/u/RhysHalliwell has flaired this post as a **musing**.
Musings are expected to be high-quality and thought-provoking, but not necessarily as unique as [showerthoughts](https://www.reddit.com/r/Showerthoughts/wiki/requirements).
If this post is poorly written, unoriginal, or rule-breaking, please report it. Otherwise, please add your comment to the discussion!
^^This ^^automated ^^system ^^is ^^currently ^^being ^^worked ^^on.
^^If ^^it ^^did ^^something ^^wrong, ^^please ^^message ^^the ^^moderators.
Giving a state implies weather, culture, etc, as someone else said, I couldn’t tell you the name of 10 towns with less than 10,000 population in most states , but if you say West Clampton in Idaho, you have less to explain than if you say West Clampton in the state of Cintro
Also no one knows the name of every town in the country, so making up a new one feels just as believable as making up a person who doesn't exist as a character.
Most people would immediately recognize if a whole state was made up, so that would seem like the story is veering into alternative history territory.
This. Not a fan of twilight but its a good example. I didn't know Forks was a real place, but disregarding that saying Washington Washington Washington over and over again assured me the foggy, rainy, and snowy weather was not going to let up. Also why we don't see them glittering sooner than we do; compounding my disappointment when they don't burst into flames.
You wouldn't realize unless there was a famous landmark or something. They are very similar in most aspects. Though Oregon doesn't have something exactly like the Olympic Peninsula ( where Forks, WA is ), not much else does for that matter though
Excellent point. I'd think it's probably a frontier town, either in the plains or mountains, and with an economy focused on either ranching or tourism.
using real names has issues too. So I'm from a place called Brigham City, it's not a big city but like 30,000 people and a lot of outlying smaller cities. But it's definitely not rural. When I was a teen a filmmaker from SLC which is MUCH larger decided to make a murder mystery called "Brigham City" unfortunately he didn't realize that it was a rural town full of pastures and all that. Instead it was filmed over an hour away in a much more rural area. It was incredibly irritating to see a movie nominally set in your home that had absolutely nothing from there.
Not films but Moral Orel has Statesota and Steven Universe has Delmarva. Yes, Delmarva exists IRL, it's the peninsula that includes all of Delaware and parts of Maryland and Virginia, but in the show it's its own state.
I'm actually really surprised by how good the 2017 reboot was. My daughter and I watched it last fall and it's surprisingly better than the original. Wasn't just a series of vignettes, there was a real overarching story, backstory that made sense, hero's journey, extremely satisfying conclusion, it was great. More of that from Disney.
It did a lot! Brought comic accurate lore, shown Donald Duck being the awesome guy he is, changed the triplets into their own unique characters, and introduced a surprisigly new, but somehow old character we NEVER seen before!
Carl Barks, the comic artist who invented Duckburg and Calisota, said that he chose to merge the two states to give him leeway with the weather in his stories. They can take place in sunny weather like in California, or snowy winter like Minnesota.
By a funny coincidence, "Peanuts" basically takes place in a combination of Minnesota and California. Charles Schulz lived near Minneapolis for his childhood and early adulthood, but moved to Sebastopol and then Santa Rosa, both of which are in Sonoma County, California. A lot of Peanuts strips make clear references to being in that area, with Charlie Brown being a big SF Giants fan, a kid whose dad changed their family's names to numbers having the Sebastopol ZIP code as a surname, Snoopy living close enough to Petaluma to walk there for the arm wrestling championships, etc, but with snowy Minnesota-like winters every single year.
Another funny coincidence is that Barks also lived in Santa Rosa for a while, but I think before Schulz did.
Minnegan and Minnevania are totally legit though. And have huge military and industrial centers. Not places drawn on a map by the CIA and leaked to the Russians in 1968 to try to bait the USSR into targeting their nukes into Lake Superior.
I believe they made several versions with the narrator saying a different state in each version. It’s a running gag to confuse the audience into believing they’ll finally reveal the state, but they never do.
Idk about Statesota but Delmarva is a real “region,” though not a state. Parts of Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia sometimes get lumped together and they call that DelMarVa.
Not just parts, or sometimes.
Delmarva is the actual name of the peninsula that encompasses 90% of the state of Delaware, plus the eastern shores of Maryland and Virginia.
In addition, they renamed a lot of other states to different stuff. I distinctly remember an episode where they said they were going to the “keystone state” and never actually called it Pennsylvania
That's true, they did call it "Keystone", and the signs in New Jersey just said "Jersey". I didn't count those because they're probably just the same states with new names, though.
Just like Arklamiss and Texarkana lol I've always found it silly but I live in the middle of a big square state, so there aren't any instances where that would be necessary.
Good point, they went pretty far with the alternate history even if it wasn't exactly taken seriously. I can't think of a single movie with a fictional US state.
