I was thinking about starting this thread a while back, and as no one seemed to protest, I'll just do it. Here are some of my observations.

While most TV characters seem to have very ordinary names - Bob, Bill, Mary, etc. - there will be the occasional Horatio here and there. It's a shame that TV people don't do that more often; while reality shows are swirming with Omarosas, Ebonys and Jenascias, scripted shows give us almost nothing but plain Janes and Jennys. Nothing wrong with those names, but it would be fun to have a show with truly original character names. You can give your kid any name in America, after all, and fictional characters could all have truly original names.

It seems TV siblings often have names with some similar element. Like Piper, Prue, Phoebe and Paige Halliwell. Or the Biblically named Matt, Mary, Ruthie, Simon, David and Sam Camden. I'm not sure about Lucy though. On Friends, we've got Joey's sisters: Gina, Dina, Mary Angela, Mary Ellen?, and yet something very similar.

TV girls seem to have more original names than TV boys - i.e., Meadow and Anthony Junior on the Sopranos. However, I've heard that this is the case in most real families too.

Eccentric characters are often given eccentric names or cooky nicknames. Good examples are Phoebe Buffay on Friends - whose sister's name is Ursula Pamela Buffay, even more unusual.

Cosmo Kramer on Seinfeld is especially good, since his first name wasn't even revealed in the first seasons and it came as a surprise that the name should even be mentioned (I doubt we'll ever hear the first name of Newman). After the buildup of Kramer as a mysterious, eccentric character, a name like John or Michael would have been disappointing.

When TV characters are naming their child, they might have a long list of names, but they can never agree on just the right one. Then they pick the name at the moment of the birth: the policeman who drove the desperate father to the delivery room at the last minute; the janitor who dies while you're stuck in the closet during the birth, etc. Or the baby's named after its father, mother, or grandparent. I'd love to see a show where they actually think about the name during the pregnancy and settle on something before the baby's born. A name with some meaning behind it.

These are just my observations for now. Any thougths?

One that comes to mind is the episode of the old Dick Van Dyke Show where a family conference ran amok and resulted in the name "Richard Rosebud Petrie".

Well, on Perfect Strangers, Balki named his son Robespierre Boinky. For some reason that just cracked me up. At least he won't have to worry about being one of 6 Robespierres in his 2nd grade class.

I'm actually a big fan of traditional names, though. I have a common first name, but my mother decided to get cutesy with the spelling. The result has been an
entire lifetime of people spelling my name wrong and even arguing with me that I am spelling my own name wrong. Case in point, years ago when I began working for a new company they spelled my first name the traditional way on my paycheck; my bank refused to cash it.

What bothers me about TV character names is the inconsistancy of them at times, or the failure to think about the long-term effects. Take SATC. Miranda named her son Brady, giving him his father's last name as his first name. She then married Steve (his father). In theory, this poor baby became Brady Brady at that point.

What really bugs me is that you can have a town full of thousands of people and no one has the same name. Even common names. I mean, say you work in a major law firm. There are going to be at least a few lawyers with the same first name. But someone on TV can call in and ask for Jim, and it's no problem for the receptionist to connect them, because out of 500 employees, there is only one Jim in the whole building.

This reminds me of an ep of WKRP in Cincinnati in which Jennifer had a new boyfriend named "Steel" -- a muscular, bodybuilding type of guy. At a party Les Nesman tells Steel that Steel is an interesting name. And Steel says, "I like to think that a person's name says something about him. What's your name?" And Les says, "Les" in a little mealy-mouthed voice. It was so funny -- and a joke they probably didn't anticipate when they chose the names for the characters.

I liked the way Mad About You handled the baby naming.

And I'm a big fan of the oddball billionaire on NewsRadio being named Jimmy James. First, because powerful men often use the boyish nickname versions of their names; second, because it's James James and no explanation was ever given for it.

Newsradio did explain how he got his name.


Jimmy James: The man so nice, they named him twice.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer had:

- Buffy Anne Summers
- Willow Rosenberg
- Alexander (Xander) LaVelle Harris
- Rupert Giles
- Anya Christina Emanuella Jenkins

AKA Anya Lame-Assed-Made-Up-Maiden-Name.

I still crack up laughing when I hear her sing that line.

Well in Farscape, John named his kid after D'Argo.

