The scene where Catalina sees two gangsters (who look like Earl and Randy) tying up an old woman to a chair to make her smoke until she dies is very much reminiscent of a scene in the second episode "Quit Smoking", where Earl ties up Donny's mother to make her quit smoking. Even the dialogue follows the same pattern, with Catalina asking what the gangsters are doing, commenting on why they kidnapped the woman and telling how many kidnappings she has seen in her life.
Diego is fixated on 1980s TV and movies. At the end of the episode he gives the battle cry "Wolfverines". That was the highschool team and post-invasion freedom fighter name in the 1984 movie 'Red Dawn'.