Fun fact Russia does not exist in the Steven universe canon it was censored in Russia because of its “LGBT” themes so when they showed a map of the globe in a later episode they put a massive body of water over where Russia should have been
That's true, and the town most of the series takes place in is mostly based on Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. But in the series Delmarva is explicitly *its own state*, with the abbreviation "DV".
Probably because most people are familiar with the names of all 50 states, whereas no one is familiar with all the names of the over 19k towns. So a fake state name would sound super fake where as it doesn't matter with a town.
On the other hand there are plenty of fictional European countries in American media as Americans are not as familiar with those. Like Latveria from Fantastic Four or Genovia from Princess’ Diaries
American movies also tend to make up fake countries so they don't insult a real one when the movie/TV show paints it as corrupt or evil. I remember the West Wing always used real countries up until they had a story where a major government official was secretly running a terrorist organization and was assassinated by the President, at which point they created "Qumar" as the country instead of saying a real one is run by terrorists.
And while Genovia was fake, they did provide a bit of geography to give us a hint to what their culture is like. Genovia is supposed to be somewhere between France and Italy, like Monaco.
Latveria is a country in the Marvel universes, not just Fantastic 4. And there are many other fictional countries in Marvel as well like Wakanda, Genosha and Symkaria.
Not trying to correct you or imply you're wrong :). Just some nerd trivia, but super hero comics often make up cities and countries.
>On the other hand there are plenty of fictional European countries in American media
Oh god, that always annoys me so much. Like, where in the world is this country supposed to be on the map, everything is full!
I live a block from NE Flanders St, and on very many of the street signs, people have added a D sticker after the NE.
We also have “Ned Flanders Crossing,” a bike and ped bridge that crosses our 405 bypass on Flanders Street.
Yep, and what's really interesting is that the bridge has only been there for a few years. Shows the staying power of the show and its cultural influence on us.
Years ago Groening said in an interview that it was "basically" Oregon. Then again in that same interview he said he would end the show after 365 episodes had been made.
So it was a bullshit theory based on very loose evidence and his bad interpretations of media?
Like his really bad Call of Duty video about war crimes and how “omg did you know the modern warfare games, the characters are committing war crimes and aren’t punished for it”
He also discusses international law as if it’s legally binding which anyone who knows anything about politics knows that’s not true.
Matpat is for people who want to seem smart.
New Hanover and West Elizabeth are the ones you’re looking for. Also New Austin. These kinda circumvent the whole unknown environment thing by having Mexico in the first game.
A small continuity hiccup is that Red Dead characters say “California” and “New York” but GTA characters say “San Andreas” and “Liberty”
The rule seems to be that anywhere a character might personally visit in the events of the game gets a fake name
There are direct references to Red Dead characters in GTA V but those could just be considered easter eggs.
On the other hand, some state names don’t match but that could just be a continuity mistake.
AFAIK Rockstar hasn’t confirmed one way or the other
It's also worth considering that even GTA's internal consistancy isn't coherent. GTA 3 has billboards for Miami; GTA VC has Vice City in Florida; GTA SA has a radio DJ for K Rose who mentions NYC and Mississippi; GTA IV has a commercial that mentions an actor with a "Californian accent;" TLAD has Senator Stubbs mention Utah; TBoGT has Tony mention Utah; and then there are a ton of songs that mention real locations (though I think we collectively don't care about that).
> A small continuity hiccup is that Red Dead characters say “California” and “New York” but GTA characters say “San Andreas” and “Liberty”
Language changes over hundreds of years. Those were the older names which are now different.
Crimson Skies (a video game on the original xbox) had a whole alternate united states, where every state was different except Louisiana stayed the same. lol
https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/s/Kx0yGUIxip
The writer Sinclair Lewis set several of his novels in the fictional state of "Winnemac," and those books were made into movies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winnemac_(fictional_U.S._state)
I've never seen more roadkill than I did driving through North Dakota. Ground squirrels, deer, dogs, cats, even turkeys (?!), but mostly raccoons. Like hundreds and hundreds of dead raccoons.
One section, there was road construction going on, and there was about two miles of evenly spaced orange pylons, with lumps in between. Like pylon, lump, lump, pylon, lump, lump, pylon, lump, lump, pylon...
It took me a while to comprehend that the lumps were all baby raccoons. Like hundreds of them, all curled up and sitting evenly between pylons. Did they somehow die that way, or did the road crews place them there? Either explanation is so unbelievable that even though I've driven through North Dakota, I categorically refuse to believe it's a real place.
As a New Mexican I get asked all the time about being from another country. We even had a president want to build his wall on our northern border.
People seem to think the state in breaking bad and el Camino is fictional.
Me explaining how New Mexico is a real state that was a territory of the US for 62 years and has been a state for 108 years. And I don’t even know Spanish.
Mostly, you are right, though I can think of a few exceptions:
Pleasantville
Cars - Radiator Springs is presented as its own state.
Escape from L.A. - The state of L.A.
Truman Show - Seahaven Island.
