Referenced By / Henry V

Fan Works

• Hidden Frontier has a fan-favourite speech in which 'Once more unto the breach' is used to inspire the Starfleet crews to similarly defend their homes and families. Which is odd, because in the original context the speech is being given to inspire the attackers, not the defenders.
• In The Legend of Total Drama Island, Noah rallies his team with an original blank verse speech based on the "St. Crispin's Day" speech.

Film — Live Action

• The Hard Way (1991): Hollywood action star Nick Lang complains to his agent that all his films are meaningless franchise "crap", and "did you ever hear of Hamlet III, Midsummer Night's IV?" His agent responds, "they made Henry V! It won awards for that little Scottish fellow!" (Since Branagh is Irish, she is Comically Missing the Point in at least two ways).
• Renaissance Man: Drill Sergeant Cass challenges one of the remedial recruits to recite something to prove whether he's actually learned anything of value from Rago's classes. The recruit delivers the St. Crispin's Day speech, and does it pretty damn well.
• Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows: Watson quotes Henry V: "Once more unto the breach."
• Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country: "Once more unto the breach, dear friends" (Act III, Scene 1) is one of the Shakespearean quotations uttered by Chang.
• Tombstone: The Saint Crispin's Day speech is performed by Mr. Fabian on stage.

Literature

• In The Dinosaur Lords, when the Final Battle of book 2 is about to commence, Rob murmurs to himself "once more unto the breach", even though there's no breach in sight.
• The Doctor Who New Adventures novel So Vile a Sin takes its title from a line in the play, among other references.
• In the Animorphs book Megamorphs #3, the first place Visser Four goes to attempt to change history is Agincourt to kill Henry V. The Animorphs are confused as to why Visser Four would try changing history here, until they finally kill Visser Four and John Berryman, Four's host, enlightens them: he's an actor, and would constantly quote Henry V at Visser Four as an act of rebellion. Unable to pinpoint a time and location to kill Shakespeare himself, Four tries killing Henry instead in order to keep Shakespeare from writing Henry V and shutting John up.
• At the end of High Citadel by Desmond Bagley, the characters muse how the Cool Old Lady among their group might "strip her sleeve and show her scars" that she got during their adventure against the Dirty Communists.
• Sherlock Holmes has "The game's afoot!" as his second best-known catchphrase (and one significantly less subject to Beam Me Up, Scotty!).
• Watership Down. Lines from the Saint Crispin's Day speech are used as an epigraph for the chapter where Hazel calls for volunteers for the high-risk job of infiltrating Efrafa. In this case however he's very select about who he chooses from those volunteers.

Live-Action TV

• The title Band of Brothers comes from the Saint Crispin's Day speech: "we few, we happy few, we band of brothers; for he to-day that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother".
• The Saint Crispin's Day speech is (mis)quoted in Buffy the Vampire Slayer (episode "The Gift"):
  Giles: We few, we happy few...
  Spike: We band of buggered.
• In Horatio Hornblower, Midshipman Kennedy's line "we few, we fortunate few! Keene has recommended our transfer to the... Indefatigable" very much resembles King Henry's line "we few, we happy few, we band of brothers". Considering it's suggested that Archie has a background as a lover of theatre (at least enough in another episode to recognize the 'Duchess' was an actress on Drury Lane), it's probably deliberate.
• In Sports Night, Dan reminds Casey that he once recited the St. Crispin's Day speech when they were first paired together as anchors. Later in the episode, Casey apparently does it in the broadcast to fill up time, though we don't see it.
• Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Season seven episode title "Once More Unto the Breach".
• Star Trek: The Next Generation: The episode "The Defector" begins with Data performing Henry V (to Picard's approval) as part of his ongoing attempts to understand the human condition. The rest of the episode alludes to the play's King Incognito plot multiple times, with Picard quoting it directly once.
  Picard: "Now if these men do not die well, it will be a black matter for the king that led them to it."

Video Games

• In Dawn of War, one of the Space Marine commander's lines is, "Who stands with me shall be my brother".
• Empire Earth has a level where you play as Henry V, which includes a few of the play's lines as dialogue.

Web Comics

• Jailbreak: The hero attempts to quote Shakespeare and was clearly going for Henry V, but doesn't actually know any lines.

Western Animation

• Zaheer's speech in the finale of book three of The Legend of Korra, about ending the avatar cycle, is rather reminiscent of the Saint Crispin's Day Speech.
  So we lucky^note which is what the original's "happy" meant in Shakespeare's time few, this Band of Brothers and sisters [...]
• Phineas and Ferb: "We few, we happy few, we band of brothers...and the girl across the street."
• In Skylanders Academy, when asked about his experience in the theatre, Glumshanks recalls being repeatedly cast as Falstaff.

Wrestling

• When Mick Foley was being interviewed as Mankind, relatively early in his WWF/WWE run, he was asked about taking part in death matches, barbed wire matches, and the like. Foley responded with the St. Crispin's day speech — not perfectly, but close enough — and making it creepy as hell.

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