Intercontinuity Crossover

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

Jigsaw: You wallow in hypocrisy, Angus. Your life has been dedicated to nonviolence, which you advance by jury-rigged poisons and explosives, pretending that using one form of violence over another makes you better than others... Well, now it is time to see how far you're -- did you just turn your manacles into laser beams?
MacGyver: Yep.
Jigsaw: ...Crap.

—Hypothetical MacGyver-Saw crossover. (Source)

Having a Crossover between two related shows is one thing—hey, it's not inconceivable that some of the Cheers cast should turn up in its Spin-Off show Frasier, is it? Or that the CSI team might help out the guys in CSI: NY every now and again.

But what happens when Jay and Silent Bob turn up in Scream 3? Or Cliff and Norm from Cheers book into St. Elsewhere for medical attention? Or a police officer from the grittily realistic Homicide: Life on the Street arrests Fox Mulder of The X-Files? Or the CSI team finds a corpse in a hotel that isn't a corpse, just Angel? Well, then you've got yourself a different kettle of fish altogether. And to add insult to injury, the fish are probably from Finding Nemo and The Little Mermaid.

There are a few reasons why this happens. Sometimes it's because both series are owned by the same network or company, and it wants to improve the ratings on the one show by having the cast from the more popular show appear in it. Sometimes it's because both shows share writers or producers and they think it would be cute to link the two. And sometimes it's just because someone somewhere thought it would be cool.

Most crossovers of this kind are between properties that are owned by the same company or person, which makes legal wrangling easier. But sometimes characters will cross over into another company's properties, like the occasional events from rival comic book firms DC Comics and Marvel Comics. And, of course, anything goes when it comes to Fanfic.

It makes quite a difference whether the crossover reveals that the characters have supposedly been sharing the same world the whole time; or if they're "just" from Another Dimension. While not as big a deal if both series are "relatively" realistic, such as Crime Dramas, if each show has its own version of fantastic events a la Fantasy or Science Fiction; then the implication is that these elements have been existing side by side the whole time, unaware of each other. It also makes for some great Fridge Logic. "Hey, Problem A for Cast B is no big deal, if Cast A and B are friends, why don't they just ask for help?" Of course, Reed Richards Is Useless.

For more information and examples, see Thom Holbrook's Crossovers and Spin Offs Master List, which documents all known crossovers between TV series, except for cartoons. With this information, the site has been able to identify no fewer than 38 contiguous TV "universes" (as of September 2020) which are home to widely disparate (and apparently unlikely) combinations of series from different eras and networks. For instance, see Holbrook's "Group 2" -- one hundred and three series (as of September 2020) ranging from Six Feet Under and Everybody Loves Raymond to Law & Order and The X-Files, taking in M*A*S*H, Cop Rock, Home Improvement and every Marvel Cinematic Universe TV series along the way. Thanks to the baroque web of interconnections and crossovers, it is suggested that these shows all inhabit the same universe. (Holbrook also discovered the "Jean-Claude Van Damme is dead" plague that poses a grave threat to any future crossovers including Star Trek and other Group 10 shows.)

It has been noted on this and other sites that the web of crossovers connects many shows, directly or indirectly, to St. Elsewhere. Since that entire series was shown in its final episode to be the fantasy of an autistic mental patient, we might reasonably conclude that the whole of television is All Just a Dream. In the words of Dwayne McDuffie, one of the executive producers of Justice League, "The last five minutes of St. Elsewhere is the only television show, ever. Everything else is a daydream."

For the Web Comic equivalent of the TV crossover list, see the Webcomic Crossover & Cameo Archive.

For a fanfiction equivalent, see this image. (It needs to add The Bet, The Teraverse and City of Villains, but nobody's complaining, really.)

When this trope happens with three or more series instead of two, it's a Massive Multiplayer Crossover. When the two settings are blended so as to be one unified setting that partakes of elements from both, that's a Fusion Fic.

When each others' works of fiction appear in-universe as fiction in a stable fictional loop, that's Mutually Fictional. When a work of fiction itself appears in its own story, that's Recursive Canon.

Compare Crossover, Fake Crossover. See also Vegas Crossover, Folgers Crossover, Transplant, Fully-Absorbed Finale, Guest Fighter and Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny.

