Community:Fallout 3 Easter Eggs

Numerous easter eggs and references to various books, movies and other games are one of the staples of the Fallout series.

1984
In Tenpenny Tower, on the top floor, resides Irving Cheng. If you look on the computer in his suite, you will find a listing called 'Daily Affirmation'. One of the affirmations is "Comrade Cheng is Watching You", as opposed to "Big Brother is Watching You" in George Orwell's dystopian classic '1984'. Another reference is found in Vault 92, where on on the overseer's terminal it notes that he used the quote: "Sanity is not statistical" to stop the crazies for a time.

Apocalypse Now
Mr. Gutsy robots can be heard saying, "There is nothing I like better than the smell of plasma in the morning", a reference to the quote "I love the smell of napalm in the morning" from the movie Apocalypse Now.

Aqua Teen Hunger Force
In the Museum of Natural History, among the many Abraham Lincoln related items that can be obtained is an action figure of Lincoln holding a samurai sword. This may be a reference to Aqua Teen Hunger Force's character Meatwad who occasionally transforms into what others call "Samurai Lincoln", although he says it's Wayne Gretzky.

Armitage III: Polymatrix/Dualmatrix
The security android for Dr. Zimmer in the Replicated Man quest is named Armitage, which is also the name of the main character in Armitage III: Polymatrix/Dualmatrix. In this movie, Armitage was a human-like robot who was struggling with who she is.

See also Neuromancer.

Back to the Future
Butch DeLoria seems to be a clone of the past version of Biff Tannen. DeLoria is probably a reference to the De Lorean, the car used as a basis for the time machine.

Bethesda Softworks
Fallout 3 was developed by Bethesda Softworks, and there is an area in the game called the Bethesda Ruins. However, as the main development office of Bethesda Softworks is in Rockville, Maryland, a few miles away from the north edge of the gameworld, the Bethesda Ruins are not a reference to it. They seem to be intended as the offices of the Fallout universe's Bethesda Softworks, apparently never having moved from the offices where the real-world company was founded, in Bethesda, Maryland (the site of the Bethesda Ruins). The main evidence (that cannot be explained away as a geographical coincidence) that a connection is meant is the name of the Bethesda Underworks.

Sweetrolls
The "sweetroll question" has been a staple of Elder Scrolls character generation quizzes since Arena. In the "tutorial" part of the game, as you turn 10, Old Lady Palmer will give you a sweet roll. After the the cake is cut, Butch (and supposedly Wally Mack and Freddie) will accost you for your sweet roll while you are left with a few decisions on what to do. This is a reference to Bethesda's recurring "Sweet roll" Character Generation Quiz scenario. In the scenario from Morrowind, a baker gives the protagonist a sweet roll, who is then accosted by 3 thugs; the player's choices in this and other questions determines their character makeup.

Uncle Leo
Uncle Leo the non-hostile Super Mutant shares name a with non-hostile zombie that lives in a woman's home in New Sheoth in the The Elder Scrolls IV: Shivering Isles (Also made by Bethesda).

Uncle Leo's dialogue when you try to rob him, where he tells you the clothes are a gift and he wishes he could give you the "wonderful moon" comes from the following Zen Buddhist koan: ''Ryokan, a Zen master, lived the simplest kind of life in a little hut at the foot of a mountain. One evening a thief visited the hut only to discover there was nothing to steal. Ryokan returned and caught him. “You have come a long way to visit me,” he told the prowler, “and you should not return empty-handed. Please take my clothes as a gift.” The thief was bewildered. He took the clothes and slunk away. Ryoken sat naked, watching the moon. “Poor fellow,” he mused, “I wish I could have given him this beautiful moon.”

Oblivion
The image of Grognak on the Grognak the Barbarian skill book is identical to the image used for the Barbarian class in Oblivion. As might be expected, it also bears an extremely close resemblance to depictions of the famous Robert E. Howard character of film, books, comics, etc "Conan the Barbarian".

If you grab the knife lying in the bathtub in the basement of “Lock and Load” (Paradise Falls) you may hear the voice of a male wood elf yelling “Stop thief!”

