The incredibly rich fantasy world of Onward is positively bursting with easter eggs and
amazing hidden details from deep-cut Toy Story and Pixar references to secret Marvel Infinity
Gauntlets.
Yippee-ki-yay, movie lovers, I'm Jan and in this video I'll be revealing over 50 of the
very best easter eggs and hidden details to look out for in Onward.
There'll be a few mild spoilers ahead, but I'll avoid any major plot reveals.
Pixar's dedication to recurring easter eggs has fuelled the idea that their movies exist
in a single shared universe and there's a fascinating connection between Onward and
Brave that fans of the Pixar theory will love.
When Barley and Ian are looking at the map for how to get to Raven's Point, there's an
area called "The Brave Wilderness" which is also next to "Loch Lake".
Brave is set in the Scottish Highlands and during the brothers' trip they pass by some
ruined stone buildings that fit the scenery of parts of rural Scotland.
There's even some tall stones which have fallen over and could possibly have been part of
an old ring of stones, similar to where Merida sees the wisps for the first time.
Another Pixar universe connection in Onward is the appearance of TripleDent gum.
You can spot the Pixie Dusters grabbing it at the gas station and Ian also has a packet
underneath his old tape player at home.
TripleDent Gum is of course the chewing gum brand from Inside Out with that very memorable
jingle Riley couldn't get out of her head.
"TripleDent gum.. ..will make you smile."
"Did I ask for the gum commercial?!"
Also in the gas station is a very sneaky Toy Story reference via a tiny little cup with
pens on the cashier's counter.
The chicken logo is from Poultry Palace, the fast-food restaurant that Bonnie and her family
visited on their road trip in Toy Story 4.
Poultry Palace first appeared in the Toy Story short film "Small Fry".
And there was also a vintage "Ye Olde Poultry Palace" sign in the antiques store in Toy
Story 4.
By the way, if you missed it at the time, Toy Story 4 had an easter egg for Onward in
one of its mid-credit scenes.
The winged Pegasus design on a bouncy castle at the carnival is the same one as on the
side of Barley's van, Guinevere.
The Pizza Planet truck from Pixar's first Toy Story movie which has appeared in almost
every Pixar film so far, is referenced several ways in Onward.
Like in Coco, where the truck was rebranded as "Pizza Planeta", in Onward the name has
been changed to "Pizza Realm", fitting better with the film's olde worlde sensibilities.
The "Pizza Realm" design still has the iconic planet, however, a mast and banner have also
been added and the font has been given a vintage look.
You can also spot a Pizza Realm truck queuing in the traffic at the toll booth as Barley
and Ian begin their quest.
Also, watch out for the cooler in the back of Barley's van as it has a Pizza Realm sticker
on it, though it's hard to spot as the box moves around a lot as they drive.
In keeping with its themes of wizardry and spell casting, Onward pays homage to a number
of other magical fantasy Disney movies.
Some of the staff at the Manticore's tavern wear hats that are very similar to the Sorceror's
Hat which Mickey Mouse first wore in Disney's Fantasia.
The Sorceror's hat is iconic in Disney history and has appeared in many other Disney productions
from Wreck-It Ralph 2 to Once Upon A Time.
There's a store called "Sword in the Scone" in Onward, which is a nod to Disney's animated
fantasy movie "The Sword in the Stone".
And that pun is a double easter egg because "Sword in the Scone" is also the name of the
breakfast sandwich on the menu at Poultry Palace in Toy Story 4 and Small Fry.
Look carefully when Ian walks in to the gas station because there are "Magic Beans" on
sale, a reference to the fairy tale of Jack and the Beanstalk.
And in Onward, as Ian and Barley go on their quest, they drive right through fields filled
with giant beanstalks that stretch all the way into the clouds.
Visually, these are some very striking scenes, but they might have originally been planned
as an easter egg to Disney's animated movie Gigantic, an adaptation of Jack and the Beanstalk,
which was due to release the same year as Onward until it was cancelled.
Tom Holland and Chris Pratt are the voices of Ian and Barley in Onward, but as actors
they're both particularly well known for their portrayals of Spider-Man and Star-Lord in
the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
And so it's inevitable that Pixar squeezed numerous Marvel references and easter eggs
into the movie.
First of all, on Barley's jacket there's an infinity gauntlet much like the one famously
wielded by Thanos in Marvel's Infinity Saga.
There's also a sticker with the same design plus the word "Gauntlet" underneath it on
the back of the passenger seat inside Barley's van.
The tiny red skull pin on Barley's jacket could be a nod to the Marvel villain Red Skull
who becomes the guardian of the Soul Stone in the Marvelverse.
Before this Red Skull was the head of HYDRA in the MCU, and there's a potential nod to
that organisation via the Hydra badge on Barley's jacket.
"Hail Hydra."
Though, of course, hydra is also a deadly multi-headed serpent from Greek and Roman
mythology, and a Dungeons and Dragons monster.
More on D&D easter eggs later.
And the Phoenix Gem which brings the brother's father back to life is orange-coloured, just
like the MCU's Soul Stone.
And the Phoenix Gem and the Soul Stone have some overlapping magical properties.
