A magic notebook can create anything, including Cthulhu and Shoggoths.
These are works that have made a Shout-Out to Cthulhu Mythos in some form or another.
General Shout-Outs
Anime & Manga- A Certain Magical Index: The Cthulhu Mythos was originally just a normal fictional universe, until some magicians for some reason created spells designed to bring the events and beings in the Mythos to life. The Amakusa sidestory has a group stealing the Necronomicon and attempting to use these spells for their own ends.
- Digimon:
- Digimon Adventure 02 had the episode "The Call of Dagomon"/"His Master's Voice", a homage to Lovecraft's "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" featuring expies of Deep Ones and a Cthulhu Expy called Dagomon. The episode was written by Chiaki Konaka.
- Episode 64 of Digimon Ghost Game, "The Call", is a Shout-Out to the original Adventure 02 adaptation. However, the Dagomon in Ghost Game is capable of affecting an entire city rather than just a single person, and whatever's left ambiguous in the original is made as explicit as possible for the sake of horror (such as people outright turning into Deep Ones).
- Digimon Tamers (also written by Konaka) references Hypnos, Yuggoth, Shaggai, and Miskatonic University. The D-Reaper also resembles a Lovecraftian abomination trying to wipe out humanity.
- Digimon Adventure 02 had the episode "The Call of Dagomon"/"His Master's Voice", a homage to Lovecraft's "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" featuring expies of Deep Ones and a Cthulhu Expy called Dagomon. The episode was written by Chiaki Konaka.
- Nyaruko: Crawling with Love!: Mahiro is a fan of the Cthulhu Mythos stories, so when Nyarlathotep, Cthugha, and Hastur appear in human form and start hitting on him, he resists, thinking he'll be driven insane and not realizing the books are inaccurate and these creatures are genuinely nice.
- Soul Eater has the "Book of Eibon".
Comic Books
- IDW Publishing had a Crisis Crossover, Infestation 2, where the Elder Gods, who were downright influencing Lovecraft from beyond the universe, find a way into some of the publisher's comics like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (IDW) and Transformers.
- Robin: Tim comes across an Eldritch Abomination flitting from one Town with a Dark Secret to another in the Appalachian Mountains.
- Zenith: The extradimensional villains are explicitly identified as Lloigor.
Fan Works
- Plan 7 of 9 from Outer Space
- Doctor Zarkendorf claims to have "conducted the archeological evacuation of a paleogean cycle of invertebrate evolution utterly beyond our powers of speculation", causing Proton to suggest that he throw away his thesaurus.
- While in Antarctica the optical distortions of the fata morgana makes mountain ranges look higher than the Himalayas, with strange cube-like buildings clinging to their peaks. Gneelicks also mentions they had to replace their pilot as "he was dragged off screaming 'Tekeli-li! Tekeli-li!' which I assume is some sort of political slogan."
- Proton contacts an Underwater City and asks to speak to whoever's in charge down there."Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu Rl'yeh wgah'nagl fhtagn," came the reply.
"Zey says ee's 'aving a snooze. Ees eet eemportant?"
- The Palaververse: Sunken Dunwhick
is confirmed by Word of God to be a reference to the town of Dunwich. - It's Always The Quiet Ones: Luna is apparently a descendant of the Deep Ones on her mother's side of the family, and knows a spell that invites Cthulhu to come visit. She uses it, in the Great Hall at dinner.
Film — Animation
- In Turning Red, Priya says "Thank Cthulhu" in relief at one point.
Literature
- Diogenes Club:
- "The Case of the French Spy" features a Fish Person, who speaks an unknown language of which the only word the narrator passes on is "f'tagn" (which the protagonist assumes from context to be a swearword). One character, listing famous mythical underwater cities the Fish Person might have come from, mentions R'lyeh.
- In "The Gypsies in the Wood", Charles Beauregard (an occult investigator for the Club) mentions owning a copy of De Vermiis Mysteris "illustrated with brass-rubbings that would curl your hair".
