Toy Story 4's Hidden Pixar Easter Eggs, From a Deleted Toy Story 2 File to The Shining Callbacks

Toy Story 4 is stuffed with hidden references to pretty much every other Pixar film, and I went scene by scene to find as many of them as I could. Here is everything I spotted, in the order it happens in the movie.

A Flashback Easter Egg Nods to the Toy Story 2 File That Almost Got Deleted

The film opens on a flashback set nine years earlier showing how Bo Peep parted ways with Woody's group, a departure that Toy Story 3 already hinted at when Woody says, "We've lost friends along the way. Bo Peep? Yeah, even even Bo. All good toys who've gone on to new owners." Thankfully that wasn't a cover story for Bo actually getting incinerated.

During this rainy RC rescue, Andy's mom gives away the Bo Peep lamp, and the recipient's license plate reads RMRF97. That's a deep cut reference to the command code an unknown Pixar employee entered during production of Toy Story 2, which accidentally started deleting the film's assets from the server until the servers were unplugged at just the right moment and a remote backup saved the movie from being wiped out completely.

Woody's Retirement Metaphor Plays Out in Bonnie's Classroom

In the present day the toys are with Bonnie, who now favors Jessie and leaves Woody to gather dust bunnies in the closet. Woody's journey here works as a metaphor for retirement: after a lifetime of always being there for a child, how do you redefine your purpose without becoming obsolete? Toy Story 3, excellent as it was, never addressed what happens to lost toys, and I don't think every neglected toy has to become Lotso. This film proposes that being forgotten can also mean being free.

Bonnie is struggling with kindergarten orientation, and her classroom hides a couple more references. There's a lunch box featuring toy weapons from an earlier Toy Story holiday special, and one of her classmates looks a lot like Boo from Monsters Inc. Boo also appears to make a cameo later as one of the kids at the carnival booth.

Forky's Existential Crisis Echoes Woody's Line to Buzz

Bonnie comforts herself by making Forky, voiced by Tony Hale, out of a spork and craft odds and ends that Woody pulls from the trash for her. In the first act Forky goes through an existential crisis, seeing himself as trash and repeatedly trying to throw himself out. Woody tells him, "You are a toy," which is a direct nod to Woody's famous words to Buzz in the first film.

The Road Trip Passes Through Dinoco and Poultry Palace

Bonnie's parents take her on an end of summer road trip that stops at a Dinoco gas station, the same brand Woody and Buzz got stranded at in the first film. They also get fried chicken from Poultry Palace, a location from the Toy Story short Small Fry that you can actually eat at in Disneyland.

The Carnival Hides References to Up, Toy Story of Terror and Red's Dream

The small town carnival is littered with references. There's a balloon cart of the same kind Carl worked at in Up. There's a delivery truck that showed up in the Toy Story short Toy Story of Terror, and a sign with a painted clown that looks a lot like the clown from Pixar's 1987 short Red's Dream. A large purple ride has been said by many to resemble the toy Stretch from Toy Story 3, while its head also kind of looks like Buzz's nemesis and father figure Zurg from Toy Story 2.

There's always a Pizza Planet truck hidden somewhere in a Pixar film, and this one is harder to find: it's a tattoo on the leg of the carny operating the booth. In the carnival exterior, many have said they spotted Bob Parr, also known as Mr. Incredible, sitting at one of the tables. Pixar almost always hides an Easter egg for the next film in the background of the current one too, the way Duke Caboom was actually visible in Jack-Jack's crib in Incredibles 2.

Buzz Becomes a Carnival Prize Surrounded by Coco and Toy Story 3 Nods

Buzz ends up stuck as a prize in the booth, and the photorealism is impressive even down to a bit of dirt under the carny's fingernails. The booth is lined with guitar toys matching the design from Coco, star plush toys with the same blue and pink color scheme as Sulley from Monsters Inc, and white rocket ships that match the Pizza Planet logo. Another prize is a green frog that shows up again in the post credit scenes and looks like the frog that teased Lotso on the grill of the truck at the end of Toy Story 3. Also visible is a toy with a red star on a yellow circle matching the famous Pixar Luxo ball design.

Ducky and Bunny's Alien Joke Comes With an Animation Clipping Detail

Here Buzz meets Ducky and Bunny, voiced by Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele. Ducky kicks Buzz in the head saying, "In the vacuum of space, they cannot hear you scream," an ode to the tagline of Alien, and Buzz using his helmet as a weapon is a callback to the move he used on Woody in the first film.

