55 Brilliant Disney Easter eggs in 'Wish,' from the obvious to the obscure

This article was originally published on Good Housekeeping US.

When Wish came out in November 2023, it was Disney's 62nd animated feature and the only one released during the Disney 100 anniversary year, a landmark one for the company. It makes sense, then, that they wanted to create an all-new adventure — and add a little intrigue — while celebrating Disney's centennial.

With that in mind, filmmakers say they loaded up Wish with Disney Easter eggs, references, in-jokes and other nods to Disney history. The filmmakers told Yahoo! News that there are somewhere between 100 and 150 allusions in the movie — so many that producer Juan Pablo Reyes Lancaster-Jones had to start tracking them on a spreadsheet. “It’s a very long spreadsheet,” he told the site.

Even the very concept of the movie is a nod to Disney lore. Wish follows a 17-year-old named Asha who lives in the Mediterranean kingdom of Rosas, a land where the king is known to grant wishes. Asha applies to be his assistant and, when the interview doesn't go well, she makes a wish on a star, who comes down to help her. That right there is a big Disney reference: Wishing on a star has been a Disney staple, done by everyone from Geppetto in Pinocchio and Cinderella in Cinderella all the way up to Tiana in The Princess and the Frog. "When You Wish Upon a Star" is the Disney theme song. There is nothing more Disney than that.

And that's just the start of all the Disney references. In a way, it feels very similar to the short "Once Upon a Studio," which also came out this year to celebrate the Disney 100. That one, which played in theaters in front of the Moana re-release and is now on Disney+, is about Disney animated film characters trying to get together for a group photo. Like Wish, it packs in references to past Disney movies at blink-and-you'll-miss-them speed: More than 500 characters from across Disney history make an appearance. Some of them make a return over the credits of Wish, which features starry illustrations of characters from most of the previous Disney animated features. (A good trivia question would be to guess which ones were skipped: The Rescuers, The Black Cauldron and Meet the Robinsons, as far as I can tell.)

But before the credits roll, there are even more references. Here are 40 Disney Easter eggs from the movie Wish. How many did you spot?

Note: The following contains spoilers for the movie Wish. If you haven't seen the movie yet, ask your fairy godmother for a chance to watch and come back when you're done.

Asha's Friends

The first clue you might get that something is going is when you get to know Asha's seven best friends.

• Safi has allergies, and the first thing he does is get his germs all over a freshly baked pan of cookies. You might say he's Sneezy.
• Simon is described as being "boring" ever since he gave his wish to King Magnifico. He does seem lethargic — even Sleepy.
• Hal doesn't get much to do, but she seems upbeat about everything. She's pretty Happy.
• Bazeema is shy and talks in a timid voice all the time. You might call her Bashful.
• Gabo is quick to anger. At one point, he even says, "I'm Grumpy!"
• Dario seems a bit dim, and he also wears a green tunic with a purple hat — just like Dopey.
• Dahlia is Asha's best friend and closest confidante. She wears glasses, just like Doc.
• In case you think this is a coincidence, all of their names start with the same letter as their corresponding dwarves.

Wish-Related Easter Eggs

In the movie, the wishes of the residents of Rosas appear as bubbles with dreamlike images inside. They're easy ways for the filmmakers to slip in other Disney references, because they often float by without being remarked upon. The song "At All Costs" has so many, but they float by in other places, too.

• One woman dreams of flying, and she's wearing a dress that looks like Wendy's from Peter Pan.
• One person dreams of being a dressmaker. The gown she's creating looks like the one Auroroa wears in Sleeping Beauty.
• A man wishes to scale a mountain. When the vision pulls back, the shape of the mountain looks like the Matterhorn in Disneyland.
• When Magnifico destroys three of the villagers' wishes, the wishes are clearly inspired by other Disney properties. The first one clearly shows Peter Pan flying, and Magnifico says, "Fantasyland in the sky? How about Neverland!" (That's a two-fer there.)
• The second wish he says, "A perfect nanny for your horrible children? I'm popping this one!" He must've seen Mary Poppins recently.
• The third one he says, "Oh, true love, how sweet. So much for true love!" That could be...basically any Disney princess movie ever, but he's specifically quoting Ursula from The Little Mermaid.

