< Shout-Out

Shout-Out/Western Animation

This page lists Shout-Outs seen in Western Animation works.


Walt Disney

"She'll be busy with her twinkle lights, and mistletoe, and carols... [SNIFF!] and roast beast! And FLIM FLANGLERS!! AND ZOOB ZOOBLERS, AND...!!"

    • ...and later complains about how unfair it is that his plans have been thwarted yet again:

"Gah! What did you do?! This is my chance to rule the world! All I want is what's coming to me! All I want is my fair share!"

Pumbaa: THEY CALL ME MR. PIG!

Cheerleading Instructor: This formation will make you stronger than a Geodude using its Harden attack!


Warner Bros.

  • WB animated shorts are notorious for including crew names on background objects such as billboards or boxes. "Friz" shows up a lot, an homage to director Friz Freleng. In the short Rocket Squad, Porky and Daffy play future cops in a parody of Dragnet, and a list of "known criminals" they use to find the bad guy includes everyone working in the animation department at that time. A more complete listing of the various inside jokes can be found here.
  • In Loonatics Unleashed, the bizarre cartoon about the descendents of the Looney Tunes characters operating as superheroes ...IN SPACE!, the most significant planets in the show's cosmology are Freleng (after Looney Tunes director Friz Freleng) and Blanc (after virtuoso voice artist Mel Blanc).
  • Batman the Animated Series and The Batman have both cast Adam West as part of their supporting cast.
    • The lyrics of the chorus singing the Batman theme in Mask of the Phantasm are the production crew backward. It's elaborated on in Ominous Latin Chanting.
    • In "Joker's Favor", one of the Joker's henchmen is reading a Tiny Toon Adventures comic book. Timm and Dini had worked on that show before doing BTAS.
    • In another episode, the inmates in Arkham are watching Bugs Bunny cartoons.
    • And one of the later episodes had a reference to another fellow WB toon:

Bruce: What are you doing tonight?
Barbara: The same thing we do every night, Pinky.
Bruce: What?

    • In the episode "Harley's Holiday" in Batman: The Animated Series Harley Quinn, upon returning to Arkham, says the line, "Home again, home again, jiggity jig." It's a reference to the scene where one of the toys says the same line when J.F. Sebastian comes home with a woman in Blade Runner.
    • The episode that introduces The Creeper has this exchange:

Harley: Think Bats saw ya, Putty Tat?
Joker: Oh he did, he did!

    • Also included:

(* Random woman screams and runs* ) Creeper: Okay I love you, bye bye! Woo!

