How Many Of These 84 Avengers: Endgame Easter Eggs & References Did You Catch?

Avengers: Endgame has now had two weekends in the box office, and if you haven't seen it by now, you've probably already been spoiled--especially since directors Joe and Anthony Russo declared Monday, May 6 to be "spoiler day." That likely had more to do with the release of the Spider-Man: Far From Home trailer than the Russos actually wanting anyone to be spoiled on Endgame, but regardless, the cat's out of the bag.

With that in mind, be sure to check out our full Endgame review, every character who died or stayed dead by the movie's end, why Captain America's ending doesn't make sense, and our best guess at what that audio Easter egg after the credits was. If you want more opinions, try how Endgame failed most of its characters, what it might mean for the MCU's future, and how the movie's time travel actually works (or doesn't).

Avengers: Endgame has a pretty big weight to carry. Not only does it wrap up the story of Avengers: Infinity War, it also stands as the end of the Avengers as we know them, and the culmination of a decade of Marvel Cinematic Universe movies. It ties together stories from all the Avengers-related franchises, plus Spider-Man, Ant-Man, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Captain Marvel. That's a lot to cram into one movie, hence the three-hour runtime.

If you've been following along closely with the MCU, though, you're going to get a lot out of Endgame--and not just the completion of some major story beats. The movie is keenly aware of all the history that has come before it, and it is absolutely overloaded with callbacks, Easter eggs, jokes, references, and gags specifically aimed at the long-time MCU fan. Characters that haven't been seen for years (such as the kid at Tony Stark's funeral), meaningful lines and catch-phrases from the beginnings of franchises, discussions of the shared history of the MCU and its characters; it's all there in Endgame, and feels like a big reward for years of fandom. It's the sort of thing that will be great to watch at home on DVD or Blu-ray when you can pause and rewind the action.

There are so many Easter eggs in Endgame, though, that catching them all on a single viewing at the theater is damn near impossible. Even though Endgame is three hours long, it's crammed to the brim with plot, characters, and callbacks, and many are subtle nods or nudges, rather than full-blown, obvious references.

The good news is, you don't need to have caught everything Marvel crammed into Endgame. Below you'll find a list of every Easter egg, reference, and callback scattered throughout the movie that we've spotted to feed your MCU addiction. Be sure to let us know which ones we've missed--it's possible a moment near the very end was even hiding a clue that could be important to Phase 4 and the future of the MCU. And we'll surely be finding even more once the home release rolls around.

In taking Steve to task upon returning from space, Tony makes a reference to this line from Avengers: Age of Ultron. Tony's deal in that movie was that he wanted to protect Earth from the next ridiculously threatening event like the invasion in Avengers. It was that line of thinking that gave birth to Ultron, a mistake Tony would struggle with through the rest of the movies he appeared in.

Tony brings up the fact that he had a vision of Thanos winning and that no one listened to him or seemed to care--he's talking about his nightmare from Avengers: Age of Ultron, which featured him seeing a mound of dead Avengers. Dark stuff.

Tony calls Nebula the Blue Meanie. This could be a reference to an ECW wrestler who was part of the Blue World Order at the wrestling promotion during the '90s. However, it could also reference the Blue Meanies from the 1968 Beatles animated movie Yellow Submarine. These antagonists are an army of music-hating humanoids that have blue faces with very long noses, which does not look like Nebula at all.

While Tony has met most of the Guardians of the Galaxy, Endgame features his first meeting with Rocket. When the latter chimes in during a conversation at the Avengers compound, Tony interjects to note that, until that point, he had thought Rocket was a Build-a-Bear.

Tony calls Dr. Strange the Bleecker Street Magician. The Sanctum Sanctorum is on Bleecker St. in Manhattan--hence the strangely appropriate and not-derogatory nicknamed from Tony.

As they jet off toward The Garden, Rocket asks the crew which of them have never been in space. Cap, Rhodey, and Black Widow all raise their hands. This is accurate as far as previous MCU movies go, since the other characters present had all been in space at one time or another.

Thanos using his armor as a scarecrow is a pretty arresting image--and one we've seen in multiple trailers, but it's also a direct homage to the Infinity War comic, where he does the exact same thing.

