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Idiosyncratic Episode Naming

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Just to make sure they drive the point home.
Many shows utilize quirky episode naming conventions. Though the episode title is usually not even broadcast with the show (usually only Animated Series do this), this information is gleaned from press releases, closed captioning, and guide information. Of course, in literature it can be more obvious.

American Live-Action TV Pilots are often exempt from this, as pilots do not usually have titles, and are usually made before anyone on the production staff comes up with the idea to name episodes idiosyncratically.

Now, if the names get too in-jokey, quirky, or obscure, they can have an adverse effect in being difficult to correlate the plot of the episode when its name means absolutely nothing.

When a show gets dubbed in a foreign language, expect this trope to not survive (particularly if it's an English show getting dubbed in German or French or if it's a Japanese show getting dubbed in the west).

Single-episode exceptions to the rule are the Odd Name Out.

A Super-Trope to Episode Finishes the Title and Excited Title! Two-Part Episode Name! (typically taking the "____! _____!!" title format). Compare Cross-Referenced Titles (when it's only a few episodes that share both a naming pattern and some internal connection), Character Name and the Noun Phrase (if they're used in a series), Unusual Chapter Numbers, Theme Naming, Translation Matchmaking and Title Drop.

Example subpages:

Other examples:

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    Advertising 

    Asian Animation 
  • Every episode of Agent Ali is titled "Misi: [subject of episode]" ("Mission: [subject of episode]").
  • Every episode of the Pleasant Goat and Big Big Wolf season Around the World in 20 Days is named "[country name] Pavilion" (so, for example, "China Pavilion", "India Pavilion", "Israel Pavilion", etc.).

    Comedy 
  • David Cross' standup comedy albums Shut Up You Fucking Baby! and It's Not Funny use track titles that have nothing to do with the routines heard on the album, but are instead meant to mock cliched stand-up comedy material - Sample titles include "Monica Lewinsky and the Three Bears" and "My Child is Enthralling, Especially When It Says Something Unexpectedly Precocious Even Though It Doesn't Understand What It Just Said!". His other albums used more straightforward track titles, but the tour documentary Let America Laugh used the titles of Chick Tracts for DVD chapter titles.
  • Stan Freberg's "Wun'erful, Wun'erful" was originally a 7-inch comedy record with Sides Uh-One and Uh-Two.