  • Animaniacs had a sketch titled "The Please Please Pleese [sic] Get a Life Foundation," about a treatment program for fans who took their obsessions just a bit too far. The fans' obsessive ramblings were taken directly from actual fans in the alt.tv.animaniacs newsgroup.
    • Ren and Stimpy did this in at least one episode, where they used quotes from real kids' fan-mail saying how great Stimpy was, and viciously tearing into Ren. ("What is he anyway, some kind of mosquito?")
    • The Animaniacs skit "HMS Yakko" is a glorious Shout-Out / Affectionate Parody of Gilbert and Sullivan's works The Pirates of Penzance and H.M.S. Pinafore.
  • And then there's the Pinky and The Brain short "Yes, Always". Maurice LaMarche has admitted that the Brain's voice was mainly inspired by Orson Welles, and he used the infamous "Frozen Peas" audio (where Welles got frustrated over the writing and directing of a commercial for which he was doing a voice-over) as a sound check. The aforementioned short centered on the Brain doing commercial voice-overs. Guess where 99% of the dialogue came from? (If you don't believe it, check out this audio synch featuring the original "Frozen Peas" audio over the short).
  • The Freakazoid! episode "The Chip" has a couple of shout outs to one of the voice actors, Ricardo Montalban. The first is when he threatens to put "ooey gooey worms, that make you go all crazy" in the ears of Dexter and Roddy McStew. The second comes when he uses the phrase "Kirk, old friend..." before apparently realizing he was in the wrong character. Both gags come from Star Trek II.
    • In his second appearance, Guttierez gains powers like Freakazoid's, and is quite obviously Khan-inspired, with long white hair and rock-hard abs. Additionally, a Chekov-character appears in a TWOK era spacesuit.
    • In one episode, Brain and Wakko appear, after Freakazoid is called "wacko" for mowing someone's lawn. They are seen arguing over which show is Steven Speilburg's favorite. Wakko sings "Wakko's America" right after he appears!
  • Histeria! contained several nods to previous WB cartoons:
    • Big Fat Baby's jingle (the one where Father Time's chasing him in the desert) is based on the theme song from The Road Runner Show.
    • Froggo's room is decorated with merchandise for Batman: The Animated Series.
    • A song introducing a sketch about Alexander the Great is sung to the tune of the Animaniacs theme, and the sketch about Florence Nightingale as a Hospital Hottie ends with the boys shouting "Hello Nurse!" In a song about the Gold Rush, Father Time can be seen watching a TV with Yakko Warner on it. Also, the World's Oldest Woman's jingle is sung to the tune of Slappy Squirrel's theme, and Froggo's regular outfit is much like that of Wakko Warner (except that he actually wears pants).
    • The Pinky and The Brain theme music can be heard when Chit Chatterson mentions brain removal in a sketch about mummification, as well as part of the background music for the introduction to Nikola Tesla's later life.
    • Superman made three cameos himself, including one as William Clark.
    • Fetch bares a bit of resemblance to Hunter from Road Rovers.
  • In the Teen Titans episode "Car Trouble", Cyborg drives a car sideways up an incredibly steep hill.
    • Later in "X", we see a set of diagrams listing all of Beast Boy's crazy theories over who is Red X now, one of them is a "Jason Todd", one of the lesser-loved Robins in the Batman comic book series.
    • Also, in "Mother Mae-Eye", Gizmo gets a transformation sequence, using transformation sounds similar, if not identical, to the Transformers series.
    • In "How Long Is Forever?" future Beast Boy is kept in a cage and advertised as "The Amazing One-Man Zoo". The designs of the two guys jeering at him are eerily close to those of the Mutant Gang in The Dark Knight Returns. They looked like younger versions of a few background characters from Batman Beyond, so it's either a shout out to this show, or both series referenced DKR.
    • "Bunny Raven... or... How to Make a Titanimal Disappear" seems to be one long shout-out to The Muppet Show.
    • The episode with the Titans Trapped in TV Land has a bunch of references, the most obvious being Control Freak and Beast Boy as Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote
    • And how about the time Beast Boy, trying to assemble a dismantled Cyborg, turns him into Giant Robo and goes as far as transforming himself into said robot's pilot ?
  • Although lots of shows poked fun at older video games of their respective eras, Tiny Toon Adventures brought out the hilariously direct Super Plucky-o Bros, featuring a side-scrolling landscape that all but matched the original game's colors and patterns, and sounds lifted straight from Super Mario Bros. 1 and 2.
    • The Parody Episode A Quack in the Quarks is one big shout out to Star Wars. "Duck Vader" is the Big Bad, and Buster ends up dressed like Han Solo, while Babs has her ears curled like Leia, and Plucky is dressed like Luke. It's not just Star Wars, though—if you look closely at the loading bay, you can see the TARDIS!
  • X-Men: Evolution's camping episode had some bigfoot hunters mistake Beast for Bigfoot; when one is using a 'bigfoot whistle' he gets asked where to find it. His reply? Go to some bigfoot store & 'Ask for Maulder' just as The X-Files theme plays.
    • Also another 2 episodes had Kitty sleeping, no not like that you perverts, with a stuffed, supposedly purple, dragon, Not that Dragon, but a reference to Lockheed, Kitty's pet dragon from the comics & Ensemble Darkhorse.
  • In Superman: Doomsday, there's a scene of Superman ( actually his clone) fighting Toyman's giant mechanical spider. This was a shot at how movie producer Jon Peters wanted a giant spider in Superman Lives, written by Kevin Smith. Smith even voices a citizen in Doomsday that remarks, "Like we needed him to take care of a giant spider."


