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"Remember how that happened? That didn't stop being a thing that happened or anything."
— Homestuck, referencing an event from hundreds of pages ago.
A reference to an event taking place earlier than the timeline of the present story. One type of call back is a Running Gag. This is often used to remind viewers that there is an ongoing storyline. More or less a Shout Out to itself — but if that's all that it's doing, then it's a Continuity Nod; a Call Back brings back an element that is actually relevant again.
Alternately, in comedy: tying the loose ends of a later, seemingly unrelated, joke to one earlier in the show (better known as the Brick Joke)
In a masterclass on playwriting, Alan Ayckbourn mentions this trope specifically, calling it "The Plant". Early on, one of his two demonstration actors mentions that he has an urge to sneeze when sexually aroused. Then at the very end:
Actress: Do you think we could become more than friends?
Actor: Aaaachoo!
Sometimes a Call Back will take up so much of a chapter or episode that will become a Sequel Episode to the earlier story it's referencing.
The opposite of this is the Call Forward. See also Chekhov's Gun, Brick Joke, and Book Ends.
Examples
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Anime & Manga
Comedy
- In general, one of the marks of a good stand-up comedian is a good understanding of how to use a Call Back well. It's a great way of keeping a show buzzing.
- Ladies.
- Stewart Lee does this all the time, especially in '41st Best Stand-Up Ever'. He also lampshades it after about 25 mins. (Remember that? From the beginning of the show?)
- Bill Bailey ends his current tour with a short film (accompanied only by swelling, melancholy piano music, no less) that references several jokes made over the course of the evening, showing things such as him standing next to a potted plant, looking suspiciously at joggers, eating Revels with a bucket over his head and him shouting at traffic with a couple of Tesco bags in hand. It Makes Sense in Context. The same show sometimes (depending on venue) a final encore after the standard two. Previously, in the first half, he plays the opening of La Bamba and makes the audience sing along and trail off, not knowing the specific words. This last encore sees him return and force the audience to learn the words, with displayed lyrics. Just to hammer it home, he plays it four times at increasingly ridiculous speeds.
- One example comes from Ron White. In the middle of his performance, he makes a joke about his dog Sluggo, who he needs to feed medication to by sticking it in a piece of cheese. At the very end of said performance, he was talking about trying to give Midol to his wife while she's PMSing. He ends the joke (and the performance) by saying he stuck the Midol in a piece of cheese. In You Can't Fix Stupid, he even references a joke that was made in a previous special. In the previous special, he made a joke about how Dabeers's slogan "Render her speechless" was just code for "Yeah, that'll shut her up!". In Stupid, he talks about trying to shut up his wife, saying that he was "all out of diamonds".
- He also does this in another performance, where the first thing he mentions is a new Chinese space program. Near the end, he does a joke about firework safety, and how his friend was killed by the main module*
but it sure was purdy! . He then says that it was the beginnings of the Chinese space program.
- In the Red Neck Comedy Show, Bill Engvall talks about boarding his dog while they're on vacation. At the kennel, they ask him what type of water the dog would like. He replies that the dog eats his own turds, the type of water probably doesn't matter to him. He also talks about taking the dog to the vet, where the vet gives him medicine to make the dog stop eating his own turds. How does it work? It makes the turds taste bad. During the Ron White portion, Ron talks about how he has dozens of people who work for him, but he is the one who goes outside to pick up the turds his dog had dropped, and pondered rearranging his staff so he wouldn't have to do that anymore. White then mentions that he asked Bill to bring his dog over, but Bill said, "No, he always comes home full."
- Eddie Izzard uses this technique during his stand-up special "Dress to Kill." Toward the end of the show he does a series of jokes about how textbook French is difficult to fit into real conversations with actual French people. To illustrate his point he repeats several of his previous jokes in French. The humor of the French dialogue, which would be incomprehensible to an English speaking audience unless they had watched the previous materials, hinges on the recognizing the jokes that we have already heard once.
- Australian comedian Josh Thomas does this several times during his show Surprise!, the most notable of which is a story, early in the routine, about how living with his first boyfriend; shortly after they moved in together, they decided to shower together, which ended badly when Josh's boyfriend began urinating, because he forgot Josh was there. This is referenced in the final lines of the show:
Josh: I told him, "one of my favourite things about you is that you've never vomited on me."... and he said, "Yeah, but I did kind of pee on you once."
- Gabriel Iglesias relates a story about a time he got pulled over with a bunch of his friends in the car. Their antics are hilarious to the officer, who lets them go with a warning, Because they made him laugh.
Officer: The only thing that beats this is the time a buddy of mine pulled over a fat guy who gave him donuts.
Comic Books
- The first scene of Green Lantern: Rebirth (which tells the story of Hal Jordan's resurrection and his taking up the Lantern mantle once more) is a call-back to Hal's origin story in the very first issue of the series. It starts with an Oan spaceship crashlanding outside of an Air Force base in the desert with an injured Green Lantern in the cockpit. But this time, the injured Green Lantern is Kyle Rayner.
- In the second issue of the New 52 reboot of the main Green Lantern magazine, Sinestro creates a Green Lantern Ring for Hal Jordan, who immediately attacks him with the ring. However, as the ring is a construct of Sinestro's, it doesn't harm him as he is in control of it. Later, at the end of the fourth issue, Sinestro creates additional rings for the imprisioned Korugarans, who attempt to attack him due to their misconception of his Sinestro Corps. The fifth issue begins with the reveal that, like before, Sinestro is not harmed by the rings' attacks.
- Ultimate Comics: Spider-Man #1 (2011) opens with Norman Osborn observing an OZ-contaminated spider whilst telling a scientist the myth of Arachne, which happened in the opening panels of Ultimate Spider-Man #1. There's a bit of Fridge Brilliance in that the dialogue is just slightly altered to clarify a different moment in time, and that the spider, rather than the original 00, is marked 42.
- In the third Blacksad album "Red Soul", Blacksad is sufficiently annoyed when he has to attend a Natalia Wilford Look-A-Like contest when doing bodyguard duty for a rich client. This should only make sense if you've read the first one, and know about his history with the real woman.
- The Powerpuff Girls
- In issue 16 of the comics, in the story "Five Green Vandals", Bubbles dredges up Buttercup's crush on Gangreen Gang leader Ace in the TV episode "Buttercrush". Buttercup is naturally repulsed by it.
- Issue #30's "Monkey See, Monkey Dough": Mojo wants to hire Bubbles to clean a device (which she doesn't know is a destruction device), and she instantly brings up how she and her sisters helped Mojo nearly take over Townsville in the movie.
- In Death Of The Family, Joker tells Damian how he can't really get people to laugh without giving them a pharmaceutical push first. In fact, Batman was apparently the only person he could get to actually laugh. In case you're wondering, Joker is referring to The Killing Joke, or its ending. In addition, the Joker commits many crimes similar to the ones he committed in his first appearances back in the 40s.
