Sandbox.Names To Run Away From Really Fast Single Words: Adjectives (The Adjective One) | Nouns (Animal | Body Part | Colors | Weapons) | Verbs | Titles (Noun X | The Person) Etymology:Ancient Dead Languages | Foreign Language Names Named After: Conquerors | Notorious Killers | Redneck Names | Religious Names (Biblical Names | Demons or Angels) | Shady Names Sounds and Letters: K Names | Mor | Names Ending In Th | R Names | Xtreme Kool Letterz | Unpronouncable Names Various: Mix and Match
A form of Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Names from religion and mythology.
Subtypes:
- Names straight from The Bible have their own article, but names from extra-Biblical Christian tradition are fair game in this page.
- Demons or Angels.
See also Religious and Mythological Theme Naming.
Examples:
Comic Books
- Abraxas is an evil cosmic being in Marvel Comics, the antithesis of Eternity.
Films — Live-Action
- Abraxas, Guardian of the Universe probably just liked the Xtreme Kool Letterz in all honesty.
Literature
- Abraxas Malfoy and the Abraxan flying-horse breed in Harry Potter.
Live-Action TV
- Abraxas is the name of demon in Charmed who tries to steal the Book of Shadows by reading its spells reversely.
Tabletop Games
- In Pathfinder, Abraxas is a demon lord with enough magical power to erase entire spells from existence and strip casters of their power forever.
Web Original
- Abraxas is the username of a Nightmare Fuel Station Attendant fanfiction author and user of Topless Robot.
Anime & Manga
- Alastor, the Flame of Heavens, from Shakugan no Shana.
Literature
- Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody from Harry Potter.
- The Big Bad of the children's book The Castle in the Attic, a sorcerer whose specialty was magic amulets.
- One science fiction story by Jack Vance was set in the Allastor Cluster.
- Used as the model name for a Humongous Mecha in Full Metal Panic!. Or, more correctly, a miniaturized version of the series' Humongous Mecha, which makes it something akin to a Terminator.
Live-Action TV
- Alastair is one of the highest and most evil demons in Supernatural. Throughout his appearances his goal is to bring about the Apocalypse, but he really wants to return to Hell so he can continue his "studies" in torturing souls.
Tabletop Games
- The Executioner of Hell in the Ninth Hell of Nessus in Dungeons & Dragons.
- In Vampire: The Masquerade, alastors are the Camarilla enforcers charged with hunting down and destroying the Anathema, those vampires who the Camarilla have marked for death.
Video Games
- Dante's lightning sword in Devil May Cry.
- One of the bosses of Painkiller
- Blade Master Alastor from Viewtiful Joe.
Web Animation
- The name of Hazbin Hotel's infamous Radio Demon, also known as one of the most powerful mortal sinners in all of Hell. Fuck with him at your own peril.
Anime & Manga
- Allelujah Haptism from Mobile Suit Gundam 00... well, not so much him as his sociopathic split personality Hallelujah.
Literature
- In Tom O'Bedlam, by Robert Silverberg, "synthetic human" Alleluia is superhumanly fast and strong. She's also seriously mentally unstable.
Comic Books
- Circe herself (like, the original character from Classical Mythology) is one of Wonder Woman's archenemies.
- She also makes an appearance in The Eternals, and later The Avengers, albeit spelled "Sersi" and subject to Adaptational Heroism (but no less dangerous).
Literature
- An incestuous vamp named Cersei Lannister is one of the central characters of A Song of Ice and Fire and the TV adaptation.
- Circe herself makes another appearance in the second Percy Jackson and the Olympians books (which makes sense, since all those books are modern takes on Classical Mythology).
Video Games
- Strangetown, a neighbourhood in The Sims 2 has Circe Beaker, a ruthless and cold-hearted woman married to resident evil scientist Loki.
Web Comics
- The Noordegraaf Files has "Circe"◊ Yu. Although "Circe" is an alias (her actual name is unknown), she's currently the most powerful mage featured in the comic,and has a thing for fire magic.
The Roman name of Cronus is 'Saturn', and the titan is indeed associated with the planet. The Roman form also has the added effect of sounding a bit like 'Satan'.
