Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes: 7 Awesome Easter Eggs And References You Probably Missed

7. Ape History

The moment a Planet Of The Apes film starts having the monkeys talk there's a distinct danger of things falling into the silly category (see Tim Burton's attempt at a reboot). Dawn sidesteps this by expanding upon Rise's sign language and giving the simian community a fully realised system of communication. It's not verging on being in anyway human, but at the same time there's a maturity that ensures we as an audience see that they aren't simple primitives. Aside from actually talking (thankfully used rather sparingly), the apes communicate through a much more advanced sign language, the written word (assumedly learnt when the original generation were in human captivity) and, most fleetingly, cyphers. It's really blink and you miss it, but in the apes forest base along with the Animal Farm-esque rules there's a bunch of cave painting-style drawings that are actually retelling the story of Rise. Confirmed by Reeves in interviews, you can make out the Golden Gate bridge and a few other images. Cool on its own merits, this hearkens back to the original series of films, where centuries after the first ape stood up to humans the story is still told as history rather than myth.