My favorite is Dr. Eggman for the Sonic games. He’s both a musical and literary reference. He has a walruslike moustache and wears John Lennon style sunglasses. He’s also a carpenter and dresses like Tweedledee and Tweedledum (later more like Sergeant Pepper)
“Robotnik” was also apt but ruined most of the allusion.
Drat. How come I’m never first posting this in these threads? (Yes, this has been done before.)
From the TV show Community, Jeff Winger was the lawyer who never prepared for anything and always just “winged it”
And of course the aptly named “Sir Not-Appearing-In-This-Film”
Or Doberman? :dubious:
What about the characters in Lost? John Locke, for gosh sakes, Desmond Hume, and the Rousseaus.
I just noticed that the name “Malatesta” fits the category! It’s Italian for “sick in the head,” and the character is definitely a little crazy.
From a recent book in this forum’s Book Club (plug!), the 1859 Wilkie Collins novel The Woman in White, we have the smooth, slippery villain Sir Percival Glyde, the righteous and right-feeling hero Walter Hartright, and the lovely heroine Miss Fairlie.
I doubt it was intentional, but “Uriah” suggests “urine”. I suspect, though, that - as was pointed out above - Uriah the Hittite was Dickens’ source. Certainly “Uriah Heep” suggests the stereotype of “the snivelly, cringing Jew”, a la Shylock and Ivanhoe’s Isaac of York.
Or a gay porn star.
If memory serves, his name was just “Grima”; “Wormtongue” was a nickname hung on him by Gandalf, for obvious reasons.
Calvin and Hobbes were named after John Calvin and Thomas Hobbes, respectively.
Both Calvins are interested in destiny while both Hobbeses (Hobbi?) have a pretty jaded view of mankind.
Stephen King wanted an Everyman character for “The Dead Zone,” so John Smith was it.
And one of 'em is nasty, brutish, and short!
How about Mary Poppins, where the banker spends so much time at the bank that someone needs to Pop In and save – well, the whole Banks family.
[Suzanne Collins]: Hmm, I need a name for the young female protagonist. Something that evokes the grace, beauty and agility of a cat.
[Peon1]: … How about um… ‘Mr. Snuffles’?
[Suzanne Collins]: You’re fired! Pack your shit up.
Peon2: … Um,… Felix…ity … ? Purr…ness … uhh, waitaminit… Mr. Snuffles?
[Suzanne Collins]: [pulls trapdoor lever]
[Peon3]: Ahh… Kat…ness???
[Suzanne Collins]: … … Brilliant!
The Amazing Race’s oft-maligned “Family Edition” featured an African-American family named – the Blacks.
Sadly, they were eliminated in the first episode.
Severus Snape. Narcissa and Draco Malfoy. Pomona Sprout. Alecto Carrow. Rabastan Lestrange. Xenophilius and Luna Lovegood. As someone else said, the whole Harry Potter series is a gold mine. I actually almost quit reading it when I picked up the first book because “Severus Snape” seemed like such a ludicrous caricature of a name. Glad I didn’t.
Kommandant of Stalag 13: Col. Wilhelm Klink.
One of my high school teachers told us that Zeena Pierce in the novel Ethan Frome, was symbolically named because of her shrill voice that would pierce your eardrums.
ZEEEEEENa Pierce.
Somehow I remember this, after almost 40 yrs. Maybe storing it away for a Jeopardy! appearance.
Brings to mind 30 Rock.
“Steven’s a good man, he’s on partner track at Dewey – and he’s a Black.”
“A Black? That is offensive!”
“No, no; that’s his last name. Steven Black. Good family.”
“Oh. Yeah, of course.”
“Remarkable people, the Blacks: musical, very athletic – not very good swimmers. Again, l’m talking about the family. <beat> Black is African-American, though.”
The heroine of Carl Sagan’s Cosmos was skeptical, anti-religious astronomer Ellie Arroway.
Her name is phonetically the same as that of Francois-Marie Arouet, the skeptical, ant-religious philosopher better known as Voltaire.