List of references (Engineer)

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Due to the comedic style of Team Fortress 2 and Valve's humor, the game includes references, usually in a humorous fashion. There are many different types, from games to movies. Even jokes that have developed within the game and its community have been included. Below are references specific to the Engineer class.

List of references (Engineer)

Technology

Name

The Engineer's name is Dell Conagher, possibly a reference to the Dell technology corporation.

Food and Drink

Red Stripe

The Engineer drinking 'BLU Streak' beer is likely a reference to the real life brand, Red Stripe, though it may also refer to the 'Blue Streak' missile, or to his 'streak' of BLU casualties.


In-Jokes

Favorite Equation

The Engineer's Favorite Equation.png


The Engineer's "favorite equation" is actually a part of the equation used to govern character lighting in-game.

Meet the Heavy


This particular quote is another reference to the $200 bullets he loads into his main weapon.

Meet the Engineer/Engineer Update Teaser Video

The Engineer's guitar (which he uses in his Dischord taunt kill) was first seen in Meet the Engineer. It later reappeared in the Engineer Update Teaser Video.

Music

Goodnight, Irene

Goodnight Irene
Well, good night, Irene!
The Engineer


"Goodnight, Irene" or "Irene, Goodnight," is a 20th century American folk standard. The lyrics tell how the singer lost his love through "rambling and gambling". He contemplates suicide in the famous line "Sometimes I take a great notion to jump in the river and drown". The final verse urges the listener to "go home to your wife and family". In addition to many recorded versions, it is also a favorite camp and fireside song.



Old Mother Hubbard

...How am I going to stop some big mean mother hubbard from tearing me a structurally superfluous new behind?
The Engineer

"Old Mother Hubbard" is a nursery rhyme. Speculative claims have been made that this had to do with Thomas Cardinal Wolsey refusing Henry VIII's divorce from Queen Catherine of Aragon, or even that it was referring to a large trebuchet, but those have been disputed. Here the Engineer uses Mother Hubbard as rhyming slang for 'motherfucker'.



Someone Else's Song

The song the Engineer plays on his guitar during Meet the Engineer was not originally composed for the video and is called 'Someone Else's Song'. It was originally written by American Country band Wilco for their album Being There.



Home on the Range

Achievement: Pownd on the Range

The song "Home on the Range" is an American folk song arranged by Texan composer David Guion, using the words of a poem called "My Western Home" by Brewster M. Higley. The song is often used in popular culture in connection with the Old West and with cowboys. However, it is the state song of Kansas, not of Texas, so this reference seems to have more to do with popular culture than the actual origins of the song.


Honky Tonk Man

Achievement: Honky Tonk Man

Honky Tonk Man

The achivement name could refer to The Honky Tonk Man, a former wrestler for the WWE, with a guitar shot as one of his signature moves.

Places

Bee Cave

The Engineer's place of origin, Bee Cave, is a real city in Travis County, Texas, United States. The population was 656 at the 2000 census; in the 2004 census estimate it was 1,700.


Saying and Phrases

PDQ

The name of the P.D.Q. is a reference to the abbreviated acronym for "Pretty Damn Quick" (alternatively "Pretty Darn Quick" or "Please Do Quickly"), sometimes appended to the end of an instruction or command to communicate urgency.

Lock, Stock, And Barrel

Achievement: Doc, Stock, and Barrel A reference to the phrase "Lock, stock and barrel" usually used to describe an entire thing. The phrase itself is taken from the primary parts of a musket and thus uniquely applicable to the Engineer.

TV and Film

Ghostbusters

Nice shootin', Tex!
The Engineer

A reference to the first "Ghostbusters" movie. As the Ghostbusters are trying to trap Slimer while in the Sedgewick Hotel ballroom, Peter says this due to Egon's overenthusiasm with his proton pack.



The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas

Achievement: The Best Little Slaughterhouse in Texas

The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas is a 1978 Broadway production that has seen several iterations on both Broadway and the silver screen. The plot concerns the proprietor of a brothel who is on good terms with local law enforcement when a crusading television reporter decides to make prostitution a political issue.


A Fistful of Dollars

Achievement: Fistful of Sappers

A very likely reference to Clint Eastwood's classic Western film, A Fistful of Dollars, the first in the popular Dollars trilogy.



Unforgiven

Achievement: Unforgiven

A quite likely reference to Clint Eastwood's Academy Award winning Western film, Unforgiven



The Distinguished Gentleman

Achievement: The Extinguished Gentleman

A possible reference to the Eddie Murphy comedy The Distinguished Gentleman. It's not clear how this film relates to the Engineer.



Field of Dreams

Achievement: If You Build It, They Will Die

A reference to the line of "If you build it, he will come" from the fantasy/drama film Field Of Dreams



Lonely Are the Brave

Achievement: (Not So) Lonely are the Brave

"Lonely Are the Brave" is a 1962 film starring Kirk Douglas as a wandering ranch hand who holds a distrust for modern society. The film was Douglas' idea, as he related to the subject matter of the novel, "The Brave Cowboy", on which it was based - the difficulty of being an individual in modern society.


How The West Was Won

Achievement: How the Pests was Gunned

Texas, the Engineer's home state, is often regarded as a frontier territory between the more densely populated eastern half of the United States and the more rural wastern half. The phrase "how the west was won" originally referred to the process by which American pioneers "conquered" the West by taking the land from the Native American tribes living there. In modern times, the phrase refers to the procedure by which something happens.


French Connection

Achievement: The Wrench Connection

The French Connection was a scheme through which heroin was smuggled from Turkey to France and then to the United States, culminating in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when it provided the vast majority of the illicit heroin used in the United States. The scheme was immortalized in a 1971 Academy Award-winning film


Walker, Texas Ranger

Achievement: Texas Ranger

Most likely a reference to the TV show "Walker, Texas Ranger", a popular television series starring Chuck Norris.


The Evil Dead Series/ The Empire Strikes Back

The Engineer's Gunslinger serves as both a reference to Ash Williams replacing his stump of an arm with a metal hand, and Luke Skywalker's replacement of his arm as well with a robotic arm.



Batman

Pow!
The Engineer
Bam!
The Engineer
Bap!
The Engineer

These sayings may be a reference to the earlier Live-Action Batman movies and TV series, as words such as "Pow!" and "Bap!" would appear during many of the fight scenes.



Mythology

King Midas

Guess I got the Midas touch.
The Engineer

King Midas is a figure of Greek Mythology, as the King of Pessinus. He was known for his ability to turn anything he had touched into gold, and eventually this was called the Midas Touch.

History

Doc Holliday

Achievement: Doc Holiday

John Henry 'Doc' Holliday was a dentist, gambler and gunfighter of the 'Old West', best known for his friendship with fellow Gunslinger Wyatt Earp, and their subsequent gunfight at the O.K. Corral, where the Earps, (Wyatt, Virgil and Morgan) alongside Doc Holliday, fought Billy Claiborne, Ike and Billy Clanton, and Tom and Frank McLaury. He eventually died of tuberculosis (then called 'consumption') on November 8, 1887.

Breaker Morant

Achievement: Breaking Morant

Harry 'Breaker' Harbord Morant was an Australian horseman, poet and soldier who was eventually convicted and later executed for war crimes he committed during guerilla wars in South Africa.

See also