Ready Player One Easter Eggs

This past weekend saw Ready Player One open in theaters, and if you are any fan of pop culture, you certainly recognized a ton of Easter Eggs.

I saw the movie last night and absolutely loved it. The movie was better than I expected, and the special effects were done really well. 

My two sons (age 13 and 10) were big fans of it as well, and while initially they were a bit suspect about the flick, they were literally on the edge of their seats while watching. After the movie, we discussed the possibility of the film becoming a reality. My oldest was hesitant to accept that virtual reality would be near as good as anything shown in the movie and questioned how they could make a virtual suit make you feel physical pain and touch, with my response being to look how far we have come since Atari and PS4. 

As a kid growing up in the 80s myself, the Ready Player One Easter Eggs were frickin’ amazing. I know I probably missed a bunch, but below you can check out my list of Ready Player One Easter Eggs.

Be sure to let us know if you spotted any we missed! 

Check out the list (no particular order):  

Ready Player One Easter Eggs

Minecraft opening sequence

Parzival’s car was the Delorean from Back to the Future and has the KITT lights from Knight Rider

Freddy Krueger from Nightmare on Elm St

Jason was there from Friday the 13th

They used a Chucky doll as a weapon

Duke Nukem

Ryu from Street Fighter

Speaking of Street Figher, Parzival uses a Shoryuken 

The race includes: Stephen King’s Christine car, Speed Racer’s Mach-5, 1966 Batmobile, A-Team van, Aech drives Big Foot

King Kong

Jurassic Park T-Rex

Art3mis’ bike I believe was from Tron (or Akira?)

Iron Giant

Batman (on the mountain and on stickers)

Simon game button that Halliday was wearing

Halliday’s Star Trek themed funeral

The villain, Sorrento, played by Ben Mendelsohn, was Superman (see pic below) 

Harley Quinn and Joker are the club together, Blanka from Street Fighter is there, as well as Deathstroke 

Robocop

Doc Brown 

Beetlejuice

Planet Doom from Voltron is the location of the final Easter Egg

Lara Croft from Tomb Raider in a couple of scenes

Aech had models in the box for Battlestar Galactica, Aliens dropship (and one other?)

A He-Man lunch box

Mario Kart

Atari games mentioned: Defender, Adventure, Asteroids, Space Invaders, Joust

A Bitcoin cryptocurrency reference as a newspaper on the wall mentioned Oasis Coin becoming its own currency with the next dollar

Apple’s Steve Jobs

BuzzFeed website

The Shining

Halo

Overwatch

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Rubix Cube that can reverse time called the Zemeckis Cube which references Back to the Future director Robert Zemeckis

Holy Grenade is from Monty Python

A list of movies they are investigating includes Gremlins, Dark Crystal, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Krull, Splash and Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

Speaking of Krull, the Krull weapon, the Glaive, was used by Sho or Daito

Speaking of Dark Crystal, Halliday’s “girlfriend” was named after Kira

Daito has a Mortal Kombat button on his shirt

R2-D2 is in Samantha’s room, I believe

Bill & Ted reference when Halliday mentions taking things backward

Nintendo 64’s Golden Eye is Halladay’s favorite shooter

Star Wars reference when Parzival wins the race he is called “padawan” 

Millennium Falcon name-dropped

Parzival dressed as Clark Kent

Twitch gets mentioned

Michael Jackson’s Thriller costume

Buckaroo Banzai costume

Tootsie pop and the owl commercial

A promo video featured the John Williams music score (movie did not) 

Songs used include:

• “Walk This Way”
• “Sleeping Beauty”
• “Pump Up The Jam”
• “Hungry Like The Wolf”
• “Dancing With Myself”
• “Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This)”
• “Everybody Wants To Rule The World”
• “I Hate Myself For Loving You”
• “I Heard It Through The Grapevine”
• “Faith”
• “Stand On It”
• Themes from King Kong, Back to the Future, Godzilla
• “One Way Or Another”
• “Can’t Hide Love”
• “Stayin’ Alive”
• “We’re Not Gonna Take It”

War of the Worlds

Sonic the Hedgehog

Robot B9 from Lost in Space

Serenity

Dungeons & Dragons

Battletoads

Deadshot

Catwoman

Batgirl

Madball grenade

Voltron Lion (blue?)

Iron Giant gives a Terminator 2 thumbs up as it dies in lava

The final Easter Egg is surrounded by Mortal Kombat

Parzival wears a Thundercats belt buckle 

Sorrento turned into Mechagodzilla

Daito became Gundam

Wade Watts was named because his dad felt it was a superhero name like Peter Parker and Bruce Banner (Marvel)

Willy Wonka (instead of a candy maker he is a video game creator)

“Jay Halliday” is a reference to “holiday” as you take a holiday while in the Oasis digital world

Gunters means egg hunters (Easter Egg hunters)

Parzival is reference to King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table with Percival finding the Holy Grail by himself (Parzival searches for the Easter Egg by himself)

Sorrento’s minions are called the Sixers because they are known only by numbers, no names

Fun fact: The music score from Alan Silvestri is all original

Pretty cool, huh?!

So what do you think of the list? Can you add any additional Ready Player One Easter Eggs?