    Comic Books 
  • Marvel series by Jeph Loeb & Tim Sale all have the protagonist's name followed by a color represented in the story. Examples are Spider-Man: Blue and Captain America White (after the character's emotions), Daredevil: Yellow and Hulk Gray (after the protagonists' early colours). The Yellow also refers to cowardice, as Daredevil is The Man Without Fear; Gray refers to the Hulk's status as a wildcard straddling the line between good and evil.
  • With one exception, the title of each of the 100 Bullets collections is based around its number. Book two is Split Second Chance, while book ten is Decayed (sounds like decade). Some titles don't actually contain the numerical pun, but instead are cleverly part of a phrase that would usually include that number, such as Samurai, the seventh book, The Hard Way, the eighth, and the twelfth book, Dirty. The only book to break this tradition is Hang Up on the Hang Low, which was named after a Story Arc contained in the book as the story in question had won an Eisner Award.note  The final volume, "Wilt," is especially clever since it's not only referring to the end of the series, but also to Wilt Chamberlain's jersey number with the LA Lakers, which was 13.
  • Every chapter in the 2000 AD story Zenith is named after a rock song. 2000 AD itself refers to issues as 'progs'.
    • The 2000 AD spin off publication The Judge Dredd Megazine also refers to it's issues as 'Megs'. The short lived 'Extreme Editions' which consisted of vintage 2000 AD reprints were also referred to as X(issue number). The Mighty Tharg seemed to like this trope.
  • The first three main storylines in Batman (Tom King) are all titled "I Am..." (Gotham, Suicide and Bane). The pattern is then completely broken by "The War of Jokes and Riddles" and "Rules of Engagement".
  • In Batman: The Long Halloween, each issue is named for a holiday (with the exception of the first and last issues, named "Crime" and "Punishment"). In Superman for All Seasons each issue is named after the season it's set in.
  • Every volume and chapter of Blue Monday is titled after a song, down to the series' title coming from New Order's "Blue Monday":
    • The first volume is named after The Who's "The Kids Are Alright". Its three chapters are "There's No Other Way" by Blur, "Substitute", also by The Whonote , and "Try This for Sighs" by Adam Ant who appears in the story.
    • The second volume is titled after David Bowie, "Absolute Beginners", with "Something About You" by Level 42, "Favorite Shirts" by Haircut 100 (alternately titled "Boy Meets Girl"), "To Sir, with Love" by Lulu, and "Hands Off, She's Mine" by The English Beat making up the chapter titles.
    • The third volume is named after The Cure's "Inbetween Days" and contains chapters titled after "Dead Man's Party" by Oingo Boingo, the band The Blue Belles, The Cure's "Lovecats", and "Nobody's Fool" by Cinderella, which itself is made up of two parts, "Everything's Gone Green" by New Order and "Everybody Plays the Fool" by The Main Ingredient.
    • The fourth volume is titled "Painted Moon" after The Silencers' song, with the chapters "How Soon is Now?" by The Smiths, "Pictures of Lily" by The Who, "Blues Before and After" by The Smithereens, and "I Confess" by The English Beat.
    • The title of the fifth, most recent volume is "Thieves Like Us", after another New Order song.
  • Four of the Cerebus the Aardvark graphic novel collections have titles that could be seen as forming a sentence: Women, Reads, Minds, Guys. (Cerebus's belief in female telepathy is discussed at some point during the story.)
  • Each story in D.R. & Quinch is titled "D.R. & Quinch _____". For example, "D.R. & Quinch Go Girl Crazy".
  • Every issue of the Forever Evil miniseries had the title "Forever _____".
  • The Fun With Milk & Cheese comics were entitled "First Number One," "Second Number One," etc. until the 5th issue was finally "First Number Two." Based on the notion that the Number One issue of a comic book tends to be grabbed up by collectors and speculators to sell more issues.
  • The four chapters of Give Me Liberty are named "Homes & Gardens", "Travel & Entertainment", "Health & Welfare", and "Death & Taxes", respectively. The contents are not quite that cheery.
    • With the exception of the fourth chapter, which is more cheerful than either death or taxes. Just.
  • Several arcs in Brian Azzarello's Hellblazer run were named after phrases involving the word "Hell", including "Highwater" and "...Freezes Over".
  • Similarly, every issue of the Infinite Frontier miniseries had the title "Infinite _____". This was cleverly used in #3, which reintroduced the second-generation JSA characters, and was titled "Infinite Incorporated".
  • The Invincible trades are all named after classic sitcoms. For instance, one was Family Matters, then The Facts of Life, and so on.
    • The tradition was unfortunately broken with the "Viltrumite War" trade.
  • In keeping with the Hollywood theme of the series, the names of all of the Lori Lovecraft stories are plays on film titles from the Golden Age of Hollywood (usually Film Noir). Specifically:
  • Each chapter in the first storyline of the Vertigo Comics Madame Xanadu book is titled by a form of divination, which Madame X uses in that chapter: "By the Runes", "Among the Stars", "In the Cards", "Thru the Crystal", and finally the more general "Of the Future".
  • In Mage, each chapter in each of the three volumes is titled with a phrase from a specific Shakespeare play: Hamlet in The Hero Discovered, Macbeth in The Hero Defined, and The Tempest in The Hero Denied.
  • The Loud House: The stories in the issue After Dark are labelled with consecutive 12-hour clock times preceding each of their main titles, from 10:55 PM to 6:00 AM.
  • Every issue of the New 52 O.M.A.C. series has a title with the "O.M.A.C." acronym. This even extends to the origin story in DC Universe Presents #0 after the book ended, which was called "Origins Matter After Cancellation".
  • Chapter numbers in Orange Crows are prefaced with the word "Scar." So "Scar 1", "Scar 2", "Scar 3..."
  • The Sex Criminals collections are titled with consecutive numbers at the beginning: One Weird Trick, Two Worlds One Cop, Three the Hard Way...
  • The first 20 issues of Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane, as well as the two Mary Jane miniseries preceding them, were all entitled "The ___ Thing", with the second word having to do with the comic's plot. For example, issue 4, when Gwen Stacy is introduced, is called "The Unexpected Thing."
  • The collections of The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl are all titled with pop music quotations, with the word "girl" replaced with the word "squirrel".
  • Each chapter of V for Vendetta features a word beginning with 'V'; "The Villain", "Virtue Victorious", "The Verdict", "Verwirrung" (German for confusion), etc.
  • All of The Walking Dead trade paperbacks have a three-word title.
  • The title of every chapter of Watchmen, and in fact the title Watchmen itself, is a Literary Allusion Title, with the full quote given at the end of each chapter.

