Cthulhu Mythos in popular culture

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The following is a list of media featuring H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos in popular culture. For works that are stylistically influenced by Lovecraft, see Lovecraftian horror.

Contents

[edit] Prose and poetry

  • Discworld novels by Terry Pratchett- The Things From the Dungeon Dimensions are clear parodies of Lovecraftian monstrosities, often with names to match (Yob-Soddoth, Tshup Aklathep, Bel-Shamaroth, the Insider, etc.) In Moving Pictures, Lovecraft is quoted directly. The book of the Necrotelecomnicon (or Liber Paginarum Fulvarum - literally 'Book of yellow pages') is a direct parody of the Necronomicon, and also appears in Good Omens as well as Neil Gaiman's Sandman comic serial.
  • One of Neil Gaiman's collection of short stories, Smoke and Mirrors, features the parody "Shoggoth's Old Peculiar" about an American who accidentally stumbles across the sleepy British coast town of Innsmouth, whose inhabitants worship Cthulhu. The story includes a loving critique of Lovecraft's style of writing.
  • Smoke and Mirrors also features the story "Only the End of the World Again", where Lawrence Talbot (private investigator/werewolf) sets up shop in Innsmouth (in America this time) and discovers a plot to raise "the Elder Gods", also called "the Deep Ones". A "Church of Dagon" is also mentioned.
  • Mystery writer Theo Angevine makes reference to the Deep Ones and "Momma Hydra" in his novel, The Last Loan Shark of Bodega Bay (1982).
  • In The Witch Queen of Acheron, a Conan graphic novel, the Witch Queen and her cult attempt to summon Yog-Sothoth.
  • The British writer Colin Wilson drew heavily on the Cthulhu mythos in two of his early novels, The Mind Parasites (1967) and The Philosopher's Stone (1969), and also in a novella entitled "The Return of the Lloigor" which was published in August Derleth's anthology Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos (1969).
  • William Browning Spencer's novel Résumé With Monsters is about a man who believes the Outer God Azathoth is being summoned to earth through a bizarre cult ritual involving the mindless nature of clerical office jobs.
  • Charles Stross has written a number of works which mix the Cthulhu Mythos with both hacker culture and Len Deighton-style spy fiction. The first was the novelette A Colder War, published in Spectrum SF #3 and now available online. The novel The Atrocity Archive, and its follow-up novella The Concrete Jungle, take the same basic approach, though they are not set in the same universe as A Colder War.
  • The SubGenius mythos overlap heavily into the Cthulhu Mythos.
  • Minions of Cthulhu attempt to bring the Great Old One back in modern day Glasgow in The Midnight Eye Files: The Amulet (2005) by British author William Meikle ([2]).
  • The Buffy the Vampire Slayer spinoff novel, Night of the Living Re-Run, features Clark Ashton Smith' Mythos-tome The Book of Eibon.
  • The works of Thomas Ligotti often intersect with the Mythos, whether obliquely or subtly.
  • Brian Lumley added numerous Cthulhu Mythos-based short stories in collections such as Fruiting Bodies and other Fungi and the Titus Crow novels. There were also references to Lovecraft's short stories in his Necroscope series, mainly to "Dreams in the Witch House" and The Case of Charles Dexter Ward.
  • The name Abdul Al-Hazred comes up in John Bellairs' "The Lamp From the Warlock's Tomb," when Emerson Eells chastises his sister Myra for not thinking the lamp they are dealing with is magical. He rattles off a few magical lamps that were, including those of Aladdin and Alhazred.
  • Brad Strickland's juvenile mystery, "The Beast Under the Wizard's Bridge", is in many ways a reworking of Lovecraft's story "The Colour out of Space." Additionally, the deity Nyarlathotep appears in Strickland's Wrath of the Grinning Ghost.
  • In Christopher Moore's books, there is a recurring character named Howard Philips, who owns H.P.'s Cafe in Pine Cove, California. H.P. believes in a race of beings that came before man called the Old Ones, and believes his unusual menu will keep them away. The menu at H.P.'s includes Eggs Sothoth.
  • F. Paul Wilson has made passing references to the Mythos; the most explicit of these occurs in his novel The Keep, wherein a treasure trove of books is discovered with titles directly out of the Mythos, including the Book of Eibon and a copy of al-Azif (the Arabic original of the Necronomicon).
  • Mark Ellis writing as James Axler has featured elements of the Cthulhu Mythos in the Outlanders novel series. Ocajink, the villain of Shadow Scourge, is believed by the protagonists to be an Old One.
  • The book series A Song of Ice and Fire by George R. R. Martin describes a religion that worships a Cthulhu-like "Drowned God" held by the people of the Iron Islands. "That is not dead which can eternal lie." - Lovecraft Cthulhu quote. "What is dead can never die." - worship phrase for the Drowned God.
  • Many of Caitlin R. Kiernan's novels and short stories have incorporated thematic elements of Lovecraft's mythos, while avoiding pastiches. In particular, her novels Threshold (2001) and Low Red Moon (2003), and her short fiction collection, To Charles Fort, With Love (2005), have been cited as exhibiting Lovecraft's influence upon her work. Kiernan has made much use of Lovecraft's "ghouls" from "Pickman's Model", and references to "Mother Hydra" and "Father Kraken" are common. In To Charles Fort, With Love, the "Dandridge House" story cycle is particularly Lovecraftian in its emphasis of cosmic horrors waiting to invade this universe.
  • In the book Boży Bojownicy (The God's Warriors) by Andrzej Sapkowski, there's a short scene featuring a book called Liber de Nyarlathotep which accidentally turns a homunculus into a small pope, which then says "Beati immaculati, Cthulhu fthagn!"
  • The Daniel Pinkwater book Alan Mendelsohn, the Boy from Mars features a book written by professors from Miskatonic University.
  • In the book A Darkness Inbred by Victor Heck, an entity called "The Black Man" is discovered in an unearthed casket by a hill family who worships it as Christ's Second Coming. The being makes reference to Shub-Niggurath, and it uses the family to bring thousands of it's young into the world.

