You Called Me "X" - It Must Be Serious: Difference between revisions

* In ''[[Chicago]]'', Amos is shocked when Billy Flynn refers to him by his actual name at the trial, rather than the Andy or Alan or whatever from all their previous meetings. This helps Flynn get exactly the testimony he needs.

* ''[[Men in Black (film)|Men in Black]]'' is an ironic example, in that the names these characters grew up with have been purged intentionally, leaving them only with one initial codenames. K takes the joke a step further, perpetually calling J every diminutive nickname in the book (Son, Kiddo, Champ, Sport, Tiger, Slick...)

** Better still, the ''whole room'' looks.

* In ''[[Coraline (animation)|Coraline]]'' the titular character is called 'Caroline' by her new neighbours, to her disgust. However, in the Otherworld the correct pronounciation is used. Also, at the end of the film after Coraline and Wybie have {{spoiler|disposed of the Other Mother's hand}}, Wybie calls her Coraline.

* All through [[John Carpenter]]'s Vampires, the priest calls Jack "Mr. Crow." So when he says "Jack, you need to see this," as he's staring at a closed circuit television, you ''know'' something bad's about to happen. For the record, he calls him "Jack" from that point on in the movie as well.

* In [[The American President]], the president tells A.J., his Chief of Staff, to call him Andy in private, but he never does until one of the very last scenes. The president asks, hypothetically, if they would have been elected if his wife hadn't died.

* In [[The Flintstones]] movie, Barney tries to get BamBam to call him "Dada" all through the movie. He finally does during a death-defying rescue... which overjoys Barney so much that he doesn't notice the beam about to hit him in the head.

* In the American remake of [[The Ring|The Ring 2]], Rachel's son Aidan insists on calling his mother by her first name. So when {{spoiler|Samara [[Demonic Possession|takes over Aidan's body]] and subsequently [[Something They Would Never Say|starts calling her "mom",]]}} she realizes something's up.

* In every [[Star Trek]] series ever, calling someone by their first name instead of their rank or last name indicates something very serious is going on.

** This goes all the way back to ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series]]''. Spock usually referred to Kirk as "[[The Captain|Captain]]"; he only called him "Jim" when his emotional state was affected, for good or bad. A good example is in "The Doomsday Machine", when he calls him "Captain" and then "Jim" in the same conversation:

'''Spock:''' Jim, you'll be killed. Just like {{spoiler|Decker}}. }}

*** Or his giddy shout at the end of ''Amok Time'', showing his relief that he hasn't... that is, that [[Blatant Lies|Starfleet has not lost a fine captain.]]

** This is also how Joan usually identifies the random strangers who are God speaking to her -- by their calling her by her first name. (Which inevitably leads to a scene where Joan flips out on a stranger who knows her name... who just happened to read it off her name tag.)

* At the end of season 3 of ''[[Lost]]'', Sawyer's in a funk after finally killing Cooper. Sawyer repeatedly addresses Kate by her name instead of "Freckles" or another nickname when she confronts him about what's wrong:

** It's a sign that things are getting really serious when almost ''everyone'' begins referring to Sawyer and Hurley by their given names (James and Hugo, respectively) instead of their nicknames.

* Aside from his wife the First Lady, only five people in seven seasons of [[The West Wing]] ever called President Bartlet "Jed" to his face -- and only Leo has done it twice.

* On ''[[Burn Notice]]'', Sam has called Michael by his first name (as opposed to "Mike" or "Mikey") exactly once, when he found confirmation that a crazy conspiracy theorist who'd been trying to enlist their help was right about a plot to kill several American spies.

** Sam combines this with [[Something They Would Never Say]] in the season two finale. He's been tasked with getting Michael's mother, Madeline, out of town to keep her safe from the bad guys, but she refuses to run. She jokes around with Sam, offering him a beer - something Sam would never turn down. He slams his hand on the counter and says "I don't want a beer, Madeline!"; refusing the beer and his calling her Madeline (instead of "Maddie") tells her he's dead serious.

* [[Inspector Lynley]] universally called his colleague and partner Barbara Havers by her last name - until Havers {{spoiler|was shot in the line of duty}}, at which point Lynley [[Berserk Button|went quite berserk]] and could only say desperately, "Barbara? ''Barbara???''"

