History Fridge / Cuphead

* If you align the background of Carnival Kerfuffle with how it is positioned on the world map, they do line up, except for one thing: the roller coaster carts. They are positioned so that they seem to go the opposite direction as to how they go in the boss battle.[[note]]They go up the background slope then across the screen from right to left in the boss battle, when the way the carts are positioned on the world map make it seem they're supposed to go across the screen from left to right then down the background slope[[/note]] But who exactly is the boss fight again? Oh yeah, that's right, a clown! So it would make perfect sense if Beppi simply had the roller coaster carts to the opposite way for the battle, [[RuleOfFunny if anything for the comedy.]]

* What company does Rumor Honeybottoms run? A newspaper company. "Honeycomb Herald" sounds exactly like a newspaper name, not to mention all the typewriters

* A commenter [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7rBImzs9SI&lc=UgyT9uDDKvhl7GQjMQ54AaABAg notes]] that with the game's infamous difficulty, it makes sense that the final boss of the game will be [[https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=salty salt]] itself. Furthermore, it makes sense that a salt shaker who makes sweets would be a villain who makes a HeelFaceTurn; adding too much salt to a baked good will ruin it, but just a pinch will enhance the flavor.

* As [[https://youtu.be/O7CX0xDVHak these two players]] note, Bonbon is an allusion to UsefulNotes/MarieAntoinette (being able to decapitate and throw her head at Cuphead), along with the saying misattributed to her, "let them eat cake" (her castle ''is'' the cake).

* Get to the last phase of "All Bets Are Off!" and King Dice will finally fight by making lines of cards march out of his sleeves. And it's nothing but Aces. So he's literally a CardCarryingVillain with an Ace up his sleeve!

* Those mosquitoes from "Treetop Trouble" that are helping Cuphead and Mugman defeat their level's miniboss aren't doing it just to be nice and subvert [[MosquitoMiscreants stereotypes]]. The boss is a giant [[DreadfulDragonfly dragonfly]] and, in reality, mosquitoes are the ideal prey of the common dragonfly species. So, the boss has either enslaved them or is about to eat them later, but not doing so, because it has to defend its territory first.

* So, you face the Moonshine Mob in "Bootlegger Boogie". You beat the Spider, the Lady Bug, and the Anteater and figure the fight is over thanks to a unique "KNOCKOUT!" call, but then you notice a Snail on the Anteater's head attacking you afterwards. Listen closely to the high-pitched announcement at the start of the fight and the one near the end. Those are both coming from the Snail himself! Once you beat him, the ''real'' announcer will show up, ''clear his throat'', and make the "KNOCKOUT" call, implying just how dirty the Mob is in screwing first-time players over if they are not paying attention, especially when they have one HP left.

* Think about the Devil and the deals he tends to make, and then consider the implications of King Dice having lost a bet. There's a real chance that he may have lost his own soul (assuming he hadn't given it to the Devil already), his position, or who knows what. While unconfirmed and a KickTheSonOfABitch moment even if true, it may put his wrath against the boys in perspective, and his battle with them may have very well been his LastDance.

* The name "Bootlegger Boogie" works in multiple levels: the first and most obvious is that they're a gang of bugs bootlegging (what initially appears to be) moonshine, and the battle takes place in the middle of a large-scale police raid of the joint; but another is that the fight consists of reworkings of various scrapped and unused concepts from the base game, from the spider gangster being a redesign of the 'Flying Gentleman' shown off in an early magazine ad to the ladybug's phase being a reworking of the scrapped '[=DicePalaceLight=]' fight that was once only accessible via debug mode - in other words, the fight is bootlegging cutting room floor concepts. And finally, the fight even has the audacity to bootleg a fake "Knockout!" screen, and even replace the announcer just for that gag!

* The Howling Aces' second phase cleverly avoids violence against children when you see what's going on. You are ''not'' hitting the puppies but rather their jetpacks, as shown by the jetpack smoke turning from white to grey when their health gets low, and their defeat animation involves their jetpack malfunctioning before sending them flying off.