    Fan Works 
  • Most fan works based off on the Ace Attorney series include the word turnabout in the title, like in the canon cases. Examples include A Complete Turnabout, Turnabout Storm and Turnabout Substitution.
  • Abraxas (Hrodvitnon): Each chapter title is a rune from the Elder Futhark.
  • Half of all the thread titles at Absit Omen (a Harry Potter forum roleplay) contain many shout-outs to other fantasy, film, television and music, along with author and character specific titles ('The Adventure of the _____' when following the mysteries an auror character investigates).
  • Ascend (xTSGx): One-Word Title-style. The first three chapters are:
    • Denial
    • Illusions
    • Errands
  • In Becoming a True Invader, every chapter has "DOOM" in its title somewhere.
  • The long iCarly fanfic Beneath The Pale Moonlight uses song titles for chapter names. The title of the story itself isn't the name of a song, but is taken from a line in the song Save The Last Dance For Me by the Drifters (not Somewhere Out There from the An American Tail soundtrack).
  • Between Dreams and Memories Universe: The first and last chapters are titled after the fanfic itself, while for the chapters in between, story arcs are dictated by a singular title in parts. For example, in Between Dreams and Memories, during the early Manberg Rebellion era, the Pogtopian chapters are titled "The Resistance", while the Manbergian chapters are titled "The Resilience"; meanwhile, the first chapter is titled "The Dreams" and the last is titled "The Memories".
  • Between My Brother and Me: Mors Omnibus has each chapter numbered as 'Xth Show' and each chapter is named after a Duel Monster card related to the events of each chapter.
  • Between the Lines (MrQuestionMark): The title used for the chapter's page titles all start with "The".
  • Each chapter of Blizzard of the Red Castle works in the English translation(s) of the character(s) principally involved in it.
  • In Bloom every chapter title is a stage of a plant's life cycle ("Germination") or a term related to agriculture ("Fertile Soil").
  • The Bolt Chronicles: Every story in the series is titled after its subject matter or a similar important plot element, always using "The" as the first word: "The Seven," "The Survivor," "The Box," "The Wedding Reception," "The Rings," "The Imaginary Letters," "The Marching Song," etc.
  • In The Bridge spinoff The Bridge: Sound of Thunder, the chapter titles form a short poem when combined.
  • Every chapter of The Biter Bit has an Alliterative Title.
  • A Certain Magical Friendship: Two words joined by an underscore, for the names of each of its stories: Context_SHIFT, MIRROR_NOISE, blood_manifestation.
  • Each chapter in Cibus Esculentus Madoka Magica is named after meal courses.
  • Connecting the Dots has every chapter named with a word that ends in "-tion". For instance, the first two chapters are titled "Introduction" and "Initiation", and the final four are "Finalization", "Conclusion", "Perpetuation" and "Repercussions".
  • Dæmorphing:
    • All the chapters of The Cowards of Lions except the last contain "lion" in the title.
    • Love the Warriors' chapters are named after Bible quotes, while Abel or Cain's are all Jewish funeral rites.
    • The chapters of Bridge to the Stars and Destroyer of Worlds are named after Yeerk and Andalite idioms, respectively.
    • The Bright Clear Line's chapters are named after chess terms.
    • The chapter titles of The Abyss all begin with a number.
  • A Delicate Balance names each chapter after a John Donne poem, a quote from which appears as an Epigraph at the start of each chapter.
  • The fics in the Eleutherophobia series (except A Straight Line Down Through the Heart) are named after sci-fi movies. Additionally, all the chapters of Ghost in the Shell are named after songs, and all the chapters of The Thing from Another World and Escape from L.A. are named after Animorphs quotes.
  • First Aid Kits and Deep Secrets: Every chapter in the story starts with the phrase "in which...". The tradition is continued by its Distant Sequel, In Which They Are Still In Love, which was uploaded nearly 7 years later.
  • Every chapter except the prologue and epilogue in The First Saniwa is titled with a yojijukugo, 4-kanji proverb, formatted as follows: [proverb in kanji] — [romaji reading]Example. Doubles as Foreign Language Title.
  • In Freakin Gensokyo, one in every five chapters stars the author's tetchy friend Matt. These almost always have a title in the form "The X with a Y for a Head"; for example, "The Man with a DIY Railgun for a Head" or "The Loli with Legislation for a Head".
  • Instead of numbered chapters, Fuck the Jesus Beam uses named chapters with titles. For example, "Chapter Rape: Holocaust."
  • Every episode of The Future is Stupid, part of Nickelodeon Fanon, named "The (something) is Stupid".
  • Glee Reprise names each chapter after a quote from said chapter. Any chapter with a song being performed in it will be Titled After the Song.
  • Grey Skies Universe: The chapters in the second installment, Every Generation, are titled "Beginning", "Middle", and "End", and the epilogue is titled "After".
  • Every chapter in Hell and High Water takes its name from a song lyric from a song, with both the lyric on its own and the meaning of the overall song reflecting the themes of that particular chapter.
  • Here There Be Monsters: Every chapter has the word "Monster(s)" in the title.
  • In Holi-daze, each chapter of 12 Days is titled after the 12 days of Christmas and each chapter of 13 Nights is titled after a horror movie.
  • Horse of the Rising Sun: Each chapter is named after a real-life monastic order (Benedictine, Camillan, Carthusian, Camaldolese, Franciscan, Piarist, Teutonic, Jesuit, Carmelite, Fatebenefratelli, Crosier, Barnabite, Trappist, Dominican, Mercederian, and Trinitarian), to reflect the story following the search for an order of monastic healers.
  • Hunting the Unicorn names its chapters after characters in The Last Unicorn. The three exceptions so far are "The Midnight Carnival," "The Quest," and "The Clock." The last two are very important, plot-wise.
  • Infinity Train: Blossoming Trail: Except for the first chapter, the chapters have two titles: one is named after a Pokémon Ability, and the other follows the format of Infinity Train that showcases the name of the train car that is the focus.