- After the apparent death of Professor X, Cyclops throws in with his ex and a number of former teammates to keep mutants safe and teach them how to command their powers while maintaining tactical/philosophical opposition to the people running his old alma mater. The original concept of X-Factor (ca. 1985)? Or his post-Avengers Vs X Men (ca. 2012) status quo?
- In the short from Issue #4 of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic (IDW) Canterlot is protected by a force field as it was in "A Canterlot Wedding", though Shining Armor doesn't otherwise appear.
- In My Little Pony Micro Series Issue #2 the Double Rainboom causes a crop of Applejack's apples to become rainbow-colored and extremely tasty, akin to Zap Apples, though AJ doesn't call them out as such.
Comic Strips
- Done a couple times in Fox Trot, such as during the Grinch arc when Jason looks through Andy's wallet and suggests cleaning out all the old Titanic ticket stubs, referring to a previous arc in which she became obsessed with Titanic and saw it dozens of times.
- One series from the late '90s in Peanuts had Rerun patting birds on the head, much to the resentment of Lucy, who mentions that her brother, Linus, did the same thing back in the 60s in a similar arc.
Fan Works
- Daryl, a Canon Foreigner from the The Walking Dead, calls back to Shane's treacherous actions in For Want of a Nail fic Better Angels upon returning to the farm. This becomes a greater issue due to Shane's survival being the premise.
- The X-Men AU fic The Wraith Saga features Jason Wyngarde being possessed by the Wraith (the Phoenix Force's Evil Counterpart) as a major plot point. The scene where the Wraith takes hold of him is a reference to the famous scene in Uncanny X-Men #101, when Jean first became the Phoenix.
Jean: Hear me, X-Men! No longer am I the woman you knew! I am fire! And life incarnate! Now and forever! I am Phoenix!
Jason: Hear me, mortals! No longer am I the man you once knew! I am the shadow! I am oblivion, and Death incarnate! Now and forever, I am The Wraith!
- Winter War plays this trope for drama rather than humor. While Orihime is restoring Ichigo to control of his body, she makes a Call Back to something Ichigo said and did way back in the canonical Soul Society arc:
Orihime: Don’t you remember what you told Kuchiki-kun — the person who’s being saved doesn’t get any say in the matter...
- The Harry Potter/Justice League crossover Terminal Justice contains numerous references to Rorschach's Blot's stories Make a Wish, The Hunt for Harry Potter and Back in Black, in which Harry went around disguised as one "Mr. Black", in addition to several scenes from and references to Justice League episodes.
- Marik Plays Bloodlines, a spin-off of Yu Gi Oh The Abridged Series, has a call back to the episode where Marik meets Joey and Tea. His vampire character is named "Malik Blishtar," the Sue Donym he made up.
- Dragon Ball Abridged: A lot of the humor in later episodes comes from stuff like this.
- Notably featured are three uses of the Solar Flare attack to blind an enemy. In the first instance, Vegeta shouted it was like "walking in on Frieza in the shower"; the second victim several episodes later saw a brief image of a showering Frieza when hit with the attack. The third victim is Frieza himself, who sees a brief image of the second victim posing.
- Calvin and Hobbes: The Series tends to incorporate parts of the original strip into itself.
TCotRWB's speech: "YOU'RE LUCKY I DON'T THROW YOU OUT ON YOUR FURRY BUTT ON THE SIDEWALK FOR THIS!"
Thunderstorm's speech: "I SHOULD'VE KICKED YOU OUT ON YOUR SORRY FURRY BUTT YEARS AGO!""
- Then there's a Call Back to earlier in the same episode - "Camping Trip Part 2" opens with a dream sequence where Calvin and Hobbes have resorted to eating tires. Later, the non-dream Calvin contemplates eating a tire.
- An especially blunt one comes in The Prayer Warriors:
And if that does not work, remove the head, like I did to Grover in the epic battle the first chapter, and if you have not read that, go back and read it, or sleep you will go to hell! Beware of my warring!
- There are entirely too many call backs in Concerned to even list. The best example is probably here when there are three separate call backs in the same day.
Films — Animation
- An Extremely Goofy Movie has several. In the Goof Troop episode "Puppy Love", PJ got a crush on a girl after she recited her poetry. He does the same thing for the same reason in this movie. In the episode "Date with Destiny", Goofy went on a dancing date with one of Max's school staff members—he does the same thing here. The final scene has some to the first movie: the trophy engraving was reminiscent of what Max and Goofy said to each other when their relationship was at its tensest moment, and Bobby calls back to two jokes in one line when he uses the word "cheesa" to describe the pizza he's holding and pointedly calls it "scrumptious."
Films — Live-Action
- In The Count of Monte Cristo, this is how Mercedes recognizes the Count's real identity, with his habit of twirling his hair.
- The Bourne Series
- In a beautiful moment at the end of The Bourne Ultimatum, Jason Bourne says to the government assassin sent to kill him, "look at what they make you give", harking back to Clive Owen's final words to him in The Bourne Identity.
- Another interesting example is a cameo from Chris Cooper as Conklin (from Identity) in The Bourne Supremacy, in which he speaks a key piece of dialogue ("Training's over.") that Bourne remembers in the first film.
- Half of the Dumb And Dumber duo says he's sold his dead parrot to a blind kid to help fund their trip to Colorado. Later, a news report has the "heart breaking story of the Rhode Island blind boy who was duped into buying a dead parakeet" as a headline. Especially funny is that Lauren Holly's character sees the report and rhetorically asks "who are these sick people?" right before said half of the duo rings her doorbell.
- The 2nd half of Shaun of the Dead is made of Call Backs. Every line in the 1st half comes back in radically different context.
- Hot Fuzz too, to a lesser extent.
- Terminator
- All of the Terminator movies have these in spades. "Come with me if you want to live" is right up there with "I'll be back". And "Get Out". Then Connor picks up that scar over his eye. Come to think of it, most of these are Call Forward as well.
- Also Dr. Silberman, a character who appears in all of the first three movies for essentially this purpose.
- An awesome one in Terminator Salvation. When John is about to try and rescue Kyle Reese from a Skynet camp, alone, Kate asks him what she should tell his troops. He answers, "I'll be back."
- Another Salvation example: when John is trying to lure a Terminator to his location, he starts playing music. The song? The same Guns n Roses song he was listening to in T2.
- Pirates of the Caribbean
- In At World's End, when the Pirate's Code is brought out, the first thing Captain Jack Sparrow looks up is whether the rule of parley (a Running Gag throughout the films) exists. It does.
- "Parley" is used as a Call Back twice more in the series. In Curse of the Black Pearl, Pintel says, "Damned to the depths with him who thought up parley!" ("That would be the French."), and "If any of you so much as thinks the word parley...". But at the end of the film (after the title curse is broken), the first thing Pintel does is ask for parley in an obviously frightened tone. And then in At World's End, upon seeing the size of the East India Company's armada, Jack Sparrow reacts with a nervous, "Parley?"
