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[[Viewers are Morons|Casual viewers]] just can't be bothered to pay the kind of attention it takes to interpret the meaning of a show's title, even if this effort is small. This can lead to some unusual and mistaken notions about key facets of the show.
 
Often contributes to instances of [[Cowboy Bebop Atat His Computer]], including the trope's namesake incident. For confusion regarding our own [[Word Salad Title|Word Salad Titles]], see [[I Thought It Meant]]. Specific [[Sub-Trope|Sub Tropes]] include:
* [[I Am Not Shazam]]: The work's title is mistaken for the protagonist's name.
* [[Iconic Character Forgotten Title]]: The protagonist's name is mistaken for the work's title.
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* [[The "The" Title Confusion]]: When nobody is quite sure if a work's title begins with a "the".
{{examples|Examples where the title itself is mistaken for something else:}}
* ''[[Dastardly and Muttley Inin Their Flying Machines]]'' is popularly known as ''Stop That Pigeon'' or ''Stop The Pigeon'' because of its theme song. As a matter of fact, ''Stop That Pigeon'' was the series' working title, and instead of Dick Dastardly, a German baron was intended as the squadron leader.
** In an episode of ''Yogi's Treasure Hunt'', Dastardly captures a bunch of HB characters, and starts ''[[Cool and Unusual Punishment|torturing them with clips from the show]]''. One of them remarks "Oh no! Not these ''Stop The Pigeon'' cartoons!". Bonus points for the audio being the [[Ear Worm|"Stop The Pigeon" portion of the theme song looped over and over]] and the "clip" being Dastardly in a plane chasing the pigeon [[Wraparound Background|also looping over and over.]]
* A minor example: ''The Sylvester & Tweety Mysteries'' were often thought of as just ''Sylvester & Tweety Mysteries'', which is understandable given that the title appears five times in the theme tune without the "The"; the "The" only appears in the title card.
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** However, the French and Italian versions have ''embraced'' the Title Confusion, making "Mermaid Melody" bigger than "Pichi Pichi Pitch" (or, in the Italian version, "Principesse Sirene") on the logo rather than the other way around. This may be an example of a [[Market-Based Title]], as [[Gratuitous English]] is more common in Europe than [[Gratuitous Japanese]] is, and if you must have both in the title, it would make more sense to emphasize the one that would get more attention instead of stay true to the source.
* The webcomic ''[[Dinosaur Comics]]'' is still occasionally referred to as ''Daily Dinosaur Comics''. [http://web.archive.org/web/20030220043058/http://www.qwantz.com/ This] is where "Daily" came from. Note the top of the page "Welcome to qwantz.com", then immediately on the next line "daily dinosaur comics". Since "qwantz.com" isn't a suitable title for the comic, the descriptive text was likely mistaken for the title back in the day, and it stuck.
* [[The Movie]] of ''[[The X Files|The X-Files]]'' is simply called "The X-Files"; the phrase "Fight the Future" was just its tagline. Confusing these two is rather like saying that every other episode of the show was called "The Truth is Out There". The second movie, however, is titiled ''The X-Files: I Want to Believe''.
** See [[wikipedia:Image:XFilesMoviePoster.jpg|the poster]]; by where "Fight the Future" is placed in relation to the title, it could easily be mistaken for a subtitle. Half the time, ''I Want To Believe'' is written in the ''same'' position when it comes to the newer movie, so it looks like [[Ascended Fanon|the writers have surrendered]].
** The poster's not the half of it—"Fight the Future" appears on the ''spine'' of the DVD case.
*** And that poster has another, more obvious tagline already!
* The Flemish playwright Hugo Claus originally titled his first novel ''The Duck Hunt'', then decided to change it to ''The Metsiers'' (title in Dutch: ''De Metsiers''), the name of the family on which the plot focuses. The novel ends on a duck hunt during which {{spoiler|the mentally ill son of the Metsiers family gets shot in the face and dies}}, but Claus wanted the title to put the whole emphasis on the title characters (some scholars insist that this is such a deliberate and important choice). Then the novel was translated into French, English, etc. with the title ''The Duck Hunt''.