Examples of Intercontinuity Crossover include:

Anime and Manga

  • Part of the Red Ribbon Army story arc on Dragon Ball had Goku chasing Captain Blue to Penguin Village, the setting of Akira Toriyama's earlier manga/anime Doctor Slump, and featured appearances by Arale, Dr. Norimaki, and several other characters. This appeared in the manga and anime (since both shows were made by Toei and aired on Fuji TV); moreover, when Doctor Slump was animated again in 1997, a new Dragon Ball crossover was written in.
    • Toriyama already did that in Dr. Slump itself: there was one chapter where the characters traveled to Wonder Island, the set of the titular manga (and Toriyama's very first published work).
  • The AIR/Kanon crossover manga. (Key Visual Arts)
  • Apparently mostly because the author of Fairy Tail really liked Flunk Punk Rumble they made a crossover called Fairy Megane.
    • That the author of Flunk Punk Rumble's favorite author happens to be the author of Fairy Tail probably helped, as well a former assistant of his. What's most stunning of all is that despite being SERIOUSLY WTF, it actually ain't half bad.
  • The Fate Stay Night X Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha and Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha X Fate Kaleid Liner Prisma Illya collaboration manga that both started in the March 2010 issue of Comp Ace magazine.
  • And then there's the Detective Conan/Lupin III crossover TV special...
    • This was because the anime adaptations of both series were produced by TMS Entertainment.
  • Dragon Ball and One Piece in Cross Epoch.
    • At one of the Jump Fiesta events they featured another crossover of Luffy and Goku going up against Eneru above the city of Tokyo. Other characters get short cameo and even Ryotsu of Kochikame made an appearance (as seen here). They would later do this again only this time against Arlong and Astro Boy was throw into the mix.
  • Slayers VS Orphen
  • Rodimus's backstory in Transformers Energon states that he left Cybertron with a band of Autobots and "traveled into the future", which reflects the ending of Transformers: The Headmasters, in which he ventures off into space to find/found a new home planet.
  • To promote the Jump Super Stars game for the DS, a manga was included for those who preordered drawn by the people behind Eyeshield 21. A standard "sucked into a world to defeat the villain" affair but damn if its not cool seeing Naruto, Luffy, Goku, Toujou, and Bobobo work with Seta to kick Dr. Mashrito's butt. Check it out here.
  • It's not much, but in G Gundam, during the finale episode where all the world's Gundams had banded together to fight the Dark/Devil Gundam, you can see Gundams from other series in the mob. For example, both the standard RX-78-GP01 and the RX-78-GP01 Full Vernian, the Wing Gundam, RX-78-2, etc. They weren't kidding when the said they had all the Gundams!

Comic Books

Fan Works

Film

  • Freddy vs. Jason.
  • Randolph and Mortimer Duke from Trading Places—reduced to homeless poverty by the events of that film—show up in Coming to America. They fail to notice Prince Akeem's uncanny resemblance to Billy Ray Valentine.
  • As a random gag in the third act of Waynes World, Wayne gets pulled over by a cop on a motorcycle... who turns out to be the T-1000, looking for John Connor.
  • In Casper, the bad guys attempt to de-haunt the house using the services of Father Guido Sarducci, and Dr. Ray Stanz from Ghostbusters. "Who you gonna call? Someone else!" (According to TheOtherWiki there was also a scene filmed with Zelda Rubenstein (Tangina Barrons from Poltergeist) but it was cut.)
  • In Little Nicky, when Nicky goes to Heaven he finds Chubbs, who had died in the earlier Adam Sandler film Happy Gilmore, as a dance instructor.
  • Godzilla vs King Kong, in which the King of Monsters and King of Kong duke it out on Mount Fuji. It is epic.
  • George of the Jungle ends with George holding George Jr. over the very same rock where Simba was similarly held. Of course, it's all Disney. And George kicked some serious lion's ass, so it could be canon.

Literature

(On encountering Gladiator in deep space)
Kirk: Did he just punch my ship?
Scotty: Aye, Captain. And he di' damage the shields a bit.

And my favorite:

Nurse Chapel: Doctor McCoy?!
Beast and Bones: Yes?