- In the first movie, Captain Barbossa says that the thing he hates most about being undead is not being able to taste anything, holding an apple as an example. When the curse is lifted at the end of the movie, he dies and the apple falls out of his hand before he can taste it. The next movie ends with him appearing at the end, finally taking a bite out of an apple.
- When asked how he returned, Will Turner sarcastically commented he used a couple of sea turtles lashed together to make a raft. Jack quipped "it's not so easy, was it?" This is more humorous if you remembered that Jack supposedly used this method before the events of the first movie.
- When Pintel and Raggetti are looking for Elizabeth in the first film, they call her "poppet" a couple of times mockingly. At the end of the third film when Elizabeth is saying goodbye to all the pirates, Pintel says "goodbye, poppet" affectionately.
- Half-pin barrel hinges and the leverage required to move it with a wooden bench.
- During the course of Dead Man's Chest, Ragetti sarcastically says to Will something along the lines of, "Your chariot awaits, sire!" while dropping a boat into the water for him to use. During At World's End, Gibbs not-sarcastically says the exact same line to Will's now-wife, Elizabeth.
- "You look very familiar, have I threatened you before?"
- In Live Free or Die Hard, John McClane is being held at gunpoint by Thomas Gabriel.
- The ending of the second Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie is a call back to the ending of the first ("I made another funny! ha, ha, ha, ha!").
- In Mother of Tears, the final movie of The Three Mothers trilogy by Dario Argento, it makes reference to the architect that built the homes for the witches much like it did in the second film Inferno, which didn't mention much of Suspiria beyond that, but in Mother of Tears, a character also mentions to the heroine how her mother got herself killed while weakening the witch from Suspiria, who would eventually be killed by the heroine of said film.
- In Ip Man 2, Ip is asked by Wong Leung if he could take on ten people at once. In the first film, he did just that. The payoff comes when he takes on even more people to save Leung later and Leung reminds him of the query.
- In Finding Neverland, the "It's a secret." ("It's a play.") lines to Sylvia by her sons are first used when they are trying to get her to come see Peter's play. They are used again at the end of the movie when they're bringing her to another surprise performance.
- In Punch Line, Tom Hanks's character's stand-up routine uses this to masterful effect. He begins his routine by talking about the peculiar expression the emcee used, "comedy stylings," applying this to various occupations to point out its absurdity (stopping at "hair stylist," because, well, that one is right). He goes on from topic to topic, at the top of his game, but soon devolving into an angry tirade about bank employees, cab drivers and debutantes. He stops and informs the audience, "I don't hate anybody. I'm not a hate monger. I'm a "hate stylist."
- Canada Russia 72, a Canadian tv movie about the fiercely fought hockey tournament between the Canaians and the Soviets had a surprisingly touching example of this. Earlier in the film, Canadian goalie Ken Dryden leaves the dressing room and sees Soviet goalie Vladislav Tretiak practice his goaltending by bouncing rubber balls against the wall. Startled, Tretiak drops a ball and Dryden picks it up, tosses it back to him and they smile at each other. Later in the film, Ken Dryden is seen bouncing rubber balls against the wall. The fact that they are now friends makes it even better. http://www.montrealgazette.com/life/Tretiak+returns+cause/3898323/story.htm
- The various endings of Clue are filled with call backs to earlier in the film: "Too late." "I told you I didn't do it." "Would anyone care for fruit or dessert?" And so on and so forth.
- DEBS
- Two jokes, one near the beginning of the movie and one near the end.
Max: Who's your best friend?
Amy: You are my best friend.
Max: And what did I say to you the very first day at the Academy?
Amy: "That's my bunk, bitch."
Max: After that.
Amy: What did I say to you the first time we met?
Max: "High-protein diets are overrated."
Amy: After that.
- Big Trouble in Little China. When Jack and Wang first go after Lo Pan, Jack asks why they don't just call the cops. Wang responds "Cops got better things to do than get killed." Later, one of the others asks why they don't call the cops and this time Jack says "Cops got better things to do than get killed."
- Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
- The last line, delivered by Kirk (if you don't count Spock's "space: the final frontier" voiceover) call back to what he told Dr. Marcus during the Darkest Hour ("How do I feel? Old. Worn out.") and what Dr. Marcus told him back ("Let me show you something... that'll make you feel young as when the world was new.").
McCoy: You okay, Jim? How do you feel?
Kirk: Young. I feel young.
- In Spock's quarters: "I would not presume to debate you." At his funeral: "... and we will not presume to debate his profound wisdom at these proceedings."
- Star Trek: Generations
- While exploring The Amargosa observatory, Data reminds Geordi of a joke Geordi told Riker at Farpoint Station. As noted in Late to the Punchline, Farpoint Station was the setting for the pilot episode of TNG.
- Shortly after the D12 is destroyed, the movie cuts to Geordi in engineering examining an open panel and in the middle of a conversation about the damage the ship's taken. He turns around and communicates with the bridge, only to be cut off as the panel he's just walked away from explodes and engineering rapidly degenerates from being a mess to being an outright hazardous environment. As he's ushering everyone out, Geordi tells the bridge that they're a few minutes away from a warp-core breach he can't stop. This scene mirrors one from the episode Yesterday's Enterprise, where the ship was fatally damaged fighting Klingons in an alternate timeline.
- Conan the Barbarian: At the end of The Battle of the Mounds, Conan gives the salute he used in his pit fighter days.
- Prometheus is full of call backs to Alien. One noteworthy example is the scene where Fifield and Millburn encounter the facehugger-like creature, Millburn's attitude in which mirrors Kane's first encounter with an egg, and the creature's attack on Millburn mirrors the attempts to get the facehugger off Kane.
- The Cracks of Doom being visited twice in The Lord of the Rings, each time with one character urging another to destroy the Ring, and the other deciding not to. First Elrond and Isildur, and two and a half films later, Sam and Frodo.
Literature
- The Dresden Files
- In White Night, a minor character from Storm Front comes back and plays a significant role in the plot. Additionally, an aspect of one characters Backstory which was mentioned only twice in the entire series (Once each in Storm Front and Death Masks) is expanded on, and becomes a major Plot Point.
- And a certain line from Storm Front gets a Tear Jerking Call Back twelve books later in Ghost Story.
Harry: Paranoid? Maybe. But just because you're paranoid doesn't mean that there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face.
Harry: Paranoid? Maybe. But just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't a wizard's ghost standing next to you with tears in his eyes.
- Good Omens is particularly fond of these. One footnote joke near the beginning becomes a major plot element near the end.
- A number of authors in the Star Wars Expanded Universe dabble in this and Call Forward.
- Timothy Zahn is particularly adept at this — in the Hand Of Thrawn duology, unless you're paying attention it's hard to tell what's a Call Back, a Continuity Nod, a Cryptic Background Reference, or a Noodle Incident.
- Survivor's Quest and Outbound Flight, very different novels with 50 years between them, were written together, so there are calls between them. Survivor's Quest also has at least two Call Backs to the Original Trilogy. "I want to go with you", a young untrained Force-Sensitive who wants to help an older Jedi, and Dean Jinzler, brother of a Jedi, who'd been passing as an ambassador.
