Hey guys it's Jan here.
As the second instalment in the DC Extended Universe, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice
firmly establishes Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman and sets up numerous future movies like
Suicide Squad and Justice League.
The film is stacked with homages and hidden references to the many Batman and Superman
films before it as well as the comic books, so I've put together all the easter eggs and
references I could find in this video.
Of course, I'd love to hear about any others you've spotted too.
Just before that, I've got an awesome giveaway thanks to our friends at Titan Books, so if
you'd like the chance to win this fantastic hardback book Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice:
The Art of the Film which is packed with stunning concept art, storyboards, blueprints, costume
detail and behind-the-scenes shots from the set, then make sure you subscribe and leave
a comment about your favourite easter egg from the movie.
For more details and ways to enter, check out the Gleam link in the video description
below!
And a quick warning, there will be spoilers ahead so if you haven't seen the movie yet,
check out my non-spoiler review here!
The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller was a major influence on Batman v Superman, and
when Batman jumps on the side of a building during the showdown with Doomsday it's a visual
homage to the cover of the comic book series.
Doomsday's look, his bony protrusions and claw-like arm are similar to his look in The
Death of Superman by Dan Jurgens.
And Superman's final moments with Lois Lane, his pivotal battle and death at the hands
of the supervillain are also references to this seminal comic book.
The coffin for Superman's state burial recalls a similar one used when Superman died battling
Doomsday in the animated movie Superman Doomsday in which Superman comes back from the dead.
And during the final scene at the Kent family burial ground, you can hear a few light thumps
in the music that resemble a heartbeat, a hint that Superman will be coming back to
life, and likely a nod to the way Batman faked his death in The Dark Knight Returns by slowing
his heartbeat.
And the earth which starts to move and float up in the very final shot recalls the way
the earth moved around Superman's fists when he first learned how to fly in Man of Steel.
The movie introduces Wonder Woman and she sports a number of her classic tools and weapons
from the comics including her Wonder Woman tiara, belt, bulletproof bracelets and Lasso
of Truth.
And her shield might also be a nod to the Amazonian Magic Sphere from the comics which
had mystical properties.
As Diana Prince, she also wears a range of gold jewellery which are nods to her Wonder
Woman logo and accessories.
And at Lex Luthor's party when Bruce Wayne chases after Diana Prince who's stolen his
hacking device, he has to avoid a cake or a model of a Greek temple being taken out
to the party, which a visual reference to Wonder Woman's Amazonian background from Greek
mythology.
Lex Luthor starts the film with a full head of hair but, when his head is shaven in prison,
he ends up with his more common bald look from the comics.
And if you look carefully at the prison guards on either side of him, you'll see they have
Belle Reve badges on their uniforms, which means he's likely going to come into contact
with the Suicide Squad!
And Lex Luthor's prisoner number 16-TK-421 is an easter egg to the Stormtrooper TK-421
who was ambushed by Han Solo in Star Wars: A New Hope.
Martha Kent works as a waitress at Ralli's Diner, a nod to the Superman comics where
Lex Luthor visits the Ralli's Diner and makes a fake proposal to a waitress to give her
a million dollars if she spends a month with him in Metropolis.
The Mark of Zorro movie poster in the flashback to the murder of Bruce Wayne's parents is
an homage to the same moment in the comics.
The movie Excalibur also gets a reference which could be a nod to the time-travelling
story in the comics where Batman and Superman travel back together to King Arthur's Camelot.
Later in Bruce's dream of blood seeping out of his parents' tombs, he has a vision of
a creature which looks a lot like Man-Bat, Batman's enemy from the comics.
And Alfred's line the next day about an empty wine cellar and the next generation of Waynes
is a line of dialogue taken straight from The Dark Knight Returns.
Oh, and the look of Batman's heavily armoured suit which he puts on to face off with Superman
is reminiscent of the same suit Batman used to battle Superman in The Dark Knight Returns.
When Bruce Wayne asks Clark Kent whether he owns the Daily Planet, it's a nod to the comics
in which Bruce Wayne became the owner of the Daily Planet.
Perry White's line that "this isn't 1938" is a reference to the year when Superman debuted
on the cover of Action Comics.
The 300 on the Russian rocket is a nod to Frank Miller's 300 comic book series and the
movie adaptation directed by Zack Snyder.
