Pop Culture and other references that Philip Reeve made in the Mortal Engines series

Mortal Engines museum whale illustration representing Philip Reeve’s use of ancient relics, old-world history, and pop culture references in the Traction Era — The Mortal Engines world is full of relics, garbled memories, old-world jokes, and half-understood references from before the Sixty Minute War.

Pop Culture, History, Music, and Literary References in the Mortal Engines Books

Philip Reeve fills the Mortal Engines books with strange fragments of our world: Shakespeare, rock music, fast food, mythology, advertising language, old cars, political figures, children’s toys, and jokes that have somehow survived thousands of years of cultural collapse.

That is part of the pleasure of the series. Mortal Engines is set so far after the Sixty Minute War that modern civilisation has become debris. The people of the Traction Era do not understand the old world properly. They preserve relics, misread names, worship consumer icons, rename places, and turn half-remembered scraps into new customs.

This guide collects pop culture references, literary allusions, rock and roll jokes, historical nods, brand-name puns, and odd real-world echoes from the Mortal Engines quartet.

It is still a work in progress. Reeve packs these books with so many sly names and buried gags that there are almost certainly more waiting to be dug out of the mud.

How References Work in Mortal Engines

The references are not just Easter eggs. They are worldbuilding.

In a normal novel, a joke name might simply be a joke name. In Mortal Engines, every warped reference also reminds us that the world has lost its own memory. People still encounter fragments of the past, but the context is gone. Mickey Mouse becomes a venerated figure. Old advertising phrases become names. Songs become airships. Mythological names become weapons.

That is the deeper trick. The books are funny because the references are funny. They are sad because nobody inside the world understands the joke anymore.

Lore note: the Traction Era is built on broken inheritance. The characters live among ruins, museum relics, scavenged technology, corrupted place names, and myths made from the junk of the Ancients.

References in Mortal Engines

The first novel is the richest source because it has to introduce the whole grammar of the world: traction cities, London, the Guilds, MEDUSA, Airhaven, Municipal Darwinism, Stalkers, old-tech, and the damaged language of the future.

Mortal Engines: The title comes from Shakespeare’s Othello. The phrase gives the novel its grand tragic weight, but Reeve turns it into a perfect description of the traction cities themselves. Their engines are vast, noisy, hungry, and ultimately mortal. The title also fits the book’s central warning: Municipal Darwinism looks powerful, but it is not sustainable. See more on the meaning of the Mortal Engines title.
My Shirona: The announcement “Now boarding at strut 7, My Shirona outbound for Arkangel” is a neat mutation of My Sharona by The Knack. In-universe, the joke works because the original pop song is long gone, but the sound of the name has survived as an airship title. That is exactly how Mortal Engines treats the past: not remembered, but repurposed.
MEDUSA: The MEDUSA weapon takes its name from the Greek mythological Gorgon whose gaze turned people to stone. Reeve uses the name well because the weapon is both ancient and horrifying, a relic of the old world that should have stayed buried. Like the mythic Medusa, it is dangerous to look too directly at the power it represents.
Mickey Mouse and Pluto: Statues of Mickey and Pluto survive as objects of veneration. This is one of Reeve’s sharpest jokes about consumer culture. The Traction Era has lost the context of Disney, but the icons remain, almost religious in their strangeness. Commercial mascots become sacred relics because nobody remembers what they were for.
Airsperanto: Airsperanto is a joke on Esperanto, the constructed international language. In the Mortal Engines world, it makes sense that aviators and traders would need a shared language across cities, air routes, and moving borders. The name is funny, but the concept is practical.
The 13th Floor Elevator: Thaddeus Valentine’s airship is most likely a nod to The 13th Floor Elevators, the American psychedelic rock band from the 1960s. The name also suits Valentine perfectly. It sounds stylish, strange, and faintly haunted, which matches his role as a glamorous explorer with a murderous private life.
Pandora Shaw: Hester’s mother is named Pandora, which points toward the myth of Pandora’s box. That is strong foreshadowing. Pandora Shaw’s discovery of MEDUSA helps set the novel’s central catastrophe in motion. The name links curiosity, forbidden knowledge, and disaster.
Dr Twix: Dr Twix, one of London’s Engineers, may be named after the chocolate bar. It is a small comic touch, but it fits Reeve’s habit of letting brand names survive as personal names in the broken future.
Dunroamin’: Dunroamin’ plays on the old house-name joke “done roaming.” In a world where towns literally roam, the pun becomes even better. It is a retirement-home joke turned into Traction Era geography.
Pete’s Eats: Pete’s Eats appears as a place-name reference with roots in real Welsh mountaineering culture. In a setting full of moving cities and scavenged names, it feels like another small piece of the old world surviving in altered form.
Happy Meal: Katherine notices a menu offering a Happy Meal. The McDonald’s reference is funny because it suggests even fast-food language has survived the apocalypse, though probably without any understanding of its original corporate meaning.
The Sea of Khazak: The name appears to echo Kazakhstan and the Caspian Sea. Reeve often bends old geography into future geography, which makes the world feel both alien and recognisably descended from ours.
Lady of High Heavens: Chudleigh Pomeroy’s wife carries a name that sounds angelic, though the character does not exactly live up to that promise. Reeve likes this kind of social naming joke: grand, ceremonial, and undercut by personality.
Motoropolis: Motoropolis is a play on Metropolis, but with a Traction Era twist. It suggests an urban machine culture, not necessarily Superman’s city. The name says “city,” but the prefix says “engine.”
Beefeaters: London’s Beefeaters echo the Yeomen Warders of the Tower of London. This is a nice civic survival detail. Future London keeps the name and ceremonial feel, but in the Traction Era they serve a more militarised and mayoral function.
Rule Londinium: The patriotic music played for Valentine is a play on Rule Britannia. It fits London’s self-image perfectly. The city treats itself as imperial, noble, ancient, and superior, even while functioning as a predator.
“I-AM-A-STAL-KER! EX-TER-MIN-ATE!”: Young Tom pretending to be a Stalker while shouting “exterminate” is a Doctor Who Dalek joke. It is also a clever bit of childish play inside the world. Tom imitates a horror he does not yet understand.
Bat out of Hull: Anna Fang’s phrase “bat out of Hull” plays on “bat out of hell,” made famous by Meat Loaf’s album. Hull also works as a British place-name joke, grounding the line in Reeve’s very English future.
Anna Fang and Han Solo: Anna Fang has some Han Solo energy: pilot, rogue, smuggler-adjacent figure, and charismatic rescuer with political complications. She is not a simple copy, but the space-adventure rhythm is there. For a useful Star Wars comparison, see how Han Solo works as a character archetype.