** And lastly, Chef Saltbaker is already able to cook magical pastries (such as the Astral Cookie), so it tracks that he'd cook things that could give him the powers he has. Not to mention most of his attacks, especially in the first half of his fight, come from external sources and ingredients. This is most explicitly shown when he increases in size- he adds a mushroom to himself to do it. Effectively, he's almost a baking-based fantasy-style alchemist, explaining his powers.
*** How do chefs and alchemy go together? Alchemy and and chemistry historically have gone hand-in-hand, and any form of cooking requires some level of chemistry, howbeit, in a different form compared to work done in a formal lab. Basically, Chef Saltbaker is a magical food-chemist, and his magic uses the mixing and transformation of ingredients as a base, making it resemble alchemy due to combination of chemistry and magic. Plus, the label "magical" is often applied to creative or notable dishes, especially desserts, which are often baked.

* The final boss in the DLC does not give you the option for a bad ending like in the base game. Cuphead and Mugman's journey isn't about to save everyone from their debts to the Devil, it's about them trying to clear their own debts, more of their own self-interest. It's why they have the option of the Good or Bad ending, they become Heroes if they choose to fight The Devil to free everyone from their debt. By the time the face Chef Saltbaker, the Cup Brothers are not fighting for their own sake, they are fighting to free Ms. Chalice (if you choose not to play as her), so of course there is no Bad Ending.

* The King of Games' champions are clearly based on chess figures, but what many players fail to realize during their first playthrough is that their attack patterns are based on their movements on the chessboard: the pawns ZergRush Cuphead and co. by diagonally jumping down then rushing them on a straight line and can't U-turn, the knight's pose, attacks and taunts are L-shaped, the bishop's head floats diagonally, the rook sharpens its axe in front of you (it has nowhere to go as long as he's not done with you) while the sparks from his grindstone move straight, and the queen moves and attacks wherever she likes.

* Chalice has more health than either Cuphead or Mugman, a dodge-roll that makes her invincible, and her shots and supers are all stronger than the brother's versions of the same attacks. She's also explicitly a legendary hero and trained fighter, unlike the brothers who only started fighting after living a largely uneventful life.
* In the main game, the bosses fight back against the Cups because they're desperate to protect their souls. A completely reasonable reaction considering their positions and one the Cups understand and know about. So why wouldn't fighting the DLC bosses raise a few eyebrows from them, perhaps making them consider getting the Wondertart ingredients isn't an innocence as it seems? Well, looking closely at each boss, it's reasonable to see why the Cups would believe fighting them is a logical course of action:

** Glumstone the Giant takes the Cups by surprise by bursting out of a rocky covering, an aggressive demonstrating that could naturally activate a flight-or-fight response.

* The Angel and Demon in The Nightmare are implied to be connected to the Devil, with the code and Jared Moldenhauer confirming their fight was meant to be a phase in the Devil's FinalBoss fight. While the Demon's presence makes sense for obvious reasons, why is there an Angel? The Devil [[FallenAngel was once]] one. Leads to a double-whammy of Fridge Heartwarming and Fridge Horror in that this implies there's still some angelic grace left in the Devil but that it's locked away and can only mourn as souls are corrupted and tormented.

*** Given the early 1930s setting of the game, the fact that ''Pickelhaube'' helmet Werner wears was de-spiked by the end of World War 1, how Germany was already being mocked for being overly militaristic in World War 1, and that concentration camp uniforms featured vertical stripes (rather than the horizontal of the mouse ghosts), it's more likely that Werner is mockingly designed after 'the Hun' of World War I than after ThoseWackyNazis of World War II.

*** Dr. Kahl's Robot has all of its weak points on the upper half of its body, and given the size difference between it and the cup brothers, there's zero chance of them nailing any of them on foot; if they tried the robot would likely either step on them or detatch its head and fly away, forcing them to resort to planes.

*** Cuphead and Mugman did try to attack Esther Winchester on foot, but she grabbed the ingredients and fled in her saloon carriage, because they couldn't run fast enough to keep up they had to go after her in planes.