Live-Action TV

  • The king of the Intercontinuity Crossover is undoubtedly Detective John Munch, played by Richard Belzer, who has appeared as of Summer 2007 on ten different programs. Originally a regular on Homicide: Life on the Street, during the course of that series he appeared in three crossovers with Law & Order. When Homicide finished he went on to become a regular in Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. Not only that, but he also made guest appearances in Law & Order: Trial by Jury, The Beat, Paris Enquêtes Criminelles, The X-Files, Arrested Development, and even Sesame Street. And in August 2007, he filmed an episode for the fifth season of The Wire.
    • Interestingly, there's an episode of Homicide in which Munch refers to people "watching The X-Files." You could take this as a paradox, or you could figure that Munch—a hard-core conspiracy theorist—leaped at the chance to play himself in an X-Files episode. Which might explain why the interrogation room in that X-Files ep looked completely different from the interrogation room in Homicide.
    • There is uncertainty over whether Belzer appears as Munch on The Wire; the character was not named and received a generic billing. He mentioned that he used to own a bar, however, which he did in Homicide, so there's some evidence that it was intended to be Munch.
  • MTM shows did this occasionally. Carla from Cheers talked about having given birth at St. Elegius, aka St. Elsewhere, and the doctors showed up at the Cheers bar once. Sam also once directed patrons to take an ailing man to St. Elegius. Similarly, Bob from The Bob Newhart Show made reference to St. Elegius, while Bob's secretary Carol showed up on Murphy Brown as a temp for Murphy, thereby enfolding it into the autistic daydream which ended St. Elsewhere. See above for more information.
  • The TARDIS, the Living Ship from Doctor Who, has appeared in the sitcoms Red Dwarf (set in the far future) and Chelmsford 123 (set in 123 AD).
    • The Doctor and Rose showed up for a panel of Buffy Season 8, which means that aliens and demons may (if it's canon) exist in the same universe.
    • The Doctor Who/Eastenders crossover (of very dubious quality, but it was for charity) Dimensions in Time could also be mentioned, although it's actually not in either of the shows' continuities (and indeed, since then they've both featured each other as fictional programmes).
    • The Kaldor City Doctor Who Expanded Universe audio dramas written by Chris Boucher and produced by Magic Bullet are set in the titular city from the Doctor Who story The Robots of Death (also by Boucher), but feature Scott Fredericks reprising the role of Psychostrategist Carnell from the Blakes Seven story "Weapon" (also by Boucher). The A History by Lance Parkin (an un-official history of the Whoniverse) makes a valiant attempt to claim that B7 may well be set in the Whoniverse, but really it's probably best to assume he's an Alternate Universe counterpart. Or just don't worry about it. (There's also a cynical manipulator played by Paul "Avon" Darrow, who knows more about Carnell's Federation background than the Kaldorians, but let's not even get started on that...)
    • Similarly, back in the heyday of Marvel Comics' British arm, there were several crossovers between the Doctor Who Expanded Universe (or at least the DWM comics branch of it) and the Marvel Universe. The first and most notable was the Special Executive, a Time Travelling Ragtag Bunch of Misfits created by Alan Moore. Originally introduced in DWM as Ancient Gallifrey's Special Ops, they later appeared in Moore's Captain Britain, where they were mercenaries.
    • Marvel also linked Doctor Who with Transformers, by way of bounty hunter (sorry, "freelance peacekeeping agent") Death's Head. This is a borderline case, however, as the linkage only occurred when Death's Head fell through a dimensional rift from the Marvel UK Transformers universe and ran into the Doctor as a result.
      • In a more solid (possibly) example, the obscure character Octus has been stated to have a Dalek altmode. He was never seen transformed, but Word of God says that's what he turned into.
    • Gallifrey itself... or rather what was left of it... shows up in the Power Rangers Lost Galaxy episode Green Courage with Coordinates to boot, This aired in 1999, Six years before the new series, by the way.
  • It appears that the soap opera Passions has set itself up as a sequel of sorts to the classic Fantastic Comedy Bewitched. It features Juliet Mills as Tabitha Lennox, a genuine witch whose daughter is named Endora and whose parents are a mortal named Darrin and a witch named Samantha. Furthermore, Bernard Fox has made two appearances on the show as his Bewitched character, Dr. Bombay.
  • The Power Rangers in Space encountered the five Turtles from TMNT: The Next Mutation... but, uh, we don't like to talk about the latter group around here (and neither do Eastman and Laird).
    • On the other side of the Pacific, the world of the Samurai Sentai Shinkenger had an unexpected visitor in Kamen Rider Decade. The crossover is in continuity for both shows; in fact, the fact that the Shinkenger world is the only world in Decade that is the genuine, canonical universe of the show in question rather than an Alternate Universe (original worlds aside) is a plot point for the arc.[1]
      • On that note about the Kamen Rider series, Ultraman vs. Kamen Rider is actually more of a team-up special than a fight with the protagonists being portrayed by Fake Shemps, but still awesome.
