The Scare Board

In Monsters Inc, there’s that board in the scare floor that calculates all of the scarer’s points. I think it was called the scare board. Anyway, it only had the last names of the scarers like “Sullivan” and “Sanderson.” But when it shows Randall’s points, it says “Randall.” Shouldn’t it say “Boggs?”

There is speculation that “Randall” might have actually originally been his LAST name, in most script versions, and Pixar just didn’t change it. It was a bit of a late-in-the-game decision to name that character “Randall”, as a first name, actually. Throughout most of the script versions he was named “Ned” or “Switt”, and it was also a last-minute decision to make him the up-front antagonist.

pitbulllady

Good question… I’ve been watching this movie for over ten years and I didn’t notice this until the last time I watched it, and it’s got me thinking a bit. My thoughts? Maybe Randall prefers his first name to his last name and convinced whoever’s in charge to use it instead? I’m sure that pitbulllady’s theory makes more sense than mine, though…

I’d say it could be as simple as keeping it easy for audiences to recognize quickly. Since Sully is commonly known by his last name, having the board say “Sullivan” will be immediately recognized by audiences. However, Randall is mostly called by his first name, so having the board say “Boggs” might not be as immediately clear.

Oh, well thank you for all of your answers!