Mortal Engines traction city concept design showing the kind of mobile city world where old cultural references survive as warped names and relics — Reeve’s references work because the Traction Era is built from the wreckage of the old world, including its music, brands, myths, jokes, and place names.

References in Predator’s Gold

Predator’s Gold moves the saga north, into Anchorage, Arkangel, the Ice Wastes, and Professor Pennyroyal’s magnificent fraudulence. The references here often orbit adventure fiction, fake travel writing, and comic names.

Allan Quartermain: Pennyroyal claims adventure aboard a ship called the Allan Quartermain, a nod to Allan Quatermain, hero of H. Rider Haggard’s King Solomon’s Mines. It is perfect for Pennyroyal because he presents himself as exactly that sort of grand adventurer, even when his stories are built from lies, luck, and self-promotion.
Machine Wash Only: One of Pennyroyal’s supposed acquaintances appears to have a name lifted from a clothing label. This is one of the funniest kinds of Mortal Engines future-joke: ordinary modern text becomes a name because the context has evaporated.
Allow Twelve Days for Delivery: Another Pennyroyal-style name that sounds like delivery small print. It fits the broader joke that people in the future may inherit phrases from packages, labels, and instructions without understanding their origin.
Zip Code: A name built from postal terminology. Again, Reeve turns dead administrative language into living identity.
Wolverinehampton: A traction city name playing on Wolverhampton, the West Midlands city. The “wolverine” twist gives it a predatory animal flavour, which suits the moving-city ecosystem.
Poskitt: Poskitt appears as a godlike name, likely referring to Kjartan Poskitt, whose books Reeve has illustrated. It is a private literary joke, but it also fits the series’ tendency to turn authors, brands, and names into strange future echoes.
Smaug: An airship named Smaug points toward the dragon from J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit. It is an especially apt airship name because Smaug suggests flight, treasure, danger, and old fantasy menace.
The Lost Boys: The Lost Boys connect to Peter Pan’s Lost Boys, but Reeve twists the reference into something crueller. In Predator’s Gold and the later books, childhood adventure language becomes attached to manipulation, exploitation, and Uncle’s underwater cult-like power structure.
Windolene Pye: Windolene Pye likely riffs on window-cleaning product language. It has that perfect Reeve quality: silly at first glance, weirdly plausible as a future name.
Graculus: The airship name probably refers to a bird. That fits the wider airship naming pattern, where flight, birds, myth, and machine culture overlap.

Predator’s Gold uses references differently from the first novel. London’s references are about civic power and old-world relics. Pennyroyal’s references are about fake authority: travel, adventure, exoticism, and the performance of being important.

References in Infernal Devices

Infernal Devices is less dense with obvious pop references, but the ones that appear are very Reeve: silly names sitting inside darker systems of slavery, exploitation, cult behaviour, fake glamour, and political decay.

