This show is very self-referential. Almost every episode has at least one reference to a classic Hanna-Barbera property, and the list here really shows.
- In "Mambo Itali-Go-Go" and several other episodes, Dick Dastardly once again uses "Milhous" as his middle name.
- In the Collective Dream World in "Guru My Dreams", Peter's Dream!Stylist gives Dick a makeover, the end result being his appearance from the original show.
- In the episode “People Who Need Purple”, Dastardly goes though multiple dimensions
. The first one looks like an anime and there is a banner that reads “チキチキマシン猛レース” (translated as “Chiki Chiki Machine Mou Race”), which is what the series was called in Japan (where it gained popularity and is still regarded as a classic childhood cartoon). He then ends up in a universe with a dirty, post-apocalyptic setting, which resembles the premise to the comic series Wacky Raceland published by DC Comics. Lastly, he ends up in a universe with the style of the original series. - The monsters that appear in the Halloween World in "Backseat Drivers" look near-identical to classic monsters from Scooby-Doo, another Hanna-Barbera work.
- In "So Far to Mardi Gras", Pandora Pitstop stops the other racers by using the same trick Dick uses in the original cartoon's intro.
- In "It's a Wacky Life", when Penelope mentions during her rap battle that she's beaten Dastardly since 1968, she and Dick are briefly seen as themselves from the original cartoon. Later on that same episode, an angel shows scenes of Dick's life. It includes scenes from the original cartoon.
- Muttley is wearing his pilot's headgear from Dastardly & Muttley in Their Flying Machines.
- In the episode "Cave Racers", the Gruesome Twosome's prehistoric counterparts at one point ride a fire-breathing dinosaur that resembles the dragon that lived inside the Creepy Coupe's balcony in the original 1968 cartoon.
- One that doubles as a Shout-Out. In "Mars Needs Racers," the space Brick Crashman equivalent is a parody of the robot from Lost in Space. Complete with a parody of its catchphrase: rather than "Danger, Will Robinson!" when the racers' spaceship in danger he shouts "Peril, Penelope Pitstop!"
- Also, one of the episode titles is named "Perils of Peter Perfect".
- In "Mother Drives Best", a picture of Dick Dastardly from the classic series is shown as the picture of Dastardly's father.
- "Under The Rainbow" has the leprechauns trying to ruin the race to keep their pot of gold from being taken. They tried to use a hairy beast to slow them down but Peter blows it all of and right onto the leprechauns. They began to hit each other with sticks while hiding behind a racecar-shaped rock.Don't get it? The racers even reminisce about them, except for I.Q, since he was not in the original cartoon.
- "Cold Rush" is also the name of an episode of the original cartoon. Both episodes feature an ice bridge that falls down.
- "Grandfather Knows Dast" features Dastardly's grandfather, who was originally tasked with taking down a messenger pigeon, complete with pictures proving this. Oh, and a pigeon that looks like Yankee Doodle Pigeon makes an appearance at the end.
- The pictures can be seen as an allusion to the episode "Lens a Hand", where the General starts suspecting that Dastardly and his squadron aren't really trying to stop the pigeon and Dastardly offers to show photographs of later attempts as proof.
- Each picture is a scene from the intro.
- During Pandora's Mirror Routine with Penelope, Pandora makes Penelope's face from the original Wacky Races cartoon.
- "Race Against Time" ends with a Bad Future where Dick Dastardly is eaten by a creature like one of those featured in Wacky Raceland.
- In "My Fair Tiny", one of the new heads Tiny tries looks like The Hooded Claw's.
- "The Trial of Dick Dastardly" is full of these:
- The self-proclaimed creators of the original show, Bill and Joe, are modeled after William Hanna & Joseph Barbera, respectively.
- The leader of the jury assigned to determine whether Dick Dastardly should stay on the show is The Hooded Claw, accompanied by several other villains from older Hanna-Barbera cartoons (Namely Mr Jinks from Pixie, Dixie and Mr. Jinks, The Great Fondoo, Magic Rabbit, Orful Octopus and Mrs Creeply from Laff-A-Lympics, The Dalton Brothers in their designs from The Good, the Bad, and Huckleberry Hound, The Gimmick from Dynomutt, Dog Wonder and The Raven from The Funky Phantom ). Near the end of the episode, Penelope finally gets a look at who he really was!
- During the Hooded Claw’s rant, he states that all cartoons must be formulaic. You can see Pixie, Dixie, and Mr. Jinks running in the background for a second when he brings this up.
- The parody of The Hollywood Squares shown after the Hooded Claw mentions that satire should never be done in animation is a nod to the history of the original series, which was originally going to be a game show made as a collaboration between Hanna-Barbera and the creators of the former show.
- The "Eating Time" insert song that plays as the racers are chased by the jury is a reference to how Scooby-Doo series would use similar music during chase scenes. Several of the backgrounds in the sequence are borrowed from older cartoons.
- The racers depart the trial when Joe swirls his hammer around in the air, leading to a recreation of the classic "Swirling Star" Hanna-Barbera logo that was used during their 80s & 90s output.
- In "What A Wacky Development This Is", some of the potential "familiar formula shows" shown on the executive’s list are Detective Dog and Unreasonably Aggressive Rabbits.
- In "Wackyland", the Creator is named as such because he was responsible for greenlighting the original Wacky Races before it first aired on TV. After the series was cancelled, he waited until studio executives ran out of ideas and decided to reboot the show, with the goal of taking Peter’s brain power for himself. Unfortunately, in the new series, Peter is the Dumb Muscle...
- The unfinished episode “Wacky Con” takes place at a convention where the racers make an appearance, and considering the type of location they’re at, these types of jokes were inevitable.
- During Dastardly’s explanation of what an Uber-Nerd is, a comment posted by the Uber-Nerd can be seen asking about what happened to the gangsters, cavemen, and country folk. These are all names used to refer to racers from the original show.
- At the titular convention, posters can be seen for The Banana Splits Live. Bill and Joe from "Trial of Dick Dastardly" are also seen in this shot.
- During the fanboy's rant to Penelope about the new show, he states that "replacing the gangsters with pirates was stupid".