Anime
- Sailor Saturn from Sailor Moon. When our heroines first meet her, they (mistakenly, mind you) think she's evil, due to being possessed by Mistress 9.
Film - Animated
- In The Incredibles, "Operation Kronos" is the name of an evil plan cooked up by Syndrome. The plan is to build Omnidroid robots capable of killing superheroes.
Film - Live-Action
- The title character of Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter.
Webcomics
- The background lore of Girl Genius mentions a Saturnus Heterodyne who tried to kill his kids Bill and Barry.
Real Life
- In medicine, "saturnism" is an old-fashioned word for lead poisoning.
Films — Live-Action
- The swamp planet Dagobah in the Star Wars franchise. It is here that Luke trains in seclusion with the hermit Yoda, in a tradition that is clearly drawn from [Western perceptions of] Buddhism and Eastern mysticism.
Anime & Manga
- Dante from Black Clover is a powerful devil host who wants to overrun the living world with devils.
- Big Bad of the first anime of Full Metal Alchemist 2003.
- Go Nagai's Demon Lord Dante, as well.
Films — Live-Action
- Dante's Peak is the name of the volcano that catastrophically erupts in the film.
Live-Action TV
- In The Flash (2014), Cisco has a brother named Dante who though a Jerk with a Heart of Gold is nonthreatening, however the same can't be said for his Earth-Two counterpart Rupture.
Literature
- It's possible that Edmond Dantes of The Count of Monte Cristo was named with this intent, given that he sentences his enemies to an Ironic Hell (albeit while still on earth).
- The Dante family in V is for Vengeance. Especially Cappi. Lorenzo, on the other hand...
Tabletop Games
- The name of the chapter master of the Blood Angels in Warhammer 40,000.
Video Games
- Half-demon Demon Slaying badass from Devil May Cry. He's generally a nice guy unless you happen to be a demon threatening humanity. Then his devil side comes out to play.
- Knight Templar who takes up Grim Reaper's scythe and runs around attracting and killing off minions of Hell
Real Life
- Don't piss off Dante Basco. The Nostalgia Critic learned that the hard way.
Comic Books
Films — Live-Action
- Elektra King, the Femme Fatale in The World Is Not Enough who gets involved with Bond. It eventually turns out that she's the main villain, having seduced Renard previously and using him to fulfill her plan.
Music
- Marina Diamandis' shallow, cynical, vampish, emotionally stunted, homewrecking alter ego, Electra Heart.
Anime & Manga
- Fairy Tail: The king of Edolas, who may have heard about ethics and similar things but decided they were for weaklings.
- The villain from Saber Marionette J.
- Claude Faustus
- Faust VIII the necromancer from Shaman King
- Nacht Faust the devil host from Black Clover
Comic Books
- Felix Faust is a longtime Justice League of America villain.
- '90s Anti-Hero Faust from the eponymous comic series. He used to be a painter, but prefers bloodbaths to acrylics since his resurrection.
Literature
- Ellen Faustino from The Supernaturalist
- The title character of Algernon Charles Swinburne's poem "Faustine". Swinburne liked dominant women.
Live-Action TV
- Dark Faust from Ultraman Nexus, the first of the evil Ultras called Dark Giants.
Music
- German Progressive Rock band Faust, culpable of terrifying deeds such as performing the Cabaret/noise-rock anthem "Why Don't You Eat Carrots".
Theater
- Faust from the various versions. Origin of the name.
Video Games
- The Chaorrupted demon who made a deal with Don Giovanni during the Mythsong saga in AdventureQuest Worlds.
- Faust from Guilty Gear, who you really want to run away from before he sticks his giant scalpel up your ass.
- The Big Bad of The 7th Guest is named Stauf, which is an anagram of Faust.
- Moon Diver's Big Bad.
- Dr. Faustus from Thrill Kill.
Real Life
- The Panzerfaust ("Tank fist") anti-tank grenade launcher from the Second World War.
- Lauren Faust has successfully convinced grown men and teenage boys to Squee over cutesy ponies aimed at little girls.
Literature
- Werewolf Fenrir Greyback in Harry Potter, who absolutely revels in his werewolf side unlike Remus Lupin who tries to protect others from it.
- In early American editions of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, the name of the White Witch's right-hand wolf is inexplicably changed from Maugrim to Fenris Ulf.