There's an interesting animation detail in this kick: Buzz's head stretches over to the side and passes through his shoulder, which is physically impossible since there's no gap in the dome rim, just hard plastic. This is an example of clipping, famous from bad video game graphics, and it happens in animation too. There's a shot during Let It Go in Frozen where Elsa's braid passes through her arm as she flips her hair back. It isn't necessarily a mistake; animators sometimes do this to make motion smoother, or in Buzz's case here, funnier.

The Playground Connects Bo Peep to Wall-E and Up

In the nearby playground, Bo Peep helps Woody with her skunk car, which a quick shot reveals is powered by BnL brand batteries, the mega corporation from Wall-E that took over the Earth, destroyed it, and safely evacuated survivors on a cruise ship. Bo's sheep bring her a grape soda cap, the same badge Ellie gave Carl when they were kids in Up, which Carl later passed on to Russell.

Three Combat Carls appear here too, with the Arctic Combat Carl left hanging for most of the film, though he does get his due thanks to Duke Caboom in the post credit scene. Combat Carl is voiced by Carl Weathers and first showed up in the Toy Story of Terror short.

Second Chance Antiques Is a Love Letter to Pixar's Whole Library

Much of the movie takes place in the antique store, and the filmmakers have said they animated 10,000 items inside it. The store's name, Second Chance Antiques, reflects the theme of redefining purpose, since toys like Woody and Gabby get a second chance at life. Its address is 1200, a nod to Pixar's actual address of 1200 Park Avenue in Emeryville, California, and the sign says it was founded in 1986, the same year Pixar broke off from Lucasfilm to become its own studio.

• A miniature Model T named Lizzie from the Cars movies on a high shelf.
• A box of Casey Jr Animal Cracker cookies like the ones P.T. Flea used for his traveling circus in A Bug's Life.
• A green diving mask like the one worn by the dentist who caught Nemo in Finding Nemo.
• Carl's cane from Up on an upper shelf, plus a painting of dogs playing poker where the dogs are Doug and the other dogs from Up, a nod to the famous Cassius Coolidge painting and the Brown and Bigelow cigar ad series.
• An unlit neon Dinoco sign and a '70s style A113 sign, the common animation Easter egg referencing the CalArts classroom many Pixar animators studied in.
• A sign reading Ye Olde Poultry Palace, another nod to the Small Fry fast food chain.
• Vintage ads for Triple Dent gum, the catchy jingle from Inside Out, and for Eggman Moving Company, the movers from the first Toy Story.
• A chandelier with an MU flag for Monsters University hanging from it.
• Yellow Monsters Inc scream canisters, Elastigirl's Elasticycle from Incredibles 2, Bing Bong's red wagon rocket ship from Inside Out, a bear carving referencing Brave, and a dollhouse that's a miniature version of Carl and Ellie's house from Up.
• A stack of LP records including Remember Me from Coco, and board games titled Knick-Knack and Lifted for the Pixar shorts of the same names.

Gabby Gabby's Dummies Were Built for The Shining Style Dread

Woody and Forky meet Gabby Gabby, voiced by Christina Hendricks, who has said she actually played with ventriloquist dummies as a kid, which makes her perfect casting since Gabby's henchmen are creepy dummies led by Benson. The animators studied mannequin structure, how their arms just dangle, their legs bend backward, their mouths drop open and their feet drag, turning them into nightmare material.

The creepiness of this introduction is accentuated by the old timey song Midnight, the Stars and You, which plays over the famous closing shot of Stanley Kubrick's The Shining. Pixar animators have snuck Shining references into several Toy Story films: Sid's house carpet pattern matches the Overlook Hotel's carpet, the Toy Story 3 dump truck license plate reads RM237 for room 237, and Trixie's online boyfriend is named Velocistar237. There's another 237 egg in this film too. When Ducky and Bunny pitch their Plush Rush attack plan, a montage follows the shop owner Margaret home, and her house number is 237.

Margaret's House Hides a Recurring Prop and My Favorite Egg in the Film

In Margaret's fridge is a Chinese food takeout carton, the same prop that has shown up in A Bug's Life, Toy Story 2, Monsters Inc, Ratatouille, Inside Out and Incredibles 2. On a shelf behind her during the Plush Rush is a stone dragon that appears to be Mushu from Mulan, and the key Ducky and Bunny are trying to retrieve resembles the keyblade from the Kingdom Hearts games.

My favorite Easter egg in the whole movie is behind the cash register, where Margaret has pinned up a photo of Geri, the old man from the Pixar short Geri's Game, implying he was an old flame of hers.

