The protagonist of Flannery O’Connor’s Wise Blood is anti-God evangelist Hazel Motes.
His first and last names both suggest a man who’s blind to the truth.
Hazel suggests “Haze,” while “Motes” makes us think of Jesus’ admonition not to point out the motes in others’ eyes while you have a plank in your own.
The heroine of Thomas Hardy’s Far From the Madding Crowd was Bathsheba Everdene, who is lusted after by several men, two of whom are doomed by love for her.
In the Bible, David defied God and committed murder for love of Uriah’s beautiful wife Bathsheba.
I love that in the Johnny Test cartoon Mr. Black was white and Mr. White was black.
An earlier post mentioned Kamandi. Actually Kamandi’s real name was Buddy Blank (also an appropriate name) he was named Kamandi beacause he was found in Command Bunker D.
I don’t think Professor Pangloss from Candide has been mentioned yet.
Originally, cartoonist Chester Gould entitled his crime/action strip “Plainclothes Tracy,” and the hero didn’t have a first name.
Since detectives were sometimes called “dicks” in slang, his editor, Captain Joseph Patterson, convinced him to call his hero “Dick” Tracy.
I think it was on this board that someone pointed that Will has no will (always doing whatever Grace tells him to do) and Grace isn’t very graceful.
I’m surprised you didn’t mention that “Neo” is an anagram of “One” - and much of the movie revolves around figuring out if Neo is “the One” or not.
Personal theory I’ve never heard anywhere else: Peter Parker (Spiderman) has a girlfriend who he can’t quit, even though he knows he should. He is addicted to Mary Jane (aka, his marijuana, his drug).
Howard Roark was hard as a rock.
The most despicable character Rand ever created was Roark’s nemesis, Ellsworth M. Toohey.
“Toohey” is onomatopoeic; it sounds like someone spitting. And Rand probably spat every time she thought of that character.
Hopefully I haven’t been ninja-ed on this, but on Without a Trace, Poppy Montgomery played an investigator named Samantha Spade.
ETA: besides the character reference, “Spade” is a good name for an investigator, since they spend their time unburying and turning over evidence, the same sort of tasks a gardener does with a spade.
Calvin’s imaginary younger brother is Melville.
I couldn’t help noticing that all three are notable authors, although their names don’t all appear, contiguously or otherwise, in the Harvard Classics or the Great Works series. Maybe they’re in some other collection in Waterston’s bookcase.
I always thought ‘Verbal Kint’ from The Usual Suspects was one of these. Kint is the Hungarian word for ‘out’ (making him ‘Mr. Out’) and obviously the writer was familiar with the language.
Dorothy Gale.
Jake and Elwood Blues. That is all.
In Salt and Pepper and One More Time Peter Lawford played Chris Pepper and Sammy Davis, Jr. played Charles Salt.