Shout Out / Psycho-Pass

• The show makes mentions to mythology, philosophy, music and theatre, especially through Makishima.
• The Sibyl System is possibly a reference to the prophetesses from Greek Mythology.
• The name on the OS disc used by the killer in Episode 3 has Johnny Mnemonic written on it.
• Talisman's stage in Episode 4 is set on a turtle swimming through space, atop elephants.
• Some of the Avatars seen in episode 4 are shout-outs as well. Spooky Boogie's handle and Halloween Town-esque Commfield recall The Nightmare Before Christmas, while Melancholia looks an awful like the Ted Kord Blue Beetle. At the meetup, there is also someone whose costume is Rorschach.
• Rikako's murder of Yoshika Okubo in Episode 6 is explicitly inspired by the death of Lavinia in Titus Andronicus. Twelfth Night and Macbeth are also discussed.
• The entire story arc inside the girl's school is basically, down to the details, a summary of the plot and setting of The Shell, a fairly famous detective-based visual novel. With the twist that the Expy of the main heroine of that visual novel is the actual serial killer this time.
• The tattooed criminal in the detention center who helped Shinya identify the killer in Episode 8 looked like tattoo artist and model, Rick "Zombie Boy" Genest.
• The house that Professor Saiga lived is based from the Fallingwater designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.
• Senguji's hobby and motivations for pursuing it make him an up-to-date Count Mecha.
• One of Senguji's hunting dogs was named Lovecraft, and the other one is named Kafka.
• Episode titles make few references as well. What makes this a bit weird is that while one arc only makes references to one source, all of the episodes may not make a Shout-Out.
  • Episodes concerning Rikako Oryou reference Hamlet (e.g. "The Rest Is Silence").
  • Episodes concerning Senguji Toyohisa reference The Bible (e.g. "The Fruit Of Paradise").
• The glorious Ninth has been the music of choice for other sociopaths.
• The entire idea of being able to sniff out criminals with specific readings and tests and numbers is similar to the tests in Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, another cyberpunk novel, used to find hiding androids.
  • In Episode 15 the novel is referenced by name by Makishima, with Choe Gu-Sung recalling that it was the basis for "an old movie".
    • On the subject of Blade Runner, the Public Safety Bureau's tower is exactly like Police Headquarters in the film, which is especially noticeable in the overhead shots. Appropriate for a special police unit hunting a white-haired criminal intent on disrupting the social order from the top down...
  • As long as we're on the subject of Philip K. Dick, the overall premise of the story also greatly resembles the short story "The Minority Report" (and the film based on it) in which advanced technology is used to arrest potential criminals before they ever commit an actual crime.
• In Episode 12, there's a music venue called the "27 Club". It's a little morbid, but there's a so called "27 Club" in real life as well; it's the "club" musicians like Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix, and Amy Winehouse "joined" when they all died at age 27.
• In episode 13, while recuperating, Kougami is shown reading Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, a popular novella in its own right, but more famously known as the basis for the 1979 film, Apocalypse Now.
• Episode 15 contains a perfect shot of a blood-stained crooked gold baseball bat. The same episode also references dystopian novelists: George Orwell and William Gibson are name-dropped by Makishima in his conversation with Choe Gu-Sung.
• In episode 19, as Saiga and Kougami discuss what drives Makishima, Saiga uses quotes from Max Weber to explain the Sybil System, and Kougami notes that Makishima would rebut him by quoting Michel Foucault or Jeremy Bentham.
• The last episode has Shinya owning a copy of Swann's Way, a book with a prominent theme of memories that involuntarily keep coming up of one's past.
  • In an earlier episode, Makishima dips a seashell shaped cookie into a cup of tea, which is what the narrator does in the opening of Swann's Way.
• The first season is set in 2112, which also happens to be the name of a Rush Concept Album set in a Dystopian future where machines control what music is allowed.
• The second season's first episode plot revolves around a terrorist trying to expose a corrupt government by way of multiple terror bombings that do not harm any civilians. In addition, at the end of the episode, we see a shot of a mysterious graffiti pattern. Do all these plot elements sound familiar?
• All the jokes about Kamui's first name being Kirito paid off at the end of episode five of season 2 when he says at the end, "Game Start."
• A popular tablet/smartphone game called "Hungry Chicken."
• The MLIT plays a major role in the second season, just as it did in Ghost in the Shell: Arise OVA 2 Ghost Whispers, also written by Tow Ubukata.
• In the second season finale, Mika breaks down after Tougane dies before her and loudly proclaims to herself "I love the Sibyl System!" which is quite similar to the ending of Nineteen Eighty-Four: "He loved Big Brother."
• Kamui's appearance, motive, and ability to evade electronic surveillance are all traits taken from the Laughing Man.
• The cyborg mercenaries in the movie bring to mind the Tyrants from Deus Ex: Human Revolution, even having a Stealth Expert Russian lady assassin.
• The Mini-Mecha that 2 of the cyborg mercs use in the movie move like and look identical to Landmates from Appleseed.
• One Line of the song "monster without a name" is " I was born behind black iron bars". Philip K. Dick used to describe the everyday reality as a prison where the bars are not visible because they were made of "black iron".
  • The title of the song might be comparing Makishima to Johan Liebert from Monster, who is called "the monster with no name".
• Arata Shindou's "Mental Trace" ability is practically a dead-on ringer for Will Graham in Hannibal. He's also called a "mentalist."
• The last part of Season 3's opening shows Arata and Kei slowly walking towards the screen and pointing their Dominators at the viewer, which is an homage to the "Divine Intervention" scene in Pulp Fiction.
• Season 3 has yet more references to Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex: 2nd GIG with Dejima being mentioned to be the focal point of refugee relocation, and a plotline involving five refugees who have been implanted with suicide bombs and going after unknown targets.