  • Kabbalah: The Passive Conqueror: Each chapter is titled "The [word]". Examples include; "The Knight", "The Reaper", "The Nightmare" etc.
  • The King Nobody Wanted: While some chapters are titled with the names of their POV characters, most use a descriptor or formal title such as "The Old Falcon", "The Loyal Knight", "The Knight of Hounds", or "The Khal". These mostly remain stable over the course of the story, but can change to reflect a character's changing status (for instance, Janos' first chapters are titled "The Butcher's Son", and become "The Journeyman of High Standing" and later "The True and Honorable Master" as the story progresses).
  • Kokuten: Half the chapters are titled "When [insert Character Action]" while the other half goes like "How [insert Character Action]". For instance, we have "When the First Victim Fails" and "How Children Play". The change from one format to the other signifies the start of the Uchiha Coup. The only variation is the prologue and some titles being in passive voice.
  • Lady Norbert tends to use this trope in a lot of her larger fanworks:
  • In The Legend of Total Drama Island, episode titles take the form "The Tale of X"; chapter titles take the form "Nth Night".
  • The Daria/Legion of Super-Heroes Crossover Legion Of Lawndale Heroes has (starting with Volume Two) each chapter named after a song title. The author has said that this is an homage to the same naming style as Degrassi: The Next Generation.
  • All the titles in book two of Luminosity are words about a person (Liar, Runner, Guesser, etc.), describing the perspective character.
  • Past Sins: The Glimpses sub-series:
    • The Core chapters both start with "Displeasing [Plural Noun That Ends With S], "Constants" and "Futures".
    • The Variants chapters of Glimpses 2 are all One-Word Title-s: "Depths", "Day", "Dreams", "Remedial", "Legacy".
  • RainbowDoubleDash's Lunaverse:
    • In Griffin Over the Line, each chapter is titled "The [Adjective] Jerk".
    • In Musicians and Dreamers, each chapter is named after a musical term related to its contents (the introduction where Octavia and Lyra meet is called "Duo for Strings", the one where Lyra and Trixie fight is called "Dissonance", the final chapter is called "Coda", and so on).
  • Maelstrom names each chapter after a different song.
  • The Manic Nuzlockes occasionally make use of this. Argent Ante, a Nuzlocke of the Gen 2 Remakes, had a playing card theme, so all the episode titles from Chapter 2 onwards were gambling terms.
  • In Marik and Bakura 333 Ways, each chapter is titled "In Which [blank]", where [blank] is a very brief overview of the chapter.
  • The Mixed-Up Life of Brad has chapter names made up of puns that incorporate the name "Brad".
  • In the Motion Practice series, which recasts various Marvel superheroes as lawyers, all the full-length stories are named after legal terms.
  • The name of every episode of Naruto: The Abridged Comedy Fandub Spoof Series Show ends with "-no Jutsu!" For Example:
    • "Pilot no Jutsu!"
    • "Spoof Movie no Jutsu!"
    • "Bowie no Jutsu!"
    • "Fanservice no Jutsu!"
    • and "Milkshake No Jutsu!"
  • In Naruto: the Secret Songs of the Ninja every chapter is called a "Song", starting with "The Song of Lost Souls" and moving through "The Song of the New Path", "The Song of the Wanderer", "The Song of Bloody Tears" and so on, so forth.
  • Nerima Magistra Nelly Magi names each chapter after a song.
  • Similar to the main Kill la Kill series, the chapters of Natural Selection are named after songs. Unlike the series, whose episodes were named after J-Pop songs, the fic's chapters are named after songs from American and British Rock music.
  • In New Hope University: Major In Murder, each chapter is titled after a course. The prologue is "Intro to Psychology," the first chapter is "Economics of Labor I," and the second chapter is "History of Hellenistic Art II." Oddly enough, they drop the Roman numerals after a while, since the third chapter is "Topics of Cosmology," the fourth is "Seminar on Aging and Adulthood," and the fifth is "Mimesis in Theory And Practice."
  • Every installment of the New Look Series is titled like [Victim]'s New Look: [Title]
  • The chapters of A New World, A New Way sidestory Swarm are named after Pokèmon moves. The chapter title also follows suit in a different way, as it's named after a Pokèmon ability.
  • Every chapter of Of Love and Bunnies is named for an episode in which a member of the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers or Power Rangers: Dino Thunder appeared. It was initially confined to just those two shows, but then the writers starting running out of names.
  • In Evangelion fanfic Orchestrating the Silence, all episodes are named after musical terms like "Larghetto" or "Grave Non Troppo".
  • Oversaturated World: Multiple instances:
  • The Petriculture Cycle: A lot:
    • One-Word Title for the title of each story: Petriculture, Inscape, Avocation, π, Pandelirium, Transdementia, Manifesto''
    • The chapter titles, for those that have multiple chapters:
  • Oyasumi Midoriya, as an explicit nod to Serial Experiments Lain, uses "Layer" for most chapters.
  • The Palaververse: Multiple ones:
  • The Pirate's Soldier uses a similar format to Tenchi Muyo!, with the chapter's title being "No need for ____!" filling the blank with something related to the chapter's plot. The only exceptions are the chapters covering the Time and Space Adventures arc.
  • Every chapter of Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Reflecting Balance is named after a line of dialogue spoken in that chapter.
  • Pokémon Master: "Returns". "Reunions". "Remembrances". "Rebellion". And so on. Every chapter's title is one word that begins with "Re".
  • Each episode in the PONY.MOV series follows the naming scheme "[single word related to the contents of the video].MOV".
  • A Posse Ad Esse, a Die Anstalt fanfic, uses Latin phrases for chapter titles. So far, Compos Mentis for Chapter 9 is the least obscure of them.
  • Promises of a Wandering Hero: All the chapters are titled after the arc they take place in followed by the corresponding Roman numeral e.g. Rusty Heart I.
  • Psychedelic Epiphany Series: From multiple stories:
  • In the Aladdin fanfic Queen of Diamonds every chapter alludes to cards or card games (i.e. "2 of Hearts", "Royal Flush", "Three of a Kind", etc).