[edit] Stephen King

In his autobiography, horror writer Stephen King pays homage to Lovecraft and even quotes from several of his short stories (although he sharply criticizes Lovecraft's reclusive tendencies and writing style). King has cited Lovecraft as one of his primary influences. King's fiction contains numerous Lovecraftian references:


  • King places many stories in fictional towns of Derry, Castle Rock, and Jerusalem's Lot. He drew inspiration for this idea from Lovecraft's stories which are often set in the fictional towns of Innsmouth, Arkham, Dunwich, and Kingsport. Though King has never set a story in any of the Lovecraftian towns, he often references them in his work.
  • The novel It mentions that in the town of Derry in 1930, there lived "that old geezer who paints those funny pictures and drinks all night at Wally's--Pickman, I think his name is."
  • In Thinner, there was a pub called Ligur's; when this burned down, it was replaced with a clothing shop called The King in Yellow.
  • "Crouch End" is a short story set entirely in the Cthulhu Mythos, with numerous references to Lovecraftian monsters.
  • Also in King's short story "Jerusalem's Lot", the horrific worm which makes an appearance in the stories finale is referred to as the Servant of Yogsoggoth by the main character while he is possessed by an evil force.
  • In Kings short story "Gramma", George's aunt tells him to say "lay down and be still in the name of her father, Hastur"