The Jalbert Brothers Waste Disposal facility may be a nod to Oblivion, specifically a Redguard Necromancer named Jalbert found in the Ayleid ruin of Vilverin early on in the game.

The doctor in the Paradise Falls is a girl called Cutter. Most likely it's a reference to the Oblivion addon Shivering Isles, where Cutter was the name of the Dementia armorer, girl as well.

Blade Runner
Chief Harkness in Rivet City is a reference to the movie Blade Runner. The title of his quest is "The Replicated Man" and could be a reference to the names of the "Replicants" in Bladerunner Harkness can also be a reference to Captain Jack Harkness from the BBC TV show Torchwood, as both characters cannot be killed.

Bradbury, Ray
A bit of a dual-natured reference in this one. In Georgetown, one of the few accessible buildings (Bradley Place) has a powered-down Mr. Handy. You can activate the robot, and one of the things you can tell it to do is to give a bedtime story to the children (or, given the war, the skeletal remains of the children) of the house. The poem spoken, There Will Come Soft Rains, speaks about how, if mankind would go extinct because of a war, nature would care very little. Ray Bradbury wrote a story of the same name (and directly used the poem) in a story of a robotic house continuing the actions of the family that lived there, before a nuclear war killed them. So, in essence, the player can reenact the main plot of Ray Bradbury's short story (have the robot do things for its obviously-dead owners), by having it speak the poem that inspired the short story in the first place.

Additionally, The Replicated Man may be a reference to Bradbury's The Illustrated Man.

Burke, William
Mr. Burke may be a reference to the William Burke who killed at least 15 people in Scotland in the 1820s.

Calvin and Hobbes
Sugar Bombs are a reference to "Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs", a breakfast cereal in the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip. In the comic strip, Calvin once found a decoder ring in his cereal box; this is reflected in the advertisement for Sugar Bombs, which also contains a decoder ring inside.

Clue
The butler in your home in Megaton is a Mr. Handy robot named "Wadsworth". Wadsworth the Butler is Tim Curry's character in the movie Clue. Like other Mr. Handy robots, he speaks in a tone and voice really similar to that employed by Tim Curry in the movie.

Comic book industry
The receptionist terminal in the Hubris Comics building contains a letter to the editor about the villain called The AntAgonizer in the Grognak the Barbarian comics (the apparent inspiration for The AntAgonizer). It complains about the current writer of the series, a Mr. Neptura, and demands the return of a former writer, Mr. Moorellis. The latter is a portmanteau of the last names of Alan Moore and Warren Ellis, critically regarded as two of the best comics writers now or ever. It is not clear to this writer whether the name "Neptura" is a similar reference; no spectacularly bad comics writers with similar names come to mind. (I would've gone with "Marzfeld", myself.)

Cool Hand Luke
In some circumstances, Rory McLaren will say "Nobody can eat 50 eggs!", referencing the movie Cool Hand Luke, in which Paul Newman's title character accepts a bet to eat 50 eggs in an hour.

Crowley, Aleister
In Underworld, there is a ghoul named Mister Crowley, presumably a reference to occultist Aleister Crowley, the subject of the song "Mr. Crowley" by Ozzy Osbourne. Allistair Tenpenny is one of the people Mister Crowley sends you to kill, which can be interpreted as reinforcing the connection to Aleister Crowley.

Crystal Pepsi / Pepsi Clear
Inside the Nuka-Cola Plant, you can find terminals mentioning the recent development of Nuka-Cola Clear as well as it's recipe. This is a reference to the very short-lived Crystal Pepsi, which was a colorless, caffeine-free variant of the regular Pepsi Coke.

Day Of The Dead
Inside the Red Racer Factory a scientist known as The Surgeon keeps a Glowing One named Stefan in a cage. The journal entries on a nearby terminal allude to the ghoul being one of the surgeon's special projects. This is reminiscent of the movie Day Of The Dead in which a mad scientist nicknamed 'Frankenstein' imprisons and experiments upon an intelligent zombie who he names bub.

