The other greatest match in the history of the world.
For Zack Snyder's Justice League, see here.
- Wonder Woman's ability to keep pace with a machine gun and deflect all its bullets at lightning speed is reminiscent of a scene in the first episode of Lynda Carter's Wonder Woman TV show.
- Barry putting his hand on the glass of the parlor and his father doing the same. It mirrors a similar gesture from the Flash CW series.
- At one point, Alfred says that he misses the days where all Batman had to worry about was "exploding wind-up penguins", a nod to one of Batman's most iconic rogues, the Penguin.
- The film's "You can't save the world alone" poster, as well as the individual character posters with the same imagery, is visually inspired by the works of famed comic book artist Alex Ross.
- The stakes of the movie escalates to a point where the skies turn red. The idea of a Red Sky is significant to a number of Crisis Crossover events, particularly the renowned Crisis on Infinite Earths. In a more general sense, though, is that a number of comics utilize a red sky for strictly stylistic purposes, especially Batman and his adaptations.
- Batman had a dream of the world ending, and using that dream as the inspiration to put a team together to stop that future from coming. This was a plot point in Grant Morrison's Batman run.
- The prison guard working for Batman alerts him to Barry's presence by with a phone symbol that turns red when pressed.
- After his resurrection, Clark stands in a cornfield wearing a black and red plaid shirt at sunset. An iconic image from Richard Donner's Superman: The Movie.
- Speaking of, Danny Elfman makes liberal use of John Williams' iconic Superman theme in this film's soundtrack, as well as his own Batman theme song from Tim Burton's 1989 film.
- The music in Flash's scenes heavily uses themes from the Arrowverse's Flash series.
- Speaking of, Danny Elfman makes liberal use of John Williams' iconic Superman theme in this film's soundtrack, as well as his own Batman theme song from Tim Burton's 1989 film.
- Clark was buried in a blue suit with a red tie, Clark's most iconic look in the comics.
- This version of Victor Stone became Cyborg after suffering near-fatal injuries in a car wreck, rather than a lab accident. This was actually Cyborg's origin in Smallville as well.
- When pressed about his skills, Barry Allen starts mentioning various technical skills and that he knows sign language, specifically gorilla sign language. One of the Flash's most famous enemies is Gorilla Grodd, an intelligent, telepathic gorilla. He also lies about practicing figure-skating, alluding to his ice-themed foe Captain Cold and Cold's skating-themed sister the Golden Glider.
- After Steppenwolf gets beamed back to Apokolips, Cyborg says his signature Teen Titans (2003) catchphrase, "Booyah".
- One of the Gotham scenes during the prologue has a building with "Janus" written on it. In the comics, Black Mask inherited a company named Janus Cosmetics.
- Arthur remarks to Diana at one point that they should get together, even though their people don't always get along, alluding to the complicated affair they have in Flashpoint.
- It's also a nod to their brief romance in the pre-Flashpoint continuity. Which itself may be an obscure nod to Wonder Woman's romance with Ronno the Mer-Man in the early Silver Age.
- The story of Steppenwolf leading an invasion of Earth which failed and left him marooned and cut off from Apokolips and from Darkseid, is taken from the alternate universe Earth 2 comics.
- The unnamed Lantern who fought Steppenwolf thousands of years ago sports a cape, just like the Alan Scott Lantern whose appearance predates Hal Jordan in the comics.
- From a more obscure source, an alternate version of Jordan's predecessor Abin Sur wore a similar cape on Earth-20 during The Multiversity series.
- The Atlantean King that gets one of the Mother Boxes, in the flashback, is blonde and wears orange body armor, a reference to Aquaman's classic look.
- Bruce says that humanity acts like "the Doomsday Clock has a snooze button", inadvertently (or deliberately, given Geoff Johns' involvement) plugging the DC Comics event Doomsday Clock even before it's out. Of course, it's also a nod to Zack Snyder's first venture into superhero movies.
- Bruce gets the Kent farm back for Clark, alluding to the time in the comics when he bought Clark and Lois their apartment. (To drive home the resemblance; in the comics Bruce doesn't just "get them the apartment", he buys the building. In the movie when Clark asks how he got the farm back from the bank, Bruce casually explains "I bought the bank".)