* The British television spy series starring Patrick McGoohan was titled ''[[Danger Man (TV)|Danger Man]]'' in the UK, ''Secret Agent'' everywhere else, but the chorus of the American theme song by Johnny Rivers is "Secret Agent Man."
* The Analects of [[Confucius]] are mistitled in English. The actual title, ''Lún Yǔ'', means "discussion over Confucius' words" -- "analects" are a collection of excerpts from a literary work, an inaccurate description for the book in question.
* Similar to the above, ''[[Wing Commander (Videovideo Gamegame)|Wing Commander]] Prophecy'' is sometimes referred to by fans as "Wing Commander 5", as the fifth "main line" WC, even though it's never been used outside the fandom using it as a working title, when almost nothing of the game was yet known to anyone not involved with production of the game.
** ''[[Mega Man (Videovideo Gamegame)|Mega Man]] & Bass'' used to get a similar treatment, fans stubbornly referring to it as ''Mega Man 9'', until the real ''Mega Man 9'' was announced.
* It's stunning how often people refer to [[David Letterman]]'s CBS show as ''Late Night with David Letterman'', the title of his old NBC show which went off the air in 1993. The CBS show is called ''Late '''Show''' with David Letterman'', and was circa 1993 seen as more of a continuation of ''[[Late Night]]'' than the actual continuation of ''Late Night'' with unknown comedy writer [[Conan O Brien|Conan O'Brien]] at the helm, which Jimmy Fallon became the host of after Conan stopped doing so. But it's been 15 years, people! Learn the name, already! Especially since ''Late Night'' still exists as ''Late Night with Jimmy Fallon'' and is completely separate from ''Late Show''.
* There is no such character as "Carmen San Diego". The [[Edutainment Game]] series instead centers on [[Carmen Sandiego]], whose surname is spelled as one word for whatever reason.
* [[Urusei Yatsura]] is often called Lum.
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** When the show was dubbed for French TV, it was actually re-titled ''Lamu'' (Lum's name in the dub, taken from the Japanese pronunciation / spelling of "Lum", which is ラム).
*** There was a bad British dub of the early episodes (cropped into widescreen) called ''Lum the Invader Girl''.
* The obscure 1970s movie ''[[Death Bed: theThe Bed That Eats]]'' is ofter referred to as ''Death Bed: The Bed That Eats '''People''' '' due to Patton Oswalt's infamous rant about the movie where he consistently and incorrectly refers to the movie by that title.
* Although the title of ''[[Doctor Who]]'' refers to the main character [the Doctor], his name is, in fact, ''not'' actually "Doctor Who", being instead just "the Doctor"- something most people unfamiliar to the series seem to miss.
** In fairness, he's referred to as "Doctor Who" in at least three episodes of the original series, and various comic strips published about his adventures during its run by people who ''should'' have been familiar with it also referred to him that way.
* Even though the most popular character is named Strong Bad, and the feature he hosts is called Strong Bad E-mails, the [[Web Animation]] series as a whole is called ''[[Homestar Runner]]''. People get this wrong even though the website is called ''homestarrunner.com''.
** [[Lampshade Hanging|Lampshaded]] in the introduction when even Homestar doesn't know the name of the site. "[http://www.homestarrunner.com/firsttime.html Homestarrunner.net...IT'S DOT COM!]"
* The TV adaptation of ''[[Journey to Thethe West]]'' is titled ''[[Monkey]]'' but often called "Monkey Magic!" after the memorable chorus to the theme song.
* ''[[Alice in Wonderland]]'' and ''Alice Through the Looking-Glass'': really ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' and ''Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There''
* Another minor example: ''Pontoffel Pock, Where Are You?'', a [[Dr. Seuss]] television special about a boy and a piano that takes him to any part of the world, is misremembered as ''Pontoffel Pock, Where '''the [[Gosh Darn It to Heck|Heck]]''' Are You?'' due to the refrain of the title song. The only time a [[Title Drop]] without "the Heck" is used is when Pontoffel escapes and Neefa Feefa is left behind, yelling the title.
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** It was intentionally marketed as (and began as) a series about people physically lost on a mysterious island.
