Referenced By / The Cat in the Hat

"Don't you talk to that brat. That brat is a bad one, That Brat in the Hat. He plays lots of bad tricks."

This page counts for the book, as well as its cartoon and film adaptations.

Comic Books

• In Grandville: Force Majeure, the Cat appears as a street entertainer.

Comic Strips

• Mother Goose and Grimm: This strip◊ has the Cat fighting the Grinch in a bar.
  Cat: (raising his fists threateningly) Oh, yeah? You want to meet Thing 1 and Thing 2?
• Off the Mark:
  • "Your boyfriend seems nice enough, dear, but for the sake of decency, could you please convince Mr. Cat-in-the-Hat to become Mr. Cat-in-the-Hat-Shirt-and-a-Pair-of-Pants?"◊
  • "Don't get any ideas..."◊
  • The Cat is in the Betty Rubble Center For Recovering Toons for a "rhyming addiction affliction".
  • Thing One, Thing Two, the Thing, and Thing take a cruise in a VW Thing.
  • The Cat appears in this strip◊ alongside other Dr. Seuss characters. He's listening to Randy Newman's "You Can Leave Your Hat On".
  • As it turns out, Thing 1 and Thing 2 are part of an invasive species◊.
  • The Cat gets fed up with having "Hat-Head".
• Sherman's Lagoon: In this strip, Hawthorne gives Sherman and Megan a book for Herman. Megan asks if it's The Cat in the Hat. Sherman replies that it's The Dude in the Nude (as Hawthorne runs around naked in the background).

Film -- Animated

• Horton Hears a Who! (2008): In the opening shots of Whoville, there is a Who that resembles the Cat in the Hat, except he's yellow with blue stripes in his hat.

Film — Live-Action

• In Addams Family Values, Morticia Addams reads this book to baby Pubert when he becomes sick and turns "normal". After a few pages Morticia flips ahead to see how it ends.
  Morticia: Oh no. He lives.
• In Jingle All the Way, there is a scene near the end with a large parade of famous cartoon characters and mascots. The Cat in the Hat can be seen marching in the parade in a few shots.

Literature

• In one of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid books, Greg says that when he was younger, he wanted to be a writer but all his ideas were taken. There is an illustration of a younger Greg holding up a drawing of a cat wearing a top hat and his mother Susan showing him the cover of The Cat in the Hat.
• In Fred, Sophie sees Ginger wearing a hat and says, "Look, in the garden— a cat! In a hat!". Later, when Nick sees Ginger still in his hat, he remarks to himself, "A cat in a hat."
• In Because of the Rabbit, Emma imagines herself and her future best friend dressing up as Thing One and Thing Two for Halloween.
• In Language Arts, Charles compares the precarious stack of dishes he's carrying to the Cat in the Hat.

Live-Action TV

• Full House: In the prologue to "Spellbound", D.J. reads The Cat in the Hat to Michelle as her bedtime story. Michelle questions the book's logic at every sentence, to which D.J. quickly deduces that Michelle is doing this on purpose to artificially lengthen the story.
• Saturday Night Live: A sketch from Season 40 has the Cat (Bill Hader) coming in to entertain the children, only to recognize their mother as his ex-girlfriend Linda (Cecily Strong). During the awkward scenario, it's revealed that the Cat fathered one of the children, and that Linda's husband is Thing 2 (Taran Killam), who now goes by "Jona-Thing". Coincidentally, this was before Hader was cast as the Cat himself in the 2025 film version.
• Seinfeld: In "The Library", Lt. Bookman talks to Jerry, who checked out a copy of The Tropic of Cancer in 1971 but never returned it. Bookman takes the rules and regulations of the library very seriously and at one point asks Jerry if a boy who sat down at the branch of the library only to find drawings of pee-pees and wee-wees in The Cat in the Hat and The Five Chinese Brothers deserves better.
• Sesame Street: In one episode, Oscar the Grouch asks Slimey his pet worm what book he wants to read for his bedtime story, with one of his suggestions being a book called The Brat in the Hat.

Pro Wrestling

• Chris Jericho hosted his famous "Man of 1,004 holds" promo and Number 3 on his list was "The Moss-Colored, Three-Handled Family Gredenza."
• In one (The) Brian Kendrick's promos, while Kendrick starts talking about Sun Tzu, his bodyguard Ezekiel is reading The Cat in the Hat.

Theatre

• Matilda: When Miss Honey is assessing her reading ability, Matilda gives a long list of books she has read recently, including Nicholas Nickleby, Oliver Twist, Jane Eyre, Tess Of The Durbervilles, The Lord of the Rings, The Invisible Man, The Secret Garden, Crime and Punishment, ...and The Cat in the Hat.

