Going into any Pixar film, you know you’re going to see a bunch of Easter eggs buried in the background of scenes.
Some of the Easter eggs are pretty easy to spot, for example, in Monster’s Inc. you can see a Luxo ball and a Jessie doll and at one point Boo tries to give Sully a Nemo toy – this was two years before Finding Nemo was even released!
Others can be pretty tough to find on your first viewing. One that’s a little more obscure is in Toy Story 3, the batteries that power Buzz Lightyear have a BnL logo on them – this is a reference to Buy N Large, the company that controls the government services in WALL-E.
If you go back and watch The Incredibles 2, you’ll even see Duke Caboom hiding in Jack-Jack’s crib.
If you love looking for Easter eggs in films, Toy Story 4 is going to be your new favourite film, because it apparently has the most hidden references of any Pixar film.
Speaking with Entertainment Weekly, the film’s director Josh Cooley said Second Chance Antiques must hold a “record” for most Easter eggs.
“I wanted [the antique store] to feel almost like a jungle to these toys so that they can get lost just within this one world, and we did a bunch of tests early on to see, can we even render the amount of stuff that’s just in this store?
“And now it’s one of those things that I think people will take for granted watching it — and they should, because they shouldn’t be thinking about the technology — but behind the scenes, it’s mind-blowing. We were able to hide so many Pixar-specific Easter eggs inside there that it’s just gotta be a record.”
Cooley added that every Pixar movie ever made is represented in that store and that viewers will likely notice “some things that are very obvious” like the Dinoco sign, which is from both Toy Story and Cars, as well as a painting of Charles Muntz from Up playing poker with his pack of dogs.
“There are also some that are a little less obvious and then there are some that you’ll actually need to freeze-frame and zoom in to see. Really, really random deep cuts that you’re not going to notice unless you physically stop and actually look at the frame.”
There are signs for TripleDent Gum from Inside Out and PJ’s Pop from A Bug’s Life and there are plenty of references to Pixar’s short films as well. Hidden in the pinball machine you’ll see Tinny, the star of Pixar’s short Tin Toy which inspired Toy Story.
There were even some Easter eggs Cooley didn’t know were included, “We always knew we’d fill this whole store and make it Easter egg central, and it is chock full of stuff, but they gave me over 10 pages of a document of all of the things that are in the store and there was stuff I didn’t even know was buried in there — and I’ve been looking at these shots for years.”
Looks like we’ll need to get back to the cinema to find a few more of them!