Jinzler: I'm not an ambassador, Guardian. I'm an electronics technician. Like my father before me.
- Jedi Apprentice has Qui-Gon Jinn commenting to Yoda about not-yet-a-Padawan Obi-Wan Kenobi. He tells Yoda that the boy fought ferociously, which isn't a trait he likes to see. Yoda mildly says that this is like a boy he knew long ago. Qui-Gon assumes Yoda means his fallen apprentice Xanatos, but is told "Not speaking of that one. Of you I spoke."
- Rebel Force, set many years ahead, has Obi-Wan as a Force Appartition describing Luke to Yoda, who says he's reminded of a boy he knew long ago. Obi-Wan immediately assumes he means Anakin and jumps to Luke's defense, saying he's nothing like that, but Yoda tells him he means Obi-Wan.
- In the Prydain Chronicles first book The Book of Three Taran helps a gwythaint, one of the dark lord's creatures, against the advice of his more experienced companions. The gwythaint appears at the end of the final book The High King and buys Taran some time at the expense of its own life.
- Dale Brown does this from time to time. For example, in Warrior Class, Dave Luger is angered and emotionally crippled when he meets one of the former personnel at the Soviet base he was rescued from in Night of the Hawk. In A Time for Patriots there are a few, such as the nanotransponders from Edge of Battle being used on the FBI agents and Pat being reminded of Hal Briggs's death.
- This gem from The Hollows Series by Kim Harrison:
"Hey, Rache," Jenks said, dropping down from who knew where. "Your back is clear. And what is Plan B?"
My eyebrows rose and I looked askance at him as he flew alongside, matching my pace exactly. "Grab the fish and run like hell"
- Then, two books later, this exchange takes place...
"Plan B?" Ivy said. "What is plan B?"
Jenks reddened. "Grab the fish and run like hell," he muttered, and I almost giggled.
- From The Lord of the Rings: Tom Bombadil gives Merry, Pippin, and Sam a long knife (a sword to a Hobbit) taken from the Barrow-wights. The enchantments on these knives, or at least Merry's, play a MAJOR role in saving Minas Tirith.
- Harry Potter is chock-full of these, to the point that a person reading through a second time (or even a third time) may have to stop every few chapters to say "It was there all along?!?"
- In the third book of the Knight and Rogue Series Burke, while boasting about his pack of magic hounds, mentions they're immune to the drug Aquilas. Though it got no mention in the second book, it was discussed several times in the first before the characters actually drug somebody with it.
- In the Paladin Of Shadows books:
- As the situation gets worse in Unto the Breach, various heads of state call the US President about some highly sensitive material the Keldara are holding onto from Choosers of the Slain.
- The intel expert seconded to the Keldara in A Deeper Blue is "Bambi" from Ghost.
- The Railway Series was fond of these.
- In The Eight Famous Engines, Thomas references an earlier, similar story where he ignored a "Danger" sign and fell into a mine. Percy doesn't see how that's relevant, because they're at the harbor, not a mine.
- In Duck and the Diesel Engine, the big engines think Duck is making fun of them. While making their plan, they say "He did it to us, we'll do it to him, and see how he likes it" - and in the next scene they're blocking Duck line to the sheds, just as he and Percy did in Percy the Small Engine.
- The BIONICLE books contain examples aplenty, due to their generally tight continuity and because certain characters, objects and plots had a tendency to go missing for many novels before suddenly resurfacing. One of the more famous ones is the fear displayed by Air-type characters to go left.
Live-Action TV
Music
- Marilyn Manson has a habit of doing this, although with a few of the examples, Foreshadowing is an alternative explanation.
- In the song 1996, there is the lyric "Anti the things I fucked and ate." In Arma-Goddamn-Motherfuckin-Geddon, "First you try to fuck it, then you try to eat it, and if it hasn't learned your name you better kill it before they see it."
- In Heart-Shaped Glasses, "That blue is getting me high and making me low." The next album was The High End of Low.
- In If I was Your Vampire, "6 a.m. Christmas morning. No shadows, no reflections here." Then, two albums later, there is the Grammy-nominated song No Reflection.
- In the pre-Portrait of An American Family (their first album) song Luci in the Sky With Demons, there is the lyric "I'll spread me open, stuck to my ribs, Are all your infants in abortion cribs?". This is reused completely in The Man That You Fear. In fact, this song has been called-back to multiple times, with the lyric "Cut, cut, cut" from it recreated almost identically (over fifteen years later) in I Want To Kill You Like They Do In The Movies.
- In DMX's Damien III, Damien mentions "What happened to the right hand, Light Man?", referring to DMX's line in the first Damien, "For that nigga, I would bleed, give him my right hand, now that I think about it, yo, that's my man!"
- Britney Spears does this quite nicely in the song "Stronger", where she sings, "The loneliness ain't killing me no more," a call back to "My loneliness is killing me" from her debut single "Baby One More Time."
- Bon Jovi's song "It's My Life" (1999) mentions Tommy and Gina from Living on a Prayer (1986). Both songs are similar in terms of arrangement (with the talk-box and a climatic guitar solo) and they were both huge hits for the band.
- Although it could be far-fetched, Queen could count as well:
- In terms of videos, "One Vision" begins similarly to "Bohemian Rhapsody", which itself is based on the cover of their second album; in terms of lyrics, "These Are the Days of Our Lives" (1991) ends with "I still love you" — "Love of My Life" (1975) had the lyric: "when I grow older, I will be there at your side to remind you how I still love you."
- And in "Lily of the Valley" on their third album Sheer Heart Attack, the lines: Messenger from seven seas has flown, To tell the king of Rhye he's lost his throne — a reference to the song "Seven Seas of Rhye" on their first and second albums.
- The connection goes further; Seven Seas of Rhye (as it appears on Queen II) ends that album with a crowd singing the music hall song "I Do Like to be Beside the Seaside" over the fadeout. The opening song on Sheer Heart Attack ("Brighton Rock") begins with some crowd noise, over which careful listeners may notice someone briefly whistling... "I Do Like to be Beside the Seaside".
- "Seaside Rendezvous" has "I love you madly"; "Was It All Worth It" has "we love you madly".
- "Dead On Time" mentions "Better keep yourself alive, better leave on time", a reference to the similar-sounding "Keep Yourself Alive", their first hit.
- The cover of Queen II, the opening shot of the video to "Bohemian Rhapsody", and the opening shot of the video of "One Vision" feature Queen lined up in the same shadowy, diamond-esque formation.
- Beirut's song "Cherbourg" has the same chorus as the earlier song "Nantes," only sang in a different sense, suggesting his longing for the events portrayed in the former.
- It is pretty usual for music in progressive genres and concept albums to Call Back at least once. Often, a lot.
- If examples on the same album count, Nine Inch Nails's "The Downward Spiral" uses part of the same melody from "Closer" in a very different context.