Mondo Sinistro writes:


Paul Simms has also said that the name was a shout-out to the Beastie Boys song "Jimmy James" (from the Check Your Head album). In a similar vein, Chris Carter named the lead character of Millenium Frank Black in honor of the Pixies frontman of the same name.

Joey's sisters were named Gina, Dina, Tina, Mary Angela, Mary Theresa, Cookie, and Veronica (though some people dispute Veronica's name).

Also, what about Chandler Bing? What a name! And his parents, Nora Tyler Bing and Charles Bing (aka Helena Handbasket).

It was also cute when they tried to think up names for the triplets, Leslie, Frank Jr. Jr. ("Don't get me started!"), and Chandler. Phoebe went through many name possibilities before settling on Chandler, including The Hulk. :)

I think the absolute worse baby name was the one Steve and Teri Irwin gave their daughter... Bindi Sue. She was named after a croc and a dog!

Well, currently there's Veronica Mars living in a town called Neptune.

And Fox Mulder, who oddly shares a name with the network his character was on. And I think he once claimed he even made his parents call him Mulder, but I might be confusing him with someone else on that one because I'm almost certain we saw his mother call him Fox. Anyone remember enough to clear that up?



On the subject of mysterious characters with unknown names, The X-Files made much use of that device. The entire consortium was known only by attributions like "Well-Manicured Man." I believe one of them was officially "The Elder" but it took a while for TPTB to give him even that much of a name so fans had independenly come up with "Well-Fed Man." We did eventually learn that Ciggarette-Smoking Man's name was CGB Spender, since his being Jeffrey Spender's father was a moderately important plot point. I think he was the only Consortium member they ever gave a real name to.

Murphy Brown had Corky Sherwood, who went and married a guy with the last name of Forrest and became Corky Sherwood-Forrest.

ETA: Mulder's mother called him Fox. For God's sake, she gave the poor guy the name, she should use it. At least his middle name was William (very normal).

Scully's name was Dana Catherine (or Katherine) Scully.

Can we *please* put a moratorium on the name JACK for awhile, especially for heroes/leads of shows? It seems like there's a Jack as a lead on every show I do watch--'Lost', 'Without a Trace', Law&Order and '24'. (Okay, no Jacks on CSI or Cold Case...) And I think there are other lead Jacks--Stargate, right? I guess the name says 'sensible, upright guy who's capable of leading in a crisis'...but enough already!

Also, apparently lead women must have a short, sensible name, often a nickname, often androgynous. (Sam, Kate, Alex.)

Er.. John Crichton's father from Farscape was Jack too no?

Even though his mum did call him Fox (and I agree with outtabreath that she should), I do have a vague recollection of Mulder telling Scully that he even made his parents call him Mulder. Although the impression I got from that conversation, was that it was during his childhood. And maybe as an adult has accepted his mother calling him Fox.

On the Australian soap Neighbours, there is a character called Toadie - short for Toadfish. He does have a normal name that only ever gets heard when he is doing his lawyerly stuff in the courtroom.

Didn't Sondra on The Cosby Show name her twins after Nelson Mandela and his wife? That was a cool, if it is true.

Angel had Winifred Burkle who everyone called Fred. Also Charles Gunn who everyone called Gunn

And Lorne's real name was something crazy too, all I can remmebr is that it's something of The Deathsomething Clan. And then there was Grooselugg.

Which reminds me that if you are human you will have a boring name, if you are not Human then you will never have a boring straightforward name, you will have some crazy looking name full of apostrophes and vowels and not many contestants.

It was in Season Two I believe when Scully comforted Mulder by using his first name. His response was something like, "Please Scully. I even made my parents call me Mulder." But, yes, his mother and father called him Fox. Chris Carter said it was the name of a boyhood friend and he always liked the name, not a network pimping.

In some cases, traditional names can be better than more individual names. Just imagine: Instead of Joshua Lyman and Samuel Norman Seaborn we had Alessandro Sniklefritz ( I always loved both those names!) an Markie-Mark Wallbergg. Though that would make for an interesting episode...

Since I'm a big "Friends" fan, I like the names of Phoebe's triplet, especially Frank Jr. Jr. because it's actually original and they didn't go with the usual Frank the 3rd. And of course Chandler for a girl.

And speaking of all the Jacks of the TV land, there's also Jack Bing, Chandler Bing's son named after his wife's father and Erica Bing, who was named after her birth mother. Even though they aren't as far-fetched as other baby names like Mabel or something, at least they are better than Emma (which I totally hate as a name, don't know why).

