M. C. Escher in popular culture

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For the main article on the artist, see M. C. Escher.

[edit] Pop culture references to Relativity

• Matt Groening, creator of The Simpsons, made a parody of Relativity in Life in Hell, where the cartoon rabbits fall down stairs at impossible angles. Groening would later reuse this joke in the "I, Roommate" episode of Futurama and as a couch gag on The Simpsons.
• In the Futurama episode I, Roommate, Fry and Bender go apartment-hunting and visit a room that resembles the painting. Fry claimed that he did not want to "pay for a dimension he wasn't going to use," and then Bender trips down one of the stairs and continues to fall.
• In an episode called Clara's Dirty Little Secret of the Comedy Central animated series Drawn Together, Princess Clara was pushed down by Toot Braunstein (and up, around, and back down) a flight of stairs modelled on Relativity. The room was called The M. C. Escher room.
• In the Family Guy episode "Brian Goes Back To College", Stewie and Brian share a room where Stewie puts up a framed print of Relativity, which he calls "Crazy Stairs." He then breaks it while playing Ultimate Frisbee. In a later episode, "No Meals on Wheels", Peter complains that "this is weirder than that rap video by M.C. Escher." M.C. Escher is then depicted inside Relativity rappng, "Going up the stairs and going down the stairs and going up the stairs and going down the stairs and going up the sideways stairs."
• In Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening, one room is partially based on this. The gravitational problems are compensated for by gravity switching to whichever staircase the player is about to climb.
• In The Matrix: Path of Neo, one section of the Merovingian's Rooms is based principally on this painting.
• Characters walk up and down stairways apparently defying gravity in the climatic scene of Labyrinth.
• In Xiaolin Showdown, a Xiaolin Showdown with Grandmaster Dashi Shows some impossible figures.
• In Chrono Cross for the Playstation, the second and third rooms of the Temporal Distortion area are based on Relativity. The first room is based on Van Gogh's works.
• In the film Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life the film's climax in the cradle also has several different gravity sources, which along with the lighting effects create a disorientating experience for the viewer.
• In the anime Cardcaptor Sakura, The Maze card creates a maze similar to Relativity.
• Sierra's early PC adventure game Quest for Glory featured a puzzle room with multiple false exits and trap doors. The game's narrative jokingly wonders if the room was designed by M.C. Escher.
• In Haunting Ground for Playstation 2, there is a room modelled after the painting, complete with its inhabitants.
• In the anime Yu-Gi-Oh!, the Millennium Puzzle, an Egyptian artifact owned by the protagonist, is said to contain the spirit of an ancient Pharaoh. The insides of the puzzle look remarkably like Relativity, which represents the Pharaoh's inability to remember his past. When various characters enter the puzzle during the course of the series, there are multiple gravitational pulls and strange dimensions (such as the instance when a main character, Joey, looks through a door, only to see himself inside looking through the same door some distance below).
• In the game Gauntlet: Dark Legacy, the final level of the Dream Realm, known as the Maze of Illusion, is somewhat based around Relativity.
• In the Digimon episode List of Digimon Adventure episodes, the heroes find themselves in a room where gravity is upside-down. [1]
• In the Mickey Mouse comic stealers, a castle just like Escher's one is pictured.
• The Marvel comic book Avengers Forever #7 (June 1999) and the 2002 DC Comics book JLA/JSA: Virtue and Vice both feature a number of the story's superheroes finding themselves in a realm with multiple gravity sources assigned to different surfaces, much as in Relativity. In the former, the heroes almost immediately fall through space the moment they find themselves there. In the latter, they do not. Interestingly, while the books were not written by the same author, both were illustrated by Carlos Pacheco.
• Another form of Relativity appears in the Captain Future anime series ("The Comet Kings" part 3).
• In the Fighting Fantasy role-playing series book 45 Spectral Stalkers, Relativity is shown in a picture as the room of the mysterious Loremaster, whom the player may encounter.
• The Temporal Vortex in the role-playing game Chrono Cross in part resembles Relativity.

[edit] Pop culture references to Other Works

• The Doctor Who episode Castrovalva takes its name from Escher's early lithograph of the same name, though Escher's view of Castrovalva has none of the paradoxical elements of his later works to which the setting of the episode could more readily be compared.[2]
• Eric Shanower's illustrations of the Absurd City in Paradox in Oz are clearly based on Escher's illustrations.^{[citation needed]}
• Similarly, on Comedy Central animated series Drawn Together, the episode "Clara's Dirty Little Secret" featured a supposedly pregnant Princess Clara being pushed down by Toot Braunstein (and up, around, and back down) a flight of stairs modeled on Relativity in the aptly named M. C. Escher Room. [3]
• In the Jim Henson movie Labyrinth, Relativity is referenced again. The audience is again treated to an answer to the great question: what if somebody walks off the edge? The Escher estate was given acknowledgment in the credits for the film.[4]
• In Larry Niven's novel Protector, the protagonist builds a working model of Relativity using gravitational engineering.Protector, p. 156
• Sheila Chandra included a piece called "Escher's Triangle" on her CD Roots and Wings - the title refers to Escher's use of the Penrose triangle in pictures like Waterfall.
• The bonus stages of the first Sonic the Hedgehog game, for the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive, feature an animated background of birds turning into fish, a reference to Sky and Water.^{[citation needed]}
• The early nineties rock music group Chagall Guevara wrote a song called "Escher's World" which made many references to the impossible structures that can be found in Escher's work.[5]
• Escher is also the subject of a song by the rock group The Breakfast. The song is called "Escher's Etchings" and is included on their 2003 live album Bona Fide. The lyrics can be read here^{[citation needed]}
• The interior of the Temple of The Ancients in Final Fantasy VII is modeled after M.C. Escher's Relativity.^{[citation needed]}
• The music video for "Around the World" by Daft Punk, directed by Michel Gondry, is based on Escher's Encounter.^{[citation needed]}
• In the Futurama episode, "I, Roommate", Fry and Bender visit an apartment that strikingly resembles M.C. Eschers "Relativity".
• The music video for "Drive" by Incubus is based on Drawing Hands, beginning with an animated hand drawing a piece of paper and second hand to form the actual Escher drawing. It also shows the hand drawing lead singer Brandon Boyd to attach itself to. All drawings in the video were done by the band members themselves.^{[citation needed]}
• A comic crossover between Mike Allred's Madman and Bernie Mireault's The Jam, features Escher as a central character when the two characters enter into an alternate universe created by a somewhat godlike Escher, based on many of his works.[6]
• "Escher" is the title of a song by the British band Teenage Fanclub. The song is about a man who doesn't know if he is up or down.[7]
• "Weird Al" Yankovic's 2006 song, White & Nerdy contains the lyrics "M.C. Escher—that's my favorite MC."
• In 2006 Audi released a commercial with many Escher-inspired scenes. [8]
• In the film "Donnie Darko", the poster on Donnie's bedroom wall is M. C. Escher's "Eye".
• Video short titled "Hallucii". It shows a drunk old man trapped on M.C. Escher's infinite staircase and how he gets out of this mess.
• In the Psygnosis game "Lemmings", the 17th level of "Taxing" is named "Tribute to M.C.Escher", as the level is seemingly impossible.