- The Doctor Who Expanded Universe has an odd tendency to reveal the main show's native Eldritch Abominations as "actually" Mythos figures. In particular, Fenric has been claimed to be Hastur, the Great Intelligence to be Yog-Sothoth, and the Animus from "The Web Planet" to be a Lloigor.
- Wayne Barlowe: Barlowes Guide To Extraterrestrials includes an entry on the Elder Things, while Barlowes Guide To Fantasy includes one on the Gugs.
- Dresden Files: In Peace Talks: The cornerhounds are creatures created by Frank Belknap Long called the The Hounds of Tindalos. They're attributed to H. P. Lovecraft by Harry, though (Lovecraft did mention the Hounds in The Whisperer in Darkness, however).
Live-Action TV
- Ultraman Tiga: The Big Bad is Ghatanothoa. There's also Zoigar, a monster based on the Lloigor.
Music
- Metallica has four songs inspired by the mythos, one of which is titled "The Call of Ktulu".
Tabletop Games
- Pathfinder makes very extensive use material from the Mythos. The Great Old Ones and Outer Gods are present as pantheons of demigods and true deities, respectively, with a major role in the setting's cosmology — Nyarlathotep, in particular, has historically had a great deal of influence in the history of Osirion — while the Dreamlands sit in the middle of the Dimension of Dreams and connect to the plateau of Leng. Creatures such as Denizens of Leng, Leng ghouls, gugs and shantaks are also statted out as regular creatures that can be encountered in most settings.
Video Games
- After the End: A Post-Apocalyptic America has the Occultists, a pagan religion primarily situated in post-apocalyptic New England, and featuring numerous deities and symbols found within the Mythos. Both versions of the Elder Sign show up as the religion's symbol (a "branch" of some sort) and the icon for a trait associated with the religion (the distorted star).
- Assassin's Creed Syndicate has a weapon called "Great Old One's Caress", and its description reads as following:The knuckles's description reads that they "were hupadgh n'gha ng n'ghft" and are shaped like a tentacle that curls over the hand.
- Chaos On Deponia: McThulu is the owner of a fast food restaurant in the Floating Black Market.
- Civilization: Beyond Earth: In the description of the Abyssal Mirror wonder, it mentions this giant and innovative underwater signal magnifier got its name when a test was performed that aimed it toward deep space, instead of planet orbit. After filtering out the background noise from distant spacecraft, satellites, and cosmic static, an unknown (yet steady) flute-like "monotonous piping" was received.
- Darkest Dungeon: The intro cinematic shows the Cthulhu statuette or fresco for a brief moment. The DLC "The Color of Madness" is a Whole-Plot Reference to The Colour Out Of Space, featuring a farmstead mutated by a Color pouring from a comet that crashlanded there.
- Dark Devotion has the Eibon Book, a spell book dropped by the Ritualist.
- Fate/Grand Order:
- It's that the Cthulhu Mythos was supposedly just a fictional universe; however, Demon God Raum sought to break the barrier between reality and fiction to bring forth a god capable of achieving the salvation of humanity, and so enacted a complicated scheme in a singularity set in Salem to call forth an Outer God. While Chaldea did succeed in killing him and stopping his plan, he did succeed in calling forth one using Abigail Williams as a vessel called "Sut-Typhon" (who is all but outright stated to just be another name for Yog-Sothoth). Abigail was later revealed to retain these powers and ended up joining with "Randolph Carter", who is heavily implied to be Lovecraft himself, and became the franchise's first Foreigner class Servant.
- Later events reveal that that the Mythos wasn't so much "fictional" as Lovecraft interpreting the true beings in question through his dreams and stories, as they are very much real, but utterly alien and not even native to the Nasuverse. And the previously mentioned events? They successfully attracted the Outer Gods' attention to said reality and have made several more interested in actually coming over. Luckily, for every Outer God willing to team up with another to get their invasion plan going, there's another one willing to screw them over for their own selfish gain.