[edit] Television

  • The Simpsons: At a meeting of the Springfield Republican Party, Mr. Burns announces that Bob Dole will now read from the Necronomicon. Dole proceeds to speak in a strange tongue.
  • Pani Poni Dash!: There are many references to Cthulu Mythos in the episode "Endure Patiently And You Will Not Wilt".
  • Justice League (IMDb entry): In the two- part episode called "The Terror Beyond", inserted the concept of the Great Old Ones into the Justice League series. In the episode the JLA must join forces with mystical Doctor Fate and villain Solomon Grundy to defeat the leader of the Great Old Ones, an extra-dimensional being named Ichthultu (a variant of Cthulhu, which couldn't be used for copyright reasons), which once posed as a god on Hawkgirl's home planet.
  • The Real Ghostbusters (IMDb entry): The episode The Collect Call of Cathulhu revolves around a cult attempting to revive Cthulhu. The episode made repeated references to various aspects of the Mythos, including Lovecraft himself, and the Derleth name, as well as the Necronomicon, which returned in the episode Russian About.
  • Kirby. One of the monsters that Kirby fights, and defeats, is a huge, bat-winged creature with tentacles writhing on it's face, which breaths green eldtritch fire at him. Kirby defeats the monsters by sucking the fire into his mouth, which transforms him into a miniature version of the monster. He is able to then use it's own power against it.
  • Digimon: Dragomon, a Cthulhu-shaped creature named after Dagon, makes a shadowed appearance in the thirteenth episode of the second season. Dragomon is the ruler of the Dark Ocean, and is worshipped by strange creatures that resemble Deep Ones. Also, in the third season, there are several Lovecraft references, such as Hypnos, Yuggoth, Shaggai, and a reference to Miskatonic University.
  • Garth Marenghi's Darkplace: In this comedy series about a horror writer aired in the UK on Channel 4, there are some vague references to Lovecraftian mythology, one episode being titled "The Creeping Moss From the Shores of Shuggoth".
  • Star Trek: The Original Series Episode #10 of the first season, "What Are Little Girls Made Of", features an ancient android built by the "Old Ones", whose tale parallels that of the Old Ones in H. P. Lovecraft's "At the Mountains of Madness". The episode is written by Robert Bloch, a friend of Lovecraft. Another Bloch episode, #7 of the second season, "Catspaw", features two characters named Korob and Sylvia who seemingly have magical powers who make repeated references to The Old Ones. When their true form is discovered, they are revealed to be tiny, tentacled creatures.
  • Night Gallery: In a segment titled Professor Peabody's Last Lecture, Professor Peabody Carl Reiner, leading a class in comparative religion, scoffs at the notion of "The Great Old Ones", and mockingly reads a passage from the Necronomicon. Ominous clouds and other portents gather during the reading, which cilminates in the Professor being transformed into a slimy tentacled being. Two students he addresses during class are "Mr Bloch" and "Mr. Lovecraft".
  • The backstory to Buffy the Vampire Slayer (and its spin-off Angel) is that before humanity, the world was ruled by the Old Ones. In the final season of Angel, the character of Fred is taken over by one named Illyria.
  • Futurama: The audio commentary for the episode A Bicyclops Built for Two reveals that one alien featured on screen is actually based on a creature from Lovecraft's short story "The Shadow Out of Time", presumably a Yithian.
  • In an episode of Quantum Leap, Sam leaps into the body of a horror writer whom Al (Dean Stockwell) quips is a "second-rate H.P. Lovecraft." Dean Stockwell played Wilbur Whateley in the 1970 movie adaptation The Dunwich Horror.
  • In an episode of the television show Metalocalypse, the band Dethklok summon a lake troll using a copy of the "Finnish Necronomicon".
  • In an episode of the television show The Venture Brothers, necromancer Dr. Orpheus swears to tell the truth on a book that looks like the Evil Dead necronomicon.
  • The entire background of Ultraman Tiga is Mythos-like, with ancient civilizations and super-ancient monsters. In the last TV episode, Tiga fights Gatanozoh-a (see Ghatanothoa), an "evil god" with an ammonite-like shell and tentacles. R'lyeh also appeared in the Tiga movie, The Final Odyssey.

[edit] Movies

Many other films have used Lovecraft's inventions, often greatly modified from his original versions; see Lovecraft's IMDB entry for a complete list of films crediting him.

[edit] Games

[edit] Role-playing games

  • Call of Cthulhu: A role-playing game based on the works of Lovecraft.
  • Dungeons and Dragons: The first two printings of the Deities & Demigods reference book included an entry for the Cthulhu Mythos. It was removed from the third (and all subsequent) printings to avoid infringing on the trademarks of rival game publisher Chaosium, and its Call of Cthulhu role-playing game. An authorized version was developed for the d20 system in 2001, though it is no longer supported by Wizards of the Coast. Numerous concepts and monsters in the game draw inspiration from the mythos, however, such as Illithids, Aboleths, Beholders, and the Far Realm.
  • GURPS: Various books make reference to the Cthulhu Mythos, most notably GURPS Cthulhupunk, a Call of Cthulhu/cyberpunk crossover, and GURPS Horror, which has a section designed for campaigns where the players must contend with "things man was not meant to know", a concept the author admits was taken from the Cthulhu Mythos.
  • Macho Women with Guns is a comedy role-playing game that parodies many subjects, including the Cthulhu Mythos. Its list of "critters" includes Bthulhu, Isaac Azathoth, and the Puppies of Tindalos.
  • Pokethulhu is a comedic parody roleplaying game which makes light of both the Lovecraft mythos and of Pokemon.