In the extremely unlikely event that you forgot the final moments of Infinity War, Thor inadvertently allowed Thanos to snap by not decapitating him with Stormbreaker when he had a chance--a mistake he decidedly does not repeat here in one of the MCU's most graphic death scenes.

Endgame has a very strong Leftovers vibe--that's the HBO show, based on a book by Tom Perrotta, in which 2% of the world's population disappears and the survivors have to deal with the fallout. Obviously 50% of all life disappearing is even worse, and Endgame feels a lot like the Leftovers toward the beginning, especially in shots like the one above.

Five years post-Snap, Steve Rogers attends a support group meeting with a number of people who are still struggling to deal with reality. One attendee notes the things they miss most--and among them, the New York Mets, who apparently weren't as lucky as others.

Image credit: Erwin Bernal on Flickr

Like Avengers: Infinity War before it, Endgame was co-directed by brothers Joe and Anthony Russo. Joe gets a cameo in Endgame: He's the gay man in Steve's support group near the beginning. And it's not his first cameo--the shot above is from Winter Soldier.

There are also at least two cameos from Community cast members (the Russos served as executive producers and directors on several seasons of the NBC comedy). Yvette Nicole Brown works at the base that Steve and Tony infiltrate in 1970, while Ken Jeong--without a single line--is the security guard at the storage facility that Scott appears in.

There's a sentiment among some Thanos fans that The Man with the Ballsack Chin kind of had a point. Overpopulation is a serious problem. In Endgame, Steve finds a silver lining to the world's current state: as he says, fewer ships means cleaner water and healthier whales. This feels like a little nod to the "Thanos has a point" camp.

After the timeskip, Natasha has been working to coordinate the efforts of the remaining Avengers, but she's also taken up some hobbies of her own. On a chair near her desk, there is a pair of ballet pointe shoes, a nod to Black Widow's Red Room backstory where she was trained as both a dancer and a killer.

The Bruce/Hulk happy medium never gets a proper name in the movie, but it's a clear nod to a similar compromise that happened in the comics, resulting in a character known as Professor Hulk who had the brains and the brawn--what more could you ask for?

Tony's daughter Morgan is the kid he tells Pepper he dreamed about back at the beginning of Infinity War--and a shout out to an obscure Iron Man side character from the comics.

As the Avengers are discussing the ins and outs of time travel, they reference a long list of time travel movies, including A Wrinkle in Time, Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, Time After Time, Terminator, Time Cop, Hot Tub Time Machine (which Bucky actor Sebastian Stan is in), and of course the most important reference of them all--"Back to the future's a bunch of bull****?" One movie that doesn't feature any time travel is Die Hard, as Scott Lang quickly realizes.

Tony and Howard's cathartic time travel reunion back in the 70s paid off a little moment back in Captain America: Civil War where Tony introduced his "BARF" tech glasses, which allowed people to engage with simulations of traumatic memories. Tony's traumatic memory was the death of his parents--and here he actually got to hug his dad goodbye.

Fulfilling Odin's "Asgard isn't a place, it's a people" remark from Ragnarok, the Asgardian refugees have settled on the idyllic Nordic seaside where Odin vanished into nothingness, the very spot Odin remarked would make a good place to settle. And this isn't the first time Asgard has been moved to Earth--though in the comics, the entire floating space city was literally transported to a tiny town in Oklahoma.

Thor's best buds, the would-be revolutionaries of Sakar Korg and Miek are back and, uh, playing a lot of Fortnite, apparently. Korg also just so happened to be dressed in Thor: Ragnarok director Taika Waititi's iconic pineapple romper.

Apparently it's still a thing five years into a desolate future. Who could have guessed? The nod is appropriate, given that Fortnite has hosted special in-game events for both Infinity War and Endgame, the latter of which lets you control Thanos or use various weapons belonging to the Avengers.

To help motivate Thor, Rocket describes how Thor isn't the only one to have lost someone. Rocket reels off the various members of the Guardians--his family--who have all met their demise. And while he can recite all of their names, he apparently doesn't know Mantis's name, instead choosing to describe her as "the chick with antennae."