In Onward, the gem gives Ian and Barley a day to interact with their dead father,
and in Avengers: Infinity War, the Soul Stone temporarily allowed Thanos to communicate
with his dead daughter Gamora when he was in the Soulworld.
And Barley, who's voiced by Chris Pratt, shares some similar characteristics with Pratt's
MCU character Star-Lord, aka Peter Quill.
Both characters have a love mix tapes and both of them had a traumatic experience as
a child when one of their parents died.
In Onward, Barley regrets that he didn't go in to say goodbye to his father when he was
ill because he was scared of all the tubes and how unwell he was.
And when his mother was about to die in Guardians of the Galaxy, as a child Peter Quill couldn't
bear to hold her hand or look at her, something that he would also later regret.
Ian, who's voiced by Tom Holland, wears red and blue colours, just like Spider-Man who
he plays in the MCU, and when Ian says he'll do "whatever it takes" to meet his dad, it
echoes a famous line from Avengers: Endgame.
"This is the fight of our lives.
Whatever it takes."
Onward also includes many hat tips to other fantasy pop culture and movies.
When Ian visits the fast food restaurant, there's a sign for "second breakfast", a nod
to J.R.R.
Tolkien's The Hobbit in which Bilbo Baggins likes to eat a second breakfast, something
also true of the hobbits in Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy.
"What about breakfast?"
"You've already had it."
"We've had one, yes.
What about second breakfast?"
And the LOR on Barley's "Quest Mix" tape is possibly another nod to Lord of the Rings.
Barley later plays a special mix tape titled "Rise to Valhalla" when he sends his beloved
van Guinevere off on her final mission.
Valhalla is a sacred place in Norse mythology where many fallen warriors go to after death.
The details in this scene are perfect with Barley's parking tickets fluttering out of
the windows giving the sense that Guinevere has wings, and the sound of the van's tyres
on the cobbles creates a galloping sound as if she's riding into battle.
Dungeons and Dragons is also a huge inspiration for Onward.
There's Barley's "Quest of Yore" role-playing game complete with a guide that resembles
a D&D manual with spell-casting instructions.
And the cover of the book cleverly foreshadows an important moment later in the movie.
On Barley's jacket, there's a d20 dice, which for anyone unfamiliar is a 20-sided dice used
in Dungeons and Dragons.
And Barley also has a d20 dice stitching with lightning bolts on his jacket sleeve.
The Gelatinous Cube, which Ian and Barley encounter after they venture into some caves,
is a classic D&D monster taken directly from the game.
The oozing cube is an antagonist that can absorb and digest the victims it traps.
And the many other murderous traps in the cave's corridors give this scene an Indiana
Jones vibe, together with the way that Ian and Barley pull their father's legs through
the closing stone door just in the nick of time, much like Indy's famous hat grab in
The Temple of Doom.
Another 80s reference comes at the end of Onward when instead of driving off in Barley's
van along the road, the van flies away with the power of magic, mimicking the end of Back
to the Future when Doc returns with his time machine car from the future and then he, Marty
and Jennifer fly away instead of driving down the road.
"Roads?
Where we're going, we don't need roads."
And that Back to the Future reference seems especially fitting given the recent deep fake
of Tom Holland as Marty McFly.
As always in every Pixar film, there's a cameo from John Ratzenberger who this time plays
a character called Fenwick who's one of the construction workers that yells at Barley
when he's getting in the way of the demolition of the stone fountain.
Towards the end of the movie, Officer Bronco is called in for duty with the police reporting
that there's an "A113 in progress".
A113 is a regular Pixar easter egg that's a tribute to the California Institute of the
Arts classroom where many of Pixar's animators studied.
In Ian and Barley's kitchen, there's a nod to Disney's Sleeping Beauty and Maleficent
with an "Aurora" branded washing-up liquid!
And on one of the shelves in Ian's room, there's a wooden dinosaur figure that resembles the
mysterious Pet Collector from Pixar's The Good Dinosaur.
Onward is also chock-full of sign and brand gags, great puns and other pop culture references.
In the opening sequence, there's a scene in an arcade where a centaur is playing a game
called "Prance Prance Revolution", a play on the music video game "Dance Dance Revolution".
At home, the boys' mother, Laurel, uses "Whey Strong" chocolate flavour protein powder for
her smoothies and Ian eats Trollios cereal, a likely pun on Cheerios.
Other brand name gags, include "Cloak & Cola", clearly Coca Cola;
Mountain Doom, Onward's version of Mountain Dew which is also a nod to Lord of the Rings
Mount Doom; and Satyrade, a pun on Gatorade.
It's also funny that the troll at the toll booth works for the "Under Bridge Transportation
Authority", a joke about how trolls in some fairy tales like "Three Billy Goats Gruffs"
wait underneath bridges to prey on those who try to cross.
And it made me chuckle when I noticed you can either pay the toll with cash or a riddle.
Now, what other easter eggs or cool details did you spot in Onward?
And do you have any theories on where the movie fits into the Pixar universe?
Leave your thoughts in the comments below.
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Yippee-ki-yay, movie lovers!