  • Every chapter in Retro Chill is titled after a song.
  • Every title in The Reprint and Repackaging of Evangelion is a song lyric.
  • Rick and The Loud House : Each chapter title is a combination of episode titles from each respective show. The only exceptions so far are Chapters 2 ("Lawnmower Dog"), 8 ("For Bros About to Rock"), and 11 ("The Citadel of Ricks").
  • A Salaryman in Nobuna's Court has each chapter referred to as a 'Slice' which is appropriate for the story being set in the Warring States era.
  • Sailor Moon: The Road Not Taken names all of its chapters after works featuring an alternate universe.
  • All odd-numbered chapters in The Second Try are numbered from 12th to 17th to represent the Angel fought, while even-numbered chapters are named with a single verb based on its major theme.
  • Senju Of Wave:
    • The series as a whole: "Senju [Word]": Senju Naruto, Senju Returned.
    • Senju Naruto's 21 chapter titles are all One-Word Title: "Fugitive", "Repercussions", "Travelling", "Arrival", "Settling", "Ice", etc.
    • Senju Returned's 19 chapter titles are all One-Word Title except for 14, Alliterative Title "Discussions and Decisions": "Prologue", "Test", "Team", "Mission", "Journey", "Palace", etc.
  • Son of the Sannin uses the classic format of giving each chapter a fairly normal title (underlined), followed by "or" and a (usually) humorous line related to whatever the chapter's plot is about written in italics. It's even given a lampshade in Chapter 122, where it has "Sorry, no funny alternate title this time". Examples:
    • Chapter 3: "When a Toad loves a Slug" or "Why prophecies are always so damn cryptic?"
    • Chapter 7: "Desert Winds" or Why turning your children into weapons is not cool"
    • Chapter 20: "The Troubles with Jinchuriki" or "Who would have guessed that the Demon Fox is a jerk?"
  • Steel Soul Saga: Multiple levels:
    • Each story has an Alliterative Title, with the first component being "Steel".
    • The chapter titles in Steel Spirit, are electronic / computer science / engineering terms, of sorts, and beyond the first, they're composed of two words: Sparks of Faith, Calculated Decision, Data Processing, Electric Extrapolation, Input Functionality, Structured Analysis and Finalized Compilation.
  • Starting with Away, every chapter title in Stroll is related to the previous.
  • Sunsplit Saga: Multiple forms:
  • Each episode of Super Therapy! is called a "Session", and its title (bar the second and last) begins with the name of the super analyzed and ends with "Therapy!" (with the exception of "Thor-apy!").
  • Tangled Up In Blues: The chapters are all titled "The [something] Blues", usually referring to the prominent location or character from the chapter, until the last one (which is simply "The Friendship Blues").
  • Tantabus Mark II: Via Fun with Acronyms, with the story titles, themed on technology:
    • Aunthood Issues: AI, a.k.a Artificial Intelligence, which is basically what the Tantabus is.
    • Tantabus Communication Protocol: TCP: Transmission Control Protocol, which governs how computers communicate to each other.
    • How the Tantabus Parses Sleep: HTTPS is the acronym for the "Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure" that connects computers across the internet, securely.
  • The Fire Emblem: Three Houses fanfic Tea is for Teacher has all of its chapter titles (except for the epilogue) begin with "T is for [a word beginning with the letter 'T']".
  • The chapters of Mobile Suit Gundam Wing/Avatar: The Last Airbender Fusion Fic Tears of Revelry are derived from lines of four songs that formed the core soundtrack of the fanfic, "Seven Devils" by Florence + the Machine, "Remember the Name" by Fort Minor, "We Are One" by 12 Stones, and "Lexington" by Alpha Rev.
  • Through the Eyes of Another Pony: The subtitles of chapters all work in "chapter" (Revenge of the Chapter, Son of a Chapter, The Bride of Chapter...).
  • Triptych Continuum has multiple instances:
  • In Various Vytal Ventures, chapter titles are two four-letter words, usually a short common phrase, that indicates the chapter's content, like 'Body and Soul', 'Rock and Roll', or 'Wine and Dine'. Word of God is that the final chapters are intended to be 'Rise and Fall' and then ‘Dusk and Dawn’, set long after the end of the RWBY main series.
  • Every title of every story in The Vinyl and Octavia Series is "Vinyl and Octavia..." followed by a general synopsis of the plot. To a lesser extent, as there's only two chapters, the fifth story, Vinyl and Octavia Have Multiple Dates, has the chapters named Octavia's Date with Vinyl and Vinyl's Date with Octavia respectively.
  • The chapters of Weiss Reacts are often titled Weiss Reacts to X, with X being the subject of the chapter. Climactic or plot-heavy arcs are titled with The (Event Name), and some fanfics are called by Special Chapter: (Fanfic Name).
  • Whispers: Each chapter is named after a key phrase within.
  • In Winter War, the chapter titles are of the format "[POV character]: [Title]", or "Ensemble: [Title]" if there are several POV characters- e.g., "Nanao: Winter", "Ensemble: "The Day Before". The few exceptions are things like "Karakura: Waiting" (actually the first ensemble chapter) and a very few chapters that list multiple narrators in the heading, like "Momo, Isane: We Have Met The Enemy".
  • In A World, Reflected, each chapter is a short phrase separated by a comma. Examples include "A Traitor, Exiled", "A Damsel, Distressed", "A House, Divided", and "A Truth, Revealed".
  • You'll Get No Answers from the Blue Sea Star: The chapter titles (usually) have nothing to do with their contents. They consist of the day in November on which the chapter was written, followed by some random musing or ranting on the author's part.
  • YuyaVision has each of the chapters called "Episode" (since it's based on WandaVision that was inspired by sitcoms) with each title named after a line from one of the songs of 35MM: A Musical Exhibition.
  • Zany To The Max: Every Kat the Cat segment is entitled "Kat the Cat: The ___," the blank being a noun that has to do with the episode.
  • Changing Gears: Due to the premise of the fic being Izuku getting Gearshift first, the title of every chapter has something to do with driving (Coming Out of Neutral, Carpool Lane) or racing (Zooming Past the Finish Line).