Transformers

  • Transformers Animated runs on these:
    • Sentinel Prime, voiced by Townsend Coleman, more famous for being the voice of The Tick (animation). Sentinel Prime himself greatly resembles the character, being mainly blue, with a humongous chin and a head shaped like The Tick (animation)'s mask. He even has a similar personality.
    • Wreck Gar, voiced by "Weird Al" Yankovic, proudly exclaims that he "Dares to be Stupid!", referencing the use of that Weird Al song in the animated movie. The "Universal Greeting" from the movie also gets a reference (utterly at random, but appreciated nonetheless). And yes, Wreck Gar is very, very stupid. The design of Wreck Gar's head is based on the rather brickish G1 toy's design.
    • The Cool Shades worn by Prowl and Soundwave are a reference to the ones worn by the ABC Warriors of 2000 AD fame. (Although they also resemble those worn by Kamina, that's just a happy coincidence.)
    • Starscream's elaborate transformation in the season one finale harkens back to the stock footage transformations used in Transformers Armada and its sequels—although the Twinkle Smile smirk at the end just takes it on to parody. It does, however, bear exceptional resemblance to Gasket/Ransack's transformation from Galaxy Force/Cybertron. And Ransack's partner in crime, Crumplezone, probably wonders why Animated Bulkhead has his jaw. Furthermore, during Starscream's stock-footage transformation, he very obviously enters a state where most of him is still in jet mode, but his robot mode legs are folded below the jet. This "jet-with-legs" mode is a reference to the "GERWALK modes" that can sometimes be formed from Transformers with jet alt-modes. The term originally comes from Macross by way of the G1 Jetfire toy, (rather infamously) a recolored Macross Valkyrie, and has since been used in the fandom to describe similar "walking jet" unofficial modes.
    • In one of the shorts on the Season 1 DVD, one of Prime's fans asks him where his trailer goes when he transforms—a common question asked among fans of the original Optimus Prime. Optimus is confused, probably because he doesn't actually have a trailer. One of the kids kept trying to get him to turn into a fire truck. An actual episode would go on to have Blitzwing (while in crazy mode) say "Ooh, ooh, I wanna see him turn into a fire truck!"
    • Lately[when?], Beast Wars references are all the rage: at the end of the episode that sees Wasp become Waspinator, he and Blackarachnia are teleported to a jungle, where a gorilla, a cheetah, a rhino, and a rat are standing over them, references to Optimus Primal, Cheetor, Rhinox, and Rattrap, the original four Maximals. Blackarachnia sees them, and says "You've got to be kidding." Also, a few episodes back, there was Tigatron Stadium. And earlier, during Sari's birthday party, the kids are hitting a piñata in the shape of a very familiar purple Tyrannosaurus. (You may also add the very existence of Waspy, Blackarachnia, and the more recently-introed Jetstorm, but that just comes with the TF franchise's oft-rebootedness.) Waspy is often showing parallels to the original, but being a darker and more tragic character than Beast Wars' resident Chew Toy, it's always got a sinister twist to it. "Waspinator has plans," indeed...
    • A sign that's a homage to the Sinclair Oil logo has a dinosaur that looks a lot like the Generation One Dinobot Sludge (who doesn't have a TFA incarnation).
    • There's also some self-reference lately: Bulkhead points out his susceptibility to the Worf Effect once. "I'll keep him distracted! He always shoots at me first." [Charges in, gets blasted all the way down the street by Blitzwing, flips over, and a pebble bounces off his head] "Called it."
    • Each member of Starscream's clone army has the color scheme of one of the Starscream-repaint Seekers from Generation 1.
  • The head writers involved in Transformers: Beast Wars were very active in the online fandom. As a result, these cropped up all the time, often in the form of locations. Subsector Hooks and Grid Joona, for example, are named after fans who posted on the alt.toys.transformers usenet group at the time.
    • At one point a concussed Waspinator refers to himself as "Wonko the Sane". While this was originally a name of a minor character in So Long and Thanks for All the Fish, the specific reference was evidently to another Beast Wars fan who used this name as an online alias. That fan, Benson Yee, went on to be recruited as a continuity consultant for the second season finale. The Beast Wars crew recognized the value of the fandom.
    • What may have been a very subtle Shout Out was Cheetor's weapon sound effect. It sounded just like Mega Man's from the cartoon. Both were voiced by Ian Corlett.
    • Rattrap and Optimus' dialog about the Ark, how "that ship wasn't built, it was poured" and "die-cast metal, its a lost art" are both about how the original Gen1 Transformer toys (well, the better, larger ones) all had die-cast parts for at least half the body.
    • In one of the Beast Wars comics, Megatron is threatened by someone claiming to be his greatest enemy, leading Megatron to ask if she's "Raksha". Raksha was the screenname of a well-known (and rather out there) Decepticon fan who absolutely loathed Beast Wars.
    • One from the TF Wiki: a toy for Polar Claw is described as transforming into an "agnostic killing machine".
    • Are we forgetting Megatron's first appearing to Optimus after he gets his new dragon body? "Enter the Dragon!"
  • The TF Wiki itself for that matter contains several shout-outs, mainly in the photo captions.
  • "Wait, look, down in the sky.. is it a bird?" "May be a plane?" "Naah, it's OPTIMUS!"