      • The upcoming special Super Hero Wars: Kamen Rider vs. Super Sentai will be bringing together 240 heroes across both franchises, and once again Decade is involved.
  • The Friends episode "The One With Two Parts" introduces Phoebe's twin sister Ursula, who was a character on Mad About You. Both had been played by Lisa Kudrow, so it was an obvious choice (to the network, at least) to make the previously unrelated characters twins. That same episode had Jamie and Fran from Mad mistake Phoebe for Ursula.
    • One episode of Mad About You itself revealed that Paul's old apartment was being loaned to Kramer from Seinfeld.
      • And later it was revealed that the series Mad About You exists in the Seinfeld universe. Maybe it's a reality show?
    • Another Mad About You episode had Carl Reiner guest star as Alan Brady, his character from The Dick Van Dyke Show. This created a bit of a paradox, because in an episode of Friends (which would seem to be in the same "universe") the characters are shown watching The Dick Van Dyke Show."
      • Not as much as you might think : The actual DvD show ended with Rob Petrie trying to find a buyer for his life story, and Alan Brady hinting that he might want to turn it into a show, which is so meta it hurts. So, it's possible that, in the fictional world where Rob, Laura, and Alan Brady live or lived alongside the Mad and Friends characters, Alan Brady eventually settled on Dick Van Dyke to play Rob Petrie -- brain exploding must stop...
    • Also, Chandler briefly appeared in a Caroline in The City episode, and Caroline briefly appeared in a Friends episode.
    • Ross appeared in an episode of The Single Guy, playing an old schoolmate of Jonathan's.
    • Daphne and Niles of Frasier were on an episode of Caroline In The City, too, so that links Frasier (and, by extension, Cheers) into this little sitcom world, too.
      • And since Cheers linked itself to St. Elsewhere, that drags all of 1990s Must See TV into the autistic kid's dream.
  • Martial Law crossed over onto Early Edition.
    • Early Edition also featured several regular characters from Chicago Hope in one episode.
      • Martial Law also had a crossover with Walker, Texas Ranger. The first episode takes place on Martial Law and begins with the characters standing in their station discussing a recent crime. Then a voice rings out from off-screen, saying "I hear you could use some help." And then the camera shifts to a pair of cowboy boots and slowly pans up to reveal Ranger Cordell Walker, illuminated by a bare lightbulb overhead like some pagan godling. Then he and Sammo team up to stop violent, genocidal white supremacist militia members attempting to steal chemical weapons to use to ethnically cleanse Los Angeles.
        • This is followed by an episode of Walker, Texas Ranger where Sammo visits Texas to help finish up the case. Sammo's extra-sensory and clairvoyant Chinese Daoist powers are accepted by the Rangers without a word of doubt. As Walker's long-suffering partner Trivette explains, "Around here, we call that sort of thing "Cherokee."
  • The Pretender had crossovers in paired episodes with The Profiler, and the relationship between the two characters was kept in the continuity.
  • Despite concepts seemingly custom-made for crossovers, JAG and NCIS only crossed over for one two-parter. Though NCIS didn't exist as a separate show when the crossover happened. In other words, a Poorly-Disguised Pilot.
    • JAG's Lt. Bud Roberts did appear in the first season NCIS episode Hung Out to Dry.
    • Meanwhile, Lt. Cmdr. Faith Coleman and a Navy SEAL played by Adam Baldwin appeared on both series.
  • It's not quite Archie Meets The Punisher bizarre, but the special Alice two-parter that featured a visit from Boss Hogg, Roscoe and Enos from The Dukes of Hazzard (Boss Hogg was Not-Flo Joleene's cousin) is up there.
  • ITV drama series Footballers' Wives briefly exported popular character Tanya Turner to Bad Girls (also produced by ITV) when Tanya was jailed during the plot.
  • The creators of Lost and Heroes have discussed the possibility of intertwining their shows, but are largely unable to do so because they are on different networks. However, small details have crossed over. Characters on both shows have sported identical brochures for the fictitious Gannon Car Rentals.
    • Lost has also featured a few shoutouts to Alias, though it's unlikely they exist in the same universe due to Terry O'Quinn's characters in both shows being completely unrelated.
    • Also, the big "cork" on the bottle of evil at the end of the show pretty closely resembles a Hellmouth. Probably not intentional, but wouldn't it explain just about everything?
  • Speaking of Lost, one of Chef Robert Irvine's missions on Dinner: Impossible was to cook for the cast of Lost. Though it was clear to everyone that Lost is only a television show, Nestor Carbonell did appear in character as Richard Alpert and Robert was given several Dharma food drops to work with, so it qualifies somewhat for this trope.
  • In an episode of Reba involving a court, the judge is obviously intended to be Philip Banks from The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, and is played by the same actor, despite Reba taking place in Houston and Fresh Prince taking place in California.