Die Hard
Bryan Wilks can be heard to say -- while in the preservation pod during the Those! quest -- that he now "knows what a TV dinner feels like", which is a line from the movie Die Hard.

Dracula
Lucy West, the woman who kicks off the Blood Ties quest is probably a reference to Lucy Westenra, Mina Murray's friend in Bram Stoker's Dracula who is turned into a vampire and then staked by Van Helsing. The vampires choose to stay out of the sun much like movie versions of Dracula do.

Duck and Cover
If you approach Springvale school on the side with the door opening into "Springvale Elementary," and continue on and around the broken wall, follow the path that leads downward. As you reach the bottom, look to your right. There should be a poster there with a turtle and a bomb. On the bottom part of the picture, it will show the turtle in it's shell with the bomb exploding next to it. This is a reference to the famous propaganda film titled "Duck and Cover," which tells you that in the event of a nuclear attack, you should duck and cover your head. The film uses a turtle to help get the point across.

Dune
In the Fallout series, Mentats are a mind-enhancing drug. In Frank Herbert's Dune, Mentats are humans trained to function as 'living computers'.

Fawkes, Guy
In Vault 87, a Super Mutant named Fawkes is trapped in cell 5. When you ask him about his name, he says that he got it from researching history texts and that Fawkes was the name of a man who died for what he believed in, and as such, the Super-Mutant Fawkes felt a kinship to him.

Guy Fawkes, a Catholic, attempted to blow up England's Houses of Parliament on November 5th, 1605, in protest of the treatment of the Catholic religion in England, and was executed in January of 1606. The Puritan religion was similarly restricted in England during that period in history.

See also V For Vendetta.

Fear Factory
On one of the many Research Lead terminals inside the Museum of American History, the first log entry ends with: "After a complete cleanup on the mainframe's core, I am happy to announce that the infection has been removed... the soul of this machine has improved. - B. Bell, Research Lead" This is a reference to the Fear Factory song "Archetype", which contains the lyrics "The infection has been removed, the soul of this machine has improved." This is evidenced by the fact that the mainframe is called the "Archetype Model FF06", Archetype being the album name, FF being Fear Factory, and 06 being the album number. Vocalist Burton C. Bell's name can also be abbreviated to B. Bell, to match the researcher's name.

Full Metal Jacket
The Mr. Gutsy robot will sometimes say when you kill one "Pin my medals upon my chest" or "Tell my mom I did my best" which are small parts of a running cadence sang in the military. This cadence is also sung in the movie Full Metal Jacket. This is not only from a cadence, but from the song "Ballad of the Green Berets" by SSgt Barry Sadler.

Futurama
The Pulowski Preservation Shelters apparently only killed people and say 'Occupied' while closed, resembling in both regards the suicide booths from Futurama.

In Megaton the unexploded bomb, could be a reference to Futurama where during an episode while in the sewers, the bomb is siting in irradiated water and the sewers are known to be irradiated(explaining the mutants). They show them their "church" which has a unexploded nuclear war head in it when asked about it they say "Eh its mostly a Easter and Chirstmas thing" Much as the people in Megaton worship it but no one (except the sheriff) seem to care.

Gorillas in the Mist
Isabella Proud's story is a blatant reference to Dian Fossey's research on Mountain Gorillas in Rwanda.

Half-Life Series
The Prototype Medic Power Armor could be a refence to the HEV suit in the Half-Life series. Both suits talk to the user, provide protection, and give the user morphine.

Incredible Hulk, The
You can overhear a Mr. Gutsy say, "I'm starting to get angry. You would not like me when I'm angry". This is very similar to the warning Dr. Banner would give before his transformation. (Mr. Gutsys also happens to be painted in 1950s Army Green)

Jackass
While not an easter egg per se, there is an amusing skeleton found in the sewers connecting Penn. Ave to the White House ruins. There is a ruined car down there, with a light over it and ramps on either side of it. A skeleton is hanging by its neck to that lamp. one can assume that some wannabe-Xtreme-Sports Wastelander was attempting to bike over the car, got stuck on the light, and stayed there until he died.

