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Mythology Gag / Anime & Manga
aka: Anime

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Whether it's 1968 or 2023, silhouetted secret-identity surprises are superb.

Anime with their own pages:

Other examples:

  • Agni's Philosophy: Several to the Final Fantasy series:
    • The main character's name is Agni, meaning "fire". It's a common trend in the series for protagonists to have names that correspond to natural forces or phenomena.
    • Summon magic in general, and a dragon summon in particular. It may even be Bahamut. Its design, which features in colorful scarves and beads, may also be a reference to Yoshitaka Amano's Signature Style.
    • A red mage.
    • A healing potion makes an appearance, and is shown in a Coke-shaped bottle, which may be a simple example of Bland-Name Product or a reference to Final Fantasy's various cross-promotions with Coca-Cola.
  • The ending of the Nakata arc in Amagami SS has the girl in question wearing a penguin suit with a smaller penguin attached to it. The scene could be considered this if you take into account her ending in the game where she gets pregnant.
  • Assassination Classroom: In Chapter 178, one of Koro-sensei's pieces of advice to Fuwa that he wrote in her personalized guidebook is for her to write a spinoff story where he's a demon king. This alludes to the spinoff Koro-Sensei Quest!, which debuted a year prior to the chapter's release.
  • Attack on Titan: Hitch bashes Jean over the head when she first meets him just like she does in the official High School AU, a Lighter and Softer parody of the main series.
  • In City Hunter, the cafe run by Umibozu and Miki is named Cat's Eye. Later perfected when Kasumi Aso, a Phantom Thief, left home and started living and working at the Cat's Eye (Miki hung a lampshade on this).
  • Code Geass:
    • During the first School Festival episode, a student is shown wearing a suit that looks to be halfway between the Lancelot and a Super Sentai costume; this is a nod to Suzaku of the Counterattack, an alternate reality manga, in which the Lancelot is a Kamen Rider-like powersuit rather than a Humongous Mecha. The author's notes for one chapter of Suzaku of the Counterattack even point this out.
    • In the Lost Colors Visual Novel, there's a scene where Nunnally fantasizes about being a super-heroine with her own Knightmare Frame; what she describes is the Mark Nemo, the machine she pilots in the Alternate Universe manga Nightmare of Nunnally, complete with a picture of it in the background. Lost Colors also contains a nod to the Nintendo DS RPG by showing primary villains Castor and Pollux on a computer screen.
    • In Nightmare of Nunally, when Nunally has a vision of alternate realities, that character saw the events from canon Code Geass, including Euphemia massacring the Japanese, Suzaku facing off with Lelouch and Lelouch dying.
  • Cyberpunk: Edgerunners:
    • The Edgerunners name is a reference to Edgerunners Inc. sourcebook for Cyberpunk 2020 game books.
    • The lines David's shaved into his undercut are very reminiscent of the look female!V has in the Cyberpunk 2077 Gameplay trailer from 2018
    • All the English episode titles are named after songs, similar to how all the story and side missions in Cyberpunk 2077 from Act 2 onwards are named after songs.
    • The HUD that is shown for multiple characters is typically ripped straight from the game. Phone calls, the GPS screen, and security camera footage in particular are almost 1-to-1 recreations of similar situations in the game.
    • Lucy's hacking is represented by the Breach Protocol minigame that one would need to perform in the video game.
  • The new pilots in Dancougar Nova repeatedly use variations on Shinobu's catchphrase "Yatte yaruze!" from the original Dancougar and even fight to be the one who gets to say it first. Finally, near the end of the series, a character played by Shinobu's actor arrives to say the real thing.
  • The Death Note movies have a couple of these, like Takada specifying Matsuda's death to be suicide by jumping off a building (in the original series, it was a ploy by L to fake Matsuda's death), and L using almost the exact same words Near used to counter Light's Motive Rant.
