Examples:
Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
The Hobbit, or There and Back Again (the book)
And before you say “alternate title”, since these supposed alternate titles are included in the full version of the main title (even if it’s usually not listed in full), how does this differ from “true” alternate titles that replace the entire main title?
Example:
Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey vs Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn
Into the Deep vs Yakamoz S-245
And then there’s the standard sub-titles, for example:
Captain America: The First Avenger
(Sorry for my lazy title choices but I couldn’t think of any others)
It seems like we have 3 things here: an “or” title in the name (alternate title which is included in the full version of the main title), a completely different alternate title that replaces the main one, and a subtitle following a colon after the main title. Are there different names to distinguish these different types of titles??
Also can we talk about how sub-title is used to mean closed captions as well as “sub-name” (sub-title used in this context)? It makes it impossible to search about because most people understand subtitle to mean closed captions, I think.
It’s called an “alternate title.” It’s different from a subtitle, which is a separate object. The alternate title is part of the normal title.
You asked what it was called but you were already calling it what it was called.
Reminds me of the novelisation of Day of the Tentacle that had the title “My Physics Adventure or It’s Never Too Late to Stop Pollution, So Let’s Start Yesterday”.
It makes it impossible to search about because most people understand subtitle to mean closed captions, I think.
I mean search engines just suck nowadays irregardless.
But feel free to found the “Society to Eliminate Homonyms or A Group of Like-minded Persons Seeking Clarity in the Meaning of Words and Greater Access to the English Language For All Peoples”. Just be careful with the autocorrect in the short title.
My favorite of these were the old Rocky And Bullwinkle cartoon
Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn is the true title. Those who didn’t get this title didn’t get the movie either.
I think they’re just called subtitles, but I’d be happy for someone to prove me wrong because they deserve a more interesting term.
And just because no one else has said it I’ll ad one of my favorite book titles: “Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus.” Shelley showed off some of her writing chops right there on the cover. And its one of the only times I can use a semicolon and know that I’m doing so correctly.
According to tv tropes, an either/or title: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/EitherOrTitle
Thank god for TV Tropes. The “subtitle” meaning “closed captions” or “sub-name” thing still bugs me. Am I the only one bugged by one name being used for multiple things confusingly? Like how “chips” is often used to mean either potato crisps (packet chips) or potato fries (hot chips). Why not just use different names, you know?