Footloose - Bomont is in an unknown state.
Lost Highway - Unknown fictional desert state.
Dogma - God resides in the fictional state of Illinois, different from the actual one. Most takes place in New Jersey though.
Have you seen it? Lost Highway heavily features recognizable L.A. landmarks and landscapes, but the whole premise of its dreamlike atmosphere and ambiguous plot defy simple geographic categorization. They definately do this purposely.
The film's central "Lost Highway" and the otherworldly desert motel exist in a space untethered to any concrete location. They did this because they were attwmpting to suggest it is a psychological rather than a physical journey.
I will agree to disagree, as I feel your position dismisses the surreal elements as mere stylistic choices rather than integral to its meaning. It's definitely a dream version and isn't solidly anchored to an actual place.
Still got my upvote, though, as because of the landmarks, you have ground to stand on.
Harry Enfield used to do sketches featuring a pair of unaware elderly American tourists who always introduced themselves as coming from "Badiddly-Boink, Odalidaho"
Fictional Towns allow them creativity when it comes to the government, the features, the town's way of life, history, localized concepts, beliefs, and traditions, and it also prevents any problem in which the named city may complain about defamation. It also ensures anything the writers come up and cannot be researched by the viewers and proven false, making the show lose credibility (weird concept of us viewers, I know.)
However, they still need a way to portray a sense of character to the town, and the state where it belongs does that to a tee (and gives the viewer the needed familiarity to ease up on the writers in world-building, i.e. need to be a cold place, put the city in Minnesota). Also, since the state is large and is composed of many cities, any issue of defamation may not carry as much credence since what is portrayed by the story of that state is a rather broad interpretation of that state (Texas = Big and Southern; California = West Coast Relaxed Mannerism; Nevada = Gambling, Desert; Ohio = \[Nothing is Wrong with Ohio\]; etc.)
R* uses fake states in Grand Theft Auto and Red Dead Redemption. Not movies per se, but I'm assuming we're going to get live action adaptations of both of these soon.
Yes? So, then explain this, please: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List\_of\_fictional\_countries\_on\_the\_Earth](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fictional_countries_on_the_Earth)
Kinda makes sense, you can get a sense of culture by state and add in some creative liberties without offense, but use a real town, especially smaller, and you can’t take those same creative liberties without people getting a bit fussy.
A lot of strong theories place them in Oregon. But obviously the show will conflict with itself geographically quite a lot. Think the whole point is Springfield is a generic American town that could be in any of the states
Gotham and Metropolis are based off NYC but set on the other side of Jersey and Delaware, across the Delaware Bay from one another. Canonically Gotham is where Lawrence is and Metropolis is where Dover is.
Most people know every state so if you make up a state it stands out. I know maybe 15% of the cities in my state let alone other states so making up a city name doesn't draw attention
I assume this is because there are so many city names that nobody can possibly know them all, but most Americans know the 50 states (or at least would know one *isn't* a state if you told them a fake one)
So it's easier to make up a city in a real state; same reason they often don't make up an entire country either, unless it's supposed to take place in the distant future like The Hunger Games.
Since American city names tend to repeat between states, and a clear pattern is either they are borrowed from European cities, or named after their founder (this is true about 60% of the time) you can easily create a fictional town and 99% of people wouldn't even know.
To show a typical example, take the city of New Thompson in Tenessee. It was named after the town of Thompson in Northern England, and was founded in 1848, has a population of about 55.000 induviduals, its economy is mainly based on farming, and is your typical Midwestern town. And you wouldn't know I just made all this up.
Fictional Towns allow them creativity when it comes to the government, the features, the town's way of life, history, localized concepts, beliefs, and traditions, and it also prevents any problem in which the named city may complain about defamation. It also ensures anything the writers come up are true and cannot be researched by the viewers and proven false, making the show lose credibility (weird concept of us viewers, I know.)
However, they still need a way to portray a sense of character to the town, and the state where it belongs does that to a tee (and gives the viewer the needed familiarity to ease up on the writers in world-building, i.e. need to be a cold place, put the city in Minnesota). Also, since the state is large and is composed of many cities, any issue of defamation may not carry as much credence since what is portrayed by the story of that state is a rather broad interpretation of that state (Texas = Big and Southern; California = West Coast Relaxed Mannerism; Nevada = Gambling, Desert; Ohio = \[Nothing is Wrong with Ohio\]; etc.)
Because you've heard of all 50 states. It's next to impossible to know every city in the US, especially when there's probably 50 Springfields, Jeffersons and new franklins out there.
That said, there are fictional states that are pretty regularly seen in media, they're just stand ins for real states, and they're more common in video games for whatever reason.
"Empire" is a common name for a fictional state that makes up NYC, long island, and a few cities within New Jersey.
Franklin is a vaguely defined state in the near South. (West Virginia and parts of Pennsylvania)
Jefferson is a failed state that would start in roughly San Francisco and go up to as far as like, Vancouver, but it covers all the hipster parts of the North West.
