Fun Flukes and Anomalies
In the level Long Night of Solace Jorge speaks in an unknown language - it is possible that he says something of significance to the story
In the level Nightfall a group of colonists says that they refused to evacuate their colony because they didn't feel like leaving it up to someone else to defend their home. In Exodus a female marine says that they (the marines) had orders to evacuate, but that they stayed behind because they "didn't like leaving a job unfinished". The repetition of this theme suggests that Bungie is trying to say something. Perhaps those bits of dialogue are in reference to members of the Bungie team who formed 343i; they "stayed behind" to finish the Halo saga (even though it has already been brought to a nice close in the alternate canon).
It seems that the enigmatic character Jun, in Halo Reach was meant to resemble the Master Chief. He is clearly not, but they bear undeniable similarities in name, armour color, and armour style (John wears Mark V and Jun wears the visually similar "Scout" helmet). Jun is also the only surviving member of Noble Team, which lead many players to believe that he was in fact the Master Chief. While this is clearly not the case, the similarities are notable. Jun will remain an enigma, but it is possible that Jun was meant by Bungie to be a metaphorical representation of John 117 simply for the sake of entertaining storytelling.
At the end of the level Winter Contingency Noble Six is stabbed by a Zealot elite. This mirrors the end of the level Lone Wolf in which Six is killed in a similar manner. This is nice touch of foreshadowing.
The Lego action figure series Bionicle features six elemental heroes. Each has a distinctive look, their own unique color and personality, and in almost every iteration of Bionicle the blue Bionicle hero is a female. There are brown, black, blue, green, white, and red Bionicles who's aesthetics seem to match up with Jorge, Emile, Kat, Jun, Carter, and Noble Six. Now I'm not saying that it is an exact match, but take into consideration that Bionicle and Halo: Combat Evolved both came out in 2001. Kids who played with the origional Bionicles are now in Bungie's target demographic. Its plausible that Bungie based the Noble Team characters on the Bionicles in order to give Reach more appeal to that generation. Something to think about.
This poem seems to be the inspiration for the Noble Six character.
In Combat Evolved captain Keyes has a Marathon logo next to his medals. The Marathon logo was also present on the Pillar of Autumn, but they were removed in Reach. The logo on Keyes chest is now a "septagon" and the logo on the side of the ship is replaced with a circular node.
Well, thanks for reading. I hope you enjoyed it. Bungie creates incredible stories and I'm excited to see where they will take us next. If I missed any allegorical elements, references in Reach to past Halo or Bungie games, narrative easter eggs, and the like, please feel free to fill in the gaps.
[Edited on 02.09.2012 5:20 PM PST]