  • Several throughout the Digimon series:
    • Digimon Frontier frequently has partner Digimon from previous series in cameo roles. Specific ones include Wizardmon and Gatomon attending a fair together, as they were friends in Digimon Adventure and the kids stopping to ask Takato and Guilmon's Biomerge form, Gallantmon, for help. The dub gave Gallantmon a single line of dialogue ("Wish we could help.") just to have Brian Beacock and Steve Blum reprise the role.
    • In Digimon Data Squad, not only is Marcus' partner Agumon, but when Marcus has to bring him home, he hides him in a box, just like Takato and Guilmon in Digimon Tamers. For bonus points, the dub cast Takato's voice actor, Brian Beacock, as Agumon.
    • Later on, when Marcus first sees Agumon in his previous form, Koromon immediately latches on and hugs his face, just like Tai and Kari's Koromon did in the first Digimon movie.
    • In Digimon Adventure tri., Taichi's mom uses the same nickname for Agumon as Masaru's mom. Taichi also has a book titled "One Vision," the Matrix evolution theme song from Tamers.
  • In the Majin Buu saga of Dragon Ball Z, when Goku is explaining Super Saiyan forms to Majin Buu, a confused Buu replies "Super . . . Saiya-jin?" "Saiya-jin" is the Japanese equivalent of "Saiyan". It also references the fandom war over the "proper" word, even though they both mean the same thing.
  • El Cazador de la Bruja:
    • Ellis picks up a fork and says it's a weapon. In Bee Train's previous Girls with Guns series, Noir, Kirika killed Chloe with a fork.
    • A subtle nod would be the red shoes. In Noir, Kirika usually wears a pair of red/pink shoes. In Madlax (the second installment of the GWG trilogy), Vanessa buys a pair of red shoes for Margaret, which somehow triggers the latter's repressed memories, kicking off the main plot. In El Cazador, a pair of red shoes appears in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it camera shot inside Illis Gonzalez' home. Now, the real kicker is that all three of them (Kirika, Margaret, and Illis) are voiced by Houko Kuwashima, so there's no way it wasn't on purpose.
  • Fairy Tail: This is not the first time Hiro Mashima introduced Etherion.
    • Jellal looking exactly like Sieg Hart is another one of these. Some early chapters have further character callbacks to Rave Master, such as Elie and Julia being visible in a crowd.
    • One chapter cover has Natsu and Lucy dressed as Haru and Elie.
    • Gray's necklace is the First Rave.
  • At one point in the English dub of the Fruits Basket remake, Tohru appears to be humming the first ending theme to the original 2001 series.
  • Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood: A blink-and-you'll-miss-it example to the first anime. The third opening shows Fuhrer King Bradley aka Wrath right as the word "Pride" is sung in Gratuitous English. Take a guess who he was in the first anime.
    • More significantly, Episode 58 features a cameo of an old woman who looks identical to Dante, Izumi's mentor in the first anime and also the main villain.
    • The outfit and briefcase Ed has at the end of the manga/second anime when he's leaving and does his Wacky Marriage Proposal? Almost exactly the same as what he had in the Conqueror of Shamballa movie.
    • The Sacred Star of Milos's art style resembles the 2003 anime way more than it does the Brotherhood it shares a continuity with. Edward's facial structure is even back to its more slender shape and Winry looks like a mixture of the styles (2003 design but the full colored eyes of Brotherhood and the manga).
  • Gundam in general does this quite frequently. Due to the sheer number of entries in the franchise, it's virtually impossible not to make a reference, even by mistake. And this isn't even taking Continuity Nod into account for the Universal Century entries.
    • The last few episodes of G Gundam feature cameos from past Gundam series, at least one super robot from a non-Gundam series, and the Wing Gundam from the then-unaired (it began after G ended) Gundam Wing.
    • Gundam Wing has blink-and-you'll-miss-it references in Sandrock's blueprints to "Gundarium Theta" and "ALICE System", the latter an AI from Gundam Sentinel.
    • Relena Peacecraft/Darlian and Setsuna F. Seiei were both born on April 7th—the day Mobile Suit Gundam debuted on Japanese television in 1979. It holds extra meaning for Relena, since Wing debuted on April 7, 1995.