    Films — Animated 

    Films — Live-Action 

    Manhwa 

    Podcasts 
  • Each episode of Camp Here & There is titled in the format "The [X] of [Y]". Starting from episode 2, the word for [X] is whatever word was the [Y] for the previous episode. For example, episode 1 was titled "The Beginning of the End", episode 2 was "The End of the Squall", episode 3 was "The Squall of Prophecy" etc.
  • The episode titles for the Cool Kids Table Harry Potter-themed game Hogwarts: The New Class are taken from relevant quotes from the episode itself.
  • Every episode of No Such Thing As A Fish is titled 'No Such Thing As X', with X being a reference to a joke or fact from that episode.
  • Each episode of Not if I Reboot You First starts with the name of the person who suggested the topic followed by a reference to a joke or comment made in the episode. So for example, "Lindsay Plays Fortnite With Sailor Moon" has Lindsay leading a reboot of the anime and joking about the main heroine's Gamer Chick characterization taken to it's logical conclusion in a modern setting. Episodes with mutliple people contributing equally will have both names in the title.
  • Every episode of Sporadic Phantoms is titled "The [Word]", just like the Animorphs books it's based on.
  • Each episode of Trashy Divorces is named after a song related to the subject of the episode. For instance the episode dealing with Britney Spears and Drew Barrymore is called "Smells Like Teen Spirit".
  • All of Wolf 359's episodes are named after a single line or word from that episode, relevancy be damned. This can lead to some pretty cool titles ("Am I Alone Now?", "Deep Breaths", three-parter "Pan-Pan", "Mayday" and "Sécurité", "Limbo", "Memoria", and "Into the Depths"), but most of them are incredibly silly, especially in season one. This is also the case with the Wham Episodes, by the way. The weirdest titles include: "Extreme Danger Bug", "Gas Me Twice", "The Kumbaya Approach", "What's Up Doc?", "Bach To The Future", "Lame-O Superhero Origin Story", two-parter "Knock Knock" and "Who's There?", "Don't Poke The Bear", two-parter "Desperate Times" and "Desperate Measures", "The Hiccups Method" and "Shut Up And Listen".

    Radio 
  • Adventures in Odyssey has used a few. The 1993 season used verses from the Lord's Prayer as titles for individual episodes: "Our Father","Hallowed Be Thy Name", "Thy Kingdom Come","Thy Will Be Done", "Our Daily Bread", "Forgive Us as We Forgive", "Into Temptation", "Deliver Us from Evil", "For Thine Is the Kingdom", "The Power", "And the Glory", "Forever...Amen". These episodes were later released in a compilation titled "On Earth as it is in Heaven."
    • During Bernard and Eugene's Road Trip arc, the episode had titles based on numerical succession: "First Hand Experience", "Second Thoughts", "Third Degree", "It Happened in Four Corners" and "The Fifth House on the Left."
  • Bleak Expectations: the first season titles described the continual ruination of Pip's life with "A <stage of life> <adverb> <verb>" (starting with "A Childhood Cruelly Kippered"); later seasons continued the theme with "A <adjective> Life <adverb> <verb>" (starting with "A Lovely Life Cruelly Re-Kippered").
  • BBC radio comedy The Burkiss Way, being originally conceived with the conceit of being the radio version of correspondence course "The Burkiss Way to Dynamic Living", used the form "Lesson X: ______ The Burkiss Way": "Lesson 1: Peel Bananas The Burkiss Way", "Lesson 4: Solve Murders The Burkiss Way", "Lesson 12: Make Short Comedy Programmes The Burkiss Way", etc. As the show drifted away from the original format to a more surreal form, they began playing with the format: "Lesson 19: Replace The Burkiss Way", "Lesson 21: Get Cut Off The Bur-", "Lesson 23: Son Of The Burkiss Way", etc. This was lampshaded with "Lesson 28: Ignore These Programme Titles The Burkiss Way". The penultimate episode of series 4 is called "Lesson 33: The Last Burkiss Way"; the actual final episode is then called "Lesson 34: The Next To Last Burkiss Way". There are two Lesson 39s, both called "Repeat Yourself The Burkiss Way"; the second starts the same as the first, before stopping with an apology for putting the wrong tape on. Lesson 45 is usually referred to as "Write Extremely Long Titles The Burkiss Way"; The full title as given in the Radio Times is "Lesson 45: Write Extremely Long Titles With Lots And Lots Of Words In, Like This, So That The Radio Times Will Have To Allot More Space Than The Measly Half A Centimetre Of Billing Space We Usually Get And At Least It'll Look A Bit More Prominent On The Page, Although Still Nowhere Near The 50 Column Inches They Give To The Hitch-hiker's Guide To The Galaxy The Burkiss Way".
  • Every episode of Cabin Pressure is titled after a town or city which is involved in the storyline. Usually because it's where the episode is at least partly set, but sometimes it's just where they're trying to go, and in "Kuala Lumpar" it's the hypothetical destination of the flight in a roleplay scenario. Also crosses over with Alphabetical Theme Naming as each episode begins with a consecutive letter of the alphabet, from "Abu Dhabi" to "Zurich".
  • Doctor Who Expanded Universe
    • The BBC Audio Books dramas starring Tom Baker and written by Paul Magrs are split into the Arcs Hornets' Nest, Demon Quest and Serpent Crest.
    • The Big Finish Doctor Who arc The New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield Volume 2: The Triumph of Sutekh comprises four stories with the title "The <item> of <Egyptian god>" (The Pyramid of Sutekh, The Vaults of Osiris, The Eye of Horus, and The Tears of Isis).
  • As in the TV show that succeeded it, the Dragnet radio show episodes were all of the format "The Big ____"
  • The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1978) in its entirety was split up into phases (Primary, Secondary, Tertiary, Quandary, Quintessential and Hexagonal) and each phase was split into six "fits" (reference to Lewis Carroll).
  • All episodes of Jeremy Hardy Speaks to the Nation have titles starting "How to...", describing the topic from which Jeremy will be digressing this week. The shortest is "How to Die", the longest is "How to be Better Theologically, Socially, Nationally and in Terms of One's Own Personal Development, Responsibility and Interaction with the Fellow Humans with Whom We Share this Fragile Planet, and Ting" (usually referred to as "How to be Better").
  • The first season of Revolting People had the episode titles "Storm Clouds"; "More Storm Clouds"; "Even More Storm Clouds"; "Tons of Storm Clouds"; "A Helluva Lot of Storm Clouds"; and "An Incredible Amount of Storm Clouds". Season 2 had "Trying Times"; "Even More Trying Times"; "Some More Trying Times"; "And Yet Even More Trying Times"; "A Bunch More Trying Times"; and "Still in Trying Times". They dropped the idea in seasons 3 and 4.
  • Undone had single word titles beginning "Un": series 1's were "Unalike", "Untoward", "Ungainly", "Underground", "United" and "Unending".
  • Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar: The program's subtitle is 'Murder Matters'; several episodes are formatted as 'The + [murder subject] + Matter'. For instance, "The Thelma Ibsen Matter", "The Rasmussen Matter", "The Templeton Matter", "The Clever Chemist Matter", "The Killer's List Matter", "The Midnight Sun Matter", and "The No Matter Matter".

