Warning! Spoilers ahead for DC’s League of Super-Pets! Easter eggs are common ground for comic-based movies, but DC’s League of Super-Pets' best reference flew by faster than a flying super-dog. Like most animated movies aimed at young audiences, some of the humor in the film is included to ensure that parents are entertained too. DC’s League of Super-Pets doesn’t disappoint, slipping in an incredibly funny and on-point reference to a dystopian classic.
DC’s League of Super-Pets follows Krypto (voiced by the DCEU’s Black Adam, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson), Superman’s dog, as he is sidelined by the Man of Steel in favor of Lois Lane. Meanwhile, at Metropolis’ animal shelter, a sad group of animals awaits adoption, including a Boxer named Ace, a potbellied pig named PB, a turtle named Merton, a squirrel named Chip, and a hairless guinea pig named Lulu. The plot kicks up after Lulu is revealed to have been a test animal “rescued” from Lex Luthor’s lab when Krypto and Superman fly in to save the day. Lulu, however, was (and is) devoted to Luthor, and devises a plan to harness the power of orange Kryptonite, escape the shelter, and reunite with her master.
Ace (True Story’s Kevin Hart) is quickly established as the leader of the other shelter animals and spins a story for his fellow inmates, telling them that he is going to break them free and take them to a farm “up north” where they can live in peace without humans that put them in cages. In response, PB replies, “that doesn’t sound ominous at all.” The quick and incredibly clever reference is to George Orwell’s classic dystopian novel, Animal Farm—and the reference only gets better as DC’s League of Super-Pets’ plot continues.
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DC's League of Super-Pets References George Orwell's Animal Farm
In Orwell’s 1945 classic, a group of farm animals band together to overthrow the farmer only to wind up being ruled by the power-hungry pig, Napoleon. Hilariously, after Ace tells the animals about the mythical farm in DC’s League of Super-Pets, Lulu (voiced by Saturday Night Live’s Kate McKinnon) stages her rebellion, using the orange Kryptonite to give herself (and, unbeknownst to Lulu, the other shelter animals) superpowers. Like in Orwell’s novel, the animals are now all equal.
Furthering the reference, Lulu then overthrows the proverbial “farmer” by capturing the Justice League and frees Luthor, who she expects to rule beside. Her plan is foiled, however, when Luthor does not see her as a peer, but as a guinea pig. By the final battle, Lulu becomes the ultimate villain after she captures her master (Lex Luthor) and begins to rule tyrannically just as Napoleon did after exiling Animal Farm's farmer, Jones, and fellow pig leader, Snowball.
As DC's League of Super-Pets is first and foremost a kids' movie, the film ends with the Super-Pets on top, playing to the PG-rated crowd. The movie masterfully completes its Animal Farm reference, however, when Luthor’s assistant rescues Lulu in DC’s League of Super-Pets’ mid-credits scene, establishing an alliance between them that reflects Napoleon’s alliance with neighboring human farmers at the end of Orwell’s novel. But while Animal Farm ends pointedly and poetically with Napoleon on top as a cautionary tale of corrupt government, DC’s League of Super-Pets is likely just leaving room for a super Solar-Paw-Punch sequel.
