This article contains minor spoilers from The Flash.
The Flash has a lot of easter eggs; that’s not a controversial statement to make — the film has sold itself in trailers and interviews as a collage of references from things that we all know and love. Most of these references are obvious ones, like Michael Keaton’s Batman or Ben Affleck’s Batman, for that matter, but others are more obscure. Some might even say surprising.
The one easter egg that will likely slip under the radar comes early in the film when Barry Allen (Ezra Miller) is phasing through a wall to grab a beer. The poster on the wall is of Raquel Welch from the film One Million Years B.C. (1966), which is unremarkable on its own, but shocking when you consider what it represents.
This poster is the same one placed on the wall of prisoner Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins) in The Shawshank Redemption (1994). For most of the story, the poster is used to mark the passage of time and confirm that the character is in the 1960s, but the final act reveals that the poster is actually concealing a tunnel that Dufresne uses to escape prison.
It’s an iconic moment from one the most acclaimed films of all time, but it seemingly has little to do with The Flash or the superhero genre. It’s only when you consider who directed The Flash that the motivation behind the reference becomes clear. Andy Muschietti has been making films for over a decade, but his mainstream breakthrough came when he directed It (2017). It was hailed as a modern classic and became the highest-grossing horror film of all time. Muschietti also helmed the sequel, It: Chapter 2 (2019), which received mixed reviews but was also successful at the box office.
Stephen King, the author who wrote It, also wrote Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption, the novella on which The Shawshank Redemption is based. Muschietti worked closely with King on the It films, and the author even made a cameo as a shop owner in the sequel.
The desire to be faithful to the source material likely endeared the Argentine director to King, who is famously protective of his work. “Stephen King made an incredible, memorable, and beautiful story,” Muschietti told The Independent in 2017. “And I tried to stay true to the spirit of it.” The two men have gotten on so well, in fact, that Muschietti is slated to work on several King adaptations in the future.
Empire reported that Muschietti would produce and direct episodes of Welcome to Derry, which will be an It prequel released by HBO. He will also have a film adaptation of the King novel Roadwork, which /Film claims will be directed by Pablo Trapero.
Given how often Muschietti and King cross paths, it makes sense that the latter saw The Flash early. He loved it so much that he tweeted about it, writing: “I got an advance screening of The Flash today. As a rule I don’t care a lot for superhero movies, but this one is special. It’s heartfelt, funny, and eye-popping. I loved it.”