[edit] Card games

[edit] Video and computer games

  • Alone in the Dark: action-adventure game by Infogrames.
  • Angband: rogue-like game, many variants of which feature various creatures from the Cthulhu Mythos as enemies.
  • Anchorhead: a text-based game by Michael Gentry, featuring an Innsmouth-like town dominated by a demonic cult.
  • Atlach=Nacha: An H-game named after Atlach-Nacha, the Spider God creature from the Cthulhu Mythos.
  • Blood: Another FPS containing certain humorous references to the Cthulhu Mythos.
  • Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth: An FPS/Survival-Horror game based directly within Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos.
  • Castlevania series: In Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, a flying monster called "Ctulhu" can be found, with an appearance very similar to the Lovecraftian description (however, there was some mix up in the localized version as the Cthulu monster was for whatever reason called Malachi) The Necronomicon can be seen in both Castlevania 64 and Legacy of Darkness.
  • Demonbane: A super robot adventure game in which the Cthulhu Mythos plays a fairly large role. One of the heroines is Al Azif itself (powerful magic books have souls, personalities, and human forms in the game), and many characters are either from the Cthulhu Mythos (e.g., Nightgaunt, Dagon, Henry Armitage) or magicians who call upon the power of characters from the mythos (e.g., the Black Lodge member Claudius uses the power of Hastur). Several locations are also from the mythos (e.g., Arkham, Innsmouth, Miskatonic University). The main antagonist is Nyarlathotep.
  • Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem: The game is heavily inspired by the Cthulhu Mythos, in terms of plot ("Long before humanity graced the universe, our planet belonged to another species--an ancient species bound by neither phsyics nor nature, purpose nor ethic"), atmosphere, and the use of diminishing sanity (and its effects) as an integral part of the game. In addition, the character Edward Roivas holds several pieces of Lovecraft material in his library. One of the title's supporting characters is an inspector named Legrasse, an homage to "The Call of Cthulhu".
  • Final Fantasy Tactics: An item is called the N'Kai armlet.
  • Final Fantasy X-2: This sequel to Final Fantasy X contains several creatures that are from the Cthulhu Mythos, such as Shantaks, Gugs, and Hounds of Tindalos.
  • Marathon: A series of FPS games that make numerous Mythos references. [5]
  • Marvel Super Heroes by Capcom features Shuma-Gorath(see the comics section below), as does the Marvel vs. Capcom series.
  • Max Payne: The leader of the cult invokes the name of Cthulhu (among others) in his incantation to achieve immortality.
  • Myth: A series of RTS games whose lore has many parallels to Lovecraft's.
  • Persona series: A role-playing game by Atlus with a good amount of references. Hastur is the strongest Persona of the TOWER Tarot, while Nyarlathotep is the final antagonist of the game. Persona is a spin-off of the Shin Megami Tensei series, which also makes quite a few references.
  • Prisoner of Ice: The semi-sequel to Shadow of the Comet, this Infogrames adventure game set in the 1940s has a plot heavily influenced by At the Mountains of Madness, featuring a German base built atop the ancient ruins that were featured in that story.
  • Quake: A first person shooter inspired by the Lovecraftian universe, with the Shub-Niggurath entity as its final boss.
  • Quest for Glory 4: The plot revolves around the Cult of the Dark One (made up of tentacled humanoids) trying to awaken their master, Avoozl (a Cthulhu pastiche, in both name and appearance). There is also a tome bound in human flesh called the Necrophilicon that can be found in the basement of a monastery.
  • Shadow Hearts: References to the Cthulhu Mythos include the Tindalos, a magic defense spell called Elder Sign, and even, in the third game, Arkham University as a destination, where H.P. Lovecraft is a professor.
  • Shadow of the Comet: An adventure game from Infogrames that borrows heavily from "The Shadow Over Innsmouth".
  • Shin Megami Tensei: The second game in this series contains Cthulhu, Nyarlathotep, and the Old Ones as demons.
  • Tales of Phantasia: The Necronomicon is Klarth F. Lester's default weapon described as a forbidden book to summon the dead.
  • Tales of Symphonia: The Necronomicon is used by the secret boss Abyssion.
  • The Lurking Horror: A text adventure game from Infocom recalls "the ghastly visions of H.P. Lovecraft and Stephen King".
  • Thief: The Dark Project: On the level entitled The Lost City, towards the end, there can be found a giant statue of Cthulhu partly sunken in lava. When the statue is approached, the character Garret whispers "Creepy..."
  • Tribe 8: Roleplaying game. Horrors of the Z'Bri sourcebook (ISBN 1-896776-57-4) mentions Tct'lu the Ancient who is "slumbering beneath the water, [his] dreams winding into the thoughts of Skkr."
  • Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines: When travelling through the sewers in Hollywood, journals are found with words and phrases clearly echoing Lovecraft's works. The dates of these journal entries are also related to the period in which Lovecraft wrote.
  • Wild Arms 3: There is an item called the Necronomicon which can increase magic power up to 400%. There's also an enemy called "Crawling Chaos", one of Nyarlathotep's epithets.
  • World of Warcraft: A quest in the game is entitled "Into the Mouth of Madness", a reference to the movie In the Mouth of Madness, which is considered a pastiche of Lovecraft's work; its title being an obvious homage to Lovecraft's "At the Mountains of Madness". In addition, there is a quest called "The Star, the Hand and the Heart", which has you fighting murlocs, a race of primitive fish-men, so that you can summon and kill the sea giant, Dagun, which they worship. There are also Old Gods referenced numerous times in World of Warcraft lore, and the dead, octopus-like remains of one can be found in Darkshore; the recently announced Old God who lives beneath the sands of Silithus is named C'thun, undoubtedly a reference to Cthulhu. Additionally, the area of Westfall contains a Sentinel Hill and in the rogue quarters of Undercity there are three trainers whose surnames are "Charles", "Dexter" and "Ward".
  • X-COM: Terror from the Deep: Unlike its predecessor X-COM: UFO Defense, which drew inspiration from popular UFO lore, this computer strategy game was based very heavily on the Cthulhu Mythos. The adversaries encountered during the game included Deep Ones (although they appear different from their original description) and Lobstermen (the latter being comparable to Lovecraft's Mi-go), and the ultimate objective was to prevent the "Great Dreamer" (a Cthulhu-like alien being) from waking from his slumber within the undersea city of T'leth (a probable reference to the city of R'lyeh). The Tentaculat's description contains the phrase: "not even the depths of a Lovecraftian nightmare would spawn...".
  • Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion: The "Enemy" many characters refer to is a creature from another dimension called "Mehrunes Dagon," the last name of which is a reference to one of the other Old Ones most notably from "Shadow Over Innsmouth." It also includes one quest entitled "Shadow over Hackdirt" which involves saving a captured argonian from being sacrificed to "The Deep Ones".