    • In Gundam SEED, Lacus draws a ∀ Gundam-style mustache on her dark-blue Haro.
    • Gundam 00 casts the ever-heroic Tōru Furuya, the man behind Amuro Ray himself, as Ribbons Almark, the main antagonist. Throw in the fact that he also piloted 0 Gundam which is basically RX-78 with a different shield and a GN Drive. Late in the series the 0 Gundam is upgraded, which includes being painted in the classic Gundam tricolor, and Ribbons appropriates it when his state-of-the-art Reborns Gundam is crippled. The Movie takes it a step further by revealing that Ribbons' genetic template was a man named E.A. Ray (Ensign Amuro Ray).
      • Gundam 00 also has the Trans-Am System, which triples the offense, defense and speed of a Gundam while causing it to turn red.
      • Graham Aker, in the second season, wears a mask, and his Ahead Sakigake is automatically red. when he later gets the Masurao, it is black with red lines on the frame, and the Trans-Am System to make it all red. Both his Masurao and Susanowo are shown to be 3 times faster than any other MS when they deploy for the first time, except for the 00 Raiser, of course.
    • In the first season of SD Gundam Force, the Dark Axis Big Bad is a Commander Sazabi. Before he actually makes his appearance, however, he sends his right-hand-man Zako Red (a Char Custom Red Zaku) to serve as his herald. When Sazabi finally arrives, Red goes to meet him, only to mysteriously deactivate and get shoved out of the way by his boss. The likely explanation is that Red was just a remote control avatar for Sazabi, a reference to the fact that in the Universal Century, both suits were piloted by Char. The Zaku first, and then Sazabi in Char's Counterattack.
    • In ∀ Gundam, when the Moonrace comes experiences lightning for the first time, the production staff reused exact dialogue from the original Gundam show, when White Base tried to hide from Ramba Ral inside a thunder cloud.
      • The melody used in "Turn A Turn" is a backmasked version of the original opening's melody, slowed down a bit, yet not at all improved in sound quality.
      • The people of Adeska call the Turn A "the White Devil". This is a reference to the original Gundam as well.
    • And then there's Turn-A's whole Dark History thing, which is pretty much nothing BUT this.
      • When the characters learn of the Dark History, they see footage from all previous Gundam shows, including a scene where the RX-78-2 Gundam impales a Zaku II with a Beam Saber. Sochie lampshades this by asking if it isn't the White Doll attacking a Borjarnon (which are Zaku IIs (or replicas thereof) that were uncovered and renamed). Someone then points out that the Gundam looks a bit different.
      • Among the clips shown in the Dark History part, there a clip from the battle 15 years prior to After War Gundam X.
    • The Core Block System. Seriously. It is a staple in Gundam shows. RX-78 Gundam introduced it, after which every major Gundam show (Counting SEED and SEED Destiny as one) except for Wing, Gundam X and 00 have had at least one Modular Mobile Suit. In order of appearance: Gundam, Guncannon and Guntank, ZZ, V and V2, (Crossbone) X-01, X-02, X-03, Shining Gundam, God Gundam, Turn A, Impulse. And that's just the major series, not including the more than 30 sidestories.
    • Char Clones. No Gundam without Char clones. Except for the first show, Z, and Char's Counterattack where there's no Char clone as it's the real thing (albeit, in Z, he goes by the name Quattro Bajeena (sometimes mistranslated as Quattro Vagina).
    • Gundam AGE has these in spades. The characters in AGE look suspiciously similar others from other Gundam shows, such as Yurin resembling Tiffa and Woolf resembling Loran. Moreover, in episode 13, Geera Zoi of the UE calls the Diva a Trojan Horse after seeing it transform into a White Base lookalike.
  • References to the Final Fantasy games are everywhere in Final Fantasy: Lost Stranger, something that Shogo, a Final Fantasy Otaku, is quick to bring up.
    • Shogo is excited to see M'qote and Lalafell from Final Fantasy XIV walking around Nylpo, though he's shocked to learn that they have different names in this world: Catters and Mahlwohns.