Superman getting nuked and then being revived by the power of the sun is a callback to a
similar moment when Superman is struck by a missile in The Dark Knight Returns.
And when Superman is shot with Batman's kryptonite, it's another reference to Frank Miller's comic
in which Oliver Queen shoots Superman with synthetic kryptonite that Bruce Wayne has
developed.
Lana Lang, Clark Kent's romantic interest in the comics when he was growing up, gets
a nod in Kevin Costner's cameo as Clark's father and his story about accidentally flooding
the Lang's Farm.
And of course, as the title suggests, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice sets up the DC
Extended Universe for the Justice League movies.
And we get some big hints at the likely big villain of the Justice League, Darkseid.
In Batman's Knightmare, he looks out over a desolate landscape where you can see Darkseid's
Omega symbol in the ground.
And the insect-like creatures which attack him later are most likely Darkseid's parademons.
The soldiers dressed in black uniforms, who are working with the parademons and kneel
before Superman, suggest that we might get a corrupted Superman in the future if he's
resurrected and also might hint that Superman will be controlled by Darkseid.
The hints at Lois' death and a tyrannical Superman with his own soldiers also reference
the storyline in the videogame Injustice: Gods Among Us.
The way Flash appeared to Batman at the end of his nightmare with the message "Lois is
the key" recalls the Flashpoint comics where Barry Allen travels to Batman with a letter
from his father Thomas Wayne.
And The Flash also appeared later again in the meta-human file that Bruce Wayne decrypted
which, by the way, is titled 'Red Streak', which is an easter egg to one of the aliases
for Grant Gustin's Flash on the CW's show.
There was also a tease to Wonder Woman's solo movie with a photo of her in Belgium in 1918
at the end of World War I, alongside Chris Pine's character Steve Trevor.
There's also an interesting look at the creation of Cyborg, who gets his own solo movie in
2020.
His father Silas Stone is working to help his wounded son Vic at STAR Labs when a box
is activated.
The box hovers over to Vic's body and starts growing him new cybernetic arms and legs.
The scene is a nod to Cyborg's origin story in the Justice League comics where he's injured
by an exploding mother box before he's repaired by his father to become Cyborg.
By the way, when Lex Luthor says "ding ding ding" in his cell it's a reference to the
ping sound the mother boxes often make in the comics.
According to his video footage, Aquaman appears to be located in the Tonga Trench and we not
only get to see his trident, but also see him do his comic-book-style superspeed swimming
as he zooms off at the end of his cameo.
And there's another Aquaman nod in a Daily Planet newspaper story about water testing
being put on hold due to funding cuts, which hints at possible pollution that could affect
Aquaman.
There's a Game of Thrones Dothraki easter egg to Jason Momoa's Khal Drogo in the words
"blood of my blood" which Lex Luthor says during the creation of Doomsday.
And there's a King Kong-style moment when Doomsday leaps to the top of the Lexcorp tower
and is then attacked from the air by helicopters, and gives a King Kong-like roar of fury.
By the way, as Bruce Wayne starts decrypting the file he's recovered from Lexcorp, the
name Leech appears on the computer screen, a little nod to Rex Leech who appeared for
the first time in the comics during the funeral procession for Superman.
When Diana Prince looks at the files on the metahumans who Luthor been investigating,
you can see their logos are versions of the official logos released for each of the solo
movies for the new members of the Justice League.
And Lex Luthor's words about Zeus, Prometheus, and a thunderbolt is a tease for the superhero
Shazam who has the power of Living Lightning in the comic books and who will be getting
a solo movie in 2019.
There's also a stack of easter eggs for classic Batman villain The Joker who will be appearing
in Suicide Squad.
Jack Nicholson who played the Joker in Tim Burton's Batman movie gets a name-check in
the sign for Nicholson Terminal & Dock Company.
Bruce Wayne's line about having a bad history with "freaks dressed like clowns" is also
an amusing nod to the Joker, and the defaced Robin costume hints at the Batman comic A
Death In The Family in which the Joker brutally beat Jason Todd with a crowbar and then killed
him.
There's a bunch more Joker easter eggs hidden in the graffiti in the dilapidated building
where Batman and Superman face off, with plays on the Joker's name such as "Joe + Kayla",
the word Jokey repeated three times on a column and another "Joe" with an arrow that points
to letters K and R on another column.
