Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality/Shout-Out

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• Chapter 3 features Bounce Boots ("Made with real Flubber!"), Knives +3! Forks +2! Spoons with a +4 bonus!, goggles that turn anything you look at green, and cushy lounge chairs with ejection seats for emergencies (???). In later chapters as well, various potions come from D&D.
• In chapter 6, Harry purchases Rincewind's Luggage.
• In Chapter 7, Harry is wearing an exercise band to hide his scar while he's on the train.
• In chapter 13, one of the notes written to Harry by the Game Controller is a reference to The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: "Ten out of ten for style, but minus several million for good thinking."
• Chapter 15: "Of course you realize this means war."
• The cube saying "blorple, blorple, blorple" in Dumbledore's office is a reference to the Infocom text-adventure game "Spellbreaker".
• Dumbledore apparently owns The Maltese Falcon.
• In Chapter 17, McGonagall discusses the recent disastrous employments of two Defense professors, Professor Blake (who was caught with THREE fifteen-year-olds in a broom closet) and Professor Summers (who failed to teach material correct in the Harry Potter universe).
• In chapter 18 Harry examines a large dust ball with eyes and feet preserved in a jar.
• One evil individual mentioned in passing in chapter 19 is named Mornelithe Falconsbane, a reference to the dark wizard who is the main villain of Mercedes Lackey's Mage Winds trilogy.
• Quirrell mentions a list he made that is suspiciously similar to the Evil Overlord List.
• In Chapter 20 we learn that mindflayers were exterminated by Harold Shea. This matches with the original making allusions with historical wizards.
• "Gom jabbar!"
• And now -- to Death Note, or should we say, Tragedy of Light. And to Gargoyles. Both of which are apparently children's stories in the Wizarding World, meant to teach young Slytherins about a cunning bussinessman named Xanatos.
• In chapter 23, Harry makes an analogy involving an invisible dragon that is taken almost verbatim from The Demon-Haunted World.
• According to Word of God, the line "And then Janet was a Squib" was not intended to be a reference to the last line of Doom: Repercussions of Evil, but it's an amusing coincidence nevertheless.
• Chapter 27: Mr. Bester is the Legilimens hired to train Harry. Harry creates an alternate persona in his mind to try to foil Bester's Legilimency; this persona is Kimball Kinnison of the Lensman series.
• And in Chapter 28, a nice reference to The Black Company.
• In Chapter 29, an offhand comment is made about a girl who can magically turn her hair bright red (not orange, red) who, upon splashing her tea on herself, briefly became a black-haired boy.
• In Chapter 30, Harry wants to name his team Dragon Army, but Draco claims priority. So Harry goes with 'Chaos Legion'. The appropriate shout-outs are swift to follow.
• Also in Chapter 30, Dean gets excited at being able to say, "Red Five standing by!"
• In the background only, but the wizard in the crowd in Diagon Alley in Chapter 32 wearing a formal top hat and bath-robes sounds suspiciously like Chrestomanci.
• "Lagann" is the trigger word for the "Breaking Drill Hex" in Chapter 33.
• In Chapter 33, Harry, an army commander at the age of 11, scolds his army for not abandoning their previous notations of gravity.
• In Chapter 35, Harry said he would evacuate all the wizards to Mars should a war break out between wizards and Muggles. Guess where the magic world in Negima is.
• "Imposition of order equals escalation of chaos." The presence of, ultimately, a quintuple agent is probably a reference to the same work.
• In Chapter 39, Dumbledore taps his fingers through a black plate inscribed with the word "Leliel", a reference to the 12th Angel from Neon Genesis Evangelion.
• In Chapter 43 we learn that Harry plans to become an Animagus so he can turn into a peregrine falcon
• In Chapter 46, Harry gives Hermione a letter that contains the answer to a mysterious question. The reference, you ask? The wax seal on the letter is inscribed with the number 42.
• In Chapter 47, a reference to the founders of Hogwarts fighting Lord Foul.
• Also in Chapter 47, Harry extinguishes his light with the word dulak; the typical word for extinguishing light is nox, Harry instead used the word the Raistlin Majere used to darken the Staff of Magius in the Dragonlance series.
• To test his Patronus, Draco sends Harry the message, "beware the green monkey," which was "a sign from a play Draco had once seen."
• To the author's mother in chapter 49.
• From the same chapter: Harry read a book called Spell and Speak.
• From the same chapter: Tenorman's family chili and green lentil soup (served with a glass of Chianti, natch).
• Chapter 51 references Tom Lehrer, quoting the first two lines of his song "Be Prepared". It also includes Harry saying a password that contains the word "friend". And the world "melon", which sounds like the elvish word for "friend". And swordfish, as a reference to the Marx brothers (because The Password Is Always Swordfish). The Tom Lehrer reference is also a callback to Harry quoting the song to explain why needs to be Crazy Prepared to McGonagall in chapter 6 (see also Second Verse Curse below).

