In gamedesign and -modding it is a cherished practice to integrate references to other popular- and/or cyberculture items. Especially hidden references, so-called easter-eggs, have developed their very own dynamic. But not only gamers “creatively re-fashion the resources of popular culture for their own expressive discourse purposes.” (↵Wright, Boria & Breidenbach 2002) I guess it is a practice to be found within every discipline of artistic expression falling into the domains of scifi, cyberpunk and their kin.
 

The dominant and constantly reappearing graphical design within Kurt Wimmer’s movie ↵“Equilibrium” (2002) is the Tetragrammaton ‘logo’. It’s prominently displayed on walls, flags, imprinted on items and so on. In addition to this appearances Wimmer has placed some kind of in-movie easter-egg, referring to the viusals of the movie itself—the pistols of Cleric John Preston (Christian Bale) emit a muzzle flash in the shape of said symbol:
 


 

This already has been ↑mentioned elsewhere, but now I discovered the same stunt in Wimmer’s next movie ↑“Ultraviolet” (2006). Again the movie is dominated by a graphical, ever-reappearing design, this time it’s the biohazard symbol. This symbol is vastly used in gamer-, online, and cyberculture. In several milieus it already has been ‘cited to death’, for example within the casemodders’ domain: “[Kitty:] In my opinion, such things as biohazard window etches are long since passé. If one guy does it and others like it, the rest of the sheep herd themselves together and do the very same thing. That’s not modding. It’s copying. It’s right back to another level of status-quo, ie, one massive clusterfuck. The modding guys I still stay in touch with occasionally are those who always have pushed the limits in ability and creativity.” (↵Kitchenman 2001)
But Wimmer’s creative use is acceptable and noteworthy in my opinion. The muzzleflashes of the guns used by Violet (Milla Jovovich) are trying hard to resemble something like the biohazard symbol:
 

 

Watching frame by frame you discover that the symbol even rotates around the axis of the weapon’s barrel. I am sure that during the movie there would be even better occasions to take clean screencaps of the designed muzzleflash, but somehow I constantly get distracted by other visual attractions …
 


 

For a ton of screencaps from “Ultraviolet” and lots of photographies showing gorgeous beauty and ultimate female cyberpunk icon Milla Jovovich, go to ↑Ultraviolet (2006).