Jefferson, Thomas/Admiral Tolwyn/Malcolm McDowell
During one of President Eden's radio broadcasts, he utters the phrase "The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." While the quote originally comes from Thomas Jefferson, it was also prominently said by Admiral Tolwyn in Wing Commander IV: The Price of Freedom. Malcolm McDowell plays the part of both characters (Eden and Tolwyn, that is, not Thomas Jefferson). President Eden's radio broadcasts also reference the Fireside Chats of President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Jericho
Jericho the mercenary in Megaton is probably a reference to the post-apocalyptic television series of the same name. The TV series is supported by Bethesda, as seen on their blog site on the attempted second revival of the show.

John Carpenter's The Thing
In Little Lamplight there is an NPC named RJ MacReady. This is the name of the protagonist from John Carpenter's "The Thing". Lacking any other evident connection to The Thing, it is unclear whether this is an intentional reference or a coincidence.

Land of the Dead
Tenpenny Tower's story is very similar to Fiddler's Green where a fortress-tower is owned by a wealthy elitist. The tower gets attacked by intelligent zombies (aka: ghouls. Everyone in the tower also refers to them as 'zombies') who eventually take over and reside in the tower just like what happens if you let the ghouls in.

Le Morte d'Arthur
Squire Arthur Maxson is a recreation of Arthur Pendragon. He is the rightful heir to the Brotherhood of Steel, but has been sent to live with a foster father for his safety. His Kingdom is divided and the factions cannot agree upon a leader. Arthur Maxson is being trained in the ideal of might for right, which his Kingdom has never followed.

Lost
In Megaton, if you talk to Maggie with the Child at Heart perk, you can get a code to a safe. The code is 15, 16, 23, 42, which is also part of a reoccurring chain of numbers in the television show, Lost. 42 is the numerical answer to "Life, the Universe, and Everything" in the earlier Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series, while 23 plays a vital role throughout the even earlier Illuminatus! trilogy and the Discordian culture that trilogy is part of.

Lovecraft, H.P.
In the extreme southwest of the world map you can find "the Dunwich Building,, which once housed the offices of a pretty innocuous company (Dunwich Drilling, a manufacturer of industrial mining and drilling machines). This is possibly the single "creepiest" or "spookiest" location in the game, as the ruins now form a very dark, chaotic three dimensional maze absolutely chock-full of feral ghouls.  The personal logs you find here and an object you find at the very end of the maze form a definite reference to Lovecraft's Cthulhu mythos/setting.  The name of the location itself is a direct reference to Lovecraft's The Dunwich Horror. (The company based in the building being titled Dunwich Borers.)

During exploration of the Dunwich Building the player comes across nine personal audio tapes that make reference to a mysterious book (somewhat implied to be the Necronomicon) that drove the man's father insane and lead him to the whispering obelisk in the Virulent Underchambers.

Mad Max
There are many items and incidents that appear to refer to the Mad Max movies, which starred Mel Gibson as a post-apocalyptic warrior. For instance, one of the Little Lamplight children uses the word humongous incorrectly, saying 'humungus.' Though it appears incorrect, it is actually a reference to Lord Humungus, the leader of the antagonizing gang in The Road Warrior. The "Scoped .44 Magnum" weapon in-game may also be a reference to Humungus's scoped revolver. The design of the Leather Jacket in Fallout 3 is strikingly similar to Mel Gibson's armor as Mad Max.

Additionally, a picture of the main character walking beside Dogmeat that is featured in the game booklet an on the back of the packaging is an homage to the image of Mad Max walking beside his dog from The Road Warrior.

Fallout 3's Dogmeat is also very clearly a Queensland Heeler, an Australian cattle dog that was used for Mad Max's dog in the movie.

There is also a random encounter with a character named Mel wearing a leather jacket and sporting a Sawed-Off Shotgun. If your Perception is high enough, you'll notice that the shotgun is unloaded. In Road Warrior Max threatens the Gyrocaptain with his shotgun, even though it wasn't loaded.