- The Devourers: The antagonist, one of the titular werebeasts, takes the name Fenrir. Another werebeast lampshades his arrogance for naming himself after a god.
Video Games
- You can actually get a dark magic tome in Fire Emblem.
- Fenris Wolfbrother, an orc chieftain in Warcraft II: Beyond the Dark Portal.
- Fenris Isle in World of Warcraft, probably not named after the orc. Home of a dark wizard and his Gnolls (hyena-like humanoids) minions until the Cataclysm expansion pack. Also Fenrus the Devourer, a gigantic
wolfworg. - Fenris from Dragon Age II.
- A villain in the Marathon Game Mod Courier 11.
Live-Action TV
- Doctor Who features an ancient evil entity with the name of Fenric in the Season 26 serial "The Curse of Fenric", a being trapped by the Doctor in a flask and using its still considerable powers to manipulate various people as pawns over the centuries in order to gain his freedom.
Anime & Manga
- Hades Vandein of Magical Record Lyrical Nanoha Force, the managing director of the Vandein Corporation, which performs human experiments with the Eclipse virus and created murderous replica Infected, all For Science! and money.
Comic Books
- Red Robin: The Daughters of Acheron are women who have left behind their names and gained dangerous dark powers. There are at least two of them, one of whom is a half-sister to Ra's al Ghul, and they nearly kill Tim.
Literature
- In the novelization of Aliens, Acheron is the name given to the planet LV426. Why the Company would do so is not mentioned, but it's implied it may have something to do with the constantly burning fusion-powered atmosphere processors giving the Death World a hellish aspect.
- The entire Hades family in the Thursday Next novels, named after the Greek underworld and the rivers in it.
- Acheron Parthenopaeus, the leader of an army of immortal vampire hunters in Sherrilyn Kenyon's Dark Hunter series.
Tabletop Games
- The Infinite Battlefield of Acheron in Dungeons & Dragons is an Outer Plane situated between the planes of pure law (Mechanus) and lawful evil (Nine Hells). This plane of existence is better known as the afterlife for evil Blood Knights who died believing that War Is Glorious, as well as being the home of certain evil war gods such as Maglubiyet and Gruumsh.
Video Games
- Gol Acheron from Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy, the Sage of Dark Eco and the Big Bad of the game.
- Hades, the Big Bad of Kid Icarus: Uprising, although that's not just a guy named Hades, but the Hades. And he's very, very evil.
Anime & Manga
- The Hydra Cannon in Transformers: Armada.
Comic Books
- A terrorist organization in Marvel Comics.
Literature
- In The Executioner novel Stony Man Doctrine, Hydra is the codename for a KGB plot to attack the United States using chemical weapons deployed by thousands of terrorists.
Video Games
- Anankos, the true Big Bad of Fire Emblem Fates is known as Hydra in the original Japanese version.
Films — Live-Action
- The Big Bad of GoldenEye is codenamed "Janus". He's revealed to be Alec Trevelyan, former British agent 006.
Literature
- The Janus Man is a Colin Forbes novel about the hunt for a double agent during the Cold War, the eponymous Janus Man "who faces both East and West".
- Janos Slynt is the name of a villain in A Song of Ice and Fire.
Video Games
- Janus from Chrono Trigger who not only prophesizes that Chrono will die in his fight with Lavos, but is also the past self of apparent Big Bad Magus.
Western Animation
- Butters was once sent to a therapist called Dr Janus in South Park who (falsely and for ridiculous reasons) diagnosed him with having multiple personalities, in reality it's Janus who has multiple personalities some of them Ax-Crazy
Anime & Manga
- The namesake of the manga and animé series Jormungand, where it is the name of a system designed to deprive humanity of the use of planes and crash the ones who are airborne at the moment of activation.
Literature
- Jormundur is Ajihad and Nasuada's right-hand man in the Inheritance Cycle.
Video Games
- Blizzard likes this one: Jormungar are giant ice worms in the Norse-themed Northrend of World of Warcraft.
- A gigantic serpent called Jormungandr serves as an early boss in Magicka.
- In StarCraft, the Jormungand Brood, controlled by the player during the Zerg campaign, and therefore responsible for the invasion of Aiur.