Joan of Arcadia is great in this regard:
Joan/Jane=God gracess' gift
Adam=Joan's first love
William=free will, protection (he's an unbeliever and a cop)
Lucy=Lucyfer
Price=Pri(n)ce of darkness, maybe?
Luke=light, physician Gospel writer (scientist)
Grace=the irony is great

I'm sure ther's lots of others I'm missing.

Ahh! Then that must be the bible character that the Lucy in Seventh Heaven is named after, too! Makes sense.

Ooohh. I wanna' play...This goes back a-ways, but I thought it was cool (but then again, I think I was, like, twelve). On Ryan's Hope, when Mary Ryan and Jack Finelli's daughter was born they gave her the name Ryan. I thought that was such a nice way to ackoweledge the importance of Mary's family's extraordinary bond. And that Jack, who could be known for being pretty stubborn, agreed with the choice, because when all was said and done, you knew he had a deep respect for, and loyalty to, the Ryan clan...
...and then she grew up to be none other that Yasmine Bleeth...
...ahhh...good times...

Yeah, well her mom and sister were named Cookie and Kiki, so what did you expect? Also, it's not like anyone held a gun to her head and told her to use a hyphen. Some things are just best left alone.

And TV land had two Rachel Greens: Jennifer Aniston’s character on Friends and Mark Greene’s devil spawn on ER. Granted the spellings of the last names are different but…

A good number of the names I have picked out (prematurely) for my future kids are from different TV sources.

They include but are not limited to,

"Bianca Kendall" from All My Children
"Bethany Quinn", the Quinn being taken from Daria
"Trista Raye" named for my two favorite characters from Sailor Moon
"Jenny Sloane" after one of my favorite episodes of Early Edition
"Eric Matthew" from Boy Meets World
"Adam Doyle" taken from Joan of Arcadia and Angel respectively. I thought they sounded good together.
Finally "Ryan O'Reilly" from Oz until i decided that I didn't like O'Reilly as a middle name. So I changed it to the much more dignified "Ryan Atwood" from the O.C..

Somebody please shoot me NOW.

Trista Raye? Maybe I blocked out too much of the English dub to remember a Trista....

Sailor Pluto. Trista was the american version of her name while Raye was the name for Sailor Mars

Krevlorneswath of the Deathwok Clan. Yet another name they didn't reveal until a few seasons in.

Ah yes I must have missed that. Setsuna only appeared a little bit during S and SuperS outside of her Sailor Suit. (Shes more in the last season but then again that was never brought over)

Yes, Sondra named her twins Nelson and Winnie.

Don't forget his middle name: Muriel.

It's too bad Phoebe didn't stick with the other baby names that were suggested. Otherwise, there could have been a kid called Exxon or The Hulk we could snark about.

I loved Marcy Rhodes reaction when she found out that not only had she married a stranger while in a drunken stupor, but her name was now Marcy D'Arcy.

Right now, Fox has two Eric Foremans: one on That 70s Show (Topher Grace) and one on House (Omar Epps).

Seinfeld's George's favorite baby name: Seven.

S&tC's Charlotte's favorite baby name: Shayla.

What other names did characters pick out for their unborn children?

On Charmed, Piper was going to name her [supposed] daughter Prudence Melinda. Before the shocker! of the baby turning out to be a boy.

Anyone who watched The Days -- Did the mother and/or daughter have any names picked out? I can't remember.

Mabel. Mabel Frickin' Buchman.

Worst. Name. Ever.

Mothers
Always
Bring
Extra
Love

is a sweet name.

edited to highlight.

That kind of thing can happen. I grew up with a girl named Kelly Kelly. I think her stepfather adopted her, so I don't think it was lack of foresight on her parents' part that caused that, but still.

What do you all think is the single worst TV name of all time? I'm going to have to go with Horatio Caine. Granted, names can go either way depending on the character, but with David Caruso, I think I've got a strong case.

I don't love Arrested Development quite as much as everyone else does, but I have to admit the names are great. Especially the three generations of women: Lucille, Lindsey, and Maeby. No prizes for guessing which order they go in.
It's difficult to say what makes a good name. There's nothing obvious about Lenny Briscoe or Gil Grissom, but they just seem to fit the characters and be memorable without being goofy.
Worst names? Well, TV gets off lightly here. Most character names are just bland and forgettable, not actively offensive. One silly name situation I've come across is in Tru Calling, where the two main characters are Davies and Davis. Of course this is the show that features a standard diner called the Standard Diner, so you can't expect much.

