Monday, May 11, 2009

Easter Eggs

Since I introduced the concept of the "Easter Egg" on DVDs to my son, he's been pretty much obsessed with them, quite to my amusement.

I realize that an Easter Egg is loosely defined as something that is hidden, but what's really fun about movies based on pop-culture icons like the Hulk or Spider-man is that these characters have such rich histories that it's child's play to pack in tons of references, some obvious, some obscure, to these histories in the movies. Depending on the fan's knowledge of the character, the little factoids may be easy or tough to spot, i.e. they may or may not be "Easter Eggs," but I'll just call them that for convenience's sake.

Here, in no particular order, are some Marvel Easter Eggs/references, some obvious, some a touch more subtle, that I particularly enjoyed:

The appearances of Jim Wilson and Bill Bixby in The Incredible Hulk. "Hey! That's a great punch!"

Tony Stark referring to a "Ben" during the press conference in Iron Man where he had everyone sit on the floor, who may or may not have been Ben Urich ( a character that Scott Glenn---not Joe Pantoliano--was born to play).

Captain America's shield in Iron Man.

The "Eddie's been trying to get a picture of him for weeks" line in the first Spider-Man movie, seen as an oblique reference to Eddie Brock which was later invalidated by the fact that in Spider-Man 3 he was "the new guy." It was quite a tease, and even though SM3 eventually disappointed, that particular reference was still fun.

The list of mutants that appeared on a computer screen in X2: X-Men United. Yet another tease that eventually let me down, but it sure got the fanboy in me drooling.

The Fastball Special from the much-reviled X-Men 3. The difficulty with casting a man as large as Hugh Jackman as the diminutive Wolverine is that you have to cast someone even bigger than him as Colossus to make the FS seem anything other than ridiculous. Well, they found their man with Daniel Cudmore, who must be seven feet tall and four hundred pounds or something (he looks huge, anyway), and even though the actual move looked a touch awkward (in the comics Colossus doesn't have to spin around; he just chucks Wolverine like he would a baseball, hence the name) I applauded the effort.

"Whiplash 1" and "Whiplash 2" in Iron Man. Coincidentally or not, Whiplash (whom I "met" in the comic book world as Blacklash), played by Mickey Rourke, is slated to be the next villain for Shellhead to square off against.

Samuel Sterns' swelling head in The Incredible Hulk, a sneak preview of his guise as the Leader. If only for that, that movie deserves a sequel.

The references to the writers and artists of the character Daredevil was one of the few things that was truly good about the movie based on him. From the names of the boxers Matt Murdock's father fought (Bendis, Mack, Miller) to the billboards (Romita was on one) to the names of the characters (Fr. Everett being a reference to co-creator Bill Everett, lowlife Jose Quesada being a reference to Marvel E-I-C and Daredevil writer/artist Joe Quesada) to appearances by the creators themselves (Stan Lee in his obligatory Marvel movie cameo, Kevin Smith as a morgue attendant, Frank Miller as a bodyguard with a Bullseye-flung pencil in his forehead), this movie is second to none in references to the character's many, many creators. It'd be even cooler if there were references I didn't catch, like Gene Colan or something like that; though I'm not about to get that movie on DVD just for that, it would be cool to catch it while I was watching the movie on TV or during a bus ride or something like that.

Yeah, comic book geeks, except for the perenially-complaining, impossible to please ones, are really in a better position to enjoy comic-book derived films than anyone else. ;D

2 comments:

Ryan said...

cap's shield was in iron man? i dont remember.

Jim Arroyo said...

In the scene where Jarvis is dismantling Tony's armor after his battle with the fighter jets, Pepper walks in on him and he turns around and says "face it, this is not the worst thing you've caught me doing." In the frame before that, just before they show Tony turning around to face Pepper, we see, in the background, the shield lying on a table. If you have a DVD skip to that scene and I guarantee you'll find it. I triple-checked.