  • Crossing Jordan and Las Vegas crossed over so often that it probably doesn't even qualify as Intercontinuity Crossover. They certainly take place far enough apart geographically that it's plausible that they're within the same continuity. I think that the Crossing Jordan characters made one more appearance in Las Vegas after their own show had been canceled, though both shows are now finished.
    • In one LV episode, Mary made a reference to booking a conference room for Dunder-Mifflin, and Heroes and the 2008 Knight Rider series have both made references. Linderman being involved would certainly explain the Montecito's high owner turnover rate. Don't combine it with the Lost bit above, though, or your head might explode.
  • When a mentally ill patient filed a paternity suit against Dr. Kiley on Marcus Welby, M.D., the trial was resolved by Owen Marshall: Counselor at Law.
  • Picket Fences crossed over into Chicago Hope (both shows created/executive produced/written by David E. Kelly and airing on CBS), when Fyvish Finkel's character Douglas Wambaugh checked into the hospital. They also poked at ER featuring a "commercial" for the hospital that parodied the opening credits of ER and later having one character say, "We don't like to talk about that other hospital."
  • Because both series were produced by William Dozier, it was practically foreordained that The Green Hornet and Kato would make an appearance in Batman, which they did in the episodes "A Piece of the Action"/"Batman's Satisfaction", which aired on March 1 and 2, 1967, as well as an appearance in a brief "window gag" in another episode. The styles of the two shows didn't really mesh, however.
    • As for the styles of the shows not meshing, it's interesting to note that in the Hornet's "window gag" appearance (the earlier of the two appearances), Batman and Robin acknowledge his and Kato's status as heroes. In the later guest appearance, the episodes run with the standard "on police records a wanted criminal" plot device of the Green Hornet property, and entangle the Hornet/Kato and Batman/Robin in a Let's You and Him Fight standoff.
  • USA Network does this on a regular basis in their ads. If you take, say, "Monk: A Tribute" as canon, Monk, Psych, Royal Pains, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, In Plain Sight, and Burn Notice all take place in one universe. Sooner or later, all of their major series end up there.
  • Disney Channel took this to an extreme, theming two entire episodes specifically for the crossover: That's So Suite Life of Hannah Montana and Wizards of Waverly Place On Deck with Hannah Montana.
  • The MythBusters appear in an episode of the original CSI (Vegas). From the way the segment is filmed its unclear whether they are intended to be fictional lab-techs, "themselves" visiting the lab, or a figment of Nick's imagination. However they later tested the same theory on Mythbusters, using clips from the CSI episode.
    • Speaking of CSI, that show once shared a rather odd crossover with the sitcom (and fellow CBS hit series) Two and A Half Men.
  • Fringe has a particularly interesting example of this trope. The Observer, or rather one of them, specifically September, whose task it is to police inter-dimensional travel and interferences with the timeline, has managed to crossover from the Fringe continuity... into the "real world". He appeared in the audience of American Idol and has been spotted in various stadiums during Fox sports broadcasts.
  • This one's a little older, but in an episode of The Jack Benny Program, Jack goes to court for supposedly murdering a rooster he owns. Who does he get as his lawyer? Perry Mason. Although it may not count officially, since it was All Just a Dream on Jack's part. Oh, and the true murderer? Perry Mason himself.
  • An episode of Warehouse 13 included Douglas Fargo of Eureka.
  • R. Lee Ermey turned up in Season 1 Episode 4 of Pawn Stars in full Lock n' Load gear.
  • Ally McBeal and The Practice had a two-part crossover special that started on Ally McBeal on Fox and was resolved in the next hour on The Practice on ABC, with several characters from each show appearing on the other show. Both shows were produced by David E. Kelley.
  • Susan's niece was missing when her sister Chloe overdosed, and was found by the police in New York.
  • Comic Relief frequently features entirely non-canonical Intercontinuity Crossovers. Notable ones include:
    • 1997's Prime Suspect Cracker, in which Fitz and DCI Tennyson hook up and decide that now they have a relationship they don't care who the killer is.
    • 1997 also had BallykissangelDibley, in which Geraldine desperately tried to convince a visiting Father Peter that her parishioners were normal.
    • 2009's When Janet Met Michelle, which combined all BBC Three's sitcoms about twentysomethings, as the cast of Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps invited characters from Grownups and Coming of Age to their fundraiser party. The title refers to the characters played by Sheridan Smith in Two Pints and Grownups, who did indeed meet.
  • Similarly, 2010's Children in Need telethon included Eastenders Street, in which a bunch of characters from each soap arrive at the location of the other one, including Gail Platt and Denise Johnson competing to see who has the most tragic backstory. The cliffhanger ending was that Liz Macdonald is Kat Moon's mother, in a direct parody of the revelation that Kat is Zoe's mother. See also the Doctor Who entry above for an earlier Children in Need 'Stenders crossover.