I just remembered a 'character's' name that is unfortunate. Since this thread was inspired by the number of reality TV 'stars' who have interesting names, I suppose it is alright to include this reality star into this thread.

The winner of Australian Idol 2 was Casey Donovan - a 16 year old girl. After her win, one the sponsors provided a link to her apparent website in a newspaper advertisement. Since they left of the all important .au, little kiddies were not directed to her website but to the website of a male porn star.

I liked The Flintstones episode when Pebbles was born; I think it was Barney who said she was a “chip off the old block”, then Fred said “More like a pebble off the old Flintstone”, and that’s how they decided to call her Pebbles. (Hey, I was a kid.)

Also liked the Avengers correlation (which is probably all in my mind just because I like the concept) between John Steed and Emma (nee Knight) Peel. Hmmm. Steed/knight. Knight/steed. Match made in heaven. Or, the fact that the chess piece known as the knight is traditionally shaped like a horse… that works for me too.

On the “hate” side, I hate the name “Harm” on JAG. I realize it’s short for Harmon, which is a nice name, but I don’t like the show anyway, and when I’m forced to watch it I cringe every time someone says “Harm”. It comes off like “Ooooohhhh, isn’t he sooooo coooooolllll, wooowwwww, what a coooooolllll naaaaaame…” Why didn’t they just call him Randy McStud or something, since they’re into being subtle?

Thank you; I’ve needed to get that off my chest for two years.

If thought that I could get away with it, I would really like to name my daughter "Stormer" after the character from Jem.

One of my favorite blunders in reference to names would have to be Topanga on Boy Meets World. When she first made her appearance in season 1, her character was the hippie chick and I think she was only supposed to be in a few episodes. Then she became a series regular and the writers had to slowly ween themselves away from the hippie aspect of her character, but they were stuck with her name.

Speaking of names that are fairly unremarkable, but just... perfect,
I submit Irina Derevko. There's just something about the name that tells you even though she <i>could</i> kill you on a whim, if she has them (and she probably would), she can also be quite loving and protective.

Apparently, though, that won't stop her from putting a hit out on you and getting killed by your dad, but that part isn't in her name.

I'm pretty sure Erykah Badu has a kid named Seven. I'm also pretty sure the father of said child is Andre 3000 from Outkast, so I suppose the name could have been a lot worse.

Sadly enough this reminds me of Six on Blossom, and how I thought that was the coolest name ever when I was a kid. I wanted to change my name to Six or Punky (oh yes, a la Miss Brewster.) Man oh man, I was such a geek.

Most awful name for a grown-up I've seen on TV in the past ten years? Pixley, the girl with a name so bizarre it became the title of an episode, on Sports Night. I would be at the courthouse, change-of-name paperwork completed and in hand, on my 18th birthday with a name like Pixley.

Kelly Kelly was a short-lived WB series starring Shelley Long. It became her name after a second marriage. (Seven episodes aired.)

The name "Dwayne Wayne" from A Different World also suffered from the "Topanga" problem as the character gained prominence.

Saw a good one on Maury. The woman wanted to tell her husband he might not be her daughter's father; the child's name was Secret. You think she might have put some thought into that?

Growing up, my absolute favorite name was Bradley Taylor, of Hey Dude! fame. I just thought it was so awesome that a girl would be named Brad.

Hippie or not, who names a girl after a canyon?

Stargate SG-1 has a lot of repetitive names. Two Davises, two Simmonses and on and on....

"Pixley" is not that far off from "Puggsley." Which, of course, reminds me of the show with some of the all-time greatest charcter names, The Addams Family. The daughter was named Wednesday, probably to combat all the parents naming their kids Tuesday, after famous at the time actress Tuesday Weld, which isn't a character name, but still a pretty cool one. My favorite character name from the show was "Gomez." I always thought, "What a kooky (and altogether ooky) name for a guy, who's not Hispanic. John Astin isn't, is he? Well, even if he is, it's still a kickass name.
I'm not Latino, but I wanted to name my baby daughter "Lopez" in a similar vein, but Mrs. LongFace wasn't going for it. We decided on Logan, instead.