We all enjoy watching Thor, Hulk, Iron Man, the Guardians of the Galaxy, and the people of Wakanda come together to fight evil forces in the Marvel Cinematic Universe or the MCU. It is a shared fictional universe in which the Marvel heroes, appearing in independent films, reside.
But much before the MCU captured our imagination, another shared universe had become wildly popular among fans of pulp fiction. The Cthulhu Mythos (pronounced “ca-thoo-loo”) is a shared fictional universe in which sprung from the works of American horror writer Howard Phillips (H. P.) Lovecraft and was continued by his literary successors. Lovecraft’s stories “The Call of Cthulhu”, “The Shadow Over Innsmouth” and “The Dunwich Horror inspired authors such as Robert Bloch, Clark Ashton Smith and August Derleth to set their stories in the same background.
Who is Cthulhu?
Cthulhu is the central creature in Lovecraft’s seminal short story “The Call of Cthulhu”, first published in the pulp magazine Weird Tales in 1928. The monster with an octopus-like head became the symbol of this shared universe. The term ‘Cthulhu Mythos’ was coined by author August Derleth.
The Cthulhu Mythos has been popular since the 1920s and has been expanded over the years. Authors and fans continue to contribute to this universe even today.
Did you know?
- In 2019, paleontologists came across a fossil of a 430-million-year-old tentacled sea creature that reminded them of Lovecraft’s famed Cthulhu. So they named the new species Sollasina cthulhu.
- A creature resembling Cthulhu, with its head full of long, rubbery feelers, appears in the popular “Doctor Who” television series as well.
Picture Credit : Google