The Antique Store's Photorealism Hides Pixar's Own History

The interior's photorealism is impressive, with dust marks and scratches on the walls and floor and cobwebs stretching everywhere. The filmmakers have said Pixar actually invented an animation technology to recreate how a spider spins its webs. The shop also nods to Pixar's own history: a cube shaped object with Pixar written on it is the company's early graphics computer from the 1980s, which it used as a logo in early shorts, and near it sits Arlo the dinosaur from The Good Dinosaur.

There's also a hand sculpture that is actually a scan of the hand of Pixar animator and former Pixar president Ed Catmull, who co-created the first 3D computer recreation of a hand in 1972, work that later led to the short film A Computer Animated Hand.

The Tiki Party Hideout Brings Back Tin Toy and Star Wars

Bo leads Woody to the toys' hideout inside a vintage game called Tiki Party, with art inspired by the tiki heads from inside the fish tank in Finding Nemo. Inside, they're greeted by Tinny from the Pixar short Tin Toy. There are also tiny vintage Star Wars toys of Alec Guinness's Obi-Wan Kenobi and Ponda Baba from A New Hope, with Obi-Wan striking Ponda's arm, which later pops off, a nod to Obi-Wan severing Ponda's arm in the Mos Eisley Cantina. Also in the hideout is Franklin the eagle from the Toy Story Small Fry short, part of the discarded toys support group.

Duke Caboom's Monologue Grew Out of Keanu Reeves Himself

The toys then meet Duke Caboom, voiced by Keanu Reeves. The filmmakers have said Duke's introspective monologue was inspired by Reeves, who kept asking questions about the character and dug deep into his soul during recording. At one point, while talking with the filmmakers, Keanu reportedly stood up on a table in the middle of Pixar's atrium and started striking victory poses, which inspired Duke's poses in the film. Duke also says "Whoa," a nod to Keanu's line from Bill and Ted and The Matrix.

Duke's backstory with the Canadian boy he disappointed mirrors Buzz Lightyear's own backstory, a cool toy traumatized by not being able to soar as far as his commercial promised. The announcer on Duke Caboom's commercial was voiced by Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

The Rescue Mission Passes Cars and Brave License Plates

During the rescue, a full Luxo ball is visible on the shop floor, and Woody freezes in place holding a phone receiver in the exact same pose as the Mickey Mouse phone. When Duke and Woody jump the ramp to the center cabinet, they pass a license plate from Carb County, a reference to Carburetor County in Cars, registered to the fictional city of Torqueville.

They rescue Forky from Gabby Gabby, and Bo slides in and sweeps the leg with her staff. While doing so, she passes a commemorative plate bearing a sword crest, which is the crest of Merida's family clan from Brave.

Woody Finds a New Purpose Without a Villain

Woody allows Gabby to take his voice box, but Gabby's plan to use it to win over the girl Harmony fails because Harmony doesn't want her and tosses her aside. Thanks to Forky and Bo, Woody realizes helping toys like Gabby who feel lost find their new forever kids can be his purpose, since he learned from his battle with Lotso that not all toys have to end up that way. In doing so, the film returns to an old Pixar rule: a story with no villain, because not every story needs a source of evil to conquer. Sometimes the battle can just be an inner one, with a character learning a key lesson.

Buzz's Pod Bay Doors Joke and Duke's Final Jump Mirror Buzz's Own Arc

Buzz's running gag in this movie is taking his pre-recorded inner voice literally. At one point he taps it repeatedly and one voice says, "Open the pod bay doors," a nod to the famous line in Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. Duke's parallel to Buzz continues with his big jump at the end, which he makes with his eyes closed, just like Buzz closed his eyes attempting to fly in the first film. Duke passes over the full moon in a shot pulled straight out of E.T.

The Ending Redefines Woody's Catchphrase

Woody says goodbye to his old friends and passes his sheriff's badge on to Jessie, a final visual, alongside the removal of his pull string, connecting him to Andy and Bonnie and severing his tether to the kids who no longer need him. The group heads to a town called New Stanton, an ode to longtime Pixar animator and writer director Andrew Stanton, who directed Finding Nemo and Wall-E.

In the final exchange, Buzz waves from the RV saying, "To infinity," and Woody completes it with, "And beyond." The movie takes that line from a meaningless commercialized toy catchphrase to the perfect description of Woody's destiny. Infinity is by definition undefined, it just goes on and on, the same way these toys do, and now with a new purpose that could get redefined again and again, it's Woody's turn to go to infinity and beyond.

Which movie do you think had the better ending, Toy Story 3 or Toy Story 4?