Fans of the Marvel Cinematic Universe love to dig through their favorite movies for
Easter eggs and references, but some hidden secrets are harder to find than others.
Here are a few deep cut Easter eggs that took audiences multiple years to discover.
As the very first film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe,
"Iron Man" has a lot of differences from the dozens of expansions,
sequels, and spinoffs that followed it. There's references to real-world conflicts,
no team-up action, and — wait a second, that's not Don Cheadle. One thing the mega-franchise has had
since the very beginning, however, is plenty of Easter eggs and hidden references to reward the
most perceptive fans. The hidden details in "Iron Man" are many, but that doesn't mean they were all
easy to find — in fact, one particular Easter egg took fans a good decade to discover.
Tony Stark's final adversary in "Iron Man" is Obadiah Stane, his former mentor and
the manager of Stark Industries. He starts out as a fairly jovial presence,
propelled by that trademark Jeff Bridges charisma that even shines through Stane's immaculate suits
and chrome dome, but there's a sinister reality underneath. In fact, Stane was actually the one
who planned Tony's kidnapping at the hands of the mysterious Ten Rings organization
in an attempt to take the CEO position for himself. In the film's explosive climax, Stane
ends up donning the Iron Monger suit and giving Tony his first taste of supervillain combat.
In 2018, Reddit user HellotoHorse noticed that Stane actually foreshadows his true intentions
around an hour into the movie, simply by sitting behind a grand piano and playing a peppy little
tune. While the scene might look unassuming, the man behind the composition Stane is playing is
actually Antonio Salieri, an 18th century composer who was depicted as the killer of
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in the 1984 Best Picture winning film "Amadeus." While there's no actual
historical evidence that Salieri killed Mozart in real life, the version of the composer played
by F. Murray Abraham does mirror Stane's arc in "Iron Man" eerily well. After all,
both Stane and Salieri are older, less brilliant talents who envy the prestige of younger,
more celebrated geniuses to the point that they start plotting their respective downfalls.
"Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 1" is a treasure trove of hidden references,
many of which director James Gunn has long refused to point out — not even to Chris Pratt
and the other stars of his own film. Although the movie came out in 2014, there may still be
secrets just waiting to be discovered, as Gunn has teased for years that a massive discovery has gone
unnoticed for some time. In April 2020, however, the director did admit that a
large part of the final major "Guardians of the Galaxy" Easter egg had been discovered — some
think that it might hint that Peter Quill's mother Meredith, played by Laura Haddock,
is actually a cosmic force known as Eternity that embodies the universe itself.
The jury is still out on whether or not that's actually the case, but fans have certainly
received their money's worth of Easter eggs from the blockbuster ensemble comedy. In 2018 — four
whole years after the film's release — Gunn confirmed a hitherto undiscovered Easter egg,
in which Stan Lee's cameo scene subtly features Lee's famous catchphrase "Excelsior" written in
the Skrull language. As recently as February 2021, the director took to Twitter to shoot
down a theory that an image of Peter's father, Ego, was hiding in Meredith's brain scans — and
casually revealed that the brain scans originally contained yet another Easter egg,
which may or may not actually be in the final cut. And that's not even counting "Guardians of
the Galaxy Volume 2," which has its own host of secrets for inquisitive fans to uncover.
"After all these years, I've found you."
February 2nd, 2018 was a good day for "Doctor Strange" director Scott
Derrickson — an eagle-eyed fan had finally managed to spot one of his favorite Easter
eggs that he had hidden in the film. As he retweeted the discovery, Derrickson commented,
"I've waited two years for somebody to notice this."
Twitter user @TimDLydon was the first to point out the Easter egg, which reveals that one of
the most dramatic events of the movie — the car accident in which Doctor Strange severely
injures his hands — happens on a very particular date. As Doctor Strange decides which of his
expensive timepieces to wear to the conference he would end up crashing en route to, a quick
glance at his watch face reveals the date to be February 2nd: the holiday known as Groundhog Day.
While Groundhog Day is a very real holiday in which a rodent in Pennsylvania predicts
the weather for the upcoming season, it's also the name of the legendary 1993 time loop comedy
starring the equally legendary Bill Murray. As a weather man sent to Punxsutawney to cover
the annual festivities, Murray's character Phil Connors finds himself reliving Groundhog Day over
and over again, doomed to spend eternity reliving February 2nd unless he can somehow find a way out.
The reference is more than just an allusion to the
comedy classic — it's also a subtle hint at the good doctor's future.
After all, Doctor Strange eventually wins his seemingly hopeless face-off against the mighty
Dormammu by trapping the powerful villain in a Groundhog Day-style time loop, dooming it to
live their confrontation over and over again until it becomes frustrated and gives up.
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