* In ''[[Criminal Minds]]'', [[Mr. Fanservice|Derek Morgan]] and [[Big Beautiful Woman|Penelope Garcia]] have many pet-names for each other. When Morgan's calling Garcia "baby girl", "goddess", or "sweetheart", and Garcia's referring to Morgan as "god of chocolate thunder", "sweet-cheeks", or "hot stuff", everything's copacetic. During {{spoiler|Garcia's shooting}} in season three, the "Derek"s and "Penelope"s were flying, due to the intense emotional fallout. In season five, when Morgan is {{spoiler|temporarily promoted to Unit Chief}}, the first thing he does is curb the unprofessional pet names (though he's right back to calling her "baby girl" again after {{spoiler|Hotch retakes the Unit Chief role}}}:

** Used jarringly in recent episodes, though not between Morgan and Garcia. Reid, upset that {{spoiler|JJ didn't tell him that Emily's death was faked, even though he spent over two months in a deep depression and crying at her house}}, calls JJ by her first name of "Jennifer". Given that ''everyone'' calls her JJ, it was quite unusual to hear, especially out of Reid, who has always had a close relationship with JJ.

** In the season one episode "Riding the Lightning", Hotch and JJ interview a guy on death row.

'''JJ:''' ''You'' are not my friend. ''You'' can call me Jennifer. }}

* Played with in the ''JAG'' episode "Full Engagement." Harm always calls Sarah MacKenzie by her nickname "Mac." During an emergency landing in Harm's Stearman, Harm mutters, "Come on, Sarah." Mac later says she knew the situation was serious because Harm called her Sarah. Harm explains that Sarah is his plane's name; he named it after his grandmother.

* Any time a wrestler is called by his real first name (e.g. Mark for [[The Undertaker]], Paul for either [[Triple H]] or [[The Big Show]] and not Heyman, or Phil for [[CM Punk]]), you know things just got serious. Especially in real life, since wrestlers usually call each other by their ring names outside the ring.

** And when it's done blatantly on-air to the point of Lampshading, one can usually count on an audience reaction somewhere between maniacal cheering and awed silence. Or both at the same time, from different sections.

== [[Video Game]] ==

* It's pretty subtle, but Jay of ''[[Jays Journey|Jay's Journey]]'' only calls Antignarot by his proper name in a few of the more serious scenes (oddly, never in Antignarot's presence.) As Atolla mechanically corrects Jay's mispronunciations of Antignarot [[Running Gag|all throughout the game]], he even starts to correct one of these correct usages.

* In ''[[Ace Attorney|Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney]]'', Klavier usually calls Apollo "Herr Forehead". When he calls him "Apollo Justice", it's serious.

** And in ''[[Ace Attorney|Trials and Tribulations]]'', Godot calls Phoenix Wright, "Trite," because he blames him for Mia's death. He only calls Phoenix by his real name at the end of the last case in the game after {{spoiler|he successfully proved that Godot was the real killer, and proved his worthiness as Mia's successor.}}

* Danette from ''[[Soul Nomad and The World Eaters]]'' has a problem with remembering names, which gets really annoying for Gig whom she frequently refers to as "Hey you in there". Until the end of the game {{spoiler|Gig [[Heroic Sacrifice|uses up all of his powers to defeat the final boss]] and appears to have died. She first tries to call for him as "You in there" before screaming "Giiig!" Ironically in one of the endings she still calls him "You in there" even when he's no longer possessing the main character.}}

** Played [[Tear Jerker|another way]] in the prequel, "Start Of Darkness": {{spoiler|Redcloak and his brother, Right-Eye, have a conversation where they promise to call each other "big brother" and "little brother" instead of the names they've adopted for Xykon's convenience. At the end of the book, after Redcloak has mortally wounded Right-Eye, their last words to each other are "Goodbye, little brother." "Goodbye...''Redcloak''."}}

** Another instance, when Belkar decides being left behind is an elaborate prank:

* ''[[Scary Go Round]]'': [http://scarygoround.com/?date=20090901 "Oh, Eustace"]

* ''[[Looking for Group]]''. [http://www.lfgcomic.com/page/463 "Take care of him, Father." "It is never a good omen when you call me that."]