Others

  • Hey Arnold! often features crew members' names as store names and product names.
  • The Legend of Korra:
    • Mako, one of the main characters, is a reference to Mako, Iroh's late original voice actor. Doubles as a real-life Crowning Moment of Heartwarming.
    • Many of the structures in Republic City are shout-outs to easily recognizable real life architecture, such as the Golden Gate Bridge, the statues in the harbors of Hong Kong, Alcatraz, and the Empire State Building. The city itself also bears a great resemblance to 1920s-era Shanghai and is similar in setting to many classic kung-fu action movies.
  • Chowder features several video game references, such as Chowder exclaiming: "I was promised cake! The cake was a lie!"
    • "Mr. Fugu" features an anthropomorphic cat character who shares an identical character design to the felines from Cat Soup. (It freaks Mung and Schnitzel out.)
    • In The Heist after Mung tastes a Sugar Saphire, his head transforms into Bubbles and proclaims in her voice, "Wow, that's sweet!" There was even a part of the theme song playing in the background.
    • In "Weekend at Schnitzel's", there's a fight scene which takes cues from Street Fighter. There's an obvious Hurricane Kick, Shoryuken, Hadoken, and a Flash Kick, and when one of the two combatants is knocked down, it declares Get 'er Done!
    • The ending of "Grubble Gum" was Katamari Damacy, complete with music reminiscent of the game.
    • It's safe to say that one of the writers is VERY One of Us.
  • Codename: Kids Next Door is full of these.
  • Invader Zim, created by the famously disturbing Jhonen Vasquez, contained various shout-outs to Vasquez's other works.
    • Mrs. Bitters, who is exactly the same in both appearance and personality as the unnamed teacher in Squee!.
    • Tak wears the same boots that Johnny the Homicidal Maniac does. And a demonic version of Johnny himself appears in "The Halloween Spectacular of Spooky Doom".
    • A scene where Dib was trying to infiltrate a warehouse, disturbing Kuronekosama in the process.
    • According to the commentary in the episode "Hamstergeddon", when Ultra-Peepi is running toward the giant hotdog, is a Shout-Out to Neon Genesis Evangelion.
    • The begining of of an episode with Dib talking to a hobo at McMeaties looked similar to Edward Hopper's Night Hawks.
    • Subverted in "Bestest Friends", as shown by the commentary. To paraphrase Jhonen: "Some people ask, 'Was the whole eye thing supposed to be an homage to the animated short The Sandman?' I like that short, but... Nope! I made it up."
    • In the episode "Planet Jackers" the two aliens who are taking away Earth in order to use it as fuel for their sun have a conversation that is similar to one that the two kidnappers in Fargo have. Their personalities are even similar. When Zim goes to ask Dib to borrow his telescope, for his has broken, GIR squishes his head a la Kids in The Hall. Kids member Kevin McDonald plays Almighty Tallest Purple on the show.
    • This became a running gag in the episode commentary, with almost every other comment later on being "Jhonen, was this your oh-mahg to...?"
  • The Spectacular Spider-Man has a few:
    • In the series premiere, there are a great many Gargoyles shown, in reference to director Greg Weisman's series of the same name, also set in New York. And when Mysterio lets loose little gargoyle-ish imps to harass Spider-Man, JJ Jameson loves it and says they should have their own show.
    • In the Title Sequence, one of the "photos" of Spider-Man is a tribute to the cover of Amazing Fantasy #15, his debut issue.
    • Musical leitmotifs from the 1960s and 1990s series can be heard in the background music.
    • In the second season episode, "First Steps," Sandman is stealing the "Urn of Morpheus" from a museum for Hammerhead.
    • In the fourth episode of the 1st season, Spider-Man comments to the Shocker/Montana "I mock. I'm a mocker." The Mocker was a comic by Spider-Man creator Steve Ditko.
  • Fosters Home for Imaginary Friends
    • A fair few to The Powerpuff Girls, both being made by Craig McCracken, as well as to many, many other pop culture phenomena, too many to list.
    • The founder of their town is Elwood J. Dowd, who was the one who saw Harvey, an "Imaginary Friend".
    • 2 of the biggest Shout Outs to Video Games in Western Animation history: A chase scene in the pilot episode resembles the game Pac-Man to high degrees (which was easy, since Bloo looks just like one of the ghosts from this game). Later, in Destination Imagination, there's a longer scene that looks exactly like an NES Super Mario Bros. game, complete with Mac growing upon eating a... not mushroom, but pumpkin. The only real differences are said pumpkin and the appearances of some enemies. Oh, and there also was a game called Immortal Wombat in another episode.
    • Another shout out to Super Mario Bros. occurs during a chase scene, where a Sheet of Glass is being carried by two guys who are clearly Mario and Luigi.
    • In the Grand Finale, one of the names signed on Coco's card for Mac is Big Fat Baby.
    • Douglas and Adam, the guys who studied Coco. Adam even had a '42' sweater! And in another episode, Bloo played a video game featuring a character called "Lord Beeblebrox".
    • There's a scene in "Bus the Two of Us" which has a hitchhiker wearing a bathrobe holding a sign that says "Magrathea." In the same episode, there is a Star Wars shout out when Mac throws money for a toll out the window and misses to which Bloo responds "Negative. It only impacted on the surface."
    • In a halloween episode, Bloo turns white (he's sick) and everyone believes that he's a ghost. Coco picks up a phone.

Wilt: Who you gonna call?
Coco: Co-coco!
Wilt: Nah, they've been out of business for years.