- Sting was fond of quoting his own lyrics from earlier works, both in his solo career and while part of The Police:
- "Love Is The Seventh Wave": Every ripple on the ocean / Every leaf on every tree / Every sand dune in the desert / Every breath you take from me / Every breath you take / Every move you make...
- "We'll Be Together": We'll be together tonight / If you need somebody / If you wanna keep something precious / [If You] Love Somebody [Set Them Free]...
- "Seven Days": Saturday could wait / But Sunday'd be too late / Do I have to tell the story of a thousand rainy days since we first met...
- Frank Zappa's body of work is Made of this, and he called it "Conceptual Continuity". Lampshaded by name in "Stinkfoot". On Overnite Sensation, "Camarillo Brillo" Calls back to "The Toads of the Short Forest" on Weasels Ripped my Flesh.
- The Format
- "The First Single" included the line "I hate what I've become". "Dog Problems", the title track to their next album, calls back to it with "When I said 'I hate what I've become', I lied, I hated who I was".
- Nate Ruess, former lead singer of The Format and current lead singer of fun. is arguably the callback king of modern music:
- In addition to the callback in "Dog Problems", Ruess calls back to "The First Single" (which included the line "let's cause a scene...") in fun.'s "Take Your Time (Coming Home)", referring to the breakup of The Format as "I'm through with causing a scene."
- In several fun. songs ("Take Your Time (Coming Home)", "Some Nights" and "Why Am I The One?") "the desert" and "the sun" are used to refer to Arizona and California, respectively. This is a callback to The Format's "On Your Porch".
- A callback to two songs from fun.'s debut album is present in the song "Stars", with the line "Some nights I rule the world with "Barlights" and "Pretty Girls"." The titles are even in quotations in the lyrics, so it's a pretty obvious reference. It's also probably not a coincidence that the debut had a song called "I Want To Be The One", while Some Nights had "Why Am I The One?".
- The refrain of Shiny Toy Guns' "You are the One" reprises the lyrics of Jeremy Dawson and Chad Petree's old trance production "Neo (The One)" under the name Slyder, featured in Grand Theft Auto III.
- Enter Shikari
- The song "Solidarity" of their second album Common Dreads ends with a chorus singing "and still we will be here / standing like statues", a phrase which is repeated multiple times during their debut album, Take To The Skies.
- "Havok A", also from Common Dreads, makes reference to their song Acid Nation, B-side to Jonny Sniper (also from TTTS).
- In Mariah Carey's "Fantasy", which Sampled Up Tom Tom Club's "Genius of Love", she interpolates the first verse of the original song for the bridge.
- Cascada's cover of Nik Kershaw's "Wouldn't It Be Good" reprises the verse melody of "Everytime We Touch". Also, "Runaway" is melodically a Call Back to "Bad Boy", which in turn was a Suspiciously Similar Song version of a Groove Coverage song also titled "Runaway".
- Two versions of Joshi Kashimashi Monogatari, the Morning Musume original and one of the Elder Club versions, contain references to the song Koi no Dance Site, also by Morning Musume during the part sung about or by Yaguchi Mari.
- The Beatles
- They liked this trope a lot. "I Am The Walrus" references "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds", and "Glass Onion" references "Strawberry Fields", "I Am The Walrus", "The Fool on the Hill", and "Lady Madonna".
- Later, on the "Abbey Road Medley", certain parts of "You Never Give Me Your Money" resemble the "Here Comes the Sun" melody, and "Carry that Weight" has a verse straight out of "You Never Give Me Your Money".
- And directly inspired by "Glass Onion", Veruca Salt's "Volcano Girls" references their first hit "Seether":
Well here's another clue if you please,
The seether's Louise.
- "We love you, yeeeeeah, yeah, yeah!" in "All You Need Is Love".
- The promo of their Hello Goodbye" video show the group wearing their old matching suits from 1963, waving at the camera, and their "Sgt. Pepper" clothing in the main performance clips.
- John's son Julian Lennon used the intro of "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" as the outro to his own song "Lucy".
- Future Perfect's "Solitary Star" refers back to "Queen of the Dance Floor", a previous song on the same album with the lines "You wanted your life to be queen of the dance floor, now all you want is the life from before", and "diamonds and bling that are losing their gleam".
- Dropkick Murphys have a couple on the title track to Going Out In Style. The narrator mentions apologizing to Slugger and the Flannigans, presumably Slugger O'Toole (mentioned later in the album's cover of "The Irish Rover"), and Flannigans presumably being the hosts of "Flannigan's Ball" on their earlier album, The Meanest of Times. The Flannigans one is particularly evocative, as the second half of "Flannigan's Ball" details the general havoc and destruction after a few too many people have a few too many drinks at the titular party.
- The title of Adele's "Set Fire to the Rain" recalls the paper cityscape being set on fire by pyrotechnics in the video to "Rolling in the Deep".
- Devin Townsend loves this so much fans actually whipped up a chart with about every Call Back they could think of. And it's still missing a few.
- Sound Horizon songs often feature Call Backs to previous songs and albums, usually cued as such by the use of a Recurring Riff or line.
- Mindless Self Indulgence references an old song Panty Shot in their later song I Hate Jimmy Page"
"Who like that song five year-old panty shot / Yeah, yeah, that could be a real big record / Cause it got the bump with the molestation"
- Though the Gaelic Storm song "Don't Let the Truth Get in the Way (of a Good Story)" is a long string of completely implausible fish tales, there's a noticeable Beat after the line "I was in some blockbuster movie and I didn't make a dime."
- Tom Waits' "Army Ants" makes reference to a line in his earlier song "Earth Died Screaming": "And as we discussed last semester, the army ants will leave nothing but your bones"
- Towards the end of Ministry's "Ghoul Diggers", Al Jourgensen starts singing the first few lines of The Doors' "Roadhouse Blues" — this is both because Jim Morrison was mentioned earlier in the song and because Ministry covered that particular song in full on their previous studio album.
- Emilie Autumn's gone out of her way to make sure Opheliac and Fight Like A Girl are two related concept albums.
- The middle eight of "Fight Like a Girl" is the same melody as the middle eight of "Misery Loves Company", albeit with different lyrics.
- "Goodnight, Sweet Ladies" samples "4 O'Clock", "The Art of Suicide" and "If I Burn".
- "Gaslight" calls back "Art Of Suicide" in its opening notes.
- "I Don't Understand" refers to the "Opheliac" theme of the prior album.
- "If I Burn" has a chant at the end which is the same style as "Let The Record Show" chant on "Opheliac"
- "4 O clock Reprise" refers explicitly to a song which came out before Fight Like A Girl.
- The various call backs within Fight Like A Girl Album. (What Will I Remember-Start Another Story, Gaslight-Gaslight reprise)
- "Take The Pill" reminds many listeners of "Liar."
- Judas Priest included so many of these on their 2005 "comeback" album Angel of Retribution that the whole thing almost became Continuity Porn.
Pro Wrestling
- Melina Perez faced Michelle McCool at Night of Champions 2009 and Michelle dropkicked her off the apron while she was doing the splits as part of her entrance. They faced each other again at the next Night of Champions event and Michelle tried to do the same thing again. This time however, Melina was ready for her and lifted herself out of the way.