Acknowledging Thor's new gut, loose clothing, and--in particular--hairstyle, Tony has a throwaway line where he refers to him as "Lebowski," a reference to Jeff Bridges' The Dude from The Big Lebowski.

While ribbing Thor about his inability to cope with failure and general depression, Tony also calls him "Yellow Bastard." The joke references the lumpy, yellow-skinned villain of the Sin City comics, who also sports a gut.

While the Avengers try and figure out time travel, Hulk is happily eating a pint of ice cream--it's Hunka Hulka Burnin' Fudge, the Hulk themed ice cream the MCU's Ben and Jerry's released referenced by Wong back in Infinity War.

Tony calls Ant Man Thumbelina while on their mission to snag the Tesseract. This is a reference to the children's tale about Thumbelina, a tiny woman who is born from a flower and grows to be a couple of inches tall. Sick burn, Tony.

Tony also calls Ant-Man Stuart Little, a reference to the tiny mouse character. Another good zinger, Tony. Keep 'em coming.

When some of the Avengers travel back to the events of the original Avengers movie, Scott Lang has to get up close and personal with that version of Tony Stark. When he does, he notices a distinct smell--Axe body spray. He asks future Tony about it, and he confirms that he had a can handy in case of emergencies.

Endgame actively undoes one of the worst jokes in the MCU, when Steve chides the team for cursing back in Avengers: Age of Ultron. He swears more than anyone in this movie, and we love him for it.

We get an extended look at just what happens after Loki's defeat back in The Avengers, including a fun little gag where he transforms into Steve Rogers to mock him--this not only earns him the muzzle we saw him wearing at the end of the movie, but is a wink to the moment from Thor: The Dark World, where he pulled the same stunt and briefly turned into Cap to antagonize Thor.

During his trip back to 2011, Steve is tasked with retrieving Loki's scepter from SHIELD--you know, the government agency that was thoroughly infiltrated by HYDRA? Steve uses this knowledge to his advantage and takes HYDRA agent Jasper Sitwell by surprise by whispering "Hail Hydra" to him in the elevator. This is a nod both to the secret whisper between Sitwell and Senator Stern and to the infamous comic book storyline Secret Empire, which featured Steve having his history re-written to make him a HYDRA loyalist.

The last time Steve was in a crowded elevator with the SHIELD Strike team back in Captain America: The Winter Soldier it ended badly for just about everyone--but also gave us one of the single greatest fight scenes in MCU history. Here, things don't pan out quite the same, but the set up is exactly the same.

HYDRA agent Jasper Sitwell was a mole in SHIELD throughout Thor, The Avengers, and Captain America: The Winter Soldier--where we actually learned just how evil he was. Steve uses his knowledge from the future to trick Sitwell into giving him the scepter.

Revisiting the Battle of New York brings the Avengers back to a time when SHIELD still existed, but having seen Captain America: The Winter Soldier, we know that several of its operatives are actually HYDRA agents. One of them is Alexander Pierce (Robert Redford), who is the primary antagonist of The Winter Soldier and shows up during the Battle of New York mostly to hassle Tony and Thor.

Captain America didn't have his signature shield in Avengers: Infinity War. In fact, he hasn't had the shield since Captain America: Civil War, which took place two years before Infinity War. Cap used the shield during his fight with Tony at the end of that movie, and had to leave his signature item behind, because he buried it in the chest of Tony's armor to immobilize him. Tony demands Cap leave it behind, since the shield was originally built by Howard, Tony's father. As we see in Endgame, Tony has been hanging onto the shield ever since, even despite his falling out with Cap.

One of the big risks of time travel is running into yourself in the past--which, unfortunately, is exactly what happened to Steve. The fight between the Cap of the present and the Cap of 2011 mirrored the fight between Steve and Bucky on the helicarriers back in The Winter Soldier, with the case containing the scepter taking the place of the override circuit board.

On top of that, we get a few fun moments of Steve providing color commentary on who he used to be--complete with a lot of very pointed cursing--which felt like a direct jab at some of Steve's more cringe-worthy lines from movies like The Avengers and Age of Ultron when he would scold his teammates for swearing.