    • "Bloo's Brothers" had lots of children imagine clones of Bloo, although each one looked/sounded/acted slightly different than him. In a rapid montage of the clones, one appeared that was very similar to Homestar Runner
  • The Powerpuff Girls
    • In one episode, spoiled brat Princess donned a super suit and proclaimed herself to be a Powerpuff Girl. The fight sequence had several blatant nods to Dragonball Z. At one point, Princess fires a laser which Blossom dodges by just tilting her head slightly—a famous scene had Goku do that to Frieza (an earlier DBZ episode, during the training period before the arrival of Nappa and Vegeta, had Piccolo do the same thing while sparring with a clone of himself). It also contained a shout out to the Marvel comic book strategem "Fastball Special" (where Colossus would grab Wolverine and throw him to attack an enemy).
    • An episode has the Professor running into a pirate named Crack McGreggen.
    • When the girls are kidnapped by a crazy fan, the mayor suspects the perpetrator may be Genndy McCracken - this is a combination of Craig McCracken, the creator of the show, and Genndy Tartakovsky, creator of Dexter's Laboratory, who McCracken worked for.
    • There were two shout-outs to The Big Lebowski. In the episode where Princess becomes mayor and "legalises" crime, the Professor refers to a rug being stolen as "tying the room together". In the episode where Sedusa impersonates Ms. Bellum, and pretends to kidnap herself, the scene where the Mayor tells the girls about the kidnapping is almost exactly like the scene where Jeffrey Lebowski tells the Dude about Bunny's kidnapping.
    • "Meet the Beat-alls", which is simply a long string of Beatles references.
    • Dexter and Top Cat with his gang had appeared at least once.
    • Besides the phone, the Mayor sometimes uses the, Powerpuff Signal, a giant heart in the sky, to summon the girls.
    • Imaginary Fiend has Blossom thrown into a pile of coats, emerging dressed as Cartman.
    • In Cootie Gras, we have this quote of Mojo Jojo's, "By the way, have you said hello to my little friend?
  • Futurama had the Harlem Globetrotter planet, which was an extended shout-out to the old Hanna-Barbera Harlem Globetrotters cartoon series.
    • As well as the Globetrotters themselves.
    • In Beast with a Billion Backs, when Bender assaults Yivo, the scene resembles a certain savvy pirate meeting a kraken with his sword.
    • Bender's guess about the nature of the god-like entity in "Godfellas", "the remains of a space probe that collided with God", is also a fairly accurate description of V'ger in Star Trek.
    • The episode A Bicyclops Built for Two contains several Shout Outs to Married... with Children, the show actress Katey Sagal (who voices Leela) was best known for before her work on Futurama. At one point, Leela does her hair up like Peggy Bundy, dresses like her, walks like her, and exchanges cheap dirty insults with her husband-to-be, an alien named Alkazar.

Turanga Leela: Aaaaaaaaal!