    • Sharuru's surname is one of the possible names automatically generated for the Warriors of Light in in the first game.
    • Shogo speculates about all the possible Final Fantasy-related reasons they could have ended up in this world: Falling into a Voidgate, touching a Gran Grimoire, or just plain summoning. Though he ultimately nixes all of these possibilities.
    • Sara, the crown princess of the magic kingdom of Mysidia, shares her name with the original princess the Warriors of Light set out to save from Garland in the very first Final Fantasy game.
    • As noted by Shogo, Count Borghen shares his name with a minor antagonist of Final Fantasy II, possessing the same pompous personality and greediness.
  • Great Teacher Onizuka:
    • In an omake for Volume 12, Onizuka is asking Urumi if he or Sorimachi is better-looking. Sorimachi is the actor who played Onizuka in the live-action TV adaptation of GTO.
    • In a later chapter, he tells a Hospital Hottie that she looks like Nanako Matsushima, who played Azusa.
    • In 14 Days in Shonan, while pulling a …But He Sounds Handsome, Onizuka describes himself as looking just like Sorimachi.
    • Azusa dressing up as a Stringy-Haired Ghost Girl may be a reference to Nanako Matsushima starring in The Ring (though she didn't play Sadako). Coincidentally, her second live-action actress, Miori Takimoto, also starred in a Ring film (Sadako 3D 2), though after starring in GTO.
  • The openings of Hidamari Sketch anime (at least x365's) make reference to scenes in the manga that never make it into the anime, such as Yuno's yonkoma-robot and camouflage Santa. They even put in some frames that had just went to the press at that time. See also Bait-and-Switch Credits.
  • His Coool Seha Girls features gags for each of the eponymous girls based on the consoles they anthropomorphize:
  • How I Became a Pokémon Card has a chapter with a young Giovanni and how he met his Persian. He mainly just has a Persian in the anime. The last scene in that chapter also resembles Giovanni waiting for Red to battle him from Pokémon Red and Blue, right down to the shadowed boy resembling Red.
  • The Idolmaster: In the Show Within a Show Mujiin Gattai Kisaragi, the girls pilot giant robots. The anime Idolmaster: Xenoglossia used that exact same premise.
  • JoJo's Bizarre Adventure:
  • In the 2009 TV special of Kimba the White Lion, Kenichi sees a flock of birds that's very similar to the one in the Japanese opening of the anime.
  • The 2006 Kujibiki♡Unbalance series references its past incarnation by bringing back old elements in new forms. The first Renko's tall and short Dumb Muscle reappear in the form of robots the new Renko creatures. The aliens from the first series' recap episode reappear as friendly aliens piloting a Mobile-Suit Human.
  • Being a franchise that runs on Negative Continuity, Lupin III tends to reference itself quite a lot in each series or TV special.
    • The Castle of Cagliostro's more gentlemanly Lupin reflects back on the wild days of his youth, a time of womanizing, explosions, and not being afraid to use his gun. Y'know, back when he acted like he does everywhere else.
    • The most recent Lupin series, Lupin III: The Italian Adventure and Lupin III: Part 5, included direct references to older episodes and villains like Pycal and Mamou.
  • Lyrical Nanoha contains many nods to the game it was spun off from, Triangle Heart 3: Sweet Songs Forever. In fact, so many are the nods that several fans take the stance that the only aspects of the original game that were changed are those directly contradicted by Nanoha (such as Shiro being alive), with almost everything else remaining unchanged.
  • Moriarty the Patriot: Sherlock Holmes in this adaptation usually wears a blue suit and unbuttoned dress shirt, but shortly after John publishes A Study in Scarlet, he forced a deerstalker cap and matching cape on Sherlock to greet the media moguls to match his most iconic look.
  • My-Otome has several of these in regards to predecessor series My-HiME. A few examples:
    • Princess/Queen Mashiro lives in a place called "Fuuka Palace". In My-HiME, Mashiro was the acting headmaster of Fuuka Academy, the main setting for that show. Additionally, the central setting for the first half of Mai-Otome is the kingdom of Windbloom, while "fuuka" is written in Japanese with the characters for "wind" and "flower".