And Batman villain The Riddler gets an easter egg via a question mark graffiti on a column.
Other graffiti include Aphrodite, the Greek goddess who appears in the Wonder Woman comics,
and Enos which is a reference to Clay Enos, who's the stills photographer on Man of Steel,
Batman v Superman, and Wonder Woman.
When Bruce Wayne clones the cell-phone of Anatoly, the Russian criminal working for
Lex Luthor, it's a callback to Nolan's Dark Knight movie when Lucius Fox uses a cell phone
to scan and record a map of Chinese mob boss Lau's building.
By the way, Anatoly's character is based on KGBeast from the comics and in the Blackest
Night Batman comic series he's resurrected and becomes one of the Black Lantern Corps,
so even though Batman probably killed him in this movie, it's possible we could see
him come back in a future film.
And when Bruce Wayne says to Anatoly that he knows a bit of Russian as he spent three
nights with a Bolshoi ballerina, it's a callback to The Dark Knight movie when Bruce Wayne
dated a Russian prima ballerina and went on a cruise ship with the Russian ballet as cover
for his investigation on Lau.
Jeremy Iron's Alfred makes fun of the various incarnations of Batman's raspy voice when
he's playing around with Batman's voice modulator.
And Alfred's line that the White Portuguese might be a phantasm is a little verbal shout-out
to the animated Batman film, Mask of the Phantasm.
By the way, the name "Penobscot" on this building in Metropolis is a reference to the Penobscot
County Probate Court where Christopher Richardson petitioned in 2016 to legally change his first
name to Batman.
Superman nearly drowning in water with kryptonite and being rescued by Lois Lane recalls when
he almost drowned because of a kryptonite necklace that Lex Luthor put on him in the
1978 Superman movie and in that movie Superman was saved by Lex Luthor's girlfriend.
Bruce Wayne's disparaging remark about the Daily Planet publishing articles about Superman
saving cats is a nod to the times in the comics and the 1978 movie that Superman rescues a
cat.
Clark Kent's dog Shelby from Smallville gets a mention in a street sign for "Shelby Street"
in Metropolis.
The Smallville talk show "Good Morning, Metropolis" also gets a shoutout with a twist when Perry
White says "Good morning, Smallville" to Clark Kent.
And during the discussion between Perry White and Clark Kent about what the newspaper should
be reporting, Perry says to Clark "The American conscience died with Robert, Martin and John"
a reference to the line in Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns that "The American
conscience died with the Kennedys."
And it's also a reference to the 1968 song Abraham, Martin and John, which is a tribute
to the assassinated John and Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King, and Abraham Lincoln.
Perry White also references The Wizard of Oz when he asks where Clark Kent is, and jokes
that he "clicks his heels three times and goes back to Kansas."
And the Emerald City is also mentioned by Lex Luthor when he's talking about the kryptonite
in the Indian Ocean.
Carla Gugino returns from Man of Steel where she voiced the Kryptonian robot Kelor.
Gugino worked with Zack Snyder previously playing Madam Gorski in his movie Sucker Punch.
And at the Daily Planet offices, there's a name plaque for Picture Editor Liz Ritenour,
who was an art department assistant on the movie.
Speaking of crew name-checks, stunt coordinator Tim Rigby also gets a nod with the name Rigby
appearing on one of the mail boxes belonging to Lois Lane's neighbours.
And there's a cameo at the very beginning of the movie by Jimmy Olsen.
He isn't named but he's the CIA op posing as a photographer who gets shot.
He's played by actor Michael Cassidy who previously played Grant Gabriel, a clone of Lex Luthor's
brother in Smallville.
By the way, Zack Synder has said that he originally wanted to cast Jesse Eisenberg as Jimmy Olsen,
with the role of Lex Luthor possibly going to Bryan Cranston.
So guys, what other easter eggs and references did you spot in Batman v Superman?
And which was your favourite?
Don't forget to comment and subscribe for a chance to win this official Batman v Superman:
The Art of the Film hardback book.
For more details and ways to enter the giveaway, check out the Gleam link in the video description
below.
And if you enjoyed this video, you can check out more of my easter egg videos for Deadpool
and Daredevil Season 2 here, and I've got more Batman v Superman videos here including
Top 5 WTF moments, my review, and behind-the-scenes facts about the movie.
Thanks for watching and see ya next time.
Yippee-ki-yay, movie lovers!