- The nature of Superman's revival and unstable state is suspiciously similar to the use of a Lazarus Pit far moreso than the manner in which he resurrected in the original comics after his fight with Doomsday. Major Batman villain Ra's al Ghul is well known for using these pits to maintain his youth and revive from death. At the cost of temporary insanity after each use. The Lazarus pits were Adapted Out in The Dark Knight Trilogy, and the older experienced Batman who lives in a more comic-book DC universe makes no reference to it at all.
- There is also a minor shout-out to The Princess Bride, when Bruce mentions that Clark's cells were in a state of constant regeneration. Clark was mostly dead.
- Parademons being formerly normal beings that were forcibly turned into monsters is lifted from Justice League: War, which coincidentally was an adaptation of the New 52's foundation of the Justice League.
- In the post-credits sequence the escaped Lex Luthor is shown to have a pair of Bodyguard Babes standing right behind him during the meeting, just as he often does in the comics. They aren't named in the movie, but one of them is blonde and the other is black, fitting the description of Luthor's most famous bodyguards, Mercy and Hope. Interestingly enough, Mercy was already a character in Batman v. Superman, where she was killed.
- The Justice League being forced to bring Superman back to life to help them, who manages to turn the tide of the battle in the heroes' favor with his presence and curb-stomp Steppenwolf is highly similar to Injustice: Gods Among Us' story mode where Superman is transported to the Injustice Earth, manages to save his fellow members and defeat the Big Bad, the Injustice version of himself.
- As Zack Snyder confirms, a shot of The Flash tripping is directly ripped from a panel from Batman: The Dark Knight Returns where Superman is struck by lightning.
- It's not the first time that a demonic being told Hippolyta that "[she] would love him". Steppenwolf's treatment of her is highly reminiscent of Hades in Justice League. Curiously, both beings share a similar background as evil deities trying to take over the world in the distant past and the Amazons being charged with guarding one of the items that are important to their return.
- Also an allusion to Steppenwolf from Earth 2 comics, who deceived this alternate universe's Wonder Woman and was briefly her lover(!).
- There's also an episode of Super Friends where Darkseid brainwashed Wonder Woman into being his queen. Must be a family tradition.
- Steppenwolf and his Parademons killed a large number of Amazons, and he later tried to single-handedly kill Diana. In the Earth 2 universe again, Steppenwolf and his army killed all of the Amazons, and he himself personally killed Diana.
- The strange plant life that begins to grow around the battle site when the Mother Boxes are separated is based on the flora of New Genesis, the
Chaotic Good Counterpart of Apokolips. - Aquaman's confession when he's accidentally wrapped in the Lasso of Truth is similar to what happened to Steve Trevor in the 2009 Wonder Woman animated film.
- Batman has the Batmobile set up to play what Alfred calls his "greatest hits" (ie. a frequency that affects Parademons). The last Batman that used his Batmobile to play music was LEGO Batman.
- Superman returns to the battlefield saying "Well I believe in truth... I'm also a huge fan of justice." While "the American way" was removed due to the importance of the international box office take. It is likely that is the reason why this movie and the cartoon weren't called "Justice League of America" instead.
- The Flash's debut appearance in the Warner Bros. produced DC Animated Universe was an episode of Superman: The Animated Series, and in which he and Superman have a race. Justice League is the Flash's live-action feature film debut (excluding his cameo appearances in Batman v. Superman and Suicide Squad), and The Stinger has Flash and Superman racing.
- They actually had several races in the comics as well, and Barry won the last race before he was killed off in Crisis on Infinite Earths.
- The ending scene shows Clark Kent doing the iconic Superman shirt rip before soaring into the air, all while a narrating Lois closes off the film with "Look up in the sky".
- In the final stinger, Luthor's escape being discovered only after finding an imposter in his cell is taken from The Killing Joke. The reference is even lampshaded by showing the imposter in close-up making a big, teethy grin and laughing.
- Although exclusively referred to as Mother Boxes, they don’t actually look like the Mother Boxes from the comics (with looked more like iPhones with exposed circuitry), and look almost exactly like the Apokoliptian knock-off Father Boxes.