    • Two shout-outs to Star Trek in the episode Why Must I Be a Crustacean in Love: The Decapodian tradition of dueling to the death is named Claw-plah (after the Klingon word for victory, Qapla'), and their national anthem is the dueling music often featured in similar deathmatches fought in the Original Series.
    • Another Star Trek shout-out that has already been used twice is the reference to Christopher Pike, former captain of the Enterprise, and particularly his wheelchair. The chair appears first in the episode "Love's Labours Lost in Space". Pike himself appears in the chair at Professor Farnsworth's 150's birthday in "A Clone of My Own". In both cases either the chair or pike's disfigured visage are subverted. The sliding doors used all throughout the show have the same sound effect from the ones in Star Trek, which is commented on by Fry in the first episode. He later gets stuck in the door too.
    • Even before Bender's Game, there were numerous shout outs to Dungeons & Dragons in the series, ranging from the obvious (Gary Gygax showing up in "Anthology of Interest") to the subtle (ranging from a rust monster at a veterinary hospital to a beholder in "How Hermes Requisitioned His Groove Back").
  • Cats Don't Dance contains numerous references to the films Singin' in the Rain and Sunset Boulevard, including Danny's wardrobe on arrival; Darla's Battle Butler, Max, and the way Darla is foiled.
  • Courage the Cowardly Dog features several products labeled "Dil", such as the Dilvac vacuum cleaner. All of them are named after the show's creator, John R. Dilworth. There is also a caricature of Mr. Dilworth hanging up in Courage's house.
    • And a far more disturbing one in the form of Muriel's cousin, "freaky barber" Fred, who is likely a reference to Sweeney Todd. Fred himself is mostly harmless and a bit amusing, but recognizing the source material still makes it a bit creepy.
    • The entire episode with the demon mattress was one to The Exorcist.
    • Any episode in which Benton Tarantella appears.
    • This still shouldn't happen to a dog.
  • Ben 10 Alien Force is fond of these:
  • Family Guy
  • In one episode of Monster Buster Club, Cathy is sent to detention, and it's specifically mentioned that it will be in Room 101.
  • Speaking of Totally Spies!, the villain from the first season finale (and second season premiere) has a last name of Lumiere, and is a filmmaker. The Lumiere brothers were pioneers of French cinema.
  • Samurai Jack has tons.
    • One episode famously focuses on Jack's adventure with an obvious Totoro send-up. Later, Jack completely loses his memory because of Destiny's Child. Another episode has Jack fighting over a time traveling jewel with a palette-swapped Daisuke Jigen.
    • In the episode with the flatulent dragon. Jack gets directions from an eccentric scissor-smith, who tells him to turn left at a fork in the road to get to the Dragon's Lair. When Jack asks, "Where does the other path lead?" the scissor-smith replies, "Space Ace!"
    • "Heeeere's Jackie!"
    • Nearly any given SJ ep is going to have shout-outs. One ep had him encountering Quick Draw McGraw and Babalooie, as he's pursued by Old-West themed bounty hunters. In one where he fights an evil witch, she is voiced by BJ Ward, the VA for both Princess Allura and Witch Haggar on Voltron and is drawn like an SJ version of Haggar. She is even called The Hag.
    • Lest we forget about the episode "Jack's Sandals." Upbeat techno music? High-speed sneakers? Blurring by anything on feet or wheels? Sounds like a certain blue-quilled speedster we all know and love.
  • The Boondocks has numerous Shout Outs to anime and manga, even in the opening credits of the first season, which are similar to the opening credits of Samurai Champloo. Jin also makes a brief cameo appearance. Another big Shout-Out is to Fist of the North Star at the very end of "Soul Plane 2: The Blackjacking", when Huey and Ruckus leap at each other, their outstretched legs crossing in midair. It's a reference to the first attacks Shin and Kenshiro make against each other when they finally fight.
  • The 2003 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2003 series has some of these:
    • When stranded on an alien planet and looking for transport, the turtles find Captain Ersatzes of Han and Chewie. They conclude, "We can do better."
    • In the previous episode, Michaelangelo says, "Not today, Chung Lee." A triple entendre in that he references not only Wang Chung and Bruce Lee, but Street Fighter Chun Li.
    • In a fight, Donatello realizes, "A bo staff? And a bunch of guys who all look the same? Time to try one of my favorite movie stunts!" He spins around his staff à la Burly Brawl, but it doesn't work. Raphael (I think) reminds Donny that "This ain't the movies."
    • A recent episode has Donatello find wayward computer data in the systems of a Texas paper factory—likely a Shout-Out to Heroes, where The Company uses a paper factory in Texas as a front. Makes you wonder what other kind of data he'd find there if he looked...
    • The episode "Reality Check" takes place In a World where the Turtles are super-powered heroes. The "Shell of Justice" is a shout-out to the Hall of Justice from Superfriends, and "Shelletron-1000" probably references the Autobots computer in Transformers Generation 1, Teletron-1. An early episode has similar shout-outs, where Mikey's fantasies of the Turtles as superheroes get mocked as "the Ninja-stice League", "the Shelltastic Four", and "the Legion of Sewer-Heroes".
    • The episode where Donatello meets an artist named Kirby and traveled with him to a world with people living in a city at the end of a rainbow bridge protected by warriors with godlike powers and cosmic technology. This episode's name was "The King"
    • In the Battle Nexus Tournament Mikey faces Kluh from the dimension "Levram". His father is Ammag.
  • On the subject of the Ninja Turtles, the old cartoon tended to have the Turtles (usually Raphael) use a reference to The Wizard of Oz in conversation.
  • Megas XLR. Oh lordy, where do we even begin? Should we start with the Gatchaman and Sailor Moon lookalikes, or the fact that Megas evidently carries the Autobot Matrix of Leadership (as well as the Wave Motion Gun, and half of the Battleship Yamato that comes with it) around in its chest? Maybe the fact that turning the heater up high enough activates Combattler V's Atomic Fire, or the giant robot version of Ash that Coop fights?
    • At one point, it uses the super-dimensional forteress Macross (SDF-01) as a gun.
    • The army being led by Evil Coop from a future alternate reality look like a bunch of silver Zakus from Mobile Suit Gundam. Evil Coop and Kiva are shout outs to Paptimus Scirocco and Haman Khan.
  • There are massive amounts of shout-outs in The Simpsons
    • In the Treehouse of Horror segment, "Dial Z for Zombies", Bart attempts to revive Snowball I with black magic and he is wearing a Michael Jackson album cover as a hat. In a segment about Zombies. Put two and two together.
    • Simpsons writer Don Payne is apparently a fan of Johnny the Homicidal Maniac, as two episodes written by him contain references to it. In "The Wandering Juvie", one of Cletus the Slackjawed Yokel's disturbing wood carvings is Psycho-Doughboy. "Thank God It's Doomsday" has an obvious shout-out to the infamous head-explody scene from issue 6.
    • In the episode where the fortune teller shows Lisa her "true love", the sound made when her future fiancee speaks into his watch is the same as the communicator beep from Star Trek.