    • The name "Windbloom", in fact, is also a reference to HiME Mashiro's surname, Kazahana, which also means "wind flower". Some other characters, like Akane and Yukino, also have surnames that are "Westernized" versions of those of their My-HiME counterparts.
    • Mikoto, a Big Eater Genki Girl with a fondness for running on all fours like a cat, shows up as two similarly-named characters. One is an actual cat with a tendency to eat anything in sight, and the other as an ethereal goddess and protector of the Harmonium Organ with a shadowy form that looks a lot like HiME!Mikoto's "beast mode", complete with Glowing Eyes of Doom. One of Cat!Mikoto's favorite foods is rumored to be "Tokiha mushrooms". HiME!Mikoto was a big fan of Mai Tokiha's cooking.
      • In Human!Mikoto's first appearance, she has a fireball-shaped tattoo on her arm that directly resembles the HiME logo.
      • In the manga, they're sort of merged into a single being, who happens to be not as nice as she first seemed.
    • Four of the Meister Otomes (Natsuki, Shizuru, Haruka and Mai) all know each other from their Garderobe academy days, and Natsuki and Mai met Yukino, who was a student at Windbloom University and a friend of Haruka's, around that time. Their HiME counterparts were all students at Fuuka Academy at around the same time. Haruka even complains about Shizuru "making her do all the work" during their survival test, a similar complaint that HiME!Haruka made toward HiME!Shizuru when the latter ran the Absurdly Powerful Student Council.
    • The manga makes a Shout-Out to a gag from the My-HiME manga: Haruka is eating from a cup of ramen labeled "E-Cup". In the Hime manga, Mikoto grabs Mai's chest and notes that she's an E-cup. In both cases, the text format is exactly the same. Shizuru also notes that Mai is an E or F cup in the sound drama "Lingerie Rhapsody".
    • Arika decides to call her mysterious patron "Sir" because Nao told her that it's what older men like to be called. Guess what HiME!Nao did in her spare time?
    • In the sound dramas, Mai, calling Natsuki "Kruger-san" during their early days at Garderobe, notes that her last name is difficult to pronounce, and suggests calling her "Kuga-san" instead, which was her surname in Mai-HiME. Similarly, Haruka's land ship, the Suzushiro, is named after her surname in My-HiME and Nao's Embarrassing First Name, Juliet, is based off the name of her Child.
    • In My-Otome 0~S.ifr~, Lena adopts the alias "Lena Yumemiya" while traveling, which is appropriate considering that she's Arika's mother. A cat called "Nina", whom Arika and Erstin found and returned to the Nina lookalike from My-HiME in the Mai-Otome Picture Drama, appears midway through Episode 1.
  • Negima! Magister Negi Magi has a number of these which imply that it takes place in the same universe as Love Hina: Tama the turtle makes a few cameos, Motoko and Setsuna are part of the same sword school, and the character Mei pretty much owes her existence in Negima to this. There's also a direct shout out to a technique used by Motoko Aoyama in Love Hina. (It also helps that the author has confirmed that Motoko and her sister Tsuroko are the two silhouettes seen in one of Setsuna's memories.)
    • Taken one step further when it's revealed that Tsukuyomi turns out to have the Hina Blade.
    • Then there's the self-contained ones, like the identity of of the perverted bounty hunter that tried to kidnap Nodoka.
    • One of the most long-reaching ones so far: in chapter 36, Negi botches some traditional Japanese charms and accidentally makes a bunch of clones of himself with names like Nugi, Migi, Hogi, and Yagi. 217 chapters later, Nugi makes a reappearance as a golem that Haruna created for the other girls to practice kissing. It goes about as well as one would expect.
    • In the Negima! Magister Negi Magi Mahou Sensei Negima! Ala Alba OVA, a scene showing the shirts Kotaro wears included a chupacabra shirt from Negima!? (second season), the Negima Alternate Continuity whose anime version the studio handling this OVA previously did.