[edit] Comics

  • During the 1970s the Skywald published comics Psycho, Nightmare and Scream frequently featured stories and strips by "Archaic" Alan Hewetson that purported to document "the Cthulu Mythos".
  • In Batman, some of Batman's foes are sent to Arkham Asylum, a prison for the criminally insane whose name alludes to Lovecraft's town of Arkham. The three-part Elseworlds story The Doom That Came To Gotham, by Mike Mignola, features Bruce Wayne and Green Arrow battling a conpiracy to bring an ancient Lovecraftian evil to Earth in Gotham, and recasts many Batman characters and villains in terms of the mythos.
  • Hellboy by Mike Mignola is a demon summoned from another dimension which it is hinted (especially in the film of the comic) contains Mythos-like entities as well as more traditional demons. Abe Sapien, another character in the comic, is a "fishman" who, while clearly not a Deep One, has encountered beings like them on at least one occasion.
  • Caballistics, Inc. by Gordon Rennie draws on a combination of the Cthulhu Mythos with ancient Hebrew and British mythological entities. Rennie often makes use of Lovecraftian themes and even includes Lovecraft as a character in Necronauts.
  • The Courtyard, by Alan Moore, was a tale of Mythos horror set in the near future, and made numerous references to Lovecraft's work. Before being published in its own volume The Courtyard was scheduled to appear in the volume Yuggoth Cultures and Other Growths and the comic book adaptor, Antony Johnston, separately released Yuggoth Creatures [6]
  • The Marvel Comics character Shuma-Gorath appears to be inspired by Cyäegha, but was actually created first. Shuma-Gorath also appears in many games in the Marvel vs. Capcom series. Another Marvel Comics character named Sligguth, subordinate to Shuma-Gorath, appears to be modeled on Yig. The town where the two are worshipped is Starksboro, New Hampshire, and its inhabitants share the Starksboro look, much like those of Innsmouth have the Innsmouth look. There are also many references to the Cthulhu Mythos in Marvel's Dr. Strange, with occasional appearances by the Necronomicon (usually shown on a bookshelf in the background). Uncanny X-Men #148-150 features Magneto living on what appears to be the island of R'lyeh.
  • 2000 AD comic "Zenith", written by Grant Morrison and drawn by Steve Yeowell, features a Lovecraftian pantheon of ancient, evil god-like entities called the Lloigor (a name originally coined by August Derleth), living in a different dimension. These entities can be summoned to our universe through dark rituals to inhabit the body of a superhero, as ordinary mortals are too fragile. The storyline of the comic involves certain deviations from history as we know it, such as Adolf Hitler being a member of a Lloigor-worshipping cult, and as a result, Nazi Germany being created - along with German "übermensch" Masterman; a superhero created with genetic engineering and inhabited by a Lloigor entity. See also the 2000 AD series Finn.
  • In the 25th anniversary issue of Nodwick, the main characters made a number of Lovecraftian references, including finding the Necronomicron, referencing worshipers of "K'Sulu," while standing outside of a building named "Misscatatonic University".
  • Little Cthulhu (Μικρός Κθούλου) is a humorous Greek strip comic by George Tsoukis, also known as Trashman. Little Cthulhu is a sad, unlucky, unhappy little monster-boy, with tentacles, claws and a devilish tail, who is tortured by his parents, friends, teachers and the whole of society for being different. He dies of flu in the end.
  • A comic entitled Lovecraft, based on a screenplay by Hans Rodionoff that never made it to film, features scenes from Lovecraft's childhood and youth mixed up with various elements of the Cthulhu Mythos.
  • The independent comic publisher Boom Studios recently created a book titled Cthulhu Tales, which is an anthology of short stories inspired by Lovecraft's writing. They range from the serious to the humorous, and also cover other subjects such as The King in Yellow. Only one issue has been printed, but the series is supposed to be continued.
  • In the Planetary comic series written by Warren Ellis, an unnamed H.P. Lovecraft appears as a character in a one-shot crossover book entitled Planetary/Authority: Ruling The World. Lovecraft was portrayed as a comically foolish racist, who believed that the alien pods he discovered were "Negro eggs" and tried to destroy them with a shotgun.
  • The comic The Super Scary Monster Show featuring Little Gloomy (which appears in the Disney Adventures publication, as well as a stand-alone comic) features a character named Carl Cthulhu, whose family includes other Mythos-inspired characters such as his parents Yog Sogoth and C'ullagah, as well as his sister Carla and a barely-audible Grandmother.