King Magnifico

King Magnifico is the unambiguous villain of the movie, so naturally he'd have nods to other famed Disney villains.

• Magnifico is often referred to as a sorcerer, and in the beginning Asha is interviewing to be his apprentice — a sorcerer's apprentice, just like in Fantasia.
• As Magnifico practices his dark magic on some of the townsfolk's wishes, you can see a Snow White-style poison apple on his desk.
• His powers show up as green mist, similar to Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty. Come to think of it, Maleficient and Magnficio are pretty similar names.
• He's clearly a Maleficient stan, because he traps Rosas in green vines and thorns similar to the ones in Sleeping Beauty.
• If that wasn't enough Snow White, at one point he also says, "Mirrors, mirrors on the wall," possibly one of the most famous Disney villain lines of all time.
• Magnifico really gets around, villain-wise. When he uses his dark magic, he's shown as commanding monstrous, magic green hands, just like Urusula did when she took Ariel's voice in The Little Mermaid.
• You'll need real fast pausing fingers to catch this one: When Magnifico is being drawn into the scepter, the magic mirror's face appears for a split-second. (It's very cool. If you have Disney+, try to pause the frame when there's 18:30 left in the movie.)

Plant and Animal Characters

What's a Disney movie without a few talking animals? (Or plants, as the case may be.)

• When Star first lands, it flies past a horse that looks like Maximus from Tangled.
• The musical number "I'm a Star" is full of singing animals, in the style of "Kiss the Girl" from The Little Mermaid.
• When the song is done, a deer says to a bear, "Thanks for not eating me, John." The bear is Little John from Robin Hood.
• John says something even more obvious back to the deer: "Don't mention it, Bambi." There are also thumping rabbits.
• Pocahontas may get its own shout-out, too, with sentient trees (a la Grandmother Willow) and a singing raccoon (a nod to Meeko).
• There's also a squirrel in that number that looks an awful lot like the ones from The Sword in the Stone.
• When explaining how the universe is all made up of the same elements, the animals sing, "We eat the leaves and they eat the sun," and Valentino, the baritone goat sidekick, responds, "See, that's where all the balls of gas come from!" That recalls Pumbaa from The Lion King, and how he "always thought [stars] were balls of gas burning millions of mies away." (The fact that they do a close-up of Valentino's butt when he sings might also be a nod to Pumbaa's famous flatulence. Hakuna Matata, Valentino.)
• Singing birds and mice? Straight-up Cinderella.
• And the flowers that accompany them are very Alice in Wonderland.
• Valentino mentions that he dreams "of a utopian metropolis where all mammals are equal and wear clothes.” Hey, that sounds a lot like Zootopia!
• When Asha looks at a clutch of sentient mushrooms, she calls it crazy, and they respond "We love crazy!" — a classic line from Frozen.

References to Other Disney Characters

It's not just the animal characters from other films who show up in Wish.