    • The Negima Summer OVA sneaks a reference to Kotarou by having a picture of his face appear on a fan held by Chizuru, one of the girls that he eventually rooms with once he arrives at Mahora Academy.
    • In chapter 175 of the manga, when Haruna makes a dark version of Nodoka, one of the notes she writes about Dark Nodoka is that her voice is done by Mamiko Noto, Nodoka's voice actress in the anime version.
  • In the anime adaptation of Nyaruko: Crawling with Love!, Nyarko's explanation of why she's on Earth gets fast-forwarded and summarized by Mahiro. If you slow the audio down, it's a direct quote from the original light novel series where she goes on a long-winded, multi-page ramble which indirectly reveals that her boss is Azathoth, the god-above-gods in the Cthulhu Mythos.
  • Franky from One Piece has a mythology gag as his Catchphrase. He likes to say "I'm feeling especially super this week!" (though he often replaces "super" with some other adjective). New chapters of One Piece come out once a week.
    • The panel where Zoro decapitates a dragon is almost identical to the one where Ryuma did the same in One Piece Wanted.
    • The Funimation dub has Usopp accidentally call Zoro "Zolo" during the Skypeia arc, referencing his name change in the 4Kids dub and the Viz Media manga translation.
  • Persona 4: The Animation has a couple:
    • Yu's ringtone for when Ai calls him is Zigeunerweisen, also known as the Game Over theme from Catherine, and his inner monologue after she calls plays out exactly like one of Vincent's.
    • The OP song for the episode when the gang goes to Tatsumi Port Island is none other than Burn My Dread.
  • Pokémon: The Series:
    • In the first episode of ''Best Wishes', the plane Ash takes to Unova is flight number 151 (the total number of Pokédex entries, counting Mew, in the original games).
    • While the Pokémon Center healing jingle was used many times in the series, starting from Best Wishes it's the exact same as the one used in Pokémon Red and Blue.
    • In DP094, "Doc Brock", a Zapdos makes a quick cameo. In Pokémon Platinum, Zapdos can be found roaming Sinnoh in the post-Elite Four storyline. Notably, this was the first episode to air in Japan after the release of Platinum. This is repeated in DP142, "Where No Togepi Has Gone Before", where the evil Togepi knows Extrasensory. In Japan, this was the last episode to air before the release of Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver. In those games, guess which move Togepi can use for the first time?
    • In "Ya See we Want an Evolution!", the organization dedicated to showing the strength of Pokémon without evolving them is called the "B-Button League", referring to the actual game mechanic used for the very same purpose.
    • The episode "Will the Real Oak Please Stand Up?" has James impersonate Professor Oak in reference to the "Imposter Professor Oak" card from the Trading Card Game.
    • During a fantasy Team Rocket is having over possibly finding treasure in BW135, Meowth references previous games in the series.
    • Gary's eyes are green up close. This is because his game counterpart is named "Green" in Japan ("Blue" in translations).
    • The first scene in the anime is actually the same intro from Red and Blue.
    • The episode "Candid Camerupt!" has a flashback of Ash and Gary watching a movie. The film is of Isamu "Red" Akai, his Clefairy, and Cousin Pikachu from the gag manga Pocket Monsters.
    • In the Journeys episode “Trade, Borrow, and Steal”, a girl trades her Spearow to a gentleman who in turn gives her a Farfetch’d named Dux. This is a reference to a trade you can make in Vermillion City (where the episode takes place) in Pokémon Red and Blue where you can that exact trade, with the Farfetch'd having the same nickname.
    • "Restore and Renew" has Goh excavating an Old Amber at Pewter City's museum. Once you had overworld access to Cut in the Kanto games, the player would find an Old Amber of their own by going through the back door of the Pewter museum.
    • When Ash defeats Steven, who is the champion of Hoenn in Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire, in the Masters Eight tournament, Steven gives the same speech to Ash that he gives to the player character when you beat him in the games.