Finally, the Raiders style is very similar to that of the various raider and biker gangs in the Mad Max films.

"Dogmeat" was said in the movie A Boy And His Dog, which also has reference to many things in the game, like the Vaults.

– You will also find Medical Leg Braces randomly throughout the wastes that Max wears on his left leg in the films.

Madison, James
The father of the PC, James, and his collaborator for Project Purity, Madison, are named after James Madison, a father of the United States of America.

Ministry
While traveling with Fawkes the "Intelligent" Super Mutant, During battle she'll occasionaly say "I only kill to know I'm alive" which is a partial lyric to the song "So What" by the band Ministry,from the album "The mind is a terrible thing to taste."

Monty Python
In the Museum of Technology there are several terminals that have notes from the lead researcher, named Professor R. J. Gumbie. This is a reference to the Monty Python character of the same name only spelled Gumby.

Munchkin
In the Munchkin card game there is a weapon called the Board of Education, a 2 by 4 with a nail in it. This weapon appears in Fallout 3 as the unique nail board. Munchkin is made by Steve Jackson Games, which also makes GURPS. Fallout 1 was originally supposed to use the GURPS system. The word "GURPS" can also appear as a possible password when hacking computers.

Music industry
In Vault 92, the vault used for music preservation, the name of the overseer is Richard Rubin. This can be found while looking into the computer files. Rick Rubin is a real life music producer who in 2007 was listed by Time Magazine among the 100 Most Influential People in The World.

Mystery Science Theater 3000
A computer in the National Archives contains a memo from the man in charge of robot maintenance is signed, P. Brantseg. Patrick Brantseg was one of the prop guys from MST3K, and was even listed in the credits of the MST3K movie as puppet wrangler.

In addition, there is a portion of the game where you can chose to settle an argument between two clueless superheroes, one being a robot mechanic. When you gain entrance to his stronghold, the door has several different layers that unlock one after another, all in different fashions, much like the beginning of the MST3K television program.

Neuromancer
Dr. Zimmer's security android is named Armitage. This may be a reference to William Gibson's "Neuromancer". Formerly a Green Beret named Colonel Willis Corto, who took part in a secret operation named Screaming Fist. He was heavily injured both physically and psychologically, and the "Armitage" personality was constructed as part of experimental "computer-mediated psychotherapy" by Wintermute, one of the artificial intelligences seen in the story (the other one being the eponymous Neuromancer) which is actually controlling the mission.

See also Armitage III: Polymatrix/Dualmatrix.

Norse Mythology
The slaver that kills the bartender in Paradise Falls, Ymir, is a reference to the Norse frost giant whose body is the foundation of Midgard. His son is called Jotun, which is the name of the race of the Norse giants.

Occam's Razor
The melee weapon Occam's Razor is a reference to the scientific principle of the same name formulated by William of Ockham, which is "do not multiply entities needlessly". One of the many possible restatements of this is "all other things being equal, the solution that makes the fewest assumptions is the best". In other words, when multiple competing theories are equal in other respects, the principle recommends selecting the theory that introduces the fewest assumptions and postulates the fewest entities.

Omega Man, The
"The Family" is the name of the nocturnal humans (vampires) that stalk Robert Neville (Charlton Heston) in the classic post-apocalyptic film, The Omega Man (1971) aka I am Legend (book not film).

Paradise Lost
John Milton's Paradise Lost appears in Fallout 3 as a skill-training book. The person who gives it to you explains that it is about a journey to Hell and the nearby bar The Ninth Circle is a reference to it. This actually describes Dante's Inferno, not Paradise Lost. Since the character claims to have read the book and therefore should know, this is probably a mistake (or joke) by the developers. The name of the area Paradise Falls is also a multiple entendre referencing Paradise Lost. Also, if you hack into a very hard terminal in the shop owned by this person, you will find the ENTIRE actual poem.