- When Trish Stratus guest hosted Raw she was involved in an awkward backstage segment with Chris Jericho where he mentioned their history together and led to Stratus having a return match against him that night.
- A similar segment happened with Lita and Kane at the Raw 15th Anniversary where they had an awkward conversation backstage (before Ron Simmons came in to say "Damn!"). They had been in a lengthy storyline where Lita had Kane's baby and married him.
- In Vickie Guerrero's match at Wrestle Mania 26 she went to the top rope and performed a Frog Splash as a tribute to her late husband Eddie Guerrero (she had been introduced on WWE TV during Eddie's feud with Rey Mysterio) and danced like he used to in his victory poses.
- Santino Marella started a romance angle with WWE diva Tamina which was quite similar to his pairing with Beth Phoenix. On a Christmas episode of Smackdown Santino cornered Beth under the mistletoe and suggested they kiss for old time's sake. She kissed his tag team partner Vladimir Kozlov instead.
- The basis for Matt Hardy's heel turn after he was drafted to Raw in 2003 was him turning on Lita whom he had been in a relationship with about a year ago before her neck injury.
Roleplay
- One infamous scene in Dino Attack RPG was intended to be a Call Back to an earlier, rather strange moment from the LEGO Island arc. The incident in question involved Zenna and an unnamed doctor attempting surgery on Kate (who had taken a bullet through the neck). For the Call Back, this was handled more realistically, when a stressed Pierce attempted to perform CPR on Amanda's corpse only for Shaw to point she was already dead. Unfortunately, this scene had to be retconned into Canon Discontinuity because for whatever reason Atton Rand failed to realize she wasn't in a position for her body to be recovered at the time.
Tabletop Games
- Geist: The Sin-Eaters has an "Fetter" Memento (a magic item made by binding a ghost to its own anchor) called the Thirty-Thirty. This is a rifle once owned by a man named Donnie Pritchard, who once tried to sacrifice several people to a ghost town he was convinced was haunted by the ghost of its past. (Pritchard's captives overpowered him and beat him to death with the rifle.) Donnie Pritchard was a character in the New World of Darkness book Ghost Stories, in the story "Dust to Dust", about a literal ghost town.
Theater
- Roy Cohn's first line in Angels in America ("I wish I was an octopus, a fucking octopus") is referenced in his final line before dying.
- The Man in Chair in The Drowsy Chaperone mentions at the very beginning that he is feeling "blue." At the end of the show, he is emotionally drained, and he mentions that it's not a perfect show, but it gives you a tune to hum "for when you're feeling blue."
Video Games
- Alice Madness Returns is full of Call Backs to American Mc Gees Alice — odd lines from various characters, a few riddles, and some statues and depictions. If you haven't played the first game, they won't bother you, but if you have, they're beautiful familiarity.
- Marathon Infinity: Blood Tides of L'howon
- The first level has a half-open door that leads to the end of the level, a small shaft that one must drop down, a mysterious locked door behind the player, an alien ship out the window, compilers operating terminals, a hidden stash of weapons through a door textured like a wall which is near ranged Fighters, and overall darkness and eerie-ness. All of these are also present in the first level of the first game. The whole thing is pretty creepy.
- And then there's the Vidmaster Challenge levels, which are the hardest level (at least in Bungie's opinion) from each game, with added enemies that you never see anywhere else in the game, such as red vacuum suit-clad Simulacrums and Super-Hunters for double the fun!
- Towards the end of the first Mega Man Star Force game, after the Z-wave incident at AMAKEN, Tom Dubius aka Cygnus Wing mentions the incident that involved him near the beginning of the game if you talk to him.
- And in Mega Man Battle Network 6: Cybeast Gregar, the titular Eldritch Abomination Final Boss, has a completely similar origin to Gospel, the Final Boss of Battle Network 2.
- Used in the Final Battle of Mega Man Zero 3: Omega's final form uses moves from the boss fights with Zero in X2 and X5.
- Another call back is the very location of the fight: the abandoned laboratory, destroyed in a mission in the first game, that Zero woke up in at the series' beginning.
- Mega Man X 5 has the return of one of the Castle Bosses from X1, complete with a remixed version of the BGM for it. It also has a recreation of Quick Man's stage from Mega Man 2.
- The Yellow Devil from the first Mega Man game reappears as a boss in numerous other forms and concepts in the Classic, X, and Zero series.
- 9 ends with Mega pointing out all of Dr. Wily's past failures with a holographic slide show in which Dr. Wily is shown to be kneeling for forgiveness over and over and over again.
- One of Ryu's win quotes in Capcom Vs SNK Millenium Fight 2000 is "What strength! I will remember there are guys like you all over the world!" Whenever you beat an opponent in the original Street Fighter, they gave you that line (but with "But remember" instead of "I will").
- Metal Gear
- Big Boss's first lines in Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots are a word-for-word Call Back to a similar scene in Metal Gear.
- The series is full of them, really. For example, the members of the Beauty and the Beast Unit act as Call Backs to previous bosses in the series. Another example; Laughing Octopus takes her name from Decoy Octopus from the first Metal Gear Solid, wields a P-90 machine gun and prehensile tentacles just like Solidus Snake in MGS2, and bears the emotion of the Joy, the codename of one boss from Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. Raging Raven takes her name from Vulcan Raven, wields the weapons of Fatman, and has the emotion of The Fury. Crying Wolf's name comes from Sniper Wolf, she wields Fortune's rail-gun, and has the emotion of The Sorrow, and she is fought in the exact same snowfield at Shadow Moses as Sniper Wolf and uses similar tactics. Screaming Mantis comes from Psycho Mantis, she uses Vamp's knives, and she has the emotion of The Fear, as well as using similar tactics to Psycho Mantis.
- In the opening sequence of The World Ends With You, we see Beat skateboarding away from a Noise while carrying Rhyme. The same occurs just before the end boss fight in a Big Damn Heroes moment, only with Shiki instead of Rhyme.
- In Dragon Age II, assuming Leliana and the Warden had a threesome with Isabela in the first game, Leliana reacts with embarrassment to meeting Isabela again, prompting Varric to snark "Is there anyone in the Free Marches you haven't slept with?"
Merrill:Do your stories ever have griffons in them...heroic griffins? The sort that swoop in and save the day?
Varric: Daisy, haven't you heard? Swooping is bad.
- Kingdom Hearts
- In Kingdom Hearts 358 Days Over 2, the fight with Xion is full of these. The first stage is Sora's Valor Form with the Sonic Blade and Slide Dash attacks. The second stage is Wisdom Form with Ragnarok and Vortex. The third is Master Form with Ars Arcanum, Vortex, and Kurt Zisa's swords. The fourth stage is Final Form, with Trinity Limit, Vortex, Thundaga, and Graviga. All four forms use Sora's original three hit combo.
- In Kingdom Hearts II, all of Genie's Limit attacks except Infinity are named after Sora's MP-consuming special attacks from the original Kingdom Hearts: Strike, Sonic, and Arcana.