  • Pokémon Adventures:
    • There are two in the second arc. A Pikachu is babysitting a Caterpie and feeds it flowers when it gets hungry. Blue has a special microphone that can send messages in bubbles. Both are references to the Hey You, Pikachu! game.
    • The FLRG arc starts off with a Nidorino and a Gengar fighting, just like the intro to the original games, Red and Blue (and their remakes).
    • Later, Mewtwo gets trapped in a Restraining Bolt armor reminiscent of the one his anime counterpart wore when under Giovanni's control.
    • Emerald's E-shooter is similar to that of the Pokémon Rangers' Capture Stylers. It's actually hinted in-universe that the E-shooter is based off of the Capture Stylers as well.
    • Green's design from Adventures is based off of an unreleased female protagonist that was later revamped for the remakes as "Leaf".
  • Powerpuff Girls Z:
    • Him is inspired to turn the girls into five-year-olds after overhearing Mojo muse that the heroines would probably be easier to defeat if they were little girls. R-i-i-i-i-i-ght...
    • This show is full of stuff like this. During the episodes featuring Dynamo, it malfunctions and instead of traveling through time, it travels to other dimensions. One of the ones they visit is the original Powerpuff Girls.
  • Sailor Moon:
    • Sailor Moon has a subtle one in the third season. In one episode, a one-shot character notes that Minako has the muscle tone necessary to become a track athlete. In her own manga, she won her school's half marathon, easily outrunning students two years her senior.
    • The 90s anime was fond of these. The daimon in the S episode detailing Sailor Uranus' origin story looks like the daimons in the manga. A Makoto-focused ep in the same season features her and a monk Meditating Under a Waterfall; Rei did the same thing in the manga.
    • Male characters connected to Mamoru in the manga had a tendency to be hit with this in the anime. His kohai Asanuma was so Demoted to Extra and his cameo came so late in the series that him existing in the anime-verse at all is this trope. In Classic's doll episode, Nephrite and Mamoru lock gazes, followed by Nephrite apologizing because he mistook Mamoru for someone else. Tuxedo Mask kind of became Zoisite and then Kunzite's arch nemesis during the latter half of the season, odd because Mask otherwise didn't interact a lot with the show's other Quirky Miniboss Squad members. Then there's an incident in the third episode with Jadeite; he's advancing on Sailor Moon, but is completely deterred by Mask throwing a rose.
    • The Viz redub has one in regards to the DIC dub. In episode 7, after Naru and Usagi feud, the former wants to partner with Umino for a talent show. Since it's only open to girls, he's Dragged into Drag and his Viz VA, Ben Diskin, imitates Naru's (or rather "Molly"'s) infamous New York accent from the DIC dub. He also uses it again later in the ep when he's not in drag.
  • In Sailor Moon Crystal: The transformation sequences contain iconic elements and choreography from those of the 90s anime, but in CGI and from the girls' POVs.
    • Sailor Moon's pose and all the Inners' S2 poses during the In the Name of the Moon speeches are taken from the 90s anime, but this time with more elaborate backdrops.
    • Crystal is loaded with these concerning the first anime, but most of them are really minor and honestly only something hardcore longtime fans would notice. There'd be no point in listing them all here. Two major ones, however, occur in episodes 2 and 5. In the former, Usagi says she still can't use a computer. This is a reference to episode 8 of Classic where she tells Luna she doesn't know how to use a computer. In the latter, Nephrite says that he will prey on humans' biggest weakness, love. Immediately after there's a cut to a picture of Naru in a wedding dress. It's hard to not interpret this as a reference to the one-sided romance subplot between the two in Classic. Diamond's death in S2 is another one, being somewhat reminiscent of his death in R, in particular the part where he's killed by Wiseman though Crystal notably doesn't try to redeem him or act like his lust was "really" love.
  • SD Gundam Force makes all sorts of references both obvious and subtle to past Gundam series. Lacroa's Knight Gundams are the main suits from Gundam Wing (and the princess is Relena), Ark's characters are all G Gundam characters, Neotopia and Dark Axis characters are from Universal Century, etc.