- Miskatonic Mysteries is a Game Mod for Minecraft that focuses on bringing numerous elements of the Cthulhu Mythos to Minecraft, including eldritch magic, creatures like the Dark Young and the Mi-Go, and the summoning of the Great Old Ones (or fragments of them, at any rate).
- Piratez: Quite prevalent, with the Deep Ones being the most glaring example.
- Scribblenauts: Maxwell has the ability to summon anything by just writing the name on his magical notepad, this includes Cthulhu and Shoggoth; "Lovecraftian" is an item that can be summoned and turns its wielder to look like a Lovecraftian monster.
- Shin Megami Tensei:
- Nyarlathotep and Cthulhu are standard demons that you can fight against and summon in a number of games.
- The plot of Persona and Persona 2 is pretty much Nyarlathotep screwing with the player characters and the world in general.
- In P1, Nyarly is the Persona of the Disc-One Final Boss, and you fight Yog-Sothoth earlier in the game. Nyarlathotep is also available as a Persona.
- The P2 duology takes up this plot and makes Nyarlathotep the Big Bad and Final Boss for both games. Especially prominent in Eternal Punishment; you can summon Hastur as a Persona — with the card needed to summon him called The King in Yellow — and the PSP remake adds boss fights against entities such as Cthulhu, Byakhee, and Shub-Niggurath. There's even a visit to the Dreamlands, references to the cult of Cthulhu, and an appearance from a member of the talking cat tribe that opposes the abominations.
- The Updated Re-release of Persona 5 (called Royal) brings back the old theme, with fights against entities like Hastur, and the new villain using Azathoth as a Persona.
- Smite: Ah-Muzen-Cab has a costume called the Dark Whisperer that makes him resemble Cthulhu. The Great Dreamer himself was later added as a playable character.
- Terraria: The Eye and Brain of Cthulhu appear. The game also features the Moon Lord, a creature greatly resembling Cthulhu himself.
- Tokyo Afterschool Summoners has transients that originate from the world of the Old Ones. They include, Nyarlathotep, Tsathoggua, Azathoth, and Cthugha, with Yog-Sothoth being an Exception in the story.
- World of Warcraft has entire sections of lore based on the Elder Gods, Eldritch Abominations straight out of Lovecraft, such as C'Thun and Yogg-Saron. The Murlocs are also a clear Expy of the Deep Ones.
Webcomics
- Freefall: Lovecraftian Eldritch Abominations are invoked when Sam starts to explain the correct way to steal; Qwerty observes, "The tentacled horror from beyond my stars spoke, and von Neumann help me, in my madness I understood its words.◊" (Sam, annoyed, says he's giving them a sustainable business model.)
Web Original
- SCP Foundation: SCP-2662, AKA Cthulhu is a large, tentacled humanoid creature that causes cults to spontaneously form from people around it. The cults have a tendency to treat 2662 as a chaotic deity that must constantly be appeased through violent, sexual, and profane rituals. Ironically, 2662 displays the mentality of a typical teenager, and responds to rituals with shock and horror.
Web Video
- The Nostalgia Critic: The Nostalgia Critic S 6 E 19: At 2:15:Rita Repulsa: It doesn't matter if people love Cthulhu.
- VG Myths: The Necronomicon is mentioned in an image from "How Many Shines Can You Get In Bowser's Fury Without Jumping?".
- Dark Dungeons (a parody/adaptation of one of the more infamous Chick Tracts) has the main villains attempting to summon Cthulhu himself.
Western Animation
- Justice League: The league fights "Ichthulhu" and its hordes in one installment. The writers later said they weren't aware that Cthulhu is public domain, othertwise they would have just used him.
- Rick and Morty: Part of the intro sequence shows the flying saucer careening through R'lyeh. As the camera Zooms into the cockpit, we see that Summer has a Star Spawn in her arms, and Cthulhu himself is chasing the vehicle.
- Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated had a couple of episodes featuring one H.P. Hatecraft, and his novel The Shrieking Madness of Char Gar Gothakon: The Beast That Hath No Name. Adding more fun is that Hatecraft is voiced by Jeffrey Combs, who appeared in numerous Mythos film adaptions including one where he played Lovecraft. In the final episode, the gang go on a road trip to see Harlan Ellison, who's taken up a teaching post at Miskatonic University.
- The Simpsons: In "Halloween of Horror", Cthulhu is one of the monsters seen in the background at Krustyland.
- The Venture Bros.: An unnamed monster that looks exactly like Cthulhu and came out of a portal to hell appears at the start of "The Better Man" before being destroyed by the Outrider.
References to the Necronomicon
The iconic book is one of the more common shout outs made to the mythos, and has spawned a number of imitators.Anime & Manga
- Fate/Zero: Caster Gilles de Rais possesses Prelati's Spellbook: Tome of the Sunken Spiraled City, which is Necronomicon. In the anime, he uses it to summon various Eldritch Abomination. He also keeps it in Fate/Grand Order, and thanks to its contents he knows a lot about the Mythos-like entities that start showing up.
- Touhou Suzunaan ~ Forbidden Scrollery: The Necronomicon makes a cameo in the first chapter. It's claimed that it the original manuscript of the kanji edition but at the same time the language is unknown.
Comic Books
- Daredevil: In Daredevil (2019), the book that gives instructions on how to use the Norn Stone is called the Necronordic.
Film — Live-Action
- Evil Dead: Many of the problems in the films are due to the Necronomicron ex Mortis (though in the first film it was named "Naturom Demonto").
Literature
- Discworld: Several novels refer to an extremely dangerous and near-sentient magic book for contacting paranormal entities called the Necrotelecomnicon or Liber Paginarum Fulvarumnote .
Music
- Necronomidol is an idol band (see what they did there?) named after the book that makes lots of Lovecraft references in its lyrics and general imagery.
Tabletop Games
- Fabula Ultima: The Necronomicon is one of the game's rare arcane weapons. It's a book which must be wielded in two hands in order to whack people, inflicting dark damage to whatever it hits. And if you're a spellcaster, it makes any offensive spell you cast inflict the Shaken status effect to its targets.
Video Games
- Crusader Kings II: In the Way of Life DLC, you can find and attempt to decipher the Necronomicon if you choose the scholarship focus (although you may Go Mad from the Revelation).
- Golden Sun: In the Japanese version of Golden Sun: The Lost Age, the book is an equipable item, changing the user's class and granting them the ability to summon monsters. In America, the book was renamed to Tomegathericon, but still retained the same aspects.
- Shin Megami Tensei:
- In Digital Devil Saga, Al-Azif is a collectible item that spams the Mamudo spell.
- In Persona 5, Futaba's Persona is the Necronomicon. In the Updated Re-release, it upgrades to the Al-Azif.
- Tales of Phantasia: The Necronomicon is but one of many Mythos tomes that is Claus' weapon.
- Tokyo Afterschool Summoners: Shiro Motoori is granted the Necronomicon from the App as his Sacred Artifact and is able to summon small demons to battle, locate others, or perform other helpful tasks.
Visual Art
- H. R. Giger has a collection of his works titled after the ancient tome.
Web Animation
- RWBY Chibi: In the "Books Fix Everything" segment of Season 3 Episode 7, Ruby ends up finding the Necronomicon, with it having the subtitle of "Open at Your Own Peril". Professor Oobleck urges her not to open it, but she does anyway, causing it to release hundreds of evil spirits, before the book falls to the floor and crawls away on its own.
Webcomics
- MegaTokyo features the Necrowombicon, a parody of the Mythos book.
- Penny Arcade features the Necrowombicon, a parody of the Mythos book.
Western Animation
- The Simpsons: Apparently, the Republican Party of Springfield has a copy of the Necronomicon.