- Kingdom Hearts 3D is full of these:
- Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story makes reference to Bowser's Castle's ability to fly from Paper Mario.
- There are also references to Partners in Time.
- The Phantasy Star series often makes references to things that happened in the previous games — the exception is Phantasy Star III, which appears to have almost nothing to do with the rest of the series until the end, and has only one reference in an optional dungeon in the fourth game.
- One of the NOD missions in Command & Conquer: Tiberium Sun features your armies uncovering an old NOD base that's been left over from the first game. When you reach it, you'll find that the buildings look exactly the same as the structure design from Tiberium Dawn.
- JoJo's Bizarre Adventure - Ogon no Kaze (based on the fifth series of the manga) has you playing as Polnareff at one point. The music is a fully orchestrated version of... his music from the arcade fighting game based on the third series.
- Starcraft II in a fairly literal way: a major Plot Point is the discovery of a recording of some of the mission briefings from the first game (specifically New Gettysburg and a crucial line from The Hammer Falls).
- Duke Nukem Forever: You can sign "Why I'm So Great," Duke's autobiography first mentioned in Duke Nukem II.
- One of the last levels of Ninja Gaiden (the Xbox360 / PS3 game) is a recreation of the first level from the previous Xbox/ PS3 Ninja Gaiden.
- Chrono Cross features several Call Backs to Chrono Trigger, in particular the Dead Sea area and a portion of the game in which the player character is transported to Lucca's house.
- The Legend of Zelda series has had an increasingly large number in recent entries.
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- At the beginning of Half-Life 2 Barney mentions the beer he owes Gordon Freeman referencing the first Half-Life game.
- Upon Augustus "Cole Train" Cole's introduction in Gears of War, Marcus mentions that Dom still owes him $20 from a bet on a game Cole played in. At the beginning of Gears of War 3, the $20 is laying on Marcus' desk, with a note from Dom apologizing for it being late. Worth noting is that the only government capable of honoring the bill's worth has collapsed in the meantime.
- Elizabeth's story campaign in Persona 4 Arena is deeply tied to the events of The Answer from Persona3: she thrusts herself into the events of the P-1 Grand Prix in search of power that would allow her to defeat Erebus permanently, so that the soul of the young man who sacrificed himself to save humanity (the player character from Persona3) could be saved.
- In the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare series, there are several:
- The long-term call back related to Price's handgun. In MW1, the gun is slid over to Soap by Price in order to finally kill Big Bad Imran Zakhaev. Soap keeps the gun, and in the second game, gives it back to Price when they meet again at the Russian gulag, with Soap remarking, "This belongs to you, sir.". In the third game, Price "gives" the gun back by placing it on Soap's body after he's died, before having to escape.
- In the third game, Price places a call into the SAS in order to get clearance to contact the U.S. Delta Force unit led by Sandman. The operative who gives the clearance is only referred to as "Mac", and Price references the person "owing me for Pripyat". This is a reference to "One Shot, One Kill" from the first game - the operative is none other than (the retired) Captain MacMillan.
- "Contingency" from MW2 is one long reference to "All Ghillied Up", with Price making several remarks referencing that mission, and Soap commenting that he "hates dogs".
- The second game's final level is one huge homage to the first game's final level. Both have "game" in the title ("Game Over" and "Endgame"), both involve a vehicular chase (in the first, the player is being chased in a truck; in the second, the player is doing the chasing in a boat); both involve said vehicle being destroyed and the player (Soap in both levels) being wounded, and then even more badly injured; and both involve Soap desperately using an emergency weapon (pistol in the first, knife in the second) to kill the Big Bad before he kills Price. In addition, all three games have a vehicle crashing just before the final confrontation (a truck, a Zodiac and a helicopter, in that order) and the second and third games have a character being saved just before they're shot (Price saving Soap in the second game, Yuri saving Price in the third).
- The mid-boss in Child of Eden's fourth stage is a pair of planetary bodies that evolve into running men, like the fourth boss of {Video Game/{Rez}}, its spiritual predecessor.
- Mass Effect:
- In Mass Effect 1, Shepard will receive different side-quests depending on the background the player chose for him/her, referencing the off-screen events of that background.
- Thanks to the Old Save Bonus, many of the emails in Mass Effect 2 and War Assets in Mass Effect 3 are references to quests and conversations from previous games.
- In Mass Effect 3, the quote "My name is Garrus Vakarian and this is now my favorite spot on the Citadel!" is one of the many call-backs to the many memetic (both out- and in-universe) lines from the second game.
- Quake has the Well of Wishes in the Crypt of Decay, where you find the Dopefish from Commander Keen.
- Dark Souls is littered with CallBacks / MythologyGags to the game's spiritual precursor, Demon's Souls.
- In The Neverhood, after Klaymen tricks the weasel into eating TNT, one of its arms lands next to Willie Trombone, who eagerly whips out a knife and fork. At the end of Skullmonkeys, Willie has the same reaction when a piece of Evil Engine No. 9 lands next to him.
- In Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance there is an info conversation in which Ike and Soren bond over both choosing not to burden themselves with unnecessary items. In the sequel Radiant Dawn, if Ike takes Soren with him then Soren's ending plaque makes note that he "lightly packed" before leaving.
Visual Novel
- Frequently used between Narcissu and its prequel, Narcissu ~ side 2nd
- Setsumi's last words from the original game are identical to the last thing Himeko said to Setsumi in Side 2nd
- Atou's last question for Setsumi in the original note "Do you want me to stop you, this time? Or do you want me to give you a push off?" is echoed in Setsumi's narration towards the end of side 2nd
- There are several phrases that reoccur in the narration of Side 2nd
- Happens a lot in the Ace Attorney series, particularly Investigations.
- One of the more serious ones is the dream Phoenix has during 2-4, which is exactly the same as the one he had at the beginning of 2-1, but it makes much more sense in the context of Phoenix having to defend an obviously guilty man to rescue Maya.
- The FAQ for I Wanna Be The Guy claims it's a ROM Hack of Battletoads, and when the sequel was made, the same FAQ claimed it was a ROM Hack of Cheetahmen.
Web Animation
- Practically every good joke in Red vs. Blue eventually gets a Call Back.
- The longest gap between joke and Call Back - which would probably be a Brick Joke if not for the Memetic Mutation of the quote — was Simmons' observation in the first episode that "Even if we pull out today, and they come and take our base, they would have two bases in the middle of a box canyon. Whoopdee-fucking-doo." In episode ninety-five, when the Blues take over the Red Base:
Church: I guess we have... two bases in the middle of a box canyon now.
Tucker: Whoopdee-fucking-doo.
- Recently been surpassed by Sarge's epic Rousing Speech in "Revelations 18" starting with the first line in the series, "Do you ever wonder why we're here?"
- And now in "Revelations 20", "Can you settle a bet? Does that look like a big cat to you?
- One of the episodes in Season 10 gives us yet another one, as well as a bit of Self-Deprecation.