Newspaper Comics

  • As of June 2021, Calvin and Hobbes is officially a part of Bloom County‍'‍s continuity. While its genesis was as an April Fools' Day prank Bloom County cartoonist Berkeley Breathed perpetrated every year starting in 2016, in 2021 he got permission from Bill Watterson to use Hobbes in an extended storyline.

Professional Wrestling

  • New Japan Pro Wrestling has Jushin Liger, Tiger Mask, and Black Tiger, all of whom were anime characters before NJPW licensed their likenesses and created wrestlers out of them. It makes sense for Tiger Mask and Black Tiger, as the anime they originate from was about wrestling in the first place, but Jushin Liger was created for a Henshin series that takes place Twenty Minutes Into the Future about a holy warrior with the power of the liger (half-lion, half-tiger) who battles evil aliens bent on destroying the world. Makes sense.
  • When Hulk Hogan's first movie, No Holds Barred, hit theaters, the WWF thought it'd be a good idea to bring in the villain of the film, Zeus, to battle Hulk in a WWF ring. They were never really clear on whether this was supposed to be the movie character come to life, or the actor assuming the character's persona to wreak havoc (in some promos, he'd lean one way, in others, the other), but one thing was absolutely clear throughout the entire angle: it was Wrestlecrap.
  • RoboCop (yes, RoboCop!) appeared at WCW's Capital Combat 1990 to rescue Sting from a cage he was placed in by the Four Horsemen.
  • Chucky (the Creepy Doll from Child's Play) interrupted a Rick Steiner promo. Sadly, he didn't take up Rick's challenge to meet him in the ring.

Toys

  • Matt Trakker of M.A.S.K. recently re-emerged as an action figure in the G.I. Joe line, presumably because Kenner (M.A.S.K.‍'‍s manufacturer) merged with Hasbro (G.I. Joe‍'‍s manufacturer) years ago.
    • SQUUEEEEEEEEEE-- Oh, excuse me!
    • And don't forget G.I.Joe's original Intercontinuity Crossover character, WWF wrestler Sgt. Slaughter.
    • Hasbro has also done G.I. Joe action figures for Rocky Balboa and William "The Refrigerator" Perry as team trainers.
    • And also G.I. Joe action figures for Street Fighter II. In fact, it was there when Ken got his last name, Masters, because they couldn't name an action figure "Ken" thanks to Barbie.
  • Hasbro recently came out with Transformers Crossovers, so far including Star Wars and Marvel Comics characters. They are presented as the characters driving vehicles that transform into Humongous Mecha that look like they do, ranging from a Hulkbot turning into a tank to a moon-sized Darth Vader robot transforming to the Death Star. The Star Wars ones have an advantage in that they can use existing vehicles to turn into. The Marvel ones don't have existing vehicles (for the most part... but then again, try remembering the last time you saw Spider-Man's Spider-Mobile), but this is an advantage in its own way as they can be designed almost entirely around making the robot mode look right.
    • There's also the Disney Label ones, including "Mickey Prime" and a Bumblebee Donald Duck. Doesn't seem like these Disney crossovers will be coming to the US, though.

Tabletop Games

  • Spelljammer fan campaign: Second Unhuman War as an extension of the Blood War—that is, between Elves corrupted and manipulated by Tanar'ri and Scro corrupted (if they need more) and manipulated by Baatezu.
  • Die, Vecna, Die was an intercontinuity adventure module, intertwining events in Greyhawk, Ravenloft, and Planescape.
    • Planescape, along with Spelljammer, had partly come to be to facilitate crossovers by connecting the various campaign settings—or, to put it another way, to render Die, Vecna, Die style campaign setting crossovers into ordinary crossovers. On the other hand, Ravenloft was supposed to have a rather one-way connection to the rest of the multiverse (things could enter, but they couldn't leave), so something coming out of Ravenloft to have a crossover was rather unexpected...
  • Paranoia had one of these with Cyberpunk in 1989 with the adventure Alice Through the Mirrorshades. In true Paranoia fashion, every aspect of Cyberpunk was given a thorough mocking, from its gritty near-future setting to its "style over substance" ethos to creator Mike Pondsmith himself.