[edit] Webcomics

  • In the now-defunct Ghastly's Ghastly Comic, 'Lil Cthuy is a recurring character summoned by FNANP. His parents assume that FNANP is there to babysit him for a couple of eons.
  • Another webcomic, Legostar Galactica, featured a cameo of Cthulhu in which Cthulhu had to bring his nephew (the ship's cook) back from the dead.
  • The User Friendly webcomic features Cthulhu and Hastur as recurring characters.
  • The webcomic Something Positive has made repeated references to Lovecraft and the Cthulhu Mythos. In 2002, it had a plot arc in which Aubrey and Peejee filmed "My Neighbor Cthulhu", with Jason as Cthulhu.
  • In a storyline of the webcomic Orneryboy, the title character takes out the Necronomicon from his desk and later uses it to cure himself back into a human from a zombie form.
  • In Nothing Nice to Say, Chtulu apparently lives in the main characters' closet. He was eventually turned into a cat (to make the strip more family-friendly) during a story arc in which the strip became syndicated.
  • In the webcomic Penny Arcade, Cthulhu appears once on a park bench, doing a crossword and wearing a bucket hat, explaining his computer game side project. He also appears in a faux children's Christmas story called "The Last Christmas."
  • The webcomic Fuzzy Knights at times employs a Cthulhu plushie who speaks in an odd language.
  • The (now ended) webcomic The Call of Whatever directly parodies the Cthulhu Mythos, and takes place primarily in the towns of Arkham and R'lyeh.
  • The webcomic "Oh my gods" has Cthulhu as a recurring character. He speaks in a fictional and illegible font, though the protagonists appear to understand him.
  • In the webcomic Jack, there are Cthulhu-like creatures called "Clithu Elder Gods" living in Hell, who tentacle rape people there.
  • 8-Bit Theater named several comic strips after the titles used in Lovecraft's work.

