the "Frog" is of royal descent.
  • The two part Family Guy episode "Stewie Kills Lois/Lois Kills Stewie"; neither title is accurate. In part 1, Stewie appears to kill Lois, but she turns out to be Not Quite Dead. Stewie does get killed in part 2, but it is Peter who kills him rather than Lois. And on top of that, the whole thing turns out to be a computer simulation anyway.
  • Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends: Its Non-Indicative Name was only half of the issues viewers had with "Foster's Goes to Europe".
    • And in the episode, Mac runs down several examples of foods that they have in Europe, including German chocolate cake.
  • Claymation is done using Plasticene® -- clay would dry out and harden.
  • How the Grinch Stole Christmas is actually about how he could steal the decorations and gifts associated with Christmas; he couldn't actually steal the holiday, and even then, he gives back what he stole in the first place.
  • Fred and Barney Meet The Thing. Fred and Barney do not meet the Thing, if you can call him that; they're in segments that never cross over.
  • Phineas and Ferb gives us this gem:

Phineas: (After Candace and various others start falling from a plane) Wow, dumb luck. And over the Sea of Razor Sharp Rock Spires too!
The Others: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!
Phineas: Good thing it was so inappropriately named!
(Candace and the others land on ground made of pillows.)

  • Flounder from The Little Mermaid is not a flounder (a flat gray fish that disguises itself as the bottom of the sea floor), but some sort of yellow tropical fish with blue stripes.
  • Similarly, Marlin from Finding Nemo is actually a clownfish like his son, Nemo. This was lampshaded about halfway through the film when Nigel the pelican tells Gill that Nemo's father shares his name with that of "a popular sport fish." Also, Dory is not a dory, she's a blue tang.
  • On Rocko's Modern Life, Heffer Wolfe is neither a heifer nor a wolf. Played with, however: he is a steer, and his last name comes from his adopted family, who are wolves.
  • Regular Show's tag line is "it's anything but".
  • The Quack Pack version of Duckburg, unlike the one seen in DuckTales (1987) and in the comics, is actually not populated by ducks (or any anthropomorphic animal), with the sole exceptions being Donald, Daisy, Professor von Drake, and the nephews, at all!
    • Also, Duckworth (Scrooge McDuck's butler), despite his name, is actually a dog.
  • Hey Arnold! plays with this, when a Drill Sergeant Nasty Sadist Teacher notes that Curly's hair isn't curly and demands to know his real name. The odd thing is, he's right—Curly's real first name is Thaddeus.
  • Doug Funnie isn't.
  • One of the main villains in My Life as a Teenage Robot is Queen Vexus, leader of the Cluster Empire.
  • The Acme Hour on Cartoon Network was actually 2 hours long.
  • The Rugrats spinoff All Grown Up! features the characters as tweens.
  • The Avengers Earths Mightiest Heroes episode "Iron Man is Born" does not retell the origin of Iron Man, nor does "The Man in the Ant Hill" show Hank Pym explore an ant hill. Some other episodes have the same names as comics they do not actually adapt, but most of them still sound relevant to the plot.
  • The My Little Pony series, Newborn Cuties, as the characters are neither newborn or cute.
  • The Scissorsmith in the Samurai Jack episode "Jack and the Farting Dragon"; he runs a shop that seems to sell everything except scissors.
  • In Dungeons and Dragons, Sheila is given the designation of "Thief" by the Dungeon Master, but this is incorrect on more than one levels. First off, she's not the Loveable Rogue type of hero who gets by through stealing from or duping enemies (although, to be honest, she could have done so offscreen, as it would have helped the heroes a lot) and even using original game terms, she doesn't fit a Thief's role in an adventuring group. Thieves are the type who disarm traps and locks, and strike at enemies from the shadows; while stealth is a big part of Sheila's role in the group (via her Invisibility Cloak) she's mostly noncombatant. In fact, ironically, "Rogue" (the name the class eventually evolved into) seemed far more fitting in hindsight.
  • Protagonist Ensign Beckett Mariner in Star Trek: Lower Decks is the daughter of Alonzo and Carol Freeman; as of season 3, no explanation is given for her having a different surname than her parents.
  • Among the hideously deformed (but environmentally informed) heroes in Toxic Crusaders is Major Disaster; not the most heroic-sounding name, but he's a Friend to All Living Things, especially plant life.
  • Downplayed with the H.I.V.E. Five in Teen Titans. They did have five members to begin with, but in "Lightspeed", as Kid Flash notices, they have six members.
  • The four protagonists of High Guardian Spice are Parsley, Sage, Rosemary, and Thyme; while the Shout Out there is obvious, those are not spices, they are herbs, there's a difference.
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