    Tabletop Games 
  • Many genre supplements for the original Big Eyes, Small Mouth RPG used the "(adjective) (noun), (adjective) (noun)":
    • Big Robots, Cool Starships (mecha and science fiction)
    • Cold Hands, Dark Hearts (gothic and horror)
    • Big Ears, Small Mouse (talking animal cartoons)
    • Hot Rods & Gun Bunnies (modern action; bends the convention a bit).
  • The code names of Magic: The Gathering expansions always have some kind of theme to them, ranging from Mexican words to food; examples have included "Rock/Paper/Scissors" (for Shards of Alara/Conflux/Alara Reborn) and "Live/Long/Prosper" (for Zendikar/Worldwake/Rise of the Eldrazi).
  • Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition "environment" books were all titled with a two syllable compound word describing an effect of that environment: Frostburn (arctic), Sandstorm (desert) and Stormwrack (ocean).

    Theatre 
  • Angels in America is a total of eight acts long, and each act has a name. Some of them are more... interesting than others.
    • Millennium Approaches Act Three: "Not-Yet-Conscious, Forward Dawning"
    • Perestroika Act Three: "Borborygmi (The Squirming Facts Exceed the Squamous Mind)"
    • And then there's Perestroika Act One: "Spooj"
  • Each scene in the musical Music in the Air is titled after a form of classical music. The first scene, which shows the evolution of a songbird's twittering into a melody later to be known as "I've Told Ev'ry Little Star," is fittingly labeled 'Leit Motif'.

    Visual Novels 
  • Ace Attorney: Each case will usually have the word "Turnabout" (or in Japanese, "Gyakuten") somewhere in its title, albeit there are a few exceptions:
    • The first game's fifth case breaks the rule in the English version, being named Rise from the Ashes. In Japanese, however, it still follows the pattern, as it's called Yomigaeru Gyakuten, meaning Turnabout Rebirth.
    • Subverted in Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: the first trial chapter is named English Turnabout, but none of the game's other trial chapters have "Turnabout" in the title.
    • The Great Ace Attorney: The first game instead names all of its cases as "The Adventure of [rest of the title]". The second game then subverts that, with the first case being named The Adventure of the Blossoming Attorney, but all subsequent cases lacking the word "Adventure" in them. They still all follow a "The X of Y" structure... except for the penultimate case, which is named Twisted Karma and His Last Bow.

    Web Animation 
  • Animator vs. Animation: All of the standalone adventures all follow this type of formula with each video being titled Animation vs. [Noun]. The "noun" is typically replaced with the title of a video game, but other videos can be something else such as Animation vs. Trash, Animation vs. YouTube, Animation vs. Math, etc.
  • Awesome Series has all the titles named after the work being parodied, but with one word replaced with "Awesome".
  • Bonus Stage defines its seasons through the use of this.
    • The first season's titles are all one word, with one exception, "The NYE".
    • Season 2's titles have "2" in them, except for the first episode, "Return". In addition, the titles of the second through fifth episodes of this season are the names of the first four episodes of the series, with "2" added.
    • Season 3's titles start with "Virtual".
    • Season 4 has rather contrived titles with "Curs" in them.
    • Season 5's episodes have "Fi" as the first two letters.
    • Season 6's titles are riffs on episode titles of The Simpsons.
    • Season 7's titles are more general puns.
  • Club Penguin Shutdown: Aside from the first one ("What's Left of Club Penguin?"), every regular episode of the series has a title that consists of "The" followed by a single word ("The Gang", "The Fall", "The Reunion", etc.).
  • Everything Is Broken: The series used to have its episode titles begin with "HTF +", with whatever work the crossover was with coming after the plus.
  • Filmcow’s series “Ghost House” gives it’s episodes subtitles from various movies.
  • Happy Tree Friends: Each of the TV season's full-length episodes under which the segments are grouped into has its number in its title. The first episode is named "One Foot in the Grave", the second "Lesser of Two Evils", and so on.
  • English episode titles in HOLOSTARS - Stars*collection! follow a specific pattern for every 10 episodes, replacing each last word with synonymous words related to starters: "...for Dummies", "...for Rookies", "...for Novices", "...for Beginners", "...for Freshmen", and "...for Newbies".
  • Red vs. Blue has a variant seen in its second story arc, The Recollection Trilogy: Each of the story arc's three seasons (Reconstruction, Recreation, and Revelation) and two miniseries ("Recovery One" and "Relocated") start with the "Re-" prefix.