- The Midgar Zolom of Final Fantasy VII, a fearsome optional encounter in the early game, although easily defeated if you go back later with a levelled-up party. His name is a mistransliteration of Midgardsormr (literally "Midgard Serpent"), the epithet of Jormungandr.
Live-Action TV
- The evil sorceress Kali from Charmed.
- In Teen Wolf, the second-in-command of the red-eyed alpha pack of evil werewolves is called Kali.
- In Stranger Things, Kali, or 008, is another one of Brenner's experements, with the ability to induce hallucinations.
Pro Wrestling
- The Great Khali.
Theater
- Cali, the villanous lizardman in Cirque du Soleil's Amaluna; note that the character is also the analogue to Caliban in The Tempest, which the show is a variation on.
Video Games
- Kalia, That One Boss in ActRaiser.
- The Caves of Kaliya in Tomb Raider III.
Anime & Manga
- Also see Demon Lord Dante by Go Nagai. Lamia wants to alternatively either screw or eat everyone in the city to have/make food for her zillions of spider babies. (She's a drider instead of the typical half-snake version fantasy works usually toss up.)
Films — Live-Action
- Lamia the witch from Stardust
Literature
- Lamia from Neverwhere.
- Lamias are a kind of vampiric witches in The Wardstone Chronicles.
Live-Action TV
- Madam Lamia, Count Grendel of Gracht's assistant in "The Androids of Tara".
- Kyōryū Sentai Zyuranger: Scorpina's Zyuranger counterpart is named Lamia-Scorpion, though when not in her monster form she's called Lami for short.
Tabletop Games
- The Lahmian vampires from Warhammer Fantasy.
Video Games
- Also Lamia Loveless from Super Robot Wars. An android and efficient spy who will sneak into your team, get really friendly with your teammates, while leaking information to her higher ups so at one point, she will be able to bring your group down in one swift move, and she has no concern in anything except her mission, her life included. Played straight in SRW Advance, when playing Axel's scenario, whereas she never did develop her conscience and stays as a cold blooded android.
- Lamia/Ramia Village in Ys II: Ancient Ys Vanished – The Final Chapter, the last town before The Very Definitely Final Dungeon.
- The Lamia Queen enemies from various Final Fantasy games. Usually they're just obnoxious enemies or bosses, often with attacks like Confuse or Charm that force characters to switch sides and attack their own party members. The Lamia from Final Fantasy II gets points for being an actual Queen who very nearly seduces the bewildered protagonist.
Comic Books
Films — Live-Action
- Marvel Cinematic Universe: One of the recurring characters is Loki, a Frost Giant and the God of Mischief.
- Dogma: One of the disgraced angels is called Loki.
Literature
- American Gods: Shadow's cellmate is called Low-Key Lyesmith. Y'know, Loki Lie-smith.
Live-Action TV
- From Supernatural, Gabriel, who goes by the alias Loki.
Video Games
- Bayonetta 2 has Loki, one half of the god Aesir. Though he is definitely a mischievous one and has Balder gunning for him due to him blaming him for Rosa's death, he's not the evil one in this game. That honor belongs to Loptr, Loki's Evil Twin, who wants the Eyes of the World for himself.
- A Gender Flipped version of the character of the same name in Fire Emblem Heroes.
- God of War (PS4) has Kratos' son Atreus, whose birthname by his mother Faye is Loki. Though more of an accident, he did take a huge role in Baldur's death.
Comic Books
- In The Wicked + The Divine, she is a young woman who flashes between three separate aspects (and in the vein of WicDiv's pop star pantheon, separate aesthetics as well) of the goddess: Her dominant personality, the one closest to the person Marian used to be, is the icy furious Macha; her anger manifests as the violent war-goddess Badb; and the kindest, arguably wisest, part of her is Anand, or Gentle Annie.
Live-Action TV
- Morgwyn of Ravenscar, the leader of a group of Satanist nuns in the Robin of Sherwood two-parter "The Swords of Wayland".
Video Games
- Morrigan Aensland from the Darkstalkers series, a shapeshifting succubus.
- In Dragon Age: Origins, there's a witch of the wilds named Morrigan who joins your party early in the game. She's quite... well-spoken even though she grew up in wilderness.