If Steve Rogers has a tagline, it would be this--a fact that he himself exasperatedly acknowledges when he's forced to fight his past self in SHIELD HQ.

Nebula and Steve both have dramatic encounters with past versions of themselves which, aside from being one of the most low hanging time travel tropes around, is also a very oblique nod to the Infinity War comic event in which the Avengers are forced to fight evil alternate timeline doppelgangers set on them by Magus, an evil doppelganger of Adam Warlock.

The Tesseract, that powerful weird blue cube, has been an item of desire for Loki for some time. He stole the cube in The Avengers and used it to kick-start the Chitauri invasion at the end of the movie, and after it was returned to Asgard following his defeat, Loki managed to steal it in Thor: Ragnarok. Seeing him get another chance to nab the Tesseract suggests he's got more trouble to get up to, likely in the upcoming Loki spin-off series on Disney's streaming service, Disney+.

Loki's scepter is an important artifact that's at the center of Avengers: Age of Ultron. It actually houses the Mind Stone, and in that movie, the stone is accidentally used to create both Ultron and Vision. After the Battle of New York, SHIELD takes the scepter into custody, but it ends up in the hands of HYDRA. The SHIELD Strike team escorting the scepter, who Cap intercepts, mention that they're taking it to Dr. List, a scientist who turns out to be a HYDRA operative on Agents of SHIELD.

One of the best gags in The Avengers is its post-credits scene. After Tony survives almost getting nuked and then stuck in space, he asks his teammates if they want to go to a nearby shawarma restaurant he's heard of--since he just nearly died, he wants to try it even though he doesn't know what shawarma is. A post-credits scene for the movie finds the Avengers in that very restaurant, eating silently, still shell-shocked from the battle.

In Endgame, when Alexander Pierce (Robert Redford) stops Tony and Thor as they escort Loki out of Stark Tower and asks them where they're going, Thor says they're headed to "lunch, then Asgard," a nod to the famous shawarma-eating scene.

Stan Lee gets his own cameo too--when Cap and Tony go back in time to 1970. And it's apparently Lee's final MCU cameo. We have a full breakdown here.

SHIELD's top secret HQ in Camp Lehigh is the same bunker that Steve and Nat were trapped in by Zola during The Winter Soldier.

When Tony and Steve travel back in time to the military base, we see a crawling shot of a young Hank Pym's office, and in that shot is the original Ant-Man helmet. Pym paraded as the superhero during the Cold War on covert-ops missions. It's a recreation of Pym's helmet from the first few appearances in Tales to Astonish from 1962.

When Steve and Tony head back to 1970 to get the Tesseract and more Pym Particles, Tony runs into his dad, Howard Stark. Right before their meeting, we hear Howard calling for Arnim Zola, a HYDRA scientist from Captain America: The First Avenger and Captain America: The Winter Soldier. SHIELD recruited Zola after HYDRA fell in 1945, but we find out in The Winter Soldier that it's Zola who keeps HYDRA alive and helps it to infiltrate SHIELD.

When Yvette Nicole Brown's character is telling security about Cap and Tony infiltrating the base in 1970, she references Tony's "hippie beard." They ask if it's more "Bee Gees or Mungo Jerry?" which is just a funny pop culture reference no one will get.

Steve's 1970s disguise is a set of army fatigues with the name "ROSCOE" sewn on them. This is a pretty deep cut, but back in the 1970s Captain America comics, Steve briefly retired from being Cap to take on the new name Nomad. During this time, various "pretenders" stepped in and took over as Cap--the most tragic of which was a man named Roscoe Simmons who served as Cap in a homemade suit for only a few days before the resurrected Red Skull captured, tortured, and murdered him to get Steve's attention.

Howard Stark's real life butler Jarvis was the inspiration for Tony's AI butler, Jarvis, who later became Vision--look, it's all a little weird if you think too hard about it. We got to see him in the flesh here--a first for the big screen MCU, but not the small, since he appeared in ABC's Agent Carter--chauffeuring Howard away from the base in the 70s.

Sam and Steve's meet cute back in Winter Soldier featured Steve constantly lapping Sam during a jog around DC--Steve's "on your left" as he passed Sam became an in-joke between the two of them, repeated here.

