The Avengers (1998 film)/Shout-Out

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Alice in Wonderland:
    • One of the Villain organizations was named "Wonderland Weather".
    • Sir August played a game of croquet with Father, as Alice did with the Red Queen.
    • At one point Mother said "I often think of six impossible things before breakfast" (a paraphrase of the White Queen's line).
    • One of the Ministry's agents was named "Alice".
    • Mrs. Peel fell "down a rabbit hole" in the maze and ended up in Sir August's clutches. He used a mixture of hypnosis and drugs to send her on a hallucinogenic journey through a bizarre area.
    • Mrs. Peel escaped from Sir August's tesseract rooms by jumping through a mirror on a wall, similar to the way Alice went through the looking glass.
  • Blade Runner:
    • During the chess game between Steed and Mrs. Peel, they call out the same moves that J.F. Sebastian and Eldon Tyrell used in their game.
    • During Sir August's final battle with Steed he says "Time to die!", the line Leon spoke to Deckard.
  • William Shakespeare's plays:
    • After finding a dead scientist wearing a teddy bear costume Steed says "Alas, poor teddy", from "Alas poor Yorick" in Hamlet.
    • When Sir August appears before the Council of Ministers to make his demands, he starts off by saying "Now is the winter of your discontent", from Gloster's line in Richard III: "Now is the winter of our discontent".
  • Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest. While Father and then fake Mrs. Peel are escaping by balloon, Sir August sends instructions by radio to head "north by northwest".
  • The endless stair Mrs. Peel tries to descend during her drug-induced nightmare was clearly inspired by the works of the artist M. C. Escher.
  • After finding two dead scientists wearing bear suits Steed says "The teddy bears are having a picnic." This refers to the song "Teddy Bears' Picnic.
  • When Steed and Mrs. Peel see the two bearsuit-wearing villains split up, Mrs. Peel says "I'll take the high road" and Steed says "And I'll take the low road.", a reference to the Scottish song The Bonnie Banks o' Loch Lomond.
  • While Steed and Mrs. Peel are in the escape pod Steed says "The owl and the pussycat went to sea, in a beautiful pea-green boat.", from the Edward Lear poem.
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