* The live-action/animation hybrid ''Vanpires'' had a title which actually referred to the series' villains. The good guys were named the Motorvators.
* The "cheeky angel" in ''[[Tenshi Nana Konamaiki]]'' is Megumi, not the mischievous spirit who transformed Megumi into a girl.
* A promotional press conference early in its run revealed that at least one reporter thought that the ''[[3rd Rock From the Sun|3rd Rock from the Sun]]'' was where its aliens were ''from'', rather than where they were ''visiting''... likewise the continuity announcers on [[Sky One1]], where the series premiered in the UK.
* Charles Schulz was allegedly very annoyed by fans who wrote to him under the assumption that "[[Peanuts]]" was the name of one of the characters - in the early days, he often got letters saying "[[Cowboy Bebop Atat His Computer|I love your new strip with Peanuts and his dog!]]" (The name of the comic strip was not his; it was an example of [[Executive Meddling]]. The original title, "Li'l Folks", was too similar to another strip of the time.) To get around this, the Sunday strips were, for a long while, subtitled "featuring Good Ol' Charlie Brown," although the subtitle has recently been dropped, presumably because nowdays the only person who ''wouldn't'' know who Charlie Brown was would be living under a rock.
** Though in Brazil, the strip title ("Minduim", from ''amendoim'', "Peanut") was turned into Charlie Brown's nickname.
* Non-fiction example: The biologist Richard Dawkins has often remarked about how many of his critics do not seem to have read his books past the title page. ''The Selfish Gene'' in particular is a magnet for this, with people assuming that he claims that ''people'' should behave in a selfish manner, that human selfishness has some kind of genetic cause, or even that genes have emotional states comparable to selfishness in humans. There's actually been quite a bit of philosophical argument about whether or not the book itself bears this out.
* In ''[[The Thin Man (Filmfilm)|The Thin Man]]'', the title refers to the person detective Nick Charles (who is out of shape in the book) is seeking. In the later sequel movies, it refers to Charles.
* ''[[The World Ends With You (Video Game)|The World Ends With You]]'' doesn't refer to [[The End of the World Asas We Know It]]. Rather, it describes the [[Emo Teen|hero's]] [[Nietzsche Wannabe|solipsistic outlook on life]] at the onset of the game. {{spoiler|He gets better.}}
** Mind you, the Japanese title is the [[Glurge]]-ical ''It's a Wonderful World''.
* Leonard Nimoy's 1977 book ''[[I Am Not Spock]]''. The book was an autobiography which dealt with the differences between Nimoy and his famous ''[[Star Trek]]'' character. Of course, everyone read the title and assumed that he hated playing Spock. Years later, a ''Paramount executive'', believing this, almost refused to let Nimoy direct ''Star Trek III''! Nimoy later published a book titled ''[[I Am Not Leonard Nimoy|I Am Spock]]''.
* Many people get confused as to what the hell the title of ''[[30 Rock (TV)|Thirty Rock]]'' is supposed to mean. Try watching the [[Title Sequence]] carefully and you'll eventually get it. {{spoiler|It comes from the street address of NBC's headquarters in New York City, 30 Rockefeller Center, where the show is set.}}
* ''Girls of the [[Playboy]] Mansion'' is not, contrary to what it sounds like, a porn show, but rather a documentary on the lives of the three Hugh Hefner wives.
* ''[[The Merchant of Venice]]'' is not Shylock, but Antonio, as made explicit by the original full title: ''The moſt excellent Hiſtorie of the Merchant of Venice. VVith the extreame crueltie of Shylocke the Iewe towards the ſayd Merchant, in cutting a iuſt pound of his flesh: and the obtaining of Portia by the choice of three chests.''
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* The title of the game series ''[[Guilty Gear]]'' is often assumed to be [[Gratuitous English]]. It in fact refers to the main character Sol Badguy, the prototype Gear who feels responsible for the creation of the Gears.
* Many non-viewers erroneously assume that ''[[Angel]]'' had a female main character, since Angel is more commonly a feminine name; in fact the title character is male. ''[[Dark Angel]]'' may have added to the confusion.