Theme Parks

Video Games

  • Garry's Mod allows you to do all kinds of crossovers with the right mods. Want John-117 to team up with Gordon Freeman and fight Saren? Have fun.
  • Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games featured the first meeting of Mario and Sonic the Hedgehog. Since the pair were the mascots of former warring console makers Nintendo and Sega (respectively), this was something of a big deal for old-school gamers.
  • Let's not forget Super Smash Bros. which features all of the Nintendo characters meeting (though technically it's not them, they're just Gashapon figurines brought to life). From Mario, to Link, to the Pokemon. And now there's the ones not from Nintendo, such as Sonic the Hedgehog and Snake.
  • Mario Hoops 3-on-3 and Mario Sports Mix add Final Fantasy characters to the traditional cast of Mario sports games.
  • The Fortune Street series eventually added Dragon Quest characters to the game. Sony installments of the series crossed them over with Final Fantasy characters, while the Wii and DS installments mixed them up with the Super Mario Bros. cast.
  • Two games by Shounen Jump were made that put up some of their high-end mascots up against each other in the same vein as Super Smash Bros. The most popular and most varied is the Jump Super Stars game on the Nintendo DS. On the Gamecube, focusing on its most successful series, is Battle Stadium DON, with DON being an acronym for Dragon Ball, One Piece, and Naruto.
  • Wario Land Blast: Featuring Bomberman! which is pretty much what the title says. (Except in Japan, where it was GB Bomberman and had nothing to do with Wario.)
  • The Gilliam Yaeger who is the final boss of the Super Famicom game Hero Senki, and who appears in the Super Robot Wars initial continuity, and the Original Generation continuity are all the same character.
    • For that matters, the Super Robot Wars series itself is built on the idea of Mazinger Z and Shinji Ikari teaming up to beat up Char Aznable.
    • Also notable in Super Robot Wars OG Saga: Endless Frontier, Reji and Xiaomu from Namco X Capcom confirm that KOS-MOS from Xenosaga comes from their future (which was already established in the former's game).
  • Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe.
  • Though it's technically one series, each of the Final Fantasy games has its own world and continuity, which means Gilgamesh's appearances in various games (it's hinted he's the same character, moving through the alternate universes) count.
    • And then there's Final Fantasy Tactics, where you can send out other characters on jobs, and they may return having found the Big Bad's palace from Final Fantasy II, or the phantom train from Final Fantasy VI, or the fake Excalibur from Final Fantasy V.
      • Not to mention the entire sidequest to get Cloud in your party. The PSP port of Tactics also included Balthier from Final Fantasy XII and Luso from Final Fantasy Tactics A2. In the case of Cloud too, it's suggested that his stint in Ivalice occurs when he fell into the lifestream, hinting that it's the actual Cloud from Final Fantasy VII. Less so with Balthier and Luso, who are more or less there with no explanation. Lampshaded by Balthier himself even, who mentions that his role in the game... "feels more like a cameo role".
  • DJ Atomica, the (some would say) annoying announcer in Burnout Paradise, is the same guy who provided the commentary for SSX 3. In Paradise, he makes reference to SSX several times, suggesting it's supposed to be the same character.
  • A couple of recent Yes! Pretty Cure 5GoGo! video games have incorporated characters from the previous universes. The story implications of the iDOLM@STER knockoff are probably not significant, but the DS game has a plot suggesting they all share a universe and simply never ran into each other before (which does happen in the Pretty Cure All Stars DX movie).
      • Some Ace Combat forum goers have taken the existence of iDOLM@STER skins in DLC to suggest that those characters are animated versions of actual musical artists in Strangereal.
  • Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo has characters from Street Fighter, Darkstalkers, and Cyberbots. There's only one character from the latter, though.
  • Capcom's "Vs. series" started life as such with X-Men vs. Street Fighter and Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter before stepping into Massive Multiplayer Crossover territory; it hasn't looked back since.
  • Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne features a guest appearance by Dante from Devil May Cry. In exchange for this being done, series demon artist Kazuma Kaneko designed the Devil Trigger forms of the Sons of Sparda in Devil May Cry 3.
  • One of the boons from finishing an Escape Velocity: Nova storyline is access to one of two known (very expensive) ships "found floating near a wormhole at the farthest end of known space". Scientists "theorize that these mystery ships somehow entered our galaxy from a parallel dimension." The ship is from the original Escape Velocity game, which has practically identical (albeit less developed) gameplay but a completely different universe.
  • One of the earliest intercompany video game crossovers was Battletoads & Double Dragon: The Ultimate Team, a crossover between Rare's Battletoads and Technos Japan's Double Dragon franchises (natch) released in 1993 for various platforms. This was made possible by the fact that Tradewest published both series in America and Europe, although the game itself was really more of a Battletoads game with Double Dragon characters as guest stars (some which were misnamed in the game).
  • Kingdom Hearts is a crossover between Disney and Final Fantasy.
  • My World, My Way features two characters, the mysterious dungeon diggers Owen and Kate, who were the protagonists of a previous Atlus/Global A game entitled Master of the Monster Lair. Owen even carries around the magic shovel that he had in Monster Lair, and the dungeon layouts are similar in both games.
  • So far, Link, Heihachi, Spawn, Kratos, Ezio Auditore, Darth Vader and Yoda, and Starkiller have all appeared in the Soul Series.
  • Telltale Games's latest game, Poker Night At the Inventory, features Tycho Brahe, Max, Heavy Weapons Guy, and Strong Bad, from Penny Arcade, Sam and Max Freelance Police, Team Fortress 2, and Homestar Runner, respectively, all playing poker together, plus an assortment of characters milling around the background. Plus, it could theoretically cross over with just about any property that's ever had a game made of it, period.
  • Although it's all from the same company, this schtick is a favorite of Nippon Ichi. Characters tend to show up in each other's games with reckless abandon, ranging from minor cameos to secret characters to actual plot-relevance. Laharl ends up in a bottle in Phantom Brave and chews out Revya in Soul Nomad and The World Eaters for trying to take his title. Etna is a central secondary character in Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories. Lujei (from Grim Grimoire) is responsible for Endorph (who is really Walnut from Phantom Brave) appearing in Soul Nomad. Everyone of any importance shows up in Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice as downloadable content. And to top it off, you have Asagi, the wandering protagonist without a game of her own, trying to usurp the hero role in almost every game.
  • Interesting crossover here, in Devil May Cry. Dante receives the sword named Alastor, imbued with an electrical motif. Later on in Viewtiful Joe, a character named Alastor appears, complete with the electrical motif. The connection is later made in the PS2 port of Viewtiful Joe in which Dante guest stars and Alastor harbors some unfriendly feelings towards Dante.
    • After this, the connection is pushed forward in Tatsunoko vs. Capcom in which Morrigan's win quote vs. Viewtiful Joe mentions that she was disappointed in him after talking to Alastor. Leading to an implication that Darkstalkers, Devil May Cry, and Viewtiful Joe are all part of the same universe.
  • Free Flash game crossover: In Shift 3 you can unlock Fancy Pants Man as a Secret Character.
  • Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater featured a bonus minigame where Solid Snake is assigned capture a bunch of escaped monkeys from the Ape Escape series. In turn, Ape Escape 3 featured a bonus mini-game where the player controls a monkey named Pipo Snake who must rescue Solid Snake.