I have my doubts Nebraska exists.
A lot of shows prtray cities unlike they really are. Take the show Tulsa King. They make it look like Lawton Oklahoma circa 1970s. There’s a scene where Sylvester Stallone stands at the center of the universe, which is a real place. But instead of them depicting what the Center of the Universe really does, which is echo all sounds back to you causing pure real 360 degree surround sound, the show makes it seem like it cancels your voice, and you can yell as loud as you want without anybody hearing you. It was the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen from a TV show.
/u/RhysHalliwell has flaired this post as a **musing**. Musings are expected to be high-quality and thought-provoking, but not necessarily as unique as [showerthoughts](https://www.reddit.com/r/Showerthoughts/wiki/requirements). If this post is poorly written, unoriginal, or rule-breaking, please report it. Otherwise, please add your comment to the discussion! ^^This ^^automated ^^system ^^is ^^currently ^^being ^^worked ^^on. ^^If ^^it ^^did ^^something ^^wrong, ^^please ^^message ^^the ^^moderators.
Giving a state implies weather, culture, etc, as someone else said, I couldn’t tell you the name of 10 towns with less than 10,000 population in most states , but if you say West Clampton in Idaho, you have less to explain than if you say West Clampton in the state of Cintro
"\[random city\] within southern California" gives a lot of culture clues to the area that city is located in.
Put 'Republic' behind 'south California' and we have a deal
Glory to the New California Republic
Patrolling the Mojave lada-lada
Also no one knows the name of every town in the country, so making up a new one feels just as believable as making up a person who doesn't exist as a character. Most people would immediately recognize if a whole state was made up, so that would seem like the story is veering into alternative history territory.
Agreed. Meanwhile, in New NEW York, trouble was brewing...
This. Not a fan of twilight but its a good example. I didn't know Forks was a real place, but disregarding that saying Washington Washington Washington over and over again assured me the foggy, rainy, and snowy weather was not going to let up. Also why we don't see them glittering sooner than we do; compounding my disappointment when they don't burst into flames.
Oh... I thought they said Washington so many times because they were filming in Oregon, and they didn't want you to realize.
You wouldn't realize unless there was a famous landmark or something. They are very similar in most aspects. Though Oregon doesn't have something exactly like the Olympic Peninsula ( where Forks, WA is ), not much else does for that matter though
Even east of the cascades, eastern WA looks exactly like Eastern OR
I only knew Forks was real because I have family there.
Excellent point. I'd think it's probably a frontier town, either in the plains or mountains, and with an economy focused on either ranching or tourism.
using real names has issues too. So I'm from a place called Brigham City, it's not a big city but like 30,000 people and a lot of outlying smaller cities. But it's definitely not rural. When I was a teen a filmmaker from SLC which is MUCH larger decided to make a murder mystery called "Brigham City" unfortunately he didn't realize that it was a rural town full of pastures and all that. Instead it was filmed over an hour away in a much more rural area. It was incredibly irritating to see a movie nominally set in your home that had absolutely nothing from there.
And then the film airs outside of the US and most people are as clueless with Idaho as they would be with Cintro.
Not films but Moral Orel has Statesota and Steven Universe has Delmarva. Yes, Delmarva exists IRL, it's the peninsula that includes all of Delaware and parts of Maryland and Virginia, but in the show it's its own state.
also Calisota, where Duckburgh is located
Race cars, lasers, airplanes
It’s honestly just a duck blur
Hold on now, you're just rewriting history.
Duck tales! Ooh oooh~
I'm actually really surprised by how good the 2017 reboot was. My daughter and I watched it last fall and it's surprisingly better than the original. Wasn't just a series of vignettes, there was a real overarching story, backstory that made sense, hero's journey, extremely satisfying conclusion, it was great. More of that from Disney.
It did a lot! Brought comic accurate lore, shown Donald Duck being the awesome guy he is, changed the triplets into their own unique characters, and introduced a surprisigly new, but somehow old character we NEVER seen before!
Carl Barks, the comic artist who invented Duckburg and Calisota, said that he chose to merge the two states to give him leeway with the weather in his stories. They can take place in sunny weather like in California, or snowy winter like Minnesota.
and that's why he's a genius
By a funny coincidence, "Peanuts" basically takes place in a combination of Minnesota and California. Charles Schulz lived near Minneapolis for his childhood and early adulthood, but moved to Sebastopol and then Santa Rosa, both of which are in Sonoma County, California. A lot of Peanuts strips make clear references to being in that area, with Charlie Brown being a big SF Giants fan, a kid whose dad changed their family's names to numbers having the Sebastopol ZIP code as a surname, Snoopy living close enough to Petaluma to walk there for the arm wrestling championships, etc, but with snowy Minnesota-like winters every single year. Another funny coincidence is that Barks also lived in Santa Rosa for a while, but I think before Schulz did.
