Alright so I’ll keep it brief,
Right now I’m watching an anime (my favorite; CLANNAD) with Japanese subs.
So basically all the characters have pretty usual names, but I noticed that one of the last names is written like 一ノ瀬 (Ichinose).
Is it odd for Japanese (last) names to contain katakana like this or is it just me? 
It’s unusual in the sense that it’s unusual for any name to have a visible の there, it’s not a common form of name, but if you’re going to have one, katakana isn’t strange.
It’s not common, but it’s not unheard-of either. Of the five thousand most common family names in Japanese, five of them have ノ, and another four have ヶ (which is technically a kanji, but close enough).
Non-existing characters generally don’t go by a real life name.
This guy explains things:
He speaks Japanese, but he is actually a Japanese teacher, so he speaks in a way that even beginners can understand him.
I can recommend the channel as a whole for learning (including many things you’ll never learn other than by asking native speakers).
Interesting. Out of curiosity, where did you find this information?
一ノ瀬 is a real name…
Yeah I get that, though most of the other characters in the anime have rather normal names so I was just wondering 
P.S. I love 三本塾, he’s great.
“Generally” ≠ “all the time”.
Right… But how does it address this question?
Something regarding the rest of the post perhaps?
The part about how characters in Clannad have normal names?
Indicating that they already knew a lot of characters in other things don’t have normal names?
Spreadsheet I made ages ago calculating what WaniKani level you need in order to read a whole pile of different proper nouns.
That may be so, but 一ノ瀬 happens to be number 1400 on the list of the five thousand most common surnames, so it’s not even particularly rare.
Difficult isn’t it?
If you answer “is this real?” with “It’s generally not”, the implication is certainly “not in this case”.
Also, I’d challenge the use of “generally” anyway - to me, “generally” is “more often than not”, but depending on the genre, I’d be astonished if the names weren’t real. I mean, names like “Natsu Dragneel” are fake, obviously, but names like “Kurosaki Ichigo” are certainly real.
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