“Terrance the Terran from Terra” alternatively known as Earthboy the Earthling from Earth

So we’ve seen the joke in sci-fi where a translator doesn’t stop so the Sahara Desert becomes Desert Desert.

But I also think we’re missing a vital piece of comedy gold in terms of character naming. Specifically the name Terrance.

Why Terrance you might be wondering to yourself? Where’s the comedy in that? It sounds like a pretty standard human name?

And it is. But here’s where the funny part comes in. 

In a lot of ‘Humans are Space Orcs’ Earth gets renamed or mistranslated into Terra, and so humans are usually called Terrans. Are you seeing where I’m going with this yet?

If you write sci-fi of this particular genre, please consider having a character named, Terrance the Terran from Terra. And then having every other character’s translators short circiut. Because surely no mother actually named their child Earthboy the Earthling from Earth.

Hyundai Kona.

To jest tak zła nazwa, że powinni go na polski rynek nazwać "Hyundai Z10". Żeby to nie było tak oczywiste.

No bo wiecie, Kona, Z-Dycha...

During the run of the original He-Man and the Masters of the Universe cartoon, Mattel executives would periodically drive over to Filmation’s offices to show off concept art of characters and vehicles the toy designers had gotten approved for production, because Mattel wanted kids to see them on the cartoon by the time they were manufactured and shipped.

The vehicle pictured above was called the Ball Buster.

Depending on the telling, Filmation co-founder Lou Scheimer either told them “That will never, ever be used in our show,” or silently got out of his chair and walked away until they realized their error.

Designers reworked the Evil Ball Buster into the Heroic Bashasaurus, released in 1985. It still didn’t get into the cartoon.

I'm About to Ruin Your Childhood

While looking for "Breslauer Malefizbuch", I also found a digitized copy of such a publication for the city of Nuremberg, and the publishers of that one felt appropriate to include a whole appendix regarding the execution of a woman for adultery and pimping her own daughter. How am I about to ruin your childhood with this one?

Her name was Barbara Schlumpfin. If you don't speak German, about three and a half centuries later her surname would mean...

...Smurfette.

Yes. They accused a woman named Smurfette of sleeping with half the city, including the brother of her deceased husband, and beheaded her on 14th October, 1620. If you were unfortunate to have heard jokes about Smurfette being slutty, this bit of historical trivia sounds like a punchline to end all punchlines.

I'm working through adventure time rn. My sympathy for the Ice King went up infinitely after learning his deadname was Simon.

I love the little AU that skinny people live in where they have the same problems as fat people and can relate to the Experience. artists references are only for fat bodies, artists that do draw thin bodies are getting DMs from people going like "omg I'm so happy I discovered your art, it's so rare to find an artist who draws small bodies!!!!! for the first time I see people who look like me 😭😭" skinny people going "omggg I finally found a clothing brand that sells nice dresses in XS, I wish they weren't so so overpriced though" skinny people getting home from the doctor's office and collapsing on the couch to tell their roommate that their doc spent the whole appointment quizzing them about their diet and they were told they need to gain 40 pounds. but the doctor didn't want to check out the weird scraping sound they make when they breathe in, just that they should probably gain weight first. skinny celebrities and influencers spending thousands of dollars getting plastic surgery to transfer fat to their stomachs and jawlines. all the main characters in tv shows are fat. when you watch cartoons as a kid, there's one skinny character, and they're really dumb and annoying and get laughed at by the other characters. they're a loser and never get a boyfriend/girlfriend. the same clothes that are stylish when worn by fat people just get you made fun of. desirable romantic leads and manic pixie dream girls twirl their hair and say "yeeah I've just been fat my whole life, I just never lose weight no matter what I eat hehe" and this is an extremely endearing and attractive trait.

Bitches will be like “my ship just got confirmed” and then show you a single low-res frame of ambiguous origin where the characters walk out of a room together. It’s me. I am bitches.

He’s in the soup! 💕

Anyway. Bi and Mspec Lesbians aren't a hotly "debated" topic or even new to queer culture, it's just the newest thing that bullies who REALLY want to be homophobic and even racist use to justify harassing gay people they don't like.

It's the thinnest possible veneer of progressive language wrapped around TERF and reactionary rhetoric so that they can feel righteous for forming an angry mob against vulnerable targets. If you're gullible enough to fall for the newest wave of bigotry within the queer community, and turn on your allies because they're "confusing" or "invading your spaces," the SAME way they turned on bi/pan labels, trans people, xenogenders, neopronouns, and aroace people before this, then get lost.

this local street cat shelter goes by “SCAT” (Street CAT) and i really wonder if they’ve thought this through cause golly i hate googling that

Major DICKIE HEAD, known in third grade by the nickname “Major Dickie Head”...

homestuck was so perfect for autistic teenagers bc it took characters being sorted into categories and having Attributes to its absolute extreme. forget four hogwarts houses, every character has their associated colour their zodiac sign their associated animal their dream planet their god tier class and aspect their typing quirk their pesterchum handle their weapon their planet of x and y, as well as each of them having a handful of other very quantifiable Personality Traits and Interests (e.g. this one is a clown this one is angry this one likes fashion this one is just rufio from hook for some reason) and THEN they all also have their respective ancestors and dancestors(?)(plucked that word from my memory) who have all of those things as WELL

and god not to mention the fucking quadrant system

as a 13-15 year old autistic kid i didnt even need homestuck to have a plot i just happily made a big big spreadsheet of character attributes in my brain

Bonus internet points will be awarded to anyone who actually tries this exercise before voting.

Assume you need to get the spelling at least somewhat close, and if a character has multiple names, only one counts. Also, if a character doesn't have a canonical name, I'm sorry, but "that guy's wife" doesn't count.

For reference, if you can name the 9 members of the Fellowship, the eponymous Hobbit and his 13 dwarf buddies, 3 prominent women, and the guy who runs the Rivendell B&B, that's 27 characters right there. And you probably also know the name of a dragon.

For further reference, Tolkien Gateway has 637 (!!) pages dedicated to Third Age characters. (Don't click that link until you've voted, of course)

Edit: Your humble pollmaker gave this a try, and got as far as 73 before deciding she was too tired to keep trying to remember dwarf and Silm names. If you also want to share (and don't mind people being incredulous at your having forgot ____), pastebin allows you to paste text and share it for free. :)

redesigning my headcanon for Sebek's parents, based on important new information (SCALES)

(you can't see it but they're both wearing crocs)

Hoodie Buddies 🍧🦁

I know lion boy looks like a beyblade mc but idc i like him, i hope he is friends with chongyun🥹💙

i have some sort of internalized victorianism syndrome because any time i see someone referring to a character that's mainly referred to in canon by their last name by their first name i feel uncomfortable for them. like you're just out there using their name. that only their absolute best friends in the world use. how do you as a reader know them that well :/ isn't it a bit of an presumption of intimacy on your part :/