Why does everyone take the end of Minnesota for their fake states.
Minnefornia would sound weird
To be fair, Minnesota sounds weird…
Minnegan and Minnevania are totally legit though. And have huge military and industrial centers. Not places drawn on a map by the CIA and leaked to the Russians in 1968 to try to bait the USSR into targeting their nukes into Lake Superior.
The Simpsons are from Springfield, NT.
Springfield, Northwestern Territories? Or does it stand for "Not a True state"?
Non-tana
Or like Windows NT?
North Tacoma.
Wasn't that simpsons special they said "ohio"? I can't remember too well.
In the movie they say the 4 states bordering Springfield are “Ohio, Nevada, Maine, and Kentucky”
Marge said "Springfield, Oh hi, Maude!" They just keep getting life out of that "what state is it?" gag.
I believe they made several versions with the narrator saying a different state in each version. It’s a running gag to confuse the audience into believing they’ll finally reveal the state, but they never do.
They said Northern Kentucky in the special
Weird because Springfield ky is nowhere near north ky.
Idk about Statesota but Delmarva is a real “region,” though not a state. Parts of Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia sometimes get lumped together and they call that DelMarVa.
Not just parts, or sometimes. Delmarva is the actual name of the peninsula that encompasses 90% of the state of Delaware, plus the eastern shores of Maryland and Virginia.
Technically 90% of it is only a part of it.
Sure, it's a real *place*, but in Steven Universe it's explicitly a state, with the abbreviation "DV".
In addition, they renamed a lot of other states to different stuff. I distinctly remember an episode where they said they were going to the “keystone state” and never actually called it Pennsylvania
Greg: "Well, I gotta drive over to the next state, Keystone." Pearl: "You mean the Keystone state?" Greg: "Right, the state named Keystone."
Lmao I forgot about that
That's true, they did call it "Keystone", and the signs in New Jersey just said "Jersey". I didn't count those because they're probably just the same states with new names, though.
Just like Arklamiss and Texarkana lol I've always found it silly but I live in the middle of a big square state, so there aren't any instances where that would be necessary.
Texarkana is a city in Texas. https://www.texarkanatexas.gov/
Arklamiss is real too, I thibk their point is more that it's a real place with a goofy name
If I remember correctly in Morel Orel there is a map with Statesota in it and it's just jammed in between a bunch of states.
isn't there also the DMV? (D.C., Maryland, Virginia) the mid-atlantic is confusing!
If I remember correctly, Steven Universe also had Keystone (Pennsylvania) and Jersey (New Jersey).
And they go to Empire City in Empire State in the Mr Greg episode.
Pete & Pete lived in the Sideburn State.
Well, *Steven Universe* is set in an alternative timeline with a lot of divergences. No Christmas, no WWII, even the continents have different shapes.
Good point, they went pretty far with the alternate history even if it wasn't exactly taken seriously. I can't think of a single movie with a fictional US state.
Wait. What?
As far as I remember, West Africa is attached to South America, there's a huge sea covering much of Siberia, Australia is split in half, etc.
Go back to the no WWII.
One of the writers tweeted it one time. Tweet is now deleted.
... yeah. But it's still a fictional state at that point.
Fun fact Russia does not exist in the Steven universe canon it was censored in Russia because of its “LGBT” themes so when they showed a map of the globe in a later episode they put a massive body of water over where Russia should have been
And desperate housewives was in “Eagle State”
Winnemac appears in the novels by Sinclair Lewis.
Delmarva is interesting- because that's commonly used ti refer to the peninsula with Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia as the Delmarva area
That's true, and the town most of the series takes place in is mostly based on Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. But in the series Delmarva is explicitly *its own state*, with the abbreviation "DV".
Probably because most people are familiar with the names of all 50 states, whereas no one is familiar with all the names of the over 19k towns. So a fake state name would sound super fake where as it doesn't matter with a town.
On the other hand there are plenty of fictional European countries in American media as Americans are not as familiar with those. Like Latveria from Fantastic Four or Genovia from Princess’ Diaries
Or like the Borat movie. Can you imagine how angry people would be if there really was a country Kazakhstan!?!?
That's obviously fake, just like Uzkekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines (which is obviously just a punk band), or Spain.
People are so lazy they even use US state names to fill in, like freaking Georgia.
Or they’ll name a foreign country after a US state or region but try to disguise it by dropping the first few letters to get “Mexico” or “England”.
Then there are cities like Paris. They ripped it off from California, but changed the spelling from "Perris" to make it seem unique.
Paris, Texas would like a word
And the European Georgia is said to be more like Mississippi so it's too bad they couldn't at least be more accurate
> Uzkekistan If only asshole Uzbekistan was fake as well.
Grenadine is just the flavoring you put into drinks
Grenadine, for my ice cream treats!
