the death of comic book villains

Sometimes in our lives there are strange juxtapositions.  Today, I couldn't get Toy Story (with the arch-villain Zurg) out of my head (a feature of having kids,  seemingly), and then noticed the name of a, ahhh, "porcelain fixture" manufacturer, Zurn.

So I'm thinking: are all the really good one- and two-syllable villain names going to be trademarked? You know, the ones that start with 'Z' and use those nasty-sounding vowels from the far end of the alphabet? How can an aspiring comic writer make the arch-arch-villain BenIjIwaki believable as a villain?

I think there's more to this problem of popular culture, copyrights and other intellectual property issues than even Lessig and other are talking about. :)

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