    Webcomics 

    Web Original 
  • For the first four years of the ApprenticeEh vlog, they used movie, TV, and book titles but replaced all or part of a word with "vlog". This ended at the start of 2015 when they changed up their whole vlog format.
  • Brat: While Chicken Girls had a few episodes in Season 1 that are named after the days of the week, each episode in Season 3 is named after a musical (e.g. "Mamma Mia", "Little Shop of Horrors", "Wicked" and "Bye Bye Birdie").
  • Call Me Kevin labels his videos as '[Name of Videogame] but' and then adds how he fails or messes up, usually by picking 'I pick every bad option'.
  • Cat Muto's Persona 3 Let's Play videos all had Latin titles that began with Memento.
  • Caught Chatting follows the pattern of Two and a Half Men, naming each episode after a quote from it.
  • Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee titles each episode after a word or phrase from that episode's conversation.
  • In hybrid webcomic/browser game Demon Thesis, you control four college students who are unexpected gifted with Elemental Powers among other magic abilities and thrust into fighting all sorts of creatures, up to and including Eldritch Abominations. Each major arc is labelled after part of the school or college experience, so we have arcs labelled as Intramurals, Field Trip, Midterms, Spring Break, etc.
  • Fire Emblem on Forums:
    • Wonderful Blessing: All of the chapter titles are anime references, specifically to works in the isekai genre.
    • Chains of Horai: All of the chapter titles refer to the focal character (for instance, Yusuke Yamada Seeks His Freedom focuses on Yusuke, the Cursed Cat).
    • Demon Soul Saga: All of the chapter titles refer to the focal character obliquely through puns on their name (for instance, Bright Moonfall refers to Saya, whose last name can be read as "fallen moon".)
  • The GameFAQs Contests had divisions named after cardinal directions, plain numbers, or in the case of two game contests, acknowledging the period covered either through the years or the generations (8, 16, 32\64, and 128). Although most memorably it named divisions with a term related to the top seed's origin - e.g. The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule, Triforce; Metroid: Zebes, Spazer, Varia; Metal Gear: Gear, Snake, Patriot; Sonic the Hedgehog: Chaos, Blast; Final Fantasy VII: Midgar, Jenova, Limit.
  • Some FAQ/walkthrough writers on GameFAQs do this. For instance, Split Infinity, a major Final Fantasy FAQ writer, uses names of characters for version "numbers."
  • Almost every episode title for The Great Nerf War rhymes.
  • Most of the video titles for the Highcraft challenge videos are puns based on the name of the mod or map and "high".
  • In New Vindicators, every chapter in the main narrative is named after a song. In the European game, this isn't the case, although the first major arc has chapters named after chess terms, relating to Meaningful Name.
  • The title of every episode of The Time... Guys is based on a saying with the word "time" in it.
  • The Platoon of Power Squadron calls each episode a hypothesis.
  • Psycomedia uses this for the Frankenpodcasts, which are named after the Universal film series.
  • For its first season, Noob named its episodes "level [number]".
  • Every chapter of Elizabeth Sandifer's Doctor Who analysis blog TARDIS Eruditorum that covers a televised Doctor Who story is a relevant quote from a different Doctor. Interspersed between these are other posts with the categories "Pop Between Realities, Home In Time For Tea" (influences on the series from beyond the Whoniverse); "Expecting Someone Else" (contemporary Doctor Who Expanded Universe works featuring the Doctor); "Time Can Be Rewritten" (later Expanded Universe works featuring this Doctor); and "Outside the Government" (Expanded Universe works that don't feature the Doctor, or televised things that aren't exactly part of the series - interestingly, Sandifer considers Sherlock to fall into this category, rather than "Pop Between Realities"). During the hiatus, when books and audios become the main storyline, they stop being "Expecting Someone Else", and get a new convention where they're titled by a relevant quote from the series by someone other than the Doctor.
  • Every episode of TotalBiscuit and Jesse Cox's Terraria playthrough was named "Jesse is bad at [thing]" (except the second, which was called "Jesse is "turable" at mental arithmetic"). Also, the second and third seasons were named The Next World Generation and Deep Place Mine.
  • VG Myths: Questioning Title?: "Can You [Challenge]?"
  • In The With Voices Project, all the Ib With Voices episodes are named for the colors of the walls of the rooms Ib is exploring at that time.

 
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Dan Vs Everything

Each episode of Dan Vs. begins with Dan being wronged in some way, shouting at the sky, and the title card for the episode appearing.

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Once per Episode

Alternative Title(s): Idiosyncratic Episode Titles

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Dan Vs Everything

Each episode of Dan Vs. begins with Dan being wronged in some way, shouting at the sky, and the title card for the episode appearing.

How well does it match the trope?

5 (31 votes)

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