Quill's super fun dancing, singing introduction back in the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie sure does get a lot funnier when you realize that from an outside perspective, where no one can hear the music, he just looks--well, like an idiot.

We first met The Ancient One in Doctor Strange, which takes place well after the first Avengers. But it's the purview of the Sorcerer Supreme to guard the Time Stone, and that means knowing stuff about the future. She's well aware that some years later, she'll encounter Stephen Strange and that he'll go on to replace her--and it's that knowledge that finally causes her to trust Bruce.

It's no secret that Thor: The Dark World is one of the least popular MCU movies, and therefore probably one of the least rewatched. So it's pretty appropriate for it to be the only movie to get a really thorough in-movie recap, courtesy of a drunken Thor.

Frigga is quick to clock time traveling Thor and not at all upset or surprised by him--she "sees with more than eyes," she explains, because she was "raised by witches." This is actually a nod to the Norse mythology the Thor comics take their inspiration from!

Thor's relationship with his mom has been a major part of his character--she's arguably one of the only good parents in the MCU, to be completely honest, which made her death in The Dark World even harder for him to handle. That's what made their conversation so touching, if extremely bittersweet.

After Rocket secures the Aether (and thus the Reality Stone) from Jane in Asgard, he's pursued by guards who shout things like, "Get the rabbit!" That's a callback to Infinity War, in which Thor also repeatedly refers to Rocket as "Rabbit."

Jane and Thor's romance never really left Thor's first two solo movies but we get to see it here, again, sort of. They never actually get to share the screen with one another but the nod to vintage Thor was pretty nice.

Nebula mentions that Vormir--the creepy planet that houses the Soul Stone and Ring Wraith Red Skull--is a "dominion of death" at the "center of Celestial space" which might actually be our first nod towards the upcoming Eternals movie planned for Phase 4. In Marvel comics, the Celestials are a major part of Marvel's cosmic mythology and the beings responsible for creating the Eternals, an immortal and ageless race of incredibly powerful humanoids that Thanos himself descended from.

When trying to secure the Soul Stone, Nat and Clint encounter Red Skull, who acknowledges each of them by mentioning one of their parents' names. In Nat's case, the name of her father--Ivan--comes as news to her, as she later points out to Clint that she never her father's name previously. This is because she was recruited and trained as an assassin from early in her life, costing her a normal family life.

In the same sequence, Red Skull also mentions the name of Clint's mother, Edith. Unlike Nat, this has little effect on him, as he doesn't think knowing a parent's name lends Red Skull much credibility. Edith Barton is actually Clint's mom from the comics, though she was given a name and formally introduced into Clint's backstory in 1988, about twenty years after Clint was created.

Though their various missions together have never been shown on screen, we know that Natasha Romanoff and Clint Barton are basically best friends, and have worked together for years as SHIELD agents. When they head to space in Endgame, Clint remarks, "This is a long way from Budapest." It's a callback to a line in The Avengers during the Battle of New York, which Clint says is "just like Budapest all over again." Nat replies, "You and I remember Budapest very differently." Their operation in that city is again referenced in Captain America: Winter Soldier, when Nat dumps all of SHIELD and HYDRA's files onto the internet, in order to expose HYDRA and Alexander Pierce. Still, we have no idea what actually happened there.

Nat and Clint arguing over who will sacrifice themselves for the Soul Stone also calls back their shared history. In The Avengers, we learn that Nat was a Russian operative before she joined SHIELD and the good guys--but she only got that shot to reform because Clint saved her during a mission in which they were on opposite sides. Nat says in The Avengers, "I've got red in my ledger," referring to the debt she owes Clint. It's easy to read the events on Vormir as Nat finally repaying him.

Scott Lang was put under house arrest for his participation in the events of Captain America: Civil War, and in Ant Man and the Wasp, neither Hank Pym nor Hope Van Dyne is happy he went to fight with the Avengers without checking in with them. When Scott tries to explain that "Cap needed my help," Hope needles him about using the nickname as if he's best pals with Captain America. Later, when Scott's regulator doesn't work and he's stuck at the size of a child, Hope picks on him again: "If only 'Cap' could see you now," she says. In Endgame, after Hulk's snap brings everyone back, Captain America tasks Ant Man and Wasp with fixing the Quantum Tunnel. "We're on it, Cap," Hope replies, with a pointed smile to Scott.