Peanuts
In the town "Little Lamplight" the doctor, Lucy, is a reference to the character "Lucy" from Charles Schultz's Peanuts. Inside of the clinic where she is located, a sign reading "The Doctor is in" can be found, which was often seen on Lucy's stand in the series.

Planet of the Apes
In Megaton there is a cult of people who worship an unexploded nuclear bomb. This is parallel to a similar cult of irradiated humans who worship an unexploded nuclear bomb in Beneath the Planet of the Apes. There is even the option to explode the bomb, which is the ending to the above movie. Unlike Beneath the Planet of the Apes however, the bomb is only powerful enough to destroy the city, not to destroy all life on earth.

Predator
The unique hunting rifle in Dave's safe (Republic of Dave), 'Ol Painless', may be a reference to "Predator". The gatling gun carried by Blaine (Jesse Ventura) was called Painless.

Princess Bride, The
While patching you up during the Wasteland Survival Guide personal injury sub-quest, Moira Brown asks you to describe the pain &mdash; "And remember, this is for posterity!" This echoes a line used by Count Rugin in The Princess Bride when asking Wesley to describe the torture in the Pit of Despair. A protectron may also be heard refering to "rodents of unusual size" when directed to execute an infestation control routine.

Quantum Leap
In one of the offices in the Nuka Cola Plant you'll find a Marketing Terminal. When you browse the entries you will find a slogan to be used in a new Nuka Cola Quantum commercial: "Take the leap, enjoy a Quantum".

Raven Rock
Raven Rock Mountain Complex is a real-world US government complex, also known as the "Underground Pentagon".

Reboot
In Canterbury Commons you can eat at Dot's Diner, a building that resembles the diner of the same name in the Reboot series. Dot's Diner locations can also be found in other places including Grayditch and Jury Street Metro Station.

Relic Hunter
During the quest to acquire the Declaration of Independence you come across an NPC named Sydney who greets you as a fellow "relic hunter", referencing the television series of the same name where actress Tia Carrere starred as Sydney Fox.

Robots
In the animated movie Robots, Rodney takes the train from Rivet Town Train Station.

Serenity
After the Dweller completes the Galaxy News Radio quest, Three Dog shouts "You can't stop the signal!". This is a reference to the movie 'Serenity', in which the quote is mentioned by a cunning hacker and TV geek, before the main actors try broadcasting a top-secret video log over the universe-wide TV system.

Shadowrun
The Wired Reflexes perk is a reference to a piece of cyberware a character can have installed in their body in the tabletop RPG Shadowrun. In Shadowrun, Wired Reflexes uses neural boosters and adrenalin stimulators which allows the user to see the world around them in a state of slow motion (much like VATS.)

Sifl and Olly
One of the 911 Dispatch terminals in the Germantown Police department references the MTV show "Sifl and Olly." The rantings captured on the terminal reference the song "Llama School."

Not only that, but you can find a note with a password for a computer terminal in the same building. The password is "Vicious Coy", the same name of the Precious Roy knockoff on the X-and-O show.

Silent Hill
The interior of Springvale School features some sinister sights including rusty cages, mangled corpses hanging from chains, letters of the alphabet hung haphazardly on classroom walls and copious amounts of blood stains on the walls, ceiling and floor. It's not a million miles away from Midwich Elementary, an area featured in the survival horror videogame Silent Hill for the original Playstation.

Simpsons, The
The few actual TVs left in the wasteland, if you look carefully, are called Radiation Kings, which is the name of the TV Homer had as a young boy. This easter egg was originally present in the opening movie of Fallout 1; this is a continuation of that reference.

Snatcher
In L'Enfant Plaza, there is a newspaper office. In the basement is a man named Gibson who has been decapitated in the same manner as Jean-Jack Gibson in Snatcher. Looting his body gets the player "Gibson's key" and "Gibson's Scrap of Paper" which are also found on his body in Snatcher. The scrap of paper says "Search the house!" which is indeed what it said in Snatcher as well. Gibson's house can be found in Minefield, along with two other buildings named after Snatcher characters: Gillian house (named for the protagonist, Gillian Seed) and Benson house (named for Benson Cunningham, Gillian and Gibson's boss). If the player checks Gibson's house, there is a small model house on a table in the living room, which can be unlocked for some fairly lame loot, and a computer upstairs, which is unfortunately broken. Both of these objects were in Gibson's house in Snatcher as well.