Anime & Manga
- The ostensibly benevolent space exploration company in Martian Successor Nadesico.
Comic Books
- In Hellblazer, Nergal is a demon who is one of John Constantine's oldest and most frequent enemies.
- In The Wicked + The Divine, it is revealed that Baphomet is actually Nergal, but he took the name of Baphomet because he didn't want people making Warhammer 40K jokes.
Literature
- In The Stormlight Archive Nergaoul, one of the Unmade, granting the Thrill—a supernatural thirst for combat and conquest.
Tabletop Games
- Nurgle, the oldest of the four Gods of Chaos in Warhammer 40,000, the God of Death and Decay, whose specialty is spreading nasty disease.
- Pathfinder has the demon lord Nurgal and the infernal duke Nergal. They were once a single being, an evil deity of the sun and deserts, before being cut into two parts by a rival.
Video Games
- Fire Emblem 7's Big Bad says hi, and waves his Ereshkigal tome around.
- The Lethal Lava Land in Ys IV: The Dawn of Ys.
Western Animation
- Nergal in The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy is an Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain Eldritch Abomination who lives in the center of the earth. He's also Billy's uncle by marriage.
Real Life
- Nergal, frontman/lyricist of the Polish death-metal band Behemoth. Somewhat fitting, since their lyrics play with theosophy a lot.
Anime & Manga
- Team Nemesis of Gundam Build Fighters. In the sequel, it's revealed that it's apparently the owner's surname, as his grandson Lucas Nemesis is the undefeated European champion.
- In Sailor Moon, the tenth planet, infused with evil energy and homeworld to the villanous Black Moon Clan, is called Nemesis.
Video Games
- The eponymous RPD S.T.A.R.S member-hunting Implacable Man in Resident Evil 3: Nemesis.
Western Animation
- In Transformers, especially in the cartoons, there is almost always a Decepticon ship called Nemesis, more often than not Megatron's flagship. The title "Nemesis Prime" is also common, generally given to an Evil Twin of Optimus Prime (and whose toy is generally easy for Hasbro to make; they just take a preexisting Optimus Prime mould and use black plastic instead).
Anime & Manga
- Ryūto Asamiya, the leader of Ragnarok, uses this as his codename in Kenichi: The Mightiest Disciple.
Literature
- Odin from American Gods, although he actually avoids using the name.
- The Dresden Files: Donar Vadderung is Odin in modern day, or at least is the inheritor of his Power. A former god, the man gave up his godhood to become more mortal and be allowed to stay in the mortal world and help influence things. He runs a mercenary group filled with Valkyries and Einherjar, the chosen dead, and every weapon and armament since the stone age is in perfect condition in his base, from old stone-and-stick clubs to modern tanks. He is a powerful and dangerous fighter even if he is weaker than what he was before. He is also Santa Claus and enjoys leading The Wild Hunt.
Live-Action TV
- WOTAN, the omniscient, mind-controlling rogue supercomputer from the classic-era Doctor Who story The War Machines
Video Games
- Odin from Final Fantasy, a summon whose defining feature is his Absurdly Sharp Sword Zantetsuken.
- Alfred Woden in Max Payne.
Real Life
- David Lane, founder of a neo-Nazi terrorist organization called "the Order," followed a white supremacist variant of Germanic Neo-Paganism and used "WOTAN" as an anagram for "Will Of The Aryan Nation."
Anime & Manga
- Gives its name to the research organization PANDORA in Darker than Black, which like Nergal in Nadesico is ostensibly good - apparently no one in either cast studied mythology.
Films — Live-Action
- Pandora is also the world inhabited by the Na'vi in Avatar. Not evil itself, but a foreshadowing that it won't remain undisturbed. Also fits the Greco-Roman theme naming of planets note
Literature
- Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles have a vampire named Pandora, though she's not particularly evil.
Live-Action TV
- In the most recent season of Doctor Who there was the Pandorica, a prison meant for containing a force that would destroy the universe.
- In the Expanded Universe, particularly the Gallifrey series, the Evil Overlord Time Lady who wants to take over Romana and declare herself "Imperiatrix" is named Pandora.
Music
- The vampish, Oblivious to Love Ice Queen title character of the song Pandora by Róisín Murphy.