Given just how awful the outcome of Infinity War was for our heroes, it was unclear what prompted Steve Rogers to cry during a particular scene we saw in one of Endgame's trailers. It turns out this was actually in response to losing yet another member of the team: Nat, who sacrifices herself on Vormir to secure the Soul Stone.

Nebula's evil past self was a direct nod to the Infinity Gauntlet saga in the comics where Nebula ends up stealing the Gauntlet and using it for herself. In that version of events, however, Thanos actually joins forces with the Avengers briefly to stop her--a moment the movie subverted by having good Nebula join forces with the Avengers to stop Thanos.

When present day Nebula is trying to convince past Gamora to free her after being captured by Thanos, she strongly hints at the fact that Gamora at this point had already found the Soul Stone and lied to Thanos about it. That lie was a central plot point in Infinity War.

Thanos' obsession with the universe he decimated thanking him continues in Endgame--even the 2014 version of him is completely fixated on a new and "grateful universe."

Here it is, the moment we've all been waiting for--Steve finally got to do his iconic "Avengers, assemble" battle cry for the very first time in the MCU. Over in the comics, the "assemble" call is thrown around basically any time more than one Avenger is in the same place at the same time but here on the big screen, in live action, these fun little comic book quirks have the potential to wear out their welcome fast. Luckily this moment felt well worth the wait.

Peter may have gotten a new suit at the start of Infinity War, but the Iron Spider get-up still packs some of the same punches that Tony's original model had once Peter and Ned disabled all the safeties back in Spider-Man: Homecoming. Instant Kill Mode is back with a vengeance--this time on purpose.

Thor's hammer has a lot of rules attached to it. You have to be "worthy" to wield Mjolnir, which is why when Thor drops the hammer, it stays where he put it--and nobody else can pick it up. Being worthy grants you "the power of Thor," though, which means if you're cool enough to pick up the hammer, you're cool enough to hit folks with lightning, too. Back in Avengers: Age of Ultron, all the Avengers took a turn trying to pick up Thor's hammer during a party. Nobody succeeded, but Steve came close--the hammer moved a bit when he tried to pick it up. Apparently by Endgame, Steve is fully worthy of the power of Thor. (You might also recall that, very pointedly, Vision casually picked up Thor's hammer in Ultron, as well.)

Over in the comics, Steve has wielded Mjolnir a few times--most recently after he had his entire history cosmically altered to make him a Hydra loyalist, which was pretty distressing but, hey, even when he's at his absolute worst, at least we know Steve is still "worthy" for a given value.

Valkyrie makes a welcome return in Endgame after her fate was unclear post-Infinity War (at least until a poster confirmed she was alive), and she isn't alone. Not only is she living with the remaining Asgardians, she's also got a Pegasus--the flying creature her and the other Valkyries previously rode on in their heyday. Of course, that begs the question: Where the hell did she get a Pegasus? We never see one during the climactic fight in Thor: Ragnarok just before Asgard is destroyed, but they apparently must have gotten one on board the ship before leaving. That, or someone has spent the past five years doing some weird hybridization experiments in New Asgard.

We may have seen Pepper armor up, sort of, back in Iron Man 3, but here we get to really see her in action complete with a custom built purple suit that was an "anniversary gift" from Tony. In the comics, Pepper's armor is called Rescue, which she used when Tony was told he could no longer be Iron Man because the suit was a weapon of mass destruction. To circumvent these sanctions, Tony built the Rescue armor with purely defensive capabilities--which did not seem to be the case here for the live action version, if that last fight scene is to be believed.

While Carol takes her turn as the Infinity Gauntlet runner during the final battle, she has a moment where she's surrounded by just about every female hero the MCU has to their name--minus, unfortunately, Black Widow, who wasn't around to see it. This was both a wink to the comics most recent all-female team, the A-Force, and a potential set up for a future movie. After all, fans have been clamoring for a female-centric team up for a long time, and someone is going to have to step in and take care of business now that the core Avengers are all done.