"I am going to be in Ravenclaw. And if you really think that I'm planning to do something dangerous, then, with respect, you don't understand me at all. I don't like danger, it is scary. I am being prudent. I am being cautious. I am preparing for unforeseen contingencies. Like my parents used to sing to me: Be prepared! That's the Boy Scout's marching song! Be prepared! As through life you march along! Don't be nervous, don't be flustered, don't be scared -- be prepared!" (Harry's parents had in fact only ever sung him those particular lines of that Tom Lehrer song, and Harry was blissfully unaware of the rest.)

• Chapter 51: Mary's Room, where Harry and Professor Quirrell have been having lunch, is in Mary's Place, owned by "Jake". Also a reference to the thought experiment "Mary's room".
• Chapter 54: An auror mentions fighting Madam Tarma as a first year Auror trainee.
• Also in chapter 54, Auror Li has a son named Kao.
• Chapter 57: "All right, you primitive screwheads! Listen up!!"
  • Also the Dementors are referred to as spheres of annihilation.
• The prisoner saying "I'm not serious" is either a reference to The Dark Knight, a hint about Sirius Black's current fate ("I'm not Sirius"), or both.
• Chapter 61: The Eye of Vance. Possibly Primer in the discussion of time travel.
• Chapter 62: Silver on the Tree alludes to the story of another 11-year-old English fantasy hero.
• Chapter 63: Urulat, Verdandi, Iocane Powder (which, of course, is thought to be in one of two flasks), "Bahl's Stupefaction", the phrase "Maximum Fun Location", Robot Unicorn Attack, and "a furry creature like a small child, holding a peculiar flat spear". (The small furry creature may be a Fuzzy and not an Ewok; the "peculiar flat spear" is more distinctive of Fuzzies than Ewoks.) And the Salem Witches Academy of America.
• Chapter 65: Peter Pevensie is a former student of Hogwarts.
• Chapter 67:
  • "In the high reaches of Hogwarts where rooms and corridors changed on a daily basis, where the territory itself was uncertain and not just the map,..."
  • "We're the Grey Knights of Chaos," said Neville's voice.
  • Hermione intends to emulate Superman. It doesn't work as planned.
  • Daphne Greengrass and Neville Longbottom basically summon lightsabers:

And finally she grasped her wand in both hands and shrieked, "Lucis Gladius!"

• • The incantation for the above spell can be translated as "Thunder! Gray skull! Sword of light!"
• In chapter 70, former students named Miles Naismith and Cimorene Linderwall are mentioned, as is an evil "Professor Barney."
  • Later edited to replace Miles with Lupe Cazaril. Word of God says that this is because Miles Vorkosigan is already attending Hogwarts.
• Hermione manages to utter "Gleep?" in chapter 72. Also, Lavender's "hero outfit" from the play Chronicles of the Lunarian Soldiers.
• Chapter 74... needs a bulletted list
  • "Acathla, mundatus sum"
  • Mabra, brahoring, mabra"
  • During the 'ritual,' Tracey and the girls are protected by an AT-Field.
  • "Shuffle, duffle, muzzle, muff. Fista, wista, mista-cuff."
  • "Lemarchand, Lament, Lemarchand"
  • "Khornath, Slaaneth, Nurgolth and Tzintchi" in the Dark Tongue
  • "Darkness beyond darkness, deeper than pitchest black. Buried beneath the flow of time," the Dragon Slave and Giga Slave]
  • "Unknown to death, nor known to life" from Archer's Unlimited Blade Works chant.
  • "From darkness to darkness, your voice echoes in the emptiness."
  • "You who know the gate, who are the gate, the key and guardian of the gate"
  • A "ritual to summon Death itself"
  • The triple-repetition of a name to summon the person named.
  • And finally, at the end, Tracy gets all dark and stuff, likely referring to My Immortal.
• Chapter 75 has a character describe Hermione and Harry's relationship as being like a play she saw whose plot matches the webcomic Ow, My Sanity.
  • "...distant voices crying 'Tekeli-li!' 'Tekeli-li!'"
• Chapter 78 mentions Venus Fire Traps from Super Mario Brothers 3
• Chapter 79 has fake? Quirrell claming to have been in Fuyuki City in 1983.
• Chapter 81 mentions people false believing that Merlin "fought the dread Totoro and imprisoned the Ree."
• Chapter 85 has Harry's internal monologue explicitly quote characters from the Chronicles of Amber, Fate/stay night, and Web of Angels.