• When Asha heads out into the forest, she wears a periwinkle blue cloak with a magenta bow. While the bow is a little more demure, she's dressed like the Fairy Godmother from Cinderella — someone else known for making wishes come true.
• To further tie these two characters together, when Star gives Asha her wand and puts a little shine in her dress, the sparkles are animated the same way as the magic sparkles during Cinderella's rags-to-riches transformation.
• Speaking of fairy godmothers, Dahlia is an analog to Doc the dwarf, but her dress is is similar color to Flora's from Sleeping Beauty.
• Asha gives Queen Elinor a warning via an unlikely messenger: a mouse. "I know, talking mouse," it says, almost acknowledging how close it is to the mice in Cinderella.
• And if you still haven't gotten the Wish-Cinderella connection, Asha's dress is embroidered with pumpkin seeds.
• Asha visits a wishing well in the forest that looks just like the one Snow White used.
• When she's making her wish, her hair blows in the wind just like Pocahontas's.
• During "Knowing What I Know Now," Dario holds up Valentino the way Rafiki holds up Simba in The Lion King.
• Throughout the movie, you see two of the townsfolk have wishes to fly, and they look like Wendy and Peter Pan. At the end of the movie, they're finally introduced to each other, and it's mentioned that Peter is working on a flying machine. (Silly Peter, don't you know that pixie dust is much easier?)
• Keep your ears open: Someone does a Tarzan call.
• In "Welcome to Rosas," Asha sings about some wishes that have been granted, including one wish to have "hair touch down to your feet." That person shows off their long tresses, and they're very Rapunzel-like.

Easter Eggs Confirmed By Filmmakers

With more than 100 references slipped into the movie, there's no way the people who worked on the film can blab about them all, but they did let some cats out of the bag.

• Co-director Fawn Veerasunthorn told The Direct about how the references would come about organically, saying things like, "There are some cups in the sink; can one of them be chipped?" The chipped cup — a nod to Beauty and the Beast — made it into the final movie.
  
• Griselda Sastrawinata-Lemay, the film's production and costume designer, tells The Hollywood Reporter that Star has a unique design. “Star’s face shape is a heart, which is also inspired by the face of Mickey Mouse,” she says.
• In the same interview, Sastrawinata-Lemay mentions the way Star doesn't talk and uses magic dust, just like Tinker Bell.
• Chris Buck, another co-director, told the LA Times about Asha's skills as an animator. Not only does she make a flip book out of the pages of her sketch pad, she includes "a timing chart, which animators use for breaking down the number of drawings a motion will take."
• Producer Juan Pablo Reyes Lancaster-Jones tells MovieWeb the Easter egg that gives him the most joy: "One of my favorite ones is Star having a Mickey mask," he says.
• This one is a deep cut for people with filmmaking knowledge: It's no secret that the look of Wish was inspired by Sleeping Beauty, with the watercolor-like effect to the animation. But Buck tells Entertainment Weekly that Sleeping Beauty also affected the shape of Wish: Wish uses a 2.55:1 aspect ratio, which Disney hasn't used since Sleeping Beauty. "It's a wider screen," Buck explains. "So, it just has that epic feel to it — and the story does, too."
• Oscar-winning actress Ariana DeBose, who does the voice of Asha, tells Yahoo! News that there is a reference to Atlantis in there somewhere. "If you can find the Atlantis reference, hey yo!" she says. (I have not found the Atlantis reference.)

Still More Easter Eggs

Just when you think they couldn't possibly fit another reference in, they sneak these into the background.

• When Star is trying to break into King Magnifico's study, it accidentally enchants a bunch of objects. A feather pen starts moving on its own, and it clearly begins to draw a set of Mickey ears.
• The movie begins with the opening of a storybook. This is a classic Disney opening, used in many movies, including many princess movies like Snow White, Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty (which has the most gorgeous book, in my opinion), along with adventure stories like The Jungle Book, Robin Hood and The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad.
• When Asha's friends have to reach the upper limits of Magnifico's workshop, they step on levitating books, similar to the ones Merlin enchanted in The Sword in the Stone.
• At one point, fireworks arc over the castle in a manner reminiscent of the Disney logo.
• If you stay until the end of the credits, Asha's father Sabino — who himself is 100 years old — plays "When You Wish Upon a Star" on his mandolin.

This is what we were able to find after just one viewing. It's sure to be easier to find and spot the references when the movie eventually comes to Disney+ and eagle-eyed viewers have a pause button at their disposal. But did you catch any that aren't listed above? Let us know in the comments! (And thanks to the eagle-eyed commenters who already helped.)