[edit] Music

  • Aarni is a Finnish doom metal band. Several Aarni songs refer to the Cthulhu Mythos, including "Ubbo-Sathla", "Reaching Azathoth", "The Black Keyes (of R'lyeh)" and "Persona Mortuae Cutis".
  • Bal-Sagoth frequently show a Lovecraft influence in their lyrics; for example, the song "In Search of the Lost Cities of Antarctica" is based heavily upon At the Mountains of Madness, while Cthulhu actually is mentioned in the song "The Dreamer in the Catacombs of Ur".
  • Beatallica is a heavy metal parody band combining elements of the Beatles and Metallica. Their song "The Thing That Should Not Let It Be" combines "The Thing That Should Not Be" and "Let it Be".
  • Cradle of Filth is a British heavy metal band with a song called "Cthulhu Dawn". Their "greatest hits" record was entitled Lovecraft and Witch Hearts. They have employed Lovecraftian artist John Coulthart to design and illustrate their records.
  • The Darkest of the Hillside Thickets is a Vancouver-based band whose music draws heavily on Lovecraft's work, though with tongue planted firmly in cheek. Their name comes from the story "The Tomb". Album titles include Cthulhu Strikes Back and The Great Old Ones, and among their songs are "Shoggoths Away", "The Innsmouth Look", "Goin' Down to Dunwich", and "The Sounds of Tindalos".
  • Drakkar, a heavy metal band, recorded "The Walls Of Olathoë" (q.v.), about the city mentioned in Lovecraft's story "Polaris", for their 1998 album Quest For Glory.
  • Drunk Horse, a band from Oakland, California, has a song entitled "Howard Phillips" on its fourth record, In Tongues. The lyrics for the song are an abbreviated version of Lovecraft's poem "Nemesis."
  • Insignium, a German black metal band, feature the songs "Vulva Stellaris" and "In Die Abgründe" ("Into the Abyss"), which are directly inspired by Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos, on their 2005 album In Die Abgründe.
  • Mekong Delta is a German thrash band who created an album is entitled The Music of Erich Zann (1988) based on the story of the same name, with five songs directly related to that story: "Age of Agony", "Confessions of Madness", "The Prophecy", "The Final Deluge" and "Epilogue". The track "I King Will Come" refers to Cthulhu.
  • The Norwegian black metal band Immortal have recorded several songs in which they use the words "At the mountains of madness," in songs such as "Cold Winds of Funeral Dust" from the album Diabolical Fullmoon Mysticism and "In My Kingdom Cold" from the album Sons of Northern Darkness.
  • The German power metal band Rage has several songs dealing with the Cthulhu Mythos, involving a being that hunted the creatures called "Soundchasers". In addition to several songs having generic Mythos references, they have 2 songs directly based on Lovecraft's story The Shadow Out of Time, those songs being "Shadow Out of Time" and "In a Nameless Time", both from their 1995 album Black in Mind.
  • Rudimentary Peni is a punk/death rock band, often associated with Crass. Vocalist/lyricist Nick Blinko wrote a concept album, Cacophony, including "The Lovecrafts Were Quarreling", "Lovecraft Baby", "Necronomical Secular and Spiritual", and "Arkham Hearse" based on L. Sprague de Camp's biography of Lovecraft, quoting extensively from the works of Lovecraft and from writers about him.
  • Swollen Members, a hip-hop group, mentions both Lovecraft and the Necronomicon in their song "Battle Axe Axperiment," which can be found on their first album Balance.
  • Thergothon, a Finnish doom metal band, recorded a demo entitled "Fhtagn-nagh Yog-Sothoth". Their full-length "Stream from the Heavens" also contains references to Lovecraft's writings.
  • Therion is a symphonic metal band who have a few songs directly based on the mythos, such as "Cthulhu" on their album Beyond Sanctorum and more recently "The Call of Dagon" on the album Sirius B.
  • Tri-Cornered Tent Show is a music band. They classify their music as "Urban electro acoustic folk improv", inspired by the Lovecraft story "The Music of Erich Zann". Lovecraft's works feature heavily in their songs, which include "Dagon Rising", "The Plains of Leng", and "Waltz of the Shogoths". One album is titled Beneath the Mountains of Madness.
  • A band called Twin Obscenity is named after the Great Old One Zhar, the Twin Obscenity, who dwells in a dead city buried under the Plateau of Sung.
  • The English Manchester based rock band The Fall have made several references to Lovecraft's work over their long career. Early 1978 album Dragnet features several songs with the author's themes; "Spectre Versus Rector" mentions Yog-Shogoth, "Flat of Angles" appears to reference The Dreams in the Witch House, while "A Figure Walks" describes the more general sense of forboding described in many of Lovecraft's works. Later song "Squid Law" from 1989 finds singer Mark E Smith appearing to (humorously) invoke the wrath of Cthulu to destroy his enemies. In the still later song "Last Commands of Xylarothep via MES" from 2003 Mark E Smith once again seems to be casting himself in the role of a Lovecraftian god figure to deliberately bombastic and humorous effect. Smith also featured a track on his solo album Post Nearly Man called "The Horror in Clay", based on The Call of Cthulu.
  • Electric Wizard have numerous Lovecraftiana tracks, such as "Weird Tales", "The Sun Has Turned to Black" and "Supercoven".
  • British Black Industrial band The Axis of Perdition have large amounts of Cthulu Mythos influences in their music. The band says they are more influenced by British Mythos author Ramsey Campbell than by Lovecraft himself.
  • Doom band Moss' latest album, Cthonic Rites, features a rendering of Cthulhu on the cover.
  • John Zorn's 2006 release is titled "Electric Masada: At the Mountains of Madness".
  • The cover of Iron Maiden's Live After Death features a slight variation of the famous quotation from the Necronomicon: "That is not dead/which can eternal lie/yet with strange aeons/even death may die."
  • American death metal band Nile have recorded several tracks based on the Cthulhu Mythos. The track "Von Unassusprechlichen Kulten" on their 2005 album Annihilation of the Wicked refers to a fictional book relating to the Mythos created by Robert E. Howard. The band's 2000 album Black Seeds of Vengeance contains the track "The Nameless City of the Accursed" and the instrumental track "In Their Darkened Shrines", from the album of the same name, is also inspired by "The Nameless City". The title of their 1998 album Amongst the Catacombs of Nephren-Ka is a direct quote from the final paragraph of Lovecraft's story "The Outsider".
  • The American Funeral Doom band Catacombs has an album titled In the Depths of R'Lyeh, with lyrics based on the Cthulhu mythology.
  • Explicitly Lovecraftian (H. P. Lovecraft is, in fact, listed as a member), Pittsburgh-based band Nyarlathotep, the Crawling Chaos has released two EPs of music inspired by Caitlin R. Kiernan's Mythos-inspired novels Threshold and The Dry Salvages, and are preparing to re-release their first album, Iä! (originally on Optikon Rekords). Many of their individual tracks are "soundtrack" pieces to various stories by H. P. Lovecraft.
  • American Shock-Rock metal band GWAR's frontman Oderus Urungus makes claim of an appendage named the Cuttlefish of Cthulhu.
  • Blue Öyster Cult has a long-running theme, dating back to their first albums, called the Imaginos saga, which is heavily inspired by Lovecraft's work, however, there are no direct references to the Cthulhu Mythos.
  • An Australian blues rock band from the 1970s called Blackfeather released an album entitled At the Mountains of Madness.
  • A band called Nox Arcana released a CD entitled Necronomicon, and many of the songs take text directly from Lovecraft's work. It is also a popular choice for background music for the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game.
  • Death metal band Yyrkoon's album, Unhealthy Opera, contains various references to Lovecraft's works and the Cthulhu Mythos.
  • Death metal band Morbid Angel's albums are often riddled with Lovecraftian references. The track "Ancient Ones" from their album Blessed Are The Sick is based solely on the Cthulhu Mythos.
  • Swedish death metal band Gates of Ishtar based their song "The Dreaming Glade" from their debut album "A bloodread path" on H.P Lovecrafts Dreamlands chronicles mixed up with some miscelaneous cthulhuiana.