Video Games
- Borderlands takes place on the planet Pandora, where almost everyone is searching for a mysterious "Vault," and trying to open it, for whatever idiotic reason...
- In Final Fantasy VIII, the Lunatic Pandora is a gigantic ship containing a crystal pillar that, when resonating with the Moon at specific locatons, causes a cataclismic event called Lunar Cry: monsters fall from the Moon, weraking continental-scale havoc.
- A Guitar Hero character.
- Kid Icarus (1986) has Pandora as the Goddess of Calamity! (It's oddly fitting though, considering what the real Pandora did...)
- Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow.
Webcomics
- In El Goonish Shive, Pandora is (one of) the chosen names of the world's most powerful Immortal. She chose it because she saw herself as similar to the original's box, a trap for the curious... but people didn't get it when she just called herself "Box".
- The notorious Final Boss of Street Fighter IV.
- The Mediochre Q Seth Series. Mediochre is The Hero and a Jerk with a Heart of Gold most of the time, sure, but he has a hell of a dark side if you make him angry enough. Also may count under the Biblical connotations of his middle name, Quirinius, who was a governor in the Roman Empire.
- The Marvel Universe has two examples: The Heliopolitan serpent god, and a Mutant in the X-Men series.
- Seth, the second in command of the Brotherhood of Nod. He gets killed by Kane, his direct superior, after trying to send the player character on a suicide mission.
- The evil snake god of Stygia from the Conan saga, who is worshipped by many Evil Sorcerers from that land.
- In Outriders, Lord Seth is a very powerful, morally ambiguous jerk. And he warns the protagonist about an even worse character named Moloch.
Anime & Manga
- Shiva in Jinki:Extend.
Comic Books
- Lady Shiva in the DC Universe.
Tabletop Games
- The Shiva Squadron from the Feng Shui supplement Glimpse of the Abyss are a Demon Slaying Amazon Brigade with eight arms much like their namesake (they're even called "shivas"). They're also not too keen on anyone who associates with demons, even if the demon in question has joined the forces of good (like quite a few Supernatural Creature PCs).
Video Games
- The Shivans of FreeSpace were named for Shiva because of their apparently mindless desire to destroy everything non-Shivan.
- Sheeva in the Mortal Kombat series, one of the four-armed Shokan race.
- Sheva Alomar in Resident Evil 5.
- Shiva from Streets of Rage series.
- The demons Shivarra in World of Warcraft.
Anime & Manga
- The street gang, Ragnarok, from Kenichi: The Mightiest Disciple. It's top eight members are all martial artists who go by the names of various figures from Norse Mythology.
- In Soul Eater, Ragnarok is a demon sword bonded to Crona — literally, as it's fused with their blood.
Comic Books
- Ragnarok, cyborg clone of The Mighty Thor.
Live-Action TV
- Ragnar Anchorage, a last-ditch Colonial supply depot visited by Battlestar Galactica to restock her weapons after her charges, the Twelve Colonies of Kobol, met their End of the World thanks to a surprise Cylon attack that also cybernetically compromised almost every other Colonial fighter and battlestar in the pilot miniseries.
- The Doctor Who serial The Greatest Show in the Galaxy introduces the three Gods of Ragnarok (one named Rag, one named Na, and another named Rok).
Video Games
- Operation Ragnarok is one of the international titles for the Nintendo Hard shmup Zed Blade.
- Ragna Rock, Jack Lupino's nightclub in Max Payne.
- The Kill Sat in Mega Man Zero 4.
- Ragnarok Canyon, the first level of Battle Toads.
- Lots and lots of different awesome swords in the Final Fantasy series. Ragnarok is usually not the strongest sword bar none, though - that's most likely Excalibur or the Ultima Weapon.
- Celica: Caring Princess, from Fire Emblem Heroes, uses the tome of the same name.
- Ragnaros, the Elemental Lord of Fire from World of Warcraft.
Anime & Manga
- Rory the Reaper from Gate.
Live Action TV
- Altered Carbon. Reaper is the street name for a drug used for near death experiences, though the protagonists only use it for a knockout drug.
Video Games
- The Reapers in Mass Effect 3.
- The giant cockroaches in Resident Evil 5.
- Reaper of Overwatch, a black robed, nigh-unkillable, sociopathic terrorist who reduces his victims to withered husks.