    • Especially notable is Professor Gerbera, who turns out to be a Gundam in disguise. From the future. The Gerbera Tetra from Gundam 0083 was originally designed in-universe as a Gundam, then modified and sold to Zeon when the Federation opted not to develop it.
    • See also: the Minov Boundary Sea, a reference to the Minovsky Particles of the UC series
  • Student Council's Discretion managed a brilliant one in the final episode via Shout-Out. Ken says he wants to establish his own eroge Visual Novel company, after which we pan to the logo of Key/Visual Arts, along with him saying that it's based on the first kanji of his name. He then mentions two other companies, one of which is Leaf, until we get the clincher to the entire Mythology Gag: Ken refers to the anime adaptation of Air, a Key/Visual Arts eroge that was animated by Kyoto Animation. Its OP theme in the Anime of the Game, "Tori no Uta", is affectionately referred to by Key/Visual Arts fans as "the national anthem."
    Ken: People who like my brand will be called Key-men. When something gets animated, the theme song will get referred to as the national anthem.
  • In Sonic X, not only Sonic does have to have rings in order to use his attacks, he's also very afraid of water. He does a "Sonic Says" joke in the first episode, too. These are references to his depictions in the American cartoons from the '90s.
  • In episode 27 of Tamagotchi, the version of the Gotchi King the Tama-Friends meet in the past has a green crown and cape, as opposed to the normal Gotchi King who has a red crown and cape. This may be a reference to how the Gotchi King had green clothes when he initially debuted in the Tamagotchi Licensed Game Hoshi de Hakken! Tamagotchi.
  • The OVA of Variable Geo makes several references to the games themselves:
  • Wandering Son:
    • The anime's art-style is meant to look like it is done with watercolor. The manga's volume covers are almost always in watercolor.
    • In the last episode of the anime, 19 minutes in we see a scene where Kaneda is greeted by a girl waving at him and a green haired boy. These two characters are from a previous manga by Takako Shimura called Shikii No Juunin. The two characters have also noticeably aged since that manga.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh!:
    • In the scene at the beginning of the first episode where Yugi and Joey are playing Duel Monsters at school, Yugi defeats Joey by playing Blackland Fire Dragon. In the original two chapters of the manga that introduced the Magic & Wizards card game, Blackland Fire Dragon was the second strongest monster in Yugi's deck (with the first one being Summoned Skull).
    • The same character, given the dub name Hobson, shows up in mutually exclusive scenes. In the manga, he runs Death-T2, in an arc that was never part of the anime. In the anime, he serves as the butler to the Kaiba family and appears in the first episode to take away Yugi's grandpa and later in a filler episode.
    • The flashback scene of Duke showcasing a prototype of Dungeon Dice Monsters to Pegasus has the game on the table looking like a tabletop version of how the game looked in the manga, complete with the player's Heart Points being represented by two clown-shaped game pieces with removable heart-shaped tokens on their bellies (which the anime replaced with the hearts just appearing at the bottom of the cockpits of the duel arena - the game pieces were also used in the shortly-lived real life version of the game).
    • The plans for Siegfried's blueprints to his Duel Monsters holographic projectors resemble the Battle Boxes that were used in the manga version of the Duelist Kingdom arc.
    • Before the Ceremonial Battle starts, Yugi and the Pharaoh need to separate. The magic that does so first shows Yugi with two shadows, calling back to an iconic scene from the show's first opening.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! 5Ds:
    • One episode had a duelist that looked virtually identical to Katsuya Jonouchi with the same voice as him. The dub took a visual gag and made it much less subtle by naming him "Jesse Wheeler" and saying he was Joey's cousin—the original version didn't name the duelist and no mention of Joey was made, but Jonouchi did mention having an annoying cousin that walks in every now and then.
    • Towards the end of the Dark Signer arc in 5D's, Akiza and Misty have their duel in a theme park named 'Monster World', which shares its name with the RPG that Yugi and his friends played with Ryou in the 6th and 7th volumes of the original manga.

Alternative Title(s): Anime

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