Video Games

• In Infinite Craft, "Cat in the Hat" is a possible crafting recipe.
• In Team Fortress 2, one of the Soldier's cosmetics is the Dr's Dapper Topper, which is the Cat's hat.

Webcomics

• Sheldon:
  • One strip has Dante reading the book.
  • This strip has Arthur saying that the book makes no sense.

Web Original

• The Nostalgia Critic:
  • The Critic has reviewed the 2003 film.
  • In his review of How the Grinch Stole Christmas!, Critic makes a dig at the movie.
    We then see Grinch, the epitome of cruel
    And yes, to be fair, that make-up is pretty cool
    He looks just like the Grinch, despite the film's flaws
    But, hey, it could be worse; they could have given him Cat claws
• In the first episode of Patman Post, Jess the cat wears the Cat's famous hat.
• SuperMarioLogan:
  • One is entitled "The Cat in the Hat", where Bowser Junior is visited by the titular feline.
  • In "The Halloween Heist!", Ken and Cody are dressed like Thing One and Thing Two, and when Mario, Rosalina, and Jeffy go trick-or-treating at Brooklyn T. Guy's house, Brooklyn wears The Cat in the Hat's hat.
  • From "Jeffy’s Big Halloween", Jeffy dresses as The Cat while Marvin and Rose dress as Thing 1 and Thing 2.

Western Animation

• The Amazing World of Gumball: The slimy babysitter with round glasses in Season 1, Episode 2, "The Responsible", bears a resemblance to the babysitter in The Cat in the Hat live-action movie, Mrs. Kwan.
• The Angry Beavers: The episode "The Yak in the Sack" is a parody of the story.
• Animaniacs (1993): The short "The Kid in the Lid" is a parody of the story, with Yakko in the titular role.
• The Fairly OddParents!: The episode "Shelf Life" features a book titled The Rat in Spats, by Dr. Bruce.
• Family Guy:
  • A flashback from "Dammit Janet" has a young Peter being asked by the Cat if he wants him to clean the house before his parents return. He refuses, wanting to surprise them.
  • In "Boy (Dog) Meets Girl (Dog)", it's revealed that Peter and Lois made up a character for Chris called "Arthur Valentine"; Peter's description of him includes him wearing a Cat in the Hat-type hat.
• In Green Eggs and Ham (2019), which is based on another Dr. Seuss book, there are several appearances of the Cat's hat, including the theme song.
• The Johnny Test episode "Sleepover at Johnny's" has many references, including Bling-Bling having a clone named Bling 2 and there being a talking fish in Johnny's house. At the end of the episode, Johnny says, "Maybe I've seen this in a book."
• KaBlam!: An episode of Sniz and Fondue is titled "Rat in the Hat". In this episode, Fondue reluctantly lets Sniz borrow his beloved hat, resulting in Sniz becoming popular.
• In the MAD sketch, "Life of Rhyme", Piscine Molitor is trapped on a boat with The Cat in the Hat.
• Muppet Babies (2018): In "Library Leapfrog", one of the books Summer finds in the library is called Rat in a Hat, with the cover illustration depicting Rizzo in a Cat in the Hat-like hat.
• Robot Chicken: A sketch from "May Cause the Need for Speed" features the Cat experimenting with his look by wearing a fedora and getting roasted by two kids.
• Rugrats (1991): In "Angelica's in Love", Dean asks the babies if they read The Cat in the Hat, saying "It changed my life".
• The Simpsons:
  • In "The Great Louse Detective", the children's section of the spa, called Dr. Ma-Seuss, has a chiropractor wearing the Cat's hat.
  • In "Treehouse of Horror XXIV", the segment Oh, the Places You'll D'oh! (a parody of Dr. Seuss' works in general) features Homer playing the Fat in the Hat; here, he turns out to be a psychotic killer who gets killed with his own umbrella.
    Homer: I'm frightened of nothing, not even Hell's fires. Just don't let me ever be played by Mike Myers.
  • There is an episode titled "The Cad and the Hat".
• Wow! Wow! Wubbzy!:
  • During the theme song, Wubbzy, for a brief moment, is seen wearing the Cat's trademark hat.
  • The episode "Happily Ever After" features a character named the Hopping Dipple-Dop, a clear parody of the Cat in the Hat. He starts out as a book character, but Widget builds a machine that brings him to life, and Wubbzy and his friends have to get him back into the book again.

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