- The undead and angelic minions of Malthael from the Diablo III expansion Reaper of Souls.
Real Life
- The Reaper Attack Drone.
Comic Books
Literature
- A place version: The Arch of Tantalus from The Underland Chronicles.
Live Action TV
- Star Trek: The Original Series. In the evil mirror universe, Captain Kirk has an alien device called a Tantalus Field which he uses to monitor and if needed destroy his enemies.
Video Games
- The Earth-destroying Tantalus Rays in Commander Keen Episode II: The Earth Explodes!.
- Marathon 1 has a Game Mod titled Operation Tantalus.
- A subversion in Final Fantasy IX - in this case the name belongs to the Tantalus Theatre Troupe. They're not so much terrifying as they are...well...they're a group of laid-back, Large Ham actor-thieves, including a beloved Ensemble Dark Horse, Blank. The game's main character is also an on-and-off member of the troupe.
Anime & Manga
- The Titans of Attack on Titan, naturally.
- The Titans of Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam are an elite branch of the Federation military, and Earthnoid supremacists.
Comic Books
- Dark Horse Comics: Titan is a Superman expy who goes insane and decides he should rule.
- Marvel Comics: Titan is the last stop in a journal belonging to a guy found floating in the air, dead, making like the Human Torch.
- Teen Titans.
Films — Animation
- In Megamind, an Ascended Fanboy becomes "Titan" when super-powered, but turns out to be a lot less heroic than his empowerer had in mind. (Also, he misspells it "Tighten")
Video Games
- Final Fantasy: Titan, the recurring summon of Earth.
- Keith Courage in Alpha Zones has the Titan Guards and Titan Warrior.
Real Life
- The Titanic.
Anime & Manga
- VF-1 Valkyrie, the iconic Transforming Mecha of Super Dimension Fortress Macross.
- Ponyo, a Cheerful Child who goes against her father's Omnicidal Maniac tendencies, defies this trope by rejecting the name Dad gave her: "Brunhilde," taken from a Valkyrie in Richard Wagner's The Ring of the Nibelung.
Fan Works
- Rocketship Voyager. In her Back Story, Kathryn Janeway was assigned to the UNRS Valkyrie whose female crewmembers mutinied against their male officers.
Films — Live-Action
- In Thor: Ragnarok, Valkyrie is a bounty hunter who captures Thor on Sakaar, and later helps him escape. Subverted in that her real name is later revealed to be Brunnhilde, and Valkyrie is just her (former) occupation.
Tabletop Games
- The Valkyrie gunship of Warhammer 40,000.
Real Life
- During The '50s and The '60s, the US Air Force designed a strategic bomber jet called the XB-70 Valkyrie, which was intended to make the world's last bombing run — a terrifyingly literal chooser of the slain. Fortunately, it was never deployed.
- Walküre was the name of a mobilization order during the time of Nazi Germany. The German resistance secretly rewrote it to use it against Hitler's regime, but the operation to overthrow the Nazis ultimately failed. Dramatized in several films, including Valkyrie.
- Speaking of Those Wacky Nazis: among the Mitfords, a British noble family that infamously included a number of prominent Nazi sympathisers, one of the most virulently pro-Nazi members was named Unity Valkyrie Freeman-Mitford. She palled around with Adolf Hitler himself (who called her "a perfect specimen of Aryan womanhood"), and she even attempted suicide after Britain declared war on Nazi Germany.
Films — Live-Action
- Podracing champion Sebulba in Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace.
- The star that Tom the Astronaut travels to in The Fountain.
Music
- A trilingual extreme metal band from Pomona, CA.
Western Animation
- The lord of the Land of the Forgotten in The Book of Life.
- The names of two Gundams in Gundam 00: A Wakening of the Trailblazer are derived from the Qur'ān, the Islamic counterpart of the Christian Bible:
- Zabanya - derived from Al-Zabaniya, the name describing the 19 guardians of Hell
- Harute (and by extension, the Marute System)- derived from Harut and Marut, a pair of angels who descended from heaven to test the people of Babel/Babylon by performing deeds of magic.
- Same goes for the legendary yandere Yuno Gasai of Future Diary — named after Juno, the Roman equivalent of Hera.