Web Comics

Web Original

Western Animation

  • According to the special The Grim Adventures of the Kids Next Door, The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy, Codename: Kids Next Door, Ed, Edd n Eddy, and The Powerpuff Girls all take place in the same universe.
  • Transformers and G.I. Joe have a long history of crossovers, which includes Inhumanoids and Jem through the shared character of sensationalist TV reporter Hector Ramirez (a Geraldo Rivera parody). The original comic books had a special crossover miniseries, and recent comics have revisited the crossover in various ways. The old eighties cartoons, meanwhile, shared a reality: in the futuristic third season of Transformers, major character Marissa Faireborn was the daughter of G.I. Joe character Flint, and one episode featured a washed-up Cobra Commander doing business under the pseudonym "Old Snake."
  • Nickelodeon's shows The Fairly OddParents and The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius had three cross-over Made For TV Movies: "The Jimmy Timmy Power Hour", "Jimmy-Timmy II: When Nerds Collide", and "Jimmy-Timmy III: Jerkinators".
  • Disney took this to another extreme with Lilo & Stitch: The Series, doing several specials that crossed it over with a bunch of the other shows on Disney Channel. Of course, this fits with the movie's initial marketing push, showing Stitch crossing over with various Disney movies, wrecking the place, and being told to get his own movie.
    • And, as a result, aliens are now Canon in Recess and The Proud Family... Which seems kinda odd, considering how relatively realistic their premises were.
      • Though it does somewhat fit with The Proud Family's usual weirdness. Heck, Penny's great-aunt canonically has telekinetic powers.
    • And the fact that, by extension, American Dragon: Jake Long is set in the same universe as Lilo and Stitch, Kim Possible, and Recess has lots of strange implications...
    • It's very confusing with Recess, as it's made explicitly clear in the series that it takes place over the course of the Fall of 1997 until the Summer of 1998 (and then Fall 1998 for Recess: Taking the Fifth Grade), even for the episodes made in the 2000s (this is firmly established in Recess: School's Out)
  • In one episode of Duck Dodgers, Dodgers gets his dry cleaning mixed up with Hal Jordan's and ends up as the newest Green Lantern when he finds the power ring in Jordan's uniform pocket.
    • The episode name, for the curious, is The Green Loontern. And in another episode (Samurai Quack) Dodgers takes the place of Samurai Jack. Complete with Aku Achoo, voiced by Mako himself.
  • On The Simpsons, Homer's claim to having had a close encounter with an extraterrestrial is investigated by none other than Agents Scully and Mulder.

Artie Ziff: Idiots.

  1. Speaking of which, Power Rangers already beat Super Sentai at a Kamen Rider crossover long ago with Mighty Morphin Power Rangers' Poorly-Disguised Pilot for Masked Rider.