Visible Panty Line: Reeve names an airship Visible Panty Line, turning a fashion phrase into a ridiculous craft name. It is a throwaway gag, but it fits the airborne culture of the books, where ships often carry names with personality.
Itsy Witsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka-Dot Yellow Machiney: This is a clear play on the novelty song Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini. Reeve bends the rhythm into machine culture, which is exactly the sort of nonsense the Traction Era deserves.
Diana, Princess of Whales: The opera reference to Diana, Princess of Whales riffs on Diana, Princess of Wales. The whale pun fits the sea and salvage atmosphere of Infernal Devices, while also mocking grand cultural memory as it decays into absurd opera titles.
“Uncle Knows Best”: The Lost Boys’ belief in Uncle carries a clear Big Brother flavour from George Orwell’s 1984. This is more than a joke. Uncle’s control of children, language, loyalty, and belief makes the reference thematically useful. For more Orwell context, see the themes of George Orwell’s 1984. Reeve has also commented on the 1984 influence around the opening line of Mortal Engines.
Cloud 9: Pennyroyal’s Airborne Park is called Cloud 9, a phrase associated with happiness or euphoria. In context, the name is painfully commercial. Pennyroyal repackages danger, lies, and spectacle as leisure.
Nabisco Shkin: Shkin Corporation is a nasty joke hidden in plain sight. The company deals in slavery, so the “skin” sound is deliberate and ugly. The Nabisco echo adds a corporate brand flavour, making the name feel both comic and morally rotten.
P. P. Bellman: The line about P. P. Bellman, author of atheistic pop-up books for trendy toddlers, is a pointed reference to Philip Pullman. It is one of Reeve’s sharper literary in-jokes, and it works because it turns literary reputation into future-world gossip.

References in A Darkling Plain

A Darkling Plain carries the bleakest title and the broadest historical weight. The jokes are still there, but they sit inside a book about exhausted war, broken peace, old memories, and the possible end of the Traction Era.

A Darkling Plain: The title comes from Matthew Arnold’s poem Dover Beach. The phrase carries the mood of confusion, struggle, and armies clashing in darkness. That is exactly right for the final Mortal Engines novel, where the world is tired, the ideologies are failing, and peace keeps collapsing under the weight of old violence.
Ford Anglia: Ford Anglia nods to the classic British car. It also has a possible second resonance for readers who know Harry Potter, where a flying Ford Anglia became famous. Either way, the name fits Reeve’s world of old vehicle culture and distorted memory.
Lego and Duplo: The front desk clerk named Lego and his contact Duplo are references to the famous building toys. In a world of assembled, rebuilt, moving cities, that joke lands neatly. The future is literally made from pieces.
Napster Varley: Napster Varley may combine Napster, the file-sharing service, with Napa Valley, the California wine region. The name sounds like a warped remnant of internet culture and geography, exactly the kind of hybrid memory the series enjoys.
The Ghost in the Machine: Popjoy refers to the ghost in the machine while discussing Stalker Anna Fang’s state of mind. Philosophically, the phrase points toward the old mind-body problem. In pop terms, it also recalls The Police’s album Ghost in the Machine. In Mortal Engines, it is especially apt because Stalkers are bodies, memories, programming, and old selves trapped in machinery.
Thatcher: The line “What in the name of Thatcher has happened?” is a clear reference to Margaret Thatcher. Reeve’s future has turned a political figure into something like an oath or divine name. That is funny, but also revealing. History survives as exclamation, not understanding.

Small correction worth keeping in mind: not every name is necessarily a deliberate reference. Reeve clearly enjoys wordplay, music, literature, politics, and British cultural debris, but some names may simply be jokes that sound right inside the world.

What These References Tell Us About the World

The references in Mortal Engines are funny, but they also build the setting in three useful ways.

1. The old world has become nonsense

Brand names, songs, children’s characters, political figures, and instruction labels survive without context. That tells us the Sixty Minute War did not simply destroy cities. It broke continuity. The people of the Traction Era inherit fragments, not explanations.

2. The Traction Era is built from scavenged meaning

London scavenges metal, fuel, labour, and old-tech, but the whole world also scavenges language. Names are salvaged from songs, packaging, myths, cars, places, and half-remembered culture. The words keep moving even when their meanings rot away.

3. Reeve keeps the darkness comic

The Mortal Engines books are full of death, exploitation, war, slavery, ecological collapse, and political fanaticism. The jokes do not soften that. They make the world stranger and more readable. Reeve knows that absurdity and catastrophe often sit side by side.

References Across the Prequel Era

The Fever Crumb prequels use the same logic, but with a slightly different texture.

Because Fever Crumb, A Web of Air, and Scrivener’s Moon sit earlier in the timeline, the references often feel closer to archaeology, folklore, and emerging myth. The old world is still gone, but the Traction Era has not fully hardened. London is not yet the predator city of Tom and Hester’s time. The world is still deciding what kind of future it will become.

That makes the prequels useful for understanding the main quartet’s references. They show how history becomes myth, how science becomes superstition, and how political slogans become civic religion.

Prequel note: by the time of Mortal Engines, many names and references are no longer remembered as references. They have become ordinary parts of the world: airship names, city names, oaths, relic labels, Guild terminology, and folk memory.

What Might We Have Missed?

Probably plenty.

The Mortal Engines books reward rereading because the joke density is high and the references are often smuggled in as background names. Airships, towns, hotel clerks, songs, fake operas, old products, political phrases, and throwaway comments can all carry some little shard of our world.

The best way to read the series is with one eye on the story and one eye on the junk pile. Reeve has hidden a lot in there.