    • Reoccurring villain "Sideshow Bob" Terwilliger got his last name from the eponymous madman in The 5000 Fingers of Dr. T
    • Some of the dialogue said during Homer's hot-pepper-induced acid trip in "El Viaje Misterioso de Nuestro Homer" is meant to be nonsensical, but hidden in all the gibberish are references to The Beatles ("goo goo g'joob?") and The Ramones ("gabba gabba hey!").
    • Look closely at the walls. There are posters for water, earth, fire, and air.
  • ReBoot runs on this trope, so much so that the Other Wiki's episode guide has a column devoted to listing them all. Some of the most notable ones include The Prisoner (which got an episode to parody it) and The X-Files, in the form of minor characters Fax Modem and Data Nully (voiced by Gillian Anderson herself, no less). Other shout-outs include Mortal Kombat, Evil Dead, Braveheart, Pokémon (and anime in general), James Bond, Star Wars, The Last Starfighter, and Star Trek.
  • American Dad had an episode wherein Steve got revenge on the cheerleaders for locking his girlfriend out of a class election. Besides title cards listing each victim, one prank has him feeding laxatives to a buffalo before getting one of the cheerleaders under it.
    • One episode had a gag involving a Swear Jar. It seems Francine keeps a separate labeled jar for each swear, and the one that was the fullest was labeled "Moist".
  • The Fairly OddParents has at least two episodes completely dedicated to Shout Outs, one is the Trapped in TV Land TV Movie Channel Chasers, the other one is the first episode including Timmy's grandfather, which has a Captain Planet and the Planeteers reference early in the story (called "Captain Green and the Ecoteens") and goes on to become a complete parody of old monochrome cartoons, especially the first Mickey Mouse shorts and Popeye.
  • In the Justice League Unlimited episode "Divided we Fall," Green Arrow dissuades Superman from disbanding the Justice League, and gets ready to ride off into the sunset. Just before he does, Batman stops him, saying "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" To which, GA translates as "Who guards the guardians?" Most comic fans know what they're really talking about, though.
  • One episode of The Real Ghostbusters had a wangsty villain whose sidekick/best friend was named DiTillio, after one of episode writer J. Michael Straczynski's former colleagues from He-Man and the Masters of the Universe.
  • The Venture Brothers is chock full of shout outs from a myriad of sources. Comics, movies, music, television, pulp fiction and real life all contribute to the VB mythos. The most obvious references are from Jonny Quest, from the technology ("Walking eye...") to appearances Race Bannon, Hadji and a drugged-out adult Jonny.
  • In one episode of The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, Billy sees what looks like the shadow of a giant spider on his ceiling. He looks down to see that it is just Bubbles' stuffed octopus on top of his lamp.
  • There are many shout outs in Arthur. Some of the ones I can think of are the shout outs to Chopin's Revolutionary etude, Invention 8 by J.S Bach, Child's Play—the movies, Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, Stellaluna, Jeopardy, James Bond, The Adventures of Tintin, Alice in Wonderland, Law and Order, Mondarin, Monty Python. This is still only about 4-5% of the shout outs from Arthur.
  • In one episode of Danny Phantom, Danny plays a "Crash Nebula" arcade game, a reference to the Show Within a Show on The Fairly OddParents. Which leads to another one: in the Poorly-Disguised Pilot for Crash Nebula, the young Crash is seen reading a Danny Phantom comic book.
    • There's an obvious nod in the episode "Lucky in Love" to Gone with the Wind. The Once an Episode title card was a parody of the famous movie poster of Rhett holding Scarlett in front of the burning city of Atlanta.
  • Metalocalypse contains lots of shout outs to metal bands, primarily in the names of places and businesses. Finntroll's supermarket, the fast food restaurants Burzum's and Dimmu Burger, Gorgoroth's Medical Supplies, Iced Earth skating rink, St. Necrophagist's Hospital, Malmsteen's, Carpathian Forest High School, Carcass Hardware, "Bed, Bathory and Beyond", Chimaira Mart.
    • Nathan also references several Cannibal Corpse songs by name in the first episode (Every Bone Broken, Rotted Body Landslide and Hammer Smashed Face). Project Falconback is a reference to Falkenbach.
  • SpongeBob SquarePants has the weird chanting and famous music from 2001: A Space Odyssey when prehistoric SpongeBob discovers that he can use fire to cook food.
  • Code Lyoko
    • Kadic Academy was named after Philip K. Dick (look at his middle initial and last name); this is confirmed by MoonScoop themselves.
    • Several times, a Totoro plush toy can be seen in Yumi's bedroom.
    • At the end of episode "Vertigo", Odd comments that he would love to turn invisible, like Susan of the Fantastic Four. This is quite a direct shout-out since French animation company MoonScoop also produced Fantastic Four: World's Greatest Heroes.
    • In episode "The Secret", the demolition worker controlled by XANA distinctly looks like Mario. William even calls him a "super-plumber".
  • Scooby Doo
    • In the What's New, Scooby-Doo? episode that tells an origin for the Mystery Machine, the unmasked villain is Susan Dimwittie, the obsessive stage mother for the bro-sis band The Mystery Kids, the MM's previous owners. Voiced by Kathy Soucie, she is drawn like and voiced to sound like the animated version of The Partridge Family's Shirley Partridge as voiced by Joan Gerber on The Partridge Family 2200 AD, aka The Partridge Family In Outer Space. Shirley Jones never voiced her animated counterpart.
    • Scooby Doo Where Are You? episode "Decoy for a Dognapper" (October 11, 1969). While in a swarm of bats, Shaggy dances around and calls it a "Batusi dance". This is a reference to the "Batusi" dance in the Batman episode "Hi Diddle Riddle" (January 11, 1966).
    • In A Scooby Doo Halloween, one of the guests at the masquerade is badly dressed up as Hong Kong Phooey.
  • Hanna-Barbera's The Adventures of Gulliver episode "The Dark Sleep". The witch Malagar was inspired by the Wicked Witch of the West in the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz.
    • She lives in a huge forbidding castle.
    • After she captures Gulliver, she holds up an hourglass and says "You have until the sand runs out, young Gulliver. Then, if you do not give up the map, I shall deal with you in my own fashion".
    • At one point she says "All in good time", a line spoken by the WWotW in the movie.
  • Johnny Bravo has few episodes starting and ending with narrator announcing that Johnny is now "in the zone, where normal things doesn’t happen very often."
  • Two Stupid Dogs once had a really weird episode where they were trained in using cartoon-violence. When they were asked to show some, very first thing they thought was to imitate The Little Mermaid.
  • One episode of Princess Gwenevere and the Jewel Riders opened with a bored fairy lamenting that her town was "boring" while her pet tried to talk her out of it. It was almost line-by-line taken from one of the best Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers episodes. Turns out that it was the same voice actress, and Jewel Riders used most of the same writers and staff as Galaxy Rangers!
  • Rocky and Bullwinkle has this shout out to Burma Shave:

Do not go back
Go on instead
Your friend the moose
Is just ahead
Boris Shave

  • Superfriends (1973) episode "Dr. Pelagian's War". Dr. Pelagian's submarine the Sprite looks very similar to the submarine U.S.S. Seaview in the film and TV series Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.
  • The Generator Rex episode "Breach" has Rex telling Holiday he was fighting a little girl, and she wasn't "made of sugar and spice!"
    • The entire episode (or at least Rex's segment) seemed to reference Silent Hill, foggy town filled with monsters, a creepy school, and the possibility of Alternate Dimensions being involved, not helped by some of the questions about Breach's psyche.
  • Jimmy Two-Shoes: Aside from a Whole-Plot Reference to I Am Legend, the title for one episode, "Jimmy, Don't Be a Hero", is a reference to the 1974 song "Billy, Don't Be a Hero".
  • Total Drama Action is a season with challenges based on movies. Yeah, there are quite a few references.
  • The Jimmy Neutron spinoff Planet Sheen features the planet Zeenu.
  • One episode of Storm Hawks had a two characters who were a Shout-Out to Statler and Waldorf.
  • George's aunt(?) in George Shrinks tends to respond to shocks with "What in the name of (Insert Groucho Marx Character Here)..." - this has included such luminaries as Hugo Z. Hackenbush, Jeffrey Spaulding, and Rufus T. Firefly.
  • The Critic is chock-full of them. (These are originally located on the show's own work page.)
    • Vlada and his son Zoltan are from Pottsylvania.
    • In the episode "Frankie and Ellie Get Lost," Franklin behaving like Curly after drinking spiked punch (also resulting in him being the show's Cloudcuckoolander), and has Albert Einstein acting like Larry and Ted Kennedy acting like Moe.
    • Prince Charles sounds like Professor Gumby.
    • Alice's sister Miranda used venetian blinds for her ball gown, a reference to the famous Gone with the Wind spoof from The Carol Burnett Show.
    • In the season 1 episode "A Little Deb Will Do Ya," Jay is about to do the deed with a woman he met at his sister Margo's debutante ball, but the woman admits to having a "terrible" secret below her waist. She's wearing the bottom half of the Humphrey the Hippo costume, also revealing to be his TV-ratings rival.
    • A reviewer's face melting off and reducing him to a skeleton (after Roger Ebert shows him a clip of a bad movie) is a reference to Raiders of the Lost Ark.
    • The episode "Miserable" is a parody of Misery.
    • The episode "Dukerella" is a cross-parody of Cinderella and A Streetcar Named Desire.
    • A drunken Arthur Bach (Dudley Moore) is spoofed in several episodes.
    • Franklin dressed up as El Kabong is a reference to Quick Draw McGraw.
    • Elenor saying "No more wire hangers!" is a direct reference to the film Mommie Dearest.
    • The "Rosebud Frozen Peas" commercial is a direct spoof of the Frozen Peas blooper tapes.
  • I know it was you Fredo!
  • On Celebrity Deathmatch Flea beats Kenny G with Nick Diamond stating "Flea killed Kenny G!" A kid in the audience then shouts, "You Bastard!"
  • On the Young Justice episode, "Terror", Superboy and Miss Martian go undercover as a pair of superpowered twins called Tommy and Tuppence, referencing the Spy Couple created by Agatha Christie.
  • While not as Shout-Out-y as the current series, the original My Little Pony did have a few. For instance, on one occasion the Moochick and his rabbit assistant Habbit are seen playing three-dimensional chess. Amusingly, Habbit is winning.
  • X-Men: Evolution was not shy about this, but here are two specific examples:
    • One episode has Beast take the students on a nature retreat, where it just so happens there are people looking for Bigfoot. They spot Beast, think it's the mythical...um, beast, and one of the ways they try and find him is to break out these Bigfoot callers. One of the searchers asks where to get one.

The Bigfoot trading post on route ten. Ask for Muldur.

Back to Shout-Out
  1. ↑ Bill Watterson having retired from making Calvin and Hobbes
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