Nerdland is based on a concept that has been pitched for several years in various incarnations: first as a live-action movie, then a television series, then a series of animated shorts, and finally an animated film.
There is a reference to "potato Jesus" fresco painting hanging on the old woman neighbor's kitchen wall that went viral on August 21st, 2012, when a failed painting restoration performed by an elderly woman named Cecilia Jiménez. Jiménez wished to restore a damaged fresco created by Spanish painter Elías García Martínez named Ecce Homo, which was donated to the Santuario de Misericordia Church in the Spanish town of Borja. According to the church, Jiménez restored the painting without permission. However, she has claimed the priest allowed her to do so.
The conspiracy web site features an image of an astronaut standing next to a director's chair with the name Kubrick across the back. This is a reference to a conspiracy theory that the Apollo 11 moon landing of 1969 was faked under the direction of filmmaker Stanley Kubrick.