* Similarly, those unfamiliar with ''[[Bambi (Disney)|Bambi]]'' often believe that its title character is female, since "Bambi" is today considered only a girls' name.
** Also, the popularity of actress [[Zooey Deschanel]] almost certainly caused some to think that the original Zooey (from J.D. Salinger's ''Franny and Zooey'') must be female. He's not.
* The ''[[Modern Warfare]] 2'' mission ''No Russian'', the controversial "airport level" centered on the player-character killing civilians to maintain his cover in Vladimir Makarov's Ultranationalist group, is often presumed to mean "don't kill any Russians," because Makarov and the Ultranationalists are themselves Russian, and the first line is Makarov doing a [[Title Drop]], using the phrase as an order to the player and his other lackies before the shooting starts. The airport, however, is ''in Russia,'' and as such, the people waiting in line to pass through the metal detectors before boarding outbound flights are most certainly Russian, barring a few tourists or businessmen returning home. "No Russian" means "don't speak any Russian, use English," to disguise the fact that the attack is conducted by Russians {{spoiler|because Makarov intends to frame the United States for it}}.
* ''[[Stargate SG -1]]'' is often thought of as [[Department of Redundancy Department|unnecessarily repetitive]] by those unfamiliar with the show. In actuality, it refers to the Stargate program and its flagship team: [[SG 1]].
* On first hearing, ''[[Firefly]]'' sounds like the name of the characters' ship. In actuality, Firefly is the type of ship and Serenity is its name.
* ''[[Dead Souls]]'' is not about souls in the spiritual sense. The word "soul" meant "person" in Imperial Russian statistics, particularly concerning peasant population. The eponymous dead souls are serfs who died before the latest update of the state records, making them factually dead but legally alive.
* ''[[Zombieland (Film)|Zombieland]]'' refers not to the Pacific Playland amusement park where the characters are headed, but rather to the zombie-infested world (or possibly just the United States) where they all live.
* In a double case, ''[[Rurouni Kenshin]]'' had a period where American viewers, upon hearing the title, would ask "Which one is Roan?" This is a result of people confusing "rurouni", meaning "wandering swordsman", with "[[Ronin]]".
* The protagonist of ''[[The Legend of Zelda]]'' series is not Zelda. Zelda is the princess that the hero ([[Canon Name|default name]] Link) must save every game.
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=== Often occurs when a [[Revival]] or [[Series Franchise]] uses idiosyncratic names: ===
* When Hal Roach began his series of child-centered comedy shorts in the 1920s, his titles included ''Roach's Rascals'' and ''The Terrible Ten''. But because the first short was titled ''Our Gang'', the public started referring to them as "Our Gang comedies". By the time MGM took over production in 1938, ''Our Gang'' had become the official title. The series' [[Syndication Title]], ''[[The Little Rascals]]'', wasn't popular until the mid-1960s, when King World sold the shorts to TV stations.
* ''[[Star Trek: Enterprise]]'' was originally titled simply ''Enterprise'', to the confusion of fans.
* ''Grace And Favour'' was, due to its title, not recognized by many fans as a sequel to ''[[Are You Being Served? (TV)|Are You Being Served]]''. It became ''Are You Being Served? Again!'' in the US, where it was apparently more successful.
* In [[Movies]], the ''[[Indiana Jones (Franchise)|Indiana Jones]]'' and ''[[Star Wars (Franchise)|Star Wars]]'' franchises had sufficient inconsistencies in their naming conventions that their first installments have been retroactively retitled.
** The first ''Star Wars'' film was originally titled "Star Wars". It was not titled "Star Wars: Episode IV: [[A New Hope (Film)|A New Hope]]" until its second rerelease 3 years later. George Lucas claims this was because the [[Executive Meddling|execs]] thought nobody would get why this was Episode ''IV'' ... instead of which, nobody got why the ''second'' film was Episode ''V''. By then, of course, he had enough [[Protection From Editors]] to get away with it.
** The first ''[[Indiana Jones (Franchise)|Indiana Jones]]'' film was titled "[[Raiders of the Lost Ark (Film)|Raiders of the Lost Ark]]". It has been renamed as "Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark" to fit better with the later movies, although the onscreen title is still ''[[Raiders of the Lost Ark (Film)|Raiders of the Lost Ark]]''.