Tony's relationship with the Infinity Stones and the Gauntlet over in the comics is an interesting one. He was actually the first human to ever wield all the stones--and he did so by crafting a gauntlet of his own on his armor back in 2011. It wasn't an exact duplicate of the moment we see here in the movie, but the inspiration is extremely clear.

Tony gets the end-all, be-all heartfelt catchphrase moment, bringing us all the way back to the moment that kicked off the MCU: When Tony revealed to the world that he was, in fact, Iron Man, at the end of his first movie.

Steve and Bucky's final farewell may have been pretty brief, but it did nicely mirror the moment the two shared all the way back in Captain America: The First Avenger, when Bucky was shipping out for World War II, leaving Steve behind. Bucky warns Steve to not do anything stupid while he's gone--a reference to Steve's non-stop efforts to enlist in the army--and Steve shoots back that he can't, because Bucky's taking all the stupid with him to Europe. Aww, best friends.

Pepper turned Tony's first ever arc reactor into a touching little trophy to remind him that, no matter what anyone may think about him or his past, he's still a good person at his core. The gesture was one of the major turning points for Tony's evolution into Iron Man back in Iron Man 1, and provided the perfect bookend to a ten year journey for Robert Downey Jr's take on the character.

Happy and Morgan Stark have a touching conversation toward the end about how much her dad liked cheeseburgers. This is a reference to the first Iron Man, when Tony Stark requested a cheeseburger upon his return stateside.

Steve's finale featured him as an old man, ready to retire and pass on the shield to fresh blood. This actually happened over in the comics, after Steve had the super serum, which had been keeping him young, removed from his body causing him to rapidly age. He passed the shield to Sam and took on a role as a SHIELD operative and tactician, rather than a front line fighter. This guy just does not know how to retire, even as a geriatric.

Steve and Peggy finally get that dance, although the total extent of their relationship following Steve's lengthy trip back in time is left somewhat ambiguous, just in case you want to believe Steve didn't knowingly erase the whole life he's well aware she had without him. Regardless, this dance is a callback to the original Captain America: The First Avenger, and they've been referencing it ever since.

Steve first got a compass with a photo of Peggy Carter back in The First Avenger before he made his big sacrifice on the Valkyrie--he's kept it all the time, of course, even though we haven't actually seen it for a while. It doesn't really come up in Cap's other solo movies but apparently he's been carrying it around in his pocket every day.

During Thor's coda, we learn that he plans on teaming up with the Guardians--something that Quill may or may not be all that stoked on--as they head off into space, probably to track down past Gamora who took off after the fight. Thor happily calls the team the "Asgardians of the Galaxy" a fun play on words that Marvel has capitalized on as an ongoing comics series--sadly Thor himself wasn't on the team in the comics, but Frog Thor was, so that's a major win.

You'd be forgiven for forgetting a lot of the ins and outs of Iron Man 3, since it came out some six years ago and doesn't get much crossover play with the rest of the MCU. The movie had a big callback in Endgame, though: you can spot a much older Harley Keener (Ty Simpkins), the Tennessee kid who helped Tony uncover AIM's plot, attending the funeral at the end of the movie.

At the end of the movie, Peter Parker's good friend Ned greets him with an incredulous look that says "I can't believe you're back!" It's hard to read the scene any other way, but that doesn't quite make sense--if Ned didn't get Snapped, he shouldn't be in high school still. Either Ned also recently reappeared and the actors played the scene in a confusing way, or Ned is just really dumb and got held back for five years in high school.

Cap gets a handful of fun costume throwbacks, starting with the fan-favorite Stealth Suit from the opening of The Winter Soldier, which he wears again for the first time since that movie for the team's first mission to go get Thanos in the Garden. The next costume he wears is his very, very primary blue 2011 Avengers outfit, which gets its fair share of gags--"that is America's ass"--and finally, we get him in a totally new costume that marries the design elements of the Stealth Suit and the Captain America: Civil War suit into one, complete with some intentionally visible scale mail, a nod to Steve's iconic comic book look.