Comicbook Easter Eggs

Something that just makes me smile when I read comicbooks is when I find a little easter egg. If you don't know what I mean by that, the term easter egg refers to a little hidden secret that serves no purpose except to entertain the people who find it and understand it. These are often references to another franchise that's completely unrelated to what you find the easter egg in. I'll give some examples. In Marvel's Annihilation, there's a scene with a fleet of ships full of refugees, and one of them is a Battlestar. They don't say anything about it and you only see it in the background of one panel, but it looks identical to the Galactica. In Annihilation Conquest, the series that takes place right after, there's a part where Nova Corps centurions are fighting Phalanx drones, and one of the centurions is a blue version of Pikachu. Some of you may hate me for this, but I'm not a fan of Pokemon. But I still found the easter egg amusing at the very least. Another thing like this is in a Judge Dredd story, the Three Amigos. Dredd and his two "amigos" are fighting an army with a very unopressive dress code, and some of them are wearing Star Trek TNG uniforms. Not only that, but they're recognizeable as Ryker, Georti, Troi, Worf, and maybe Picard. I don't quite remember. The artist put all that effort into drawing Star Trek characters into one panel, and I appreciate that. Probably the most obscure one I've seen is one that I'm not 100% sure was intended, but I'm 90% sure. In Green Lantern: the Sinestro Corps War, an anonymous member of the Sinestro Corps looks exactly like a Baltan, which is an alien race from the Japanese TV show Ultraman. Good show by the way. The Sinestro's skin was blue instead of brown, but his proportions and his distinctive head and hands were the same. Also, in DC's series 52, they made at least one reference to the show Moonlighting. I've never seen this show, so I didn't get any of their references, but in the trade paperbacks, there's a section of text after each issue where either one of the writers or the artists discusses his thoughts on that issue and the series, so the reference was pointed out but not explained. But anyway, I love finding easter eggs in comic books.

Motorcycles and Stuff

A supernatural or futuristic motorcycle or something like that would definitely be one of the cooler vehicles, for sure something I want. If you're familiar with the Wraith, who first appeared during Marvel's Annihilation: Conquest series, think of his vehicle, and try saying with a straight face that you don't want one! If not, it's like a big motorcycle with laser guns on the front and a huge rocket engine in the back. Hopefully his morphing weapon would be included with his vehicle. Unfortunately, I haven't read Annihilation Conquest in a while, so I don't know what it's called; I just know that it can be a gun, a sword, a whip/tentacle, and probably some other stuff too. And it doesn't have wheels, so it's not exactly like a motorcycle, but close enough to mention. I also would want something like Lobo's bike, which doesn't have wheels either. But it does have a big skull from some kind of space creature on it, and besides the lack of wheels, it looks a lot more like a motorcycle, plus I know for a fact that the engine is pretty powerful and you can tow things behind it without incinerating them with an enormous afterburner like the Wraith's. Well, I've actually seen his bike with big afterburners sometimes, so I take that back. But of course, the big downside of Lobo's bike is that it doesn't have guns. An actual bike with wheels and everything that would be awesome to ride is Ghost Rider's famous Flame Bike. The wheels made of fire alone make it worth having, not to mention all the cool powers it has. If you're a Ghost Rider fan, you probably already know that besides being indestructible and insanely fast, you can drive it on anything, including vertical surfaces, upside down, or even on water! And if it comes with a chain whip, well, that just seals the deal. But how could I not mention the Batcycles? Especially the batpod from the Dark Knight. Between the guns and the cable launcher things and the way it can stretch out and get all low, and that thing it does where the front wheel goes up a wall, then it spins around and goes back down (and I realize how little sense those last two things make if you haven't seen TDK, but if you're reading a blog like this, I assume you have, and if not, go watch it.), it's just plain awesome. And while speeders from Star Wars probably don't count, I still want one and think they're worth bringing up. And if you're wondering, I think the Imperial ones from Return of the Jedi that they used on Endor were the coolest ones, but STAPs are pretty cool too. And this one is probably really obvious, but it would be great to have a motorcycle that was secretly an Autobot.