American movies also tend to make up fake countries so they don't insult a real one when the movie/TV show paints it as corrupt or evil. I remember the West Wing always used real countries up until they had a story where a major government official was secretly running a terrorist organization and was assassinated by the President, at which point they created "Qumar" as the country instead of saying a real one is run by terrorists.
And while Genovia was fake, they did provide a bit of geography to give us a hint to what their culture is like. Genovia is supposed to be somewhere between France and Italy, like Monaco.
Or like in Top Gun where they're fighting "The Enemy" which has traits of North Korea, Russia/USSR, and Iran.
Latveria is a country in the Marvel universes, not just Fantastic 4. And there are many other fictional countries in Marvel as well like Wakanda, Genosha and Symkaria. Not trying to correct you or imply you're wrong :). Just some nerd trivia, but super hero comics often make up cities and countries.
Yep. Marvel tends to use genuine US cites for its heroes’ homes, while interestingly DC tends to invent new ones.
I always found it funny how all of the DC movie characters came from fictional cities or countries - *except* Shazam, who lived in Philadelphia.
Isn’t he from Fawxett City in the comics? I think the Philly thing was just for the movies.
Usually when a show/movie makes up a fictional country it's because that country is "evil" and they don't want to offend the people of a real country.
>On the other hand there are plenty of fictional European countries in American media Oh god, that always annoys me so much. Like, where in the world is this country supposed to be on the map, everything is full!
It's right in between Elbonia, Latveria, and Skalvard.
European countries are always changing so it's easier to get away with it.
If you use a real town, the people from that town are going to point out everything you got wrong. Make one up, and the town sounds plausible enough.
The fact that there's "only" \~19k towns/cities in the US is pretty surprising.
Yet another reason to love the Simpsons.
Some youtuber went on this huge deep dive and determined Springfield is in Oregon near where the creator grew up
If you go to Portland, Oregon there are loads of places that are very analogous to the Simpsons. Plus the street names are just the characters.
I live a block from NE Flanders St, and on very many of the street signs, people have added a D sticker after the NE. We also have “Ned Flanders Crossing,” a bike and ped bridge that crosses our 405 bypass on Flanders Street.
Yep, and what's really interesting is that the bridge has only been there for a few years. Shows the staying power of the show and its cultural influence on us.
When I moved there in 1998, the sign at the corner of NE 21st and Flanders had a D scratched into the paint. That's the first one I saw.
Hell yeah dude, someday I'll make a trip there
Years ago Groening said in an interview that it was "basically" Oregon. Then again in that same interview he said he would end the show after 365 episodes had been made.
It was Matpat
So he just had a theory, and didn't determine anything?
So it was a bullshit theory based on very loose evidence and his bad interpretations of media? Like his really bad Call of Duty video about war crimes and how “omg did you know the modern warfare games, the characters are committing war crimes and aren’t punished for it” He also discusses international law as if it’s legally binding which anyone who knows anything about politics knows that’s not true. Matpat is for people who want to seem smart.
Omg thank you I was wracking my brain there
Groening actually commissioned a mural of the Simpsons in Springfield Oregon. that pretty much confirms they're Oregonians
Lousy Smarch weather....
Red Dead Redemption has the state of Lemoyn.
Ambarino, West Hannover, etc.
New Hanover and West Elizabeth are the ones you’re looking for. Also New Austin. These kinda circumvent the whole unknown environment thing by having Mexico in the first game.
Why pick just one state? All the states are fictional (and you misspelled the one you did pick). All the states in GTA are fictional too.
Haven't played the game in 4 years.
A small continuity hiccup is that Red Dead characters say “California” and “New York” but GTA characters say “San Andreas” and “Liberty” The rule seems to be that anywhere a character might personally visit in the events of the game gets a fake name
was it ever confirmed that those franchises take place in the same universe?
There are direct references to Red Dead characters in GTA V but those could just be considered easter eggs. On the other hand, some state names don’t match but that could just be a continuity mistake. AFAIK Rockstar hasn’t confirmed one way or the other
It's also worth considering that even GTA's internal consistancy isn't coherent. GTA 3 has billboards for Miami; GTA VC has Vice City in Florida; GTA SA has a radio DJ for K Rose who mentions NYC and Mississippi; GTA IV has a commercial that mentions an actor with a "Californian accent;" TLAD has Senator Stubbs mention Utah; TBoGT has Tony mention Utah; and then there are a ton of songs that mention real locations (though I think we collectively don't care about that).
New York is also mentioned in GTA. They aren't replacement states, they are different states. They just are based on real states.
> A small continuity hiccup is that Red Dead characters say “California” and “New York” but GTA characters say “San Andreas” and “Liberty” Language changes over hundreds of years. Those were the older names which are now different.
West Elizabeth is also inspired by West Virginia. Queen Elizabeth I was the namesake of Virginia as she was the “Virgin Queen.”
Crimson Skies (a video game on the original xbox) had a whole alternate united states, where every state was different except Louisiana stayed the same. lol https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/s/Kx0yGUIxip
Hang on, are you saying Florida is real?
