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Any idea what the reasoning behind this is? To my knowledge, they are called Bud and Lou, after Abbott and Costello, but in some stories I've read, they're called Chuckles and Giggles. Is it just bad writing, or is nobody at DC keeping a record of character names?

ADDITIONAL : They seem to be called Chuckles and Giggles in media aimed at children, such as the Madcap Capers books that came out in 2023.

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    Most likely - They were Bud and Lou on Batmanimated, and it's a small enough detail that it's not on the top of the list of things to keep track on. They used to have any number of people who who'd know those kind of details, no idea if there's anyone of staff for it.
    – VBartilucci
    Commented Dec 3 at 20:42
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    Harley seems like such a sensible and grounded young lady. It's hard to believe that she'd do anything odd like renaming a pet
    – Valorum
    Commented Dec 3 at 21:00
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    Names are often chosen to match with the country the material is published in. Elmer Fudd (hunter in Bugs Bunny) has different names in some countries in EU.
    – Solar Mike
    Commented Dec 3 at 21:46
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    It's good to know that (although incomplete) the Wikipedia page of Bud and Lou lists a few occurrences of different names and even different numbers of hyenas (three instead of two for example). Perhaps some writers deem the hyenas are not important enough to keep consistent throughout different continuities.
    – Clockwork
    Commented Dec 4 at 1:08

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There are a number of possibilities. One, indeed, is oversight. Another is Harley, possibly on one of her less rational phases, using whatever name comes to mind, or strikes her fancy. Lastly, it's entirely possible that they're an entirely different set of hyenas in that instance. Hyena lifespans are only about 12 years, and that's not including the wear and tear from fighting Batman, the time Harley used them to test deadly diseases, the tendency for minions to die around Joker... there's a decent chance that we're on our third or fourth set of Bud and Lou.

For what it is worth, I haven't found any references to them being named Giggles and Chuckles outside of a few pieces of fanfiction (where the author generally said they made up the names themselves) and in Birds of Prey, the (single) hyena was named Bruce, after Bruce Wayne.

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    Upvoted even if I found an official occurrence of "Giggles". Writing a small answer for completion purpose.
    – Clockwork
    Commented Dec 4 at 0:49
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As you noted, a recurring name for Harley's two hyenas (who were introduced alongside her in Batman: The Animated Series (1992)) is Bud and Lou.

However, the above Wikia link also points out the idea of the Joker having a pet hyena initially originated from The New Adventures of Batman (1977), and that hyena's name was Giggles.

I don't see anything about a "Chuckles" though, because back then the Joker only had a single hyena, and it's Harley Quinn's debut which started the trend of Joker and Harley Quinn owning a pair of hyenas. Chances are someone coined that name up as they wanted to dig back the first hyena's name whilst sticking to the "Harley's pair of hyenas" pets idea.

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    Gotta admit though, Chuckles does rhyme well with Giggles, so I can perfectly understand why someone thought it would be a good idea. I can almost imagine they could have made a perfect pair of comic relief Looney Tunes characters with names like that.
    – Clockwork
    Commented Dec 4 at 0:59

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