- The Deuteragonist of Romancing Apoptosis Doll Sartain In Love is named Kusari Izanami, Izanami as in the Japanese God of the Dead. He's a Mad Scientist who severaly violates What Measure Is a Non-Human? by trapping a group of Artificial Intelligence-loaded dolls in a serial experimenting site to find one who can actually "love" without becoming "an idiot". Any doll who becomes an "idiot" (showing odd expressions and just overall acting like love freaks) are unquestionably all but Killed Off for Real and he's not far from manipulating or outright controlling Sartain to carry out the executions in his place.
Film
- In the 1962 adaptation of The Manchurian Candidate, the Chinese agent who "reprograms" the title character is named Dr. Yen-Lo, which is the same name as the Taoist god of death.
- FernGully: The Last Rainforest's Big Bad, Hexxus, takes his name from hex, meaning an evil spell or curse, itself derived from the Germanic word for "witch".
Literature
- Hera Volopoulos, a Dark Action Girl from The Facts of Death, who is just as vengeful as her namesake Greek goddess.
- Overlapping with Names Ending In Th, Good Omens gives us "Ashtoreth" — after a Lady of War and Love Goddess from Canaanite Mythology — as an alias for the Noble Demon Crowley when he's undercover and genderbent as a nanny to a boy believed to be The Antichrist. Hell, the kid himself counts: Warlock Dowling.
Video Games
- Baldur's Gate, named after the Norse god.
- Ishtaros (named after the Babylonian goddess Ishtar) and Nicchae (named after Nike, the Greek goddess of victory) in Ninja Gaiden Black/Sigma.
- Derceto (Syrian goddess), the haunted mansion in Alone in the Dark (1992).
- Fallout 3 has an Underworld resident named Charon, after the ferryman of Hades, who can be recruited as a follower, and Cerberus, the Mister Gutsy robot who patrols Underworld.
- Baraka (Hebrew/Arabic for "blessing") from the Mortal Kombat series.
- Istersiva (portmanteau of Ishtar and Shiva), the Cursed Mine boss in Ys III: The Wanderers from Ys and The Oath in Felghana.
- The Anti-Hero Arumat Thanatos from Star Ocean: The Last Hope. He himself had made references to being the incarnation of death himself.
- In Evolve, the Gorgon is named after the greek monster that turned all who looked at it to stone, as well as the root word gorgós, meaning dreadful.
- Divinity: Original Sin II: The Dragon is named Windego after the cannibalistic evil spirit of First Nations lore. She's a thoroughly evil old lady and undead to boot, but has no resemblance to the Wendigo.
Webcomics
- Rhea, of Slightly Damned, happens to be named after a Greek titan—the mother of Zeus, in fact.
- "Dullahan" is the original name for the Headless Horseman, a sinister Implacable Man who wasn't even slowed down by the loss of his head. 6 Gun Mage has the rebel leader Dullahan Cas, who survived being hung with barbed wire (though presumably his head didn't actually come off). He's an absurdly skilled sharpshooter, animals don't like him, is supposedly the chosen one of a long-forgotten god, oh and he appears to be either lucky beyond belief or nigh unkillable. Possibly both.
Web Original
- ContraPoints features a neo-Nazi named Freya, after Norse Mythology's resident Love Goddess who doubles as a Lady of War. This is probably a nod to how Those Wacky Nazis tend to idolise all things Nordic.
Western Animation
- Beast Wars's Megatron uses this as an invoked trope, in an attempt to be the figure from the series' equivalent of The Bible, "The Covenant of Primus". The Transformers Wiki put it best: "What distinguishes Megatron from the countless others who share [his] goal is his chutzpah. This is a guy who named himself after his faith's equivalent of the Antichrist."
Real Life
- Oda Nobunaga is often referred to as "Dairokuten Maou", "Devil King of the Sixth Heaven", in various franchises he appears in (a nickname he apparently chose for himself in Real Life). This is roughly the Buddhist equivalent of Satan.
- Orcas. otherwise known as Killer Whales (if that name wasn't bad enough), have the scientific name of Orcinius orca, Basically named after Orcus, the Roman god of death. That's right, Shamu is named after the god of death.
- The Greek god Pan is a literal one, as his name is the root of the word Panic.