** Another ''[[Star Wars]]'' example: a [[Dark Forces Saga|video game series]] set in the New Republic Era, featuring Kyle Katarn, a mercenary-turned-Jedi (although he was not the player character in all of them). The games were named: ''Dark Forces'', ''Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II'' (with an expansion pack, ''Jedi Knight: Mysteries of the Sith''), ''Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast'', and ''Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy'' (without any numbers despite being a sequel to ''Jedi Knight II'', which brought yet more confusion).
*** Other confusion that ''Star Wars'' evokes is when mentioning numbers, since it started from the middle (when you mention "the first" can be either IV or I).
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* The first game in the ''[[Command and Conquer]]'' series was retronymmed "Tiberian Dawn".
** That was always the subtitle at least, though you wouldn't know it without [[All There in the Manual|the readme.txt file]].
* The ''[[X-Men (Comic Book)|X-Men]]'' [[X-Men (Filmfilm)|movies]] are largely themselves to blame for the confusion around their titles. While the first is simply ''X-Men'', the second is identified in its opening sequence as ''X2'' but in its closing sequence as ''X2: X-Men United'', and in publicity material is also promoted as ''X-Men 2'', ''X-Men 2: X-Men United'' and simply ''X-Men United''. Similarly, the third entry is variously known as ''X3'', ''X3: The Last Stand'', ''X-Men 3'', ''X-Men 3: The Last Stand'' and ''The Last Stand''. The next movie in the series, a prequel, gained the unnecessarily lengthy ''X-Men Origins: Wolverine'', and is referred to simply as ''Wolverine'' by most sane people.
* There seems to be some confusion about whether ''[[Transformers Animated|Animated]]'', the latest ''[[Transformers]]'' series, has a colon in the title, so it's either ''Transformers: Animated'' (like on the [[Cartoon Network]] site), or ''Transformers Animated'' (which shows up on all press releases about the series).
** Cartoon Network [[Credits Pushback|"up next" announcements]] sometimes make things even worse by appending "Series" to the end.
* After the success of ''[[Star Wars Clone Wars|Star Wars: Clone Wars]]'', the animated series set between episode II and III, Lucasfilm decided to create a new animated series set in the same time period called ''[[Star Wars: theThe Clone Wars|Star Wars:]]'' '''''[[Star Wars: theThe Clone Wars|The]]''''' ''[[Star Wars: theThe Clone Wars|Clone Wars]]''. Enough said.
** Similarly, there was a "Star Wars: Clone Wars" comic series long before the production of either television series. It was then followed up with "Clone Wars Adventures" then simply "Star Wars: The Clone Wars", in turn followed up by "Star Wars The Clone Wars" graphic novel series. [http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Clone_Wars_%28disambiguation%29 Throw in a book series and several video games using only the words "Clone Wars" as their titles] and you'd think someone would be able to think to at least subtitle them. Some people even mistakenly refer to ''[[Attack of the Clones]]'' as "The Clone Wars".
* [[Bubble Bobble (Video Game)|Bubble Bobble]]; Rainbow Islands: Story of Bubble Bobble II; Parasol Stars: Story of Bubble Bobble III; Bubble Bobble '''''Part''''' 2; Bubble Bobble II aka Bubble Symphony; Bubble Memories: Story of Bubble Bobble III. [[Non-Linear Sequel|Non-Linear Sequels]] have you confused yet?
* ''[[Modern Warfare]] 2'' originally didn't include the series name, [[Call of Duty]]; the original ''Modern Warfare'' was ''[[Call of Duty]] 4: [[Modern Warfare]].'' When it was discovered that the absence of the series name led to fans being less aware of ''Modern Warfare 2,'' it was added back on. The special editions of the game still omit it on their box art.
* The "Doom/Quake with a crossbow" series: ''[[Heretic]]''; ''[[Hexen]]''; ''Hexen II''; ''Heretic II''.
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* Because of the confusing nature of the Dark Forces/Jedi Knight series (for more information, see above), each game can have multitudes of abbreviations such as JKII, JO, JKII:JO, SW:JO, DFIII.
