City Nicknames
City Nicknames
[Black Hat, Megan, and Ponytail are standing on a hill overlooking a city. The Gateway Arch is visible, as well as a number of skyscrapers in the skyline.] Black Hat: Ah, New York. The Hot Tamale. Megan: This is St. Louis. Also, that's not– Black Hat: The Winged City. The Gold Trombone. Castleopolis. Megan: It's none of those.
[Close-up of Black Hat] Black Hat: The Kissing Kingdom. Sandland. The High Place. Ol' Ironhook. Megan (off-panel): Still wrong. Black Hat: The Thousand Spires. The Graveyard of Kings. Bloomtown. Lantern City USA. Megan (off-panel): Please stop.
[Black Hat, Megan, and Ponytail are walking] Black Hat: The City of Many Daughters. Big Mauve. The Glass Cradle. The Road Source. London Prime. Hamtown. The Salad Bowl. God's Boudoir. The Glittering Swamp. The Steel Forest. The Mobius Strip. The Land of Trains and Fog. The Meeting Place. The Dark Star. The Walled Garden. Skin City. The Horse Rotary. Turkeytown. The Naked Towers. The Meta-City. The Urban Orb. The City of Angles. The Big Wheel. Bird City USA. The City of Seven Crowns. Hilltopia. Bug City. The Bottomless Cup. [Text size getting smaller] Lorde's Fen. The Last Town. The Empty Set. Ghost Harbor. Megan: How long does this last? Ponytail: No city has ever let him stay long enough to find out.

Cities often have official or unofficial nicknames. For instance, St. Louis, Missouri , is known as "Gateway to the West" among several other nicknames. The nicknames typically invoke some historical or geographic feature of the city, but can sometime be opaque to those not familiar with the city. The full, formal name of Bangkok includes a long list of superlatives translating as "The city of angels, the great city, the residence of the Emerald Buddha, the impregnable city (of Ayutthaya) of God Indra, the grand capital of the world endowed with nine precious gems, the happy city, abounding in an enormous Royal Palace that resembles the heavenly abode where reigns the reincarnated god, a city given by Indra and built by Vishnukarn."
Despite the skyline being clearly recognizable as St. Louis due to the Gateway Arch , Black Hat calls it New York City . However, the nickname he gives is neither a common New York nickname (such as " The Big Apple ") nor a St. Louis nickname. Megan tries to correct him, but it becomes clear that Black Hat is making up nicknames. Many of his suggestions are puns for real nicknames of other places.
The title text contains made up demonyms in the same pattern. A demonym is a word for the people who live in a particular place. They are typically derived from the name of the place (e.g. "St. Louisan" for people from St. Louis, or New Yorker for those from New York), but some regions have an informal demonym that can be used colloquially by those familiar with the place to refer to its residents (e.g. Hoosier for people from Indiana).
[Black Hat, Megan, and Ponytail are standing on a hill overlooking a city. The Gateway Arch is visible, as well as a number of skyscrapers in the skyline.] Black Hat: Ah, New York. The Hot Tamale. Megan: This is St. Louis. Also, that's not– Black Hat: The Winged City. The Gold Trombone. Castleopolis. Megan: It's none of those.
[Close-up of Black Hat] Black Hat: The Kissing Kingdom. Sandland. The High Place. Ol' Ironhook. Megan (off-panel): Still wrong. Black Hat: The Thousand Spires. The Graveyard of Kings. Bloomtown. Lantern City USA. Megan (off-panel): Please stop.
[Black Hat, Megan, and Ponytail are walking] Black Hat: The City of Many Daughters. Big Mauve. The Glass Cradle. The Road Source. London Prime. Hamtown. The Salad Bowl. God's Boudoir. The Glittering Swamp. The Steel Forest. The Mobius Strip. The Land of Trains and Fog. The Meeting Place. The Dark Star. The Walled Garden. Skin City. The Horse Rotary. Turkeytown. The Naked Towers. The Meta-City. The Urban Orb. The City of Angles. The Big Wheel. Bird City USA. The City of Seven Crowns. Hilltopia. Bug City. The Bottomless Cup. [Text size getting smaller] Lorde's Fen. The Last Town. The Empty Set. Ghost Harbor. Megan: How long does this last? Ponytail: No city has ever let him stay long enough to find out.