Starship Troopers
In the approach to Galaxy News Radio, one of the Brotherhood of Steel soldiers spurs on his comrades by inquiring as to whether they want to live forever. The quote is similar, possibly identical, to the "Come on, you apes, you want to live forever?" that figures prominently in Robert Heinlein's Starship Troopers and its movie adaptation. That, in turn, is a reference to a quote sometimes attributed to one Sergeant Major Daniel Joseph "Dan" Daly, but coming from soldiers wearing power armor, it constitutes a reference to Starship Troopers (it being the novel where the concept of power armor was invented).

Star Trek: The Original Series
In the beginning of the game when your character is being born, and your mother begins to die, it fades out with the phrase "James I need a doctor not a dentist" a slight reference to lines in the original Star Trek where Dr. McCoy says to James "Jim" Kirk... "Damnit Jim, I'm a doctor not a scientist."

Similarly, the doctor in Rivet City will say "I'm a doctor, not a dealer!" when confronted about purchasing chems.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
The password for the shipping computer in the Nuka-Cola bottling plant is NC-C1864. The call letters of the USS Reliant, the ship hijacked by Khan, were NCC-1864.

Star Trek: Voyager
Sawbones, the medical robot in the B Ring of The Citadel greets you with the phrase "Please state the nature of the medical emergency"; a phrase used by popular character The Doctor of Star Trek: Voyager. (This line is also used by medics in the classic RTS game "Starcraft", again, as a homage to the Doctor.)

Them!
One of the side quests is titled "Those!". It's a nice reference/homage to the excellent oscar-nominated sci-fi/horror movie "Them!" from 1954, in which a small town is invaded by, you guessed it, giant ants.

THX-1138
The code of the safe in the Republic of Dave is 1138. a reference to THX-1138, the first movie made by George Lucas. The letters THX and numbers 1138 appear in numerous other Lucasfilm productions.

Tim O'Brien
When you kill a Mister Gutsy robot they sometimes will say "Box me up and ship me home". This is a reference to Tim O'Brien, who is an author who wrote a memoir on Vietnam named "If I Die in a Combat Zone: Box Me Up and Ship Me Home," which in turn references a US Army running cadence popular in the Vietnam era and still used today.

Transformers
When following Liberty Prime to the Memorial in the first part of the quest Take it Back!, it can be heard shouting "Freedom is the sovereign right of all Americans", a reference to Optimus Prime's defining quote, "Freedom is the right of all sentient beings".

U.F.O
North-west of the Greener Pastures Disposal Site is an area where your Pip boy will get a new radio transmission called the "Recon Craft Theta Beacon", exploring the area will result in the discovery of a crashed alien space ship. The alien body can be found near the ship along with the extremely powerful Alien Blaster which can be used as a weapon as well as (limited) ammo for the weapon. This is a parody on the old random encounter from Fallout. Also in the library of the Brotherhood of Steel citadel there is a terminal that explains a crashed ufo aswell as other government conspiracies.

V For Vendetta
In the graphic novel and movie adaptation V For Vendetta, the character V was imprisoned in a secret experimental facility, its purpose to test a potent airborne pathogen that was later released on an unsuspecting populace (similar to the FEV virus, and plot to release it, from the Fallout series), the ensuing fear of terrorism leading to martial law and the establishment of a fascist state. His cell was number 5, marked with the Roman numeral V, for 5, which was also the cell number of Fallout 3's Fawkes. He also wore a Guy Fawkes mask, a nod to the real Guy Fawkes, as well as his own plan to blow up Parliament.

See also Fawkes, Guy.

Wolverine (X-Men)
The Perk Adamantium Skeleton is a reference to the Marvel Comics character Wolverine, of the X-Men, who (usually) has an indestructible adamantium skeleton.