OD&D Pop culture references in early editions?

[Shades of Eternity]

And, of course, early D&D had absolutely nothing to do with Lord of the Rings influences...........

I thought saying Tolkein had Gygax respond not unlike Miracle Max does with Humperdink?

 

[Sprattoo]

The most pop culture thing I recall about Old School D&D is the 70's haircuts and fashion sprinkled into the art that was representing medieval fantasy. The clothes being some mash up of KISS, Bowie, and Queen costumes, feathered hair, and Heavy Metal artwork simulations.

Don't get me wrong, I thought it was great... but I knew that 70s hair and style didn't quite fit. The later editions featured solidly 80s perms and post-disco clothes.

 

[Aldarc]

Not D&D, but Michael Moorcock made several pop culture references in the Hawkmoon series, most notably Aral Vilsson as one of the gods of Granbretan ( Harold Wilson, Prime Minister of the late 60s/ early 70s for non-Brits)

The Granbretan gods before the Tragic Milennium included "Johne, Jhorg, Phowl, and Rhunga."

There are a lot of inside references (Vecna = Vance) and my favorite is probably the Vacuous Grimoire, which was a slam on the contemporaneous Arduin Grimoire. My favorite detail wasn't the loss of intelligence, it was that the book changed appearance to conform to the other books it was with.

Which is admittedly a bit weird since basis for the Eye and Hand of Vecna were Moorcock's Corum books rather than Vance.

 

[turnip_farmer]

Sesame seeds for Passwall ("Open Sesame!") is definitely a pop culture reference, though.

'Open Sesame' is hundreds of years old. I not really sure that counts as pop culture.

 

[Turgenev]

In the Dungeons & Dragons Monster & Treasure Assortment book (1977, 1978, 1980), Magneto's helmet shows up in treasure in the back cover image by Jeff Dee.

Cheers,
Tim

 

[Blue Orange]

There are a lot of inside references (Vecna = Vance) and my favorite is probably the Vacuous Grimoire, which was a slam on the contemporaneous Arduin Grimoire. My favorite detail wasn't the loss of intelligence, it was that the book changed appearance to conform to the other books it was with.

I think that the best way to show that ... maybe Gygax didn't have his finger on the pulse of pop culture in order to reference it was in Heward's Mystical Organ, which includes references to such "with it" songs from 1979 like ... Fly Me to the Moon and The Monster Mash.

Since those were released 1954 and 1962, that gives us some useful coordinates to, for example, check the Billboard hits.
I believe one of the early editions' boots of dancing (cursed item) says the wearer may heel and toe or shuffle off to Buffalo, which is from 1933.

 

[Tonybro001]

It started being carried on my local PBS station in 1983, just as an example.

And by 1987, it was well known enough that Keith Parkinson (an American) put a mini-TARDIS on the shelf behind Raistlin in his painting "The Last Spell of Fistandantilus":

Old School FRP — “The Last Spell of Fistandantilus” (Keith...

www.google.com

Wow never spotted that before

 

[Richards]

The shambling mound illustration in the AD&D 1E Monster Manual bears quite a striking resemblance to Marvel's Man-Thing.

Johnathan

 

[Tonguez]

Does Castle Amber doing a homage to Clark Ashton Smiths Averoigne count as pop culture?

 

[Stormonu]

Does Castle Amber doing a homage to Clark Ashton Smiths Averoigne count as pop culture?

If it does (and probably should, they had to get Clark's permission to do Castle Amber), then so would all of Lankhmar.

Gah, how could we forget Stormbr... I mean Black Razor?