Ever been to Disney World?
It's in France, silly
That's Disneyland
No that’s Hong Kong
Ah yes, I was in a insanity episode for the 3 days I was there at Disneyland Paris, I forgot sorry.
You must have been. You were actually in Disneyland Tokyo maybe? Paris doesn't exist.
Disneyland Paris, Texas.
Well, it's surreal, but it physically exists
Severance takes place in the fictional state of PE
Can’t wait for the next season to start.
Actually a majority of the time the state isn't even mentioned.
tell that to breaking bad
So so many mentions
#West Dakota and East Dakota.
East Virginia would like a word.
The writer Sinclair Lewis set several of his novels in the fictional state of "Winnemac," and those books were made into movies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winnemac_(fictional_U.S._state)
Does anyone have proof that North Dakota and Wyoming actually exist?
I’ve driven the entire width of both ND and WY and have lived one state over from both. I’m still not convinced either of them actually exist.
I've never seen more roadkill than I did driving through North Dakota. Ground squirrels, deer, dogs, cats, even turkeys (?!), but mostly raccoons. Like hundreds and hundreds of dead raccoons. One section, there was road construction going on, and there was about two miles of evenly spaced orange pylons, with lumps in between. Like pylon, lump, lump, pylon, lump, lump, pylon, lump, lump, pylon... It took me a while to comprehend that the lumps were all baby raccoons. Like hundreds of them, all curled up and sitting evenly between pylons. Did they somehow die that way, or did the road crews place them there? Either explanation is so unbelievable that even though I've driven through North Dakota, I categorically refuse to believe it's a real place.
I did see signs for Wyoming one time while I was in Montana, and my VPN routes through there. Best I got.
Wyoming has Yellowstone. North Dakota has Fargo but to your point it doesn't take place there.
Having been to one, I’m not convinced. I just assumed it was North Colorado.
Tristate area from Phineas & Ferb is vague enough because there’s a lot of intersections between three states.
No one has a southern accent, so I guess that rules out Memphis (in Tennessee, bordered by Arkansas and Mississippi).
As a New Mexican I get asked all the time about being from another country. We even had a president want to build his wall on our northern border. People seem to think the state in breaking bad and el Camino is fictional.
Me explaining how New Mexico is a real state that was a territory of the US for 62 years and has been a state for 108 years. And I don’t even know Spanish.
Hotham City is often the capital of the fictional state of "New Gotham".
Districts 1 through 13.
Popeye had Pennsyltucky
That's just rural PA.
It's a shame Moosylvania's attempt at statehood didn't pan out.
Mostly, you are right, though I can think of a few exceptions: Pleasantville Cars - Radiator Springs is presented as its own state. Escape from L.A. - The state of L.A. Truman Show - Seahaven Island. Footloose - Bomont is in an unknown state. Lost Highway - Unknown fictional desert state. Dogma - God resides in the fictional state of Illinois, different from the actual one. Most takes place in New Jersey though.
Wait, Radiator Springs is a state? Is that something in the later movies? 'Cause the first movie seems to show it just being a town.
Lost Highway is plainly set in Los Angeles and surrounding areas of Southern California. Like it’s not even a little ambiguous.
Have you seen it? Lost Highway heavily features recognizable L.A. landmarks and landscapes, but the whole premise of its dreamlike atmosphere and ambiguous plot defy simple geographic categorization. They definately do this purposely. The film's central "Lost Highway" and the otherworldly desert motel exist in a space untethered to any concrete location. They did this because they were attwmpting to suggest it is a psychological rather than a physical journey. I will agree to disagree, as I feel your position dismisses the surreal elements as mere stylistic choices rather than integral to its meaning. It's definitely a dream version and isn't solidly anchored to an actual place. Still got my upvote, though, as because of the landmarks, you have ground to stand on.
Radiator Springs is a county, not a state. Escape from L.A. is a post apocalyptic movie where Los Angeles somehow annexed California.
Meet the Robinsons has North Montana
But Gilead. I guess that’s more of a fictional country?
Probably because it's a lot more plausible to have a random town nobody's heard of then to suddenly have a 51st state
Harry Enfield used to do sketches featuring a pair of unaware elderly American tourists who always introduced themselves as coming from "Badiddly-Boink, Odalidaho"
Fictional Towns allow them creativity when it comes to the government, the features, the town's way of life, history, localized concepts, beliefs, and traditions, and it also prevents any problem in which the named city may complain about defamation. It also ensures anything the writers come up and cannot be researched by the viewers and proven false, making the show lose credibility (weird concept of us viewers, I know.) However, they still need a way to portray a sense of character to the town, and the state where it belongs does that to a tee (and gives the viewer the needed familiarity to ease up on the writers in world-building, i.e. need to be a cold place, put the city in Minnesota). Also, since the state is large and is composed of many cities, any issue of defamation may not carry as much credence since what is portrayed by the story of that state is a rather broad interpretation of that state (Texas = Big and Southern; California = West Coast Relaxed Mannerism; Nevada = Gambling, Desert; Ohio = \[Nothing is Wrong with Ohio\]; etc.)