[edit] Individual gods

[edit] Abhoth

[edit] Other media

  • Yog Sothoth is referred to in an episode of The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy entitled "Big Trouble in Billy's Basement" in which Billy sneaks a peek at one of Grim's books of dark magic and ends up becoming a minion of "Yog-Sovoth". He then tries to summon "his master".
  • In one episode of The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy billy looks in grim's trunk and finds a phone and decided to make prank phone calls with it. As it turns out, he is acctually summoning Cthulu himself.
  • In the 2000 AD comic series Zenith, "Iok Sotot" is the name of the main Lloigor, Lovecraft-inspired extradimensional beings that are the primary antagonists.
  • Though rarely encountered, in the THQ game Dawn of War:Winter Assault, clicking on an Ork butcha boy squad will result in them answering "Yog-Sothoth", much like other times in which they will instead answer "Whatchu want?"
  • In the TCG Hecatomb, Yog-Sothoth is featured as God in the set Last Hallow's Eve and is given the title The Key to the Gate.
  • The authors of the webcomic Penny Arcade are collaborating with Hot Head Games to create their first video game, the first episode of which is titled "On the Rain-slick Precipice of Darkness," and which will draw from the Cthulhu Mythos. The game is described as a "comic adventure." It will have some elements remniscient of RPG and adventure games. It is not clear how much of the game will include elements of Lovecraftian lore, though the games creator's are quoted as saying on their website, "I’ll leave you with three words: Tycho, Gabe, Lovecraft."

[edit] Miscellaneous

  • There is an internet newsgroup known as alt.sex.cthulhu - which was apparently started to parody spam in the alt.sex hierarchy.
  • There are student organizations on several US college campuses called Campus Crusade for Cthulhu, parodying the Campus Crusade for Christ and other "campus crusade" organizations. "It found me" was a popular slogan of such organizations, reversing the Campus Crusade for Christ's "I found it."
  • The Uncyclopedia has a parody help column called Ask Cthulhu.

[edit] Book of Eibon

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

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