You pretty much can't make a movie without a shared universe these days. Marvel and DC are leading the pack, of course, but they're far from alone, being joined recently by the new Universal Monster-verse (The Mummy will be the first), The Conjuring-verse (including Annabelle and next up The Nun), the Godzilla-verse (including Kong: Skull Island and later Godzilla 2 and Godzilla vs Kong) and even the Despicable Me-verse, with Minions popping up left, right and centre.
Then there are the following ones. The ones that played it a bit more subtly and left it to the fans to theorise exactly what those shared worlds could mean.
*Warning: some spoilers and some blowing of minds ahead*
1. Star Wars and Indiana Jones
Sharing a stable at Lucasfilm meant it wasn't so difficult to squeeze in a couple of Easter eggs to suggest that these epic series both existed in the same world(s). Look out for the hieroglyphs of R2-D2 and C-3PO in Raiders, as well as Club Obiwan in Temple of Doom. Is Indiana Jones just an elaborate dream conjured up by Han Solo while he's frozen in carbonite? Maybe, maybe not – but it's a fun idea.
2. Scream and Kevin Smith's movies
Scream is a hyper-referential mix of cultural check points essentially taking place in the real world, where all the classic horror movies exist as horror films. But in Scream 3 there's a cheeky bit of franchise crossover as we see two of Kevin Smith's best known characters, Jay and Silent Bob, pop up for a cameo. They're on a movie set tour for the film-within-a-film Stab 3 and mistake Courteney Cox's Gail Weathers for "that TV news chick Connie f***ing Chung". She gives them the finger.
3. All of Pixar's movies
This theory is too long and all-encompassing to properly explain here – it requires its own Pixar Theory Feature, which we've handily already written – but in short it spans from The Good Dinosaur to Monsters Inc and tells the tale of a war between humans and increasingly advanced animals, which goes a bit Planet of the Apes. The movies are packed with Easter eggs to support the theory.
4. Daredevil and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Okay, a bit more tenuous and not, as far as we're aware, referenced in the films, but the Turtles comic book origin story relates to the accident that gave Daredevil his powers. The story goes that Matt Murdock saves a blind guy from a speeding truck but is hit in the head by a radioactive canister. In the Turtles' story, the canister rolls down the drain and dowses the boys in goo, creating the heroes in a half shell (turtle power!)
5. Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs (and basically all of Tarantino's movies)
As well as the reappearance of made-up brands like Big Kahuna Burger and Red Apple cigarettes, Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction are more directly related. Literally – John Travolta's Vincent Vega of Pulp Fiction is supposed to be the brother of Michael Madsen's Vic Vega, aka Mr Blonde, in Dogs. But wait, there's more. Tarantino himself has "explained" that all his films are related in two separate worlds. He explained to news.com.au:
"There's the realer-than-real universe, alright, and all the characters inhabit that one. But then there's this movie universe. And so From Dusk Till Dawn, Kill Bill, they all take place in this special movie universe. So basically when the characters of Reservoir Dogs or Pulp Fiction, when they go to the movies, Kill Bill is what they go to see. From Dusk Till Dawn is what they see."
6. Out of Sight and Jackie Brown
…But Jackie Brown exists outside of the Tarantino-verse. Or Out of Sight exists within it. Both are based on novels by Elmore Leonard and have a shared character played by the same actor, cementing the idea that they take place in the same world. That actor is Michael Keaton, who plays law enforcement agent Ray Nicolette in both films. He was first cast in Jackie Brown and Tarantino insisted he be allowed to take the small role in Out of Sight without having to pay Miramax for the rights.
7. Tangled and Frozen (and maybe Tarzan)
Keep your eyes peeled during Elsa's coronation in Frozen and you'll spot Rapunzel and Eugene (aka Flynn Rider) in attendance (bottom left, above). So there's that.
But it gets bigger: the fan theory is that Anna and Elsa's parents were on the way to Rapunzel and Eugene's wedding when their ship was lost at sea. One of Frozen's directors, Chris Buck, says that Tarzan links in to their world too. What if their ship didn't sink but in fact "got washed up on a shore in a jungle island. The queen gave birth to a baby boy. They build a treehouse. They get eaten by a leopard."
And that baby boy? Tarzan, of course.
"So in my little head, Anna and Elsa's brother is Tarzan – but on the other side of that island are surfing penguins, to tie in a non-Disney movie, Surf's Up. That's my fun little world."