** They are almost always called, in order, ''Dark Forces,'' ''Jedi Knight,'' ''Jedi Outcast'' and ''Jedi Academy.''
* ''[[Ghost in Thethe Shell]]: [[Stand Alone Complex]]'' is often called by the straight pronunciation of it's acronym, which comes out as "[[Does This Remind You of Anything?|Gits Sack]]." Thankfully, the second season, subtitled "2nd Gig," is abbreviated to just "2nd Gig."
* ''[[The Hitchhiker's Guide to Thethe Galaxy (Franchise)|The Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy]]'' is usually referred to by fans as "The Hitchhiker's Guide" or sometimes "H2G2." (The in-universe guidebook of the same name is referred to in-story and out as simply "The Guide".) Most of the books in the series have similarly long titles (if not even longer), and get referred to by acronyms or significant words.
* ''[[Temple of Elemental Evil]]'' technically has a "The" in front of it, but absolutely no one uses it (It gets a smaller font size on the original's logo even). Similarly, the computer game adaptation has the subtitle "A Classic Greyhawk Adventure", but it isn't used outside of the cover, first patch installer, and copyright screen.
* [[Dr. Strangelove|Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Bomb]].
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* ''[[Neverwinter Nights 2]]'''s first expansion is referred to as both "Mask of '''t'''he Betrayer" and "Mask of '''T'''he Betrayer" (The Betrayer is a character's title, so it's an exception to normal grammar rules). Even the game itself is split when using "The Betrayer" vs "the Betrayer", but the newer instances (such as the gold and platinum releases) favor capital T.
* Comics, especially one-shots suffering from [[Colon Cancer]], sometimes have a different title in the indicia than on the cover.
* [[The BBC]] Radio 4 sitcom ''You'll Have Had Your Tea: The Doings of Hamish and Dougal''. At least, that's what the announcer calls it. The BBC website calls it ''Hamish and Dougal'' or ''Hamish and Dougal: You'll Have Had Your Tea'' (the Radio 7 Comedy A-Z lists both seperately) and the CD covers say either ''Hamish And Dougal: The hilarous spin-off from [[I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue (Radio)|I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue]]'' or ''[[I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue (Radio)|I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue]]: The Doings of Hamish and Dougal''.
* The ''X-Men'' [[Licensed Game]] for the NES is titled ''The Uncanny X-Men'' on the cover, but ''Marvel's X-Men'' is what the title screen says.
* ''Star Trek: The Motion Picture'' for the Vectrex is identified on the title screen as ''Star Trek - The Game''. It's a video game, not a motion picture.
 
=== Titles which are very similar, but not the same. ===
* There were some, only going by title and not having read a synopsis or seeing a trailer, thought that ''[[28 Days Later (Film)|28 Days Later]]'' was a sequel to ''[[28 Days (Film)|28 Days]]''. ''28 Days Later'' was about a zombie outbreak, ''28 Days'' (no "later") was [[Sandra Bullock]] playing a woman in a rehab program. It didn't help that ''28 Days Later'' was released 2 years after ''28 Days'', about the expected time for a sequel to be produced.
* Some people assume that [[The Beatles]]' "Revolution 9" is the song that has the lyrics "You say you want a revolution..."; they're actually thinking of "Revolution 1" (or "Revolution," the B-side to "Hey Jude"). "Revolution 9" is the weird sound collage with the voice repeating, "Number nine... Number nine... Number nine..." (which notoriously sounds like "Turn me on, dead man" when played backwards).
* ''[[3rd Rock Fromfrom the Sun]]'' and ''[[30 Rock (TV)|Thirty Rock]]'', made all the more confusing by the fact that the former's title is commonly shortened to "''3rd Rock''". ''3rd Rock'' is about [[Alien Among Us|aliens living on Earth]], i.e. the third planet (rock) from the sun. ''30 Rock'' is a [[Work Com]] set at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, otherwise known as "30 Rock". Amusingly, they're both [[NBC]] [[Sit ComSitcom|Sit Coms]].
 
=== In-universe examples: ===
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