It's natural that these Clefairy Tales have obvious references to other franchises and the like.
- There could only be one game described in the very first paragraph of the first chapter that Leaf is playing on her SNES.
- Being an unrepentant Moonie, the author likes to shout out to Sailor Moon quite a bit.
- Upon receiving her Clefairy, Leaf wonders if Professor Oak thinks she's Sailor Moon.
- The team of Magical Girls fighting Team Rocket on Mt. Moon is loosely based on the Sailor Soldiers.
- Apart from being revealed to be a Moonie herself in chapter 11, Misty also emulates Sailor Moon's iconic pose when challenging the plainclothes Rocket at the end of the Nugget Bridge, complete with a parody of her classic In the Name of the Moon sequence (stopping short of the actual In the Name of the Moon line and accompanying pose, of course).
- Leaf's Pikachu shares her name with Sailor Jupiter no matter the dub (the Japanese version uses Makoto, the English/French versions use Lita).
- Red nicknamed his Charmander "Gojira".
- Some of the nicknames Leaf gives her Pokémon are also references, including those for her Spearow (Terminator) and Pikachu (Lita).
- 1138 is the number on the device Leaf receives from Nurse Joy.
- The first thing Clefairy and Pikachu say upon receiving the ability to speak human language? "Happy birthday!"
- Pikachu is particularly prone to speaking in them at times. Examples from the Mt. Moon arc include:
- The first Rocket grunt Leaf faces refers to her Clefairy's ability to use Water Gun as waterbending.
- In chapter 8, upon encountering a Paras, Leaf mentions the Super Mushroom and its effects.
- The Raticate Rocket, upon summoning his damn-near infamous Raticate, shouts, "Say 'ello ta me liddle frien'!"
- In chapter 14, not only is the Swordfish scene from Horsefeathers referenced, Leaf is also warned about videocassettes and videodiscs containing programs about jewelry heists, mysterious diamond-filled briefcases, master thieves, and aliens from outer space, as a Self-Deprecation of the author's trademark Reference Overdosed syndrome. Basic is also mentioned to be the lingua franca of the Pokémon world.
- Erika's dress in the S.S. Anne episodes is a dead ringer for Cinderella's blue dress in Disney's 2015 film adaptation.
