Referenced By / The Metamorphosis

Anime And Manga

• Dragon Ball Z: Gregory is an anthropomorphic cricket named after the protagonist.
• Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei: The Metamorphosis is Fuura Kafuka's favorite story. There is a reason she is called Fuura Kafuka. Kafuka was Dead All Along, and the girls (and one guy) who received her organs-and subsequently became her Hive Mind-felt it impersonal that they did not know her name, so named her after the author of her favorite story. Also note that while she does not become a bug, it is easy to suggest that Kafuka possessing the others is a kind of metamorphosis...

One morning, when Kafuka Fuura woke up, she had become...

Comic Books

• The Simpsons: One Treehouse of Horror story is a retelling of The Metamorphosis, with Homer in the role of Gregor.

Comic Strips

• FoxTrot had one arc in which Jason, the youngest son of the family, wakes up as a girl. Since he is not fond of girls and would rather be an insect, he does not take it well at all. The arc is meant as a reference to The Metamorphosis, which is openly discussed at one point.

Franchises

• Kamen Rider: The iconic "Henshin!" catchphrase almost all Kamen Riders use is said to have come from the Japanese translation of the novel's title; Toru Hirayama, a producer of the 1971 series, suggested it as it fits with Kamen Rider's core premise of a man morphing into an insectoid superhero.

Films - Animated

• Flushed Away: In one scene, a cockroach is seen reading a copy of La Metamorphosis.

Films - Live Action

• The Producers: There is a scene of Max, trying to find the worst play ever written, reads the first line of an adaptation of The Metamorphosis, considers it for a moment, then decides it is "too good" (read: not bad enough) and tosses it aside.
• Also by Mel Brooks, in Spaceballs once it's announced Spaceball-1 will undergo metamorphosis, Dark Helmet adds "Ready, Kafka?"

Literature

• Samsa In Love by Haruki Murakami is a Fix Fic in which Gregor transforms back into a human, with no memory of his experiences as a giant bug, and bonds with a hunchback woman while readjusting to the human world.
• In Boot Camp, Garrett thinks of the abusive camp where he's been imprisoned for five months, "It's like something out of Kafka. Instead of waking up as a giant cockroach, I've woken up in a penal colony."

Live Action TV

• Ultraman Dyna: Gregorl-man is named after Gregor Samsa, fitting his ability to shapeshift into other individuals, including an Evil Knockoff of Ultraman Dyna himself. Additionally, his home galaxy of Hercules M16 is a reference to the Hercules beetle, echoing Gregor's transformation into a beetle-like insect.
• Where In The World Is Carmen Sandiego: It had an ACME informant that was a cockroach named Kafka.

Music

• Brazilian band Inimigos do Rei had a song called "A Cockroach Called Kafka".

Tabletop Games

• Werewolf: The Apocalypse: One race of shapeshifters (created by the Big Bad) are were-cockroaches, who are called the Samsa. They are all more or less mad and one of their forms (a giant human-cockroach hybrid) is called ungeziefer.

Video Games

• Bayonetta 2: One of Bayonetta's weapons is a bug-themed bow named "Kafka" after the story's author that can fire poisonous arrows at enemies, while Jeanne's version of the bow is named "Samsa" after the story's protagonist. Both weapons' descriptions make mention of a man who was turned into a bug, which is what happens in the story.
• Limbus Company: The Metamorphosis is the basis for the Sinner Gregor, who shares the name of the story's protagonist as well. Like the original, Gregor turns into an insect, albeit in his case only his arm, and has a case of Abusive Parents. His default E.G.O.'s name, "Suddenly, One Day", references the story's opening.
• Skullgirls: There is a parasite named Samson, who has an attack called Gregor Samson, of which are both allusions to this story.
• Sonny: The second game includes a battle in the subway against Gregor, a small-but-powerful cockroach that throws apples, weaponizes its enemies' pity, and has the voice of a man.
• WarioWare Gold: The description for the "Bug Birdie" microgame^note where Wario as a bug must push a ball into a hole says that Wario once woke up to find himself turned into one, which clearly references the story.

Webcomics

• Girl Genius: It includes a brief mention of a mad-scientist type named Franz who likes to turn people into beetles.
• Housepets!: Marion Ward was studying this book in class shortly before he was turned into a squirrel. While trying to find solutions to this problem, he decides to read ahead to the end to see how the protagonist turned back.

Western Animation

• Home Movies: It has the teenage rock band creating a music video rock opera summarizing the story. Clearly a school project, as they miss a few things.
• Arthur: In the episode “Bugged”; Alan “The Brain” has a nightmare in which he wakes up with the body of an insect, cumulating in his friends trying to squish him. Brain believes that since everyone has recently taken to calling him a bug, due to his anal retentiveness, it would do him best if he just stays silent for a while.