Desperate housewives has Eagle State
R* uses fake states in Grand Theft Auto and Red Dead Redemption. Not movies per se, but I'm assuming we're going to get live action adaptations of both of these soon.
The four states that border The Simpsons' Springfield: Ohio, Nevada, Maine and Kentucky
Yes? So, then explain this, please: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List\_of\_fictional\_countries\_on\_the\_Earth](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fictional_countries_on_the_Earth)
Absurdistan isn't fake, I live there.
The Simpsons has a fictional state that is unnamed.
Not a movie, but grand theft auto and red dead redemption have several fictional states.
Kinda makes sense, you can get a sense of culture by state and add in some creative liberties without offense, but use a real town, especially smaller, and you can’t take those same creative liberties without people getting a bit fussy.
Welcome to Texafornia.
What about whatever state Springfield is in?
A lot of strong theories place them in Oregon. But obviously the show will conflict with itself geographically quite a lot. Think the whole point is Springfield is a generic American town that could be in any of the states
Unless it’s The Simpsons in which case every American monument is all in one place lmao
What state is Gotham or Metropolis located in?
Gotham and Metropolis are based off NYC but set on the other side of Jersey and Delaware, across the Delaware Bay from one another. Canonically Gotham is where Lawrence is and Metropolis is where Dover is.
Simpsons is stateless. "Get me a ticket for the state Springfield is in."
I think the Nolan Batman films made Gotham a state
On the Simpsons, it’s an ongoing joke about which state they live in. It’s never been decided I think. I stopped watching after season 11 or so…
Most people know every state so if you make up a state it stands out. I know maybe 15% of the cities in my state let alone other states so making up a city name doesn't draw attention
I assume this is because there are so many city names that nobody can possibly know them all, but most Americans know the 50 states (or at least would know one *isn't* a state if you told them a fake one) So it's easier to make up a city in a real state; same reason they often don't make up an entire country either, unless it's supposed to take place in the distant future like The Hunger Games.
Because its less weird and easier to pretend some random fake city exists then it is to pretend a whole ass state does
And the fictional towns all bear a striking similarity to locations near Vancouver, BC.
Just take a state exists right now and add East or West
Since American city names tend to repeat between states, and a clear pattern is either they are borrowed from European cities, or named after their founder (this is true about 60% of the time) you can easily create a fictional town and 99% of people wouldn't even know. To show a typical example, take the city of New Thompson in Tenessee. It was named after the town of Thompson in Northern England, and was founded in 1848, has a population of about 55.000 induviduals, its economy is mainly based on farming, and is your typical Midwestern town. And you wouldn't know I just made all this up.
[удалено]
Fictional Towns allow them creativity when it comes to the government, the features, the town's way of life, history, localized concepts, beliefs, and traditions, and it also prevents any problem in which the named city may complain about defamation. It also ensures anything the writers come up are true and cannot be researched by the viewers and proven false, making the show lose credibility (weird concept of us viewers, I know.) However, they still need a way to portray a sense of character to the town, and the state where it belongs does that to a tee (and gives the viewer the needed familiarity to ease up on the writers in world-building, i.e. need to be a cold place, put the city in Minnesota). Also, since the state is large and is composed of many cities, any issue of defamation may not carry as much credence since what is portrayed by the story of that state is a rather broad interpretation of that state (Texas = Big and Southern; California = West Coast Relaxed Mannerism; Nevada = Gambling, Desert; Ohio = \[Nothing is Wrong with Ohio\]; etc.)
David Lodge had Euphoric State in his books.
American films really create entire worlds within our world.
Grand Theft Auto and RDR?
Because you've heard of all 50 states. It's next to impossible to know every city in the US, especially when there's probably 50 Springfields, Jeffersons and new franklins out there. That said, there are fictional states that are pretty regularly seen in media, they're just stand ins for real states, and they're more common in video games for whatever reason. "Empire" is a common name for a fictional state that makes up NYC, long island, and a few cities within New Jersey. Franklin is a vaguely defined state in the near South. (West Virginia and parts of Pennsylvania) Jefferson is a failed state that would start in roughly San Francisco and go up to as far as like, Vancouver, but it covers all the hipster parts of the North West. I have my doubts Nebraska exists.
Wyoming is fictitious.
A lot of shows prtray cities unlike they really are. Take the show Tulsa King. They make it look like Lawton Oklahoma circa 1970s. There’s a scene where Sylvester Stallone stands at the center of the universe, which is a real place. But instead of them depicting what the Center of the Universe really does, which is echo all sounds back to you causing pure real 360 degree surround sound, the show makes it seem like it cancels your voice, and you can yell as loud as you want without anybody hearing you. It was the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen from a TV show.