Tucker: Whose turn is it this time?
Grif: It's Simmons' turn.
Simmons: *sigh* Fine. I would just like to know that I suck, and that I'm a girl...
Grif (to Donut): You know, these were a lot funnier the first time we did them.
- Zero Punctuation: Yahtzee's review of the iPhone game Fruit Ninja, whose developers are based in the same city as he is, featured a call-back to his subtle recommendation of Gametraders Robina in his Super Smash Bros Brawl review.
- Much to his dismay, Koden's party from the first episode of DSBT Insani T is references a few times.
- Ultra Fast Pony turns these into an off-screen subplot. In "Out with the Old Characters", Applebloom kidnaps Princess Luna to finance the Cutie Mark Crusaders' new treehouse. In "Rocks Clocks, and Two Stupid Ponies", Celestia shows up at the Running Of The Leaves because she's "pretending to care" about Luna's kidnapping. (This is accompanied by the subtitle "Epic continuity!") In "Ponynet Fight!" the day lasts for much longer than 24 hours, because Luna isn't there to raise the moon (and Celestia forgot). Finally, in "Gelatin Swingsets", Celestia pays the ransom, and the CMC build their treehouse.
Web Comics
- In this strip of Holiday Wars, Labor Day makes a reference to some sort event that happened ten years ago in Venice. It's the first time in the webcomic that really hints that there is a large history between all the main characters.
- Concerned has a lot of these. In one strip Frohman find out he can use the force (that's what he said, not me) to pick stuff up. For most of the rest of the comic, whenever he holds something it floats in front of him.
- 8-Bit Theater
- One of Brian Clevinger's related blog posts read this: Anyone confused by today's comic needs a history lesson. Also counts as Foreshadowing...
- More recently, the aptly titled strip "Longest set up in webcomic history" has a Call Back to a throwaway line over 1200 pages ago.
- Sluggy Freelance: Sept 26 1997 and Sept 15 2011, 4738 days later Bun-bun and Zoe are in the same spot they first met with the same dialog. Also a rare Pet the Dog moment for Bun-bun
- El Goonish Shive
- The Order of the Stick
- At one point, Belkar suggests selling a captured female antagonist into slavery because he "knows a guy who knows a guy". Several plot-arcs later, the party runs into said guy-his-guy-knew, Buggy Lou, as he's out catching slaves in the desert.
- V's raven familiar fails to recognize her/him when s/he is transformed into a lizard. 536 strips later, he learns of his mistake.
- It's Walky! celebrated its tenth anniversary (and the birth of a new character) with a Call Back to its first two strips.
- Girl Genius: Agatha and Von Zinzer meeting each other. And again.
- Homestuck is absolutely loaded with Call Backs, from the phrasing of words to reused art panels.
- Andrew Hussie discusses it here.
- According to Doc Scratch, Call Backs are a rule of Paradox Space.
- And Caliborn hates the frequent Call Backs and gets pissed off when Dirk notices that he's repeating phrases that other characters have used, which is a sort of meta-commentary on readers who find this practice irritating.
- Bittersweet Candy Bowl, This most definitely shows Justin remembers David.
- A Wapsi Square strip from December 2009 featured a reference to the dialogue in the very first strip back in 2001.
- In 5 Color Control, Vlad and Dave's match in the Pro Tour intentionally mirrors their earlier games from earlier comics.
- In General Protection Fault, after Trent sues Fred for libel, Fooker proposes breaking into his house again, like they did to clear Trudy's name. Nick, however, refuses and points out that it comes off in a new light now that they know he's a secret agent. The "To Thine Own Self" arc is based around a universe in which an alternate universe's Nick and Ki enacted a scheme their prime counterparts dreamed about in a brief arc in the early comic and took over the world.
- The most recent, and furthest one in The Adventures of Dr. McNinja: The McNinja Burger is back! Complete with Flat "What.".
- This strip of minus mentions several previous one-off gags.
- Bob and George: Overlooking all the Running Gags, in an early strip Bob agrees to a suicidal plan with the phrase "Sure, why not, I was tired of living anyway." Fast-forward several years, and Alternate Mega Man and Bass cheerfully use the exact same justification for an equally suicidal plan. (Naturally, this being Bob and George, certain death...isn't as certain as you'd expect.)
Web Original
- In The Gamers Alliance, various story arcs feature quite a few Call Backs to previous storylines. For example, Leon recognizes the lich Drishnek whom he met several years earlier during another plot, and Ax references Refan's attempted rape during their second encounter.
- Lots in Echo Chamber, the TV Tropes original webshow.
- In Episode 4, Tom tells Dana that all he has to offer her to eat is rice, but she can "add salt" if she's "feeling adventurous". Then, in Episode 6, Tom is depicted making rice. Dana has a plate in front of her, but she conspicuously does not help herself to any.
- The eighth episode's Girl of the Week, Porn Girl, first appeared briefly in Terrible Interviewees Montage, an episode which also set up the character of Shannon, who had her day in the limelight in Episode 6.
- A literal call back in Episode 5, which features a Moment Killer phone call. Episode 6 implies that this phone call was from Shannon.
- lonelygirl15 features multiple Call Backs to earlier points in the series, particularly towards the end of the third season, where details such as a broken clock seen in the background of a season 1 video suddenly became relevant to the plot.
- I Am Not Infected has Amanda repeating the phrase "I can't hear you through the door" to Hartley, who had originally told this to Handcuff Guy. Who could hear him perfectly.
- The Angry Video Game Nerd
- Used in his review of Winter Games for the NES. When complaining about the unresponsiveness of the controls during the figure skating segment, he states "I wonder who programmed this...maybe it was Fred Fuchs...". Fuchs is the name of one of the producers of the film version of Bram Stoker's Dracula, and whom the Nerd referenced in a review of that game after seeing his name in the credits.
- In his review of Dark Castle for the Sega Genesis and CD-i, he ends by saying that the game "fucks you harder than life itself", recalling a quote (in German) of a fan summary of Deadly Towers.
- The Nostalgia Chick's "NChick Labs" segment is full of these, referencing the Makeover Fairy, the scientists, Lord MacGuffin (and the confusion about MacGuffins) and rapping about rape.
- Two Best Friends Play has a couple of Call Backs. Usually they are in the form of Pat making Matt play something because Matt made Pat play something earlier.
- Whenever something is repeated in Regular Ordinary Swedish Meal Time, the last videos where they appeared are put on top of the current one.
- Tobuscus followed up his immensely popular Literal Trailer of Assassins Creed Brotherhood with one for Assassins Creed Revelations. At the end, he reuses two lines ("Nod at the bird and PEOPLE DIE / Everywhere PEOPLE DIE.") in an Ironic Echo fashion, transitioning from the awesome action scene in the first trailer to Ezio's poignant, apparently hopeless plight in the second.
- Cheap Arse Film Review has one in the Christmas Special:
Ghost: Who makes important life decisions while wearing an animal costume? Cheapus: (looks uncomfortable) ...
Western Animation
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