1958's The Fly was a significant box-office hit, and like many science fiction films of its era has seen many shout outs in pop culture in the decades since. The climax that sees the housefly with André Delambre's head (and left arm) trapped in a spider's web, only able to shriek "Heeeeeelp meeeeeeee!" in a tiny buzz of a voice, is most frequently referenced, but whenever a human with an insect's head note (or, alternatively, a Big Creepy-Crawly that presumably Was Once a Man and still wears human clothes) shows up in a sci-fi/horror spoof that's most likely a reference to this movie as well.
The very different 1986 film adapted from the same short story has its own page. There are many pop culture shout-outs involving teleporter accidents creating Half-Human Hybrids that could apply to either film, but a good rule of thumb is that if it results in a simple Mix-and-Match Critter or especially two such creatures, it has the 1958 version in mind. If it results in a single Body Horror abomination and/or Slow Transformation into one, it's referencing the 1986 version.
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- An advertisement filmed in retraux Fifties-style had the Damsel in Distress (after shrieking in terror over the human-fly reveal) realising she can invent the world's first integrated stereo system this way.
- An old 1980s bumper for The Disney Channel involves Mickey Mouse testing a teleportation machine with Mousekteer hats, one of which gets crossed with a bee to form the Disney Channel logo in use at the time.
- In chapter 13 of Blattodea, Alice the spider-themed assassin exits a pod designed to connect her mind into the internet to absorb the global knowledge of the ongoing Zombie Apocalypse. It has the same general look of Andre's pod.
- One Sgt. Frog episode had Keroro accidentally fuse with a mosquito while using a teleporter, with the end result being that the fly gets Keroro's head and arm and vice-versa. The rest of the episode consists of the other characters trying to locate Keroro!Mosquito and succeeding by luring him back into the teleporter alongside Mosquito!Keroro with a Gunpla model...only for poor Keroro to end up fused to the model kit instead.
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- In the Star Trek: Voyager Parody Fic Attack of the 50-Ft Half-Klingon, B'Elanna Torres discovers her husband Tom Paris has been using the holodeck to cheat on her and so launches an Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever, picking up his Flying Car in her giant hand and throwing it as far as she can."Heeeeelp meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!" cried Tom as he flew across the sky, sounding to the gaping bystanders below like a man-fly caught in a web.
- Plan 7 of 9 from Outer Space. D'Ork tries to use his transmatter to escape his self-destructing spaceship, only to discover that it's been sabotaged by Mad Scientist Dr. Zarkendorf when he rematerialises with the head of an enormous fly."You bastard, I look even sillier than I did before! What did you do? How did this fly's head get so big? Where have you hidden the RAID?"
- The Emperor's New Groove: While lost in the jungle, Kuzco sees a fly in a spiderweb screaming "Help me!" before it gets eaten by the spider.
- In Monsters vs. Aliens, Dr. Cockroach Ph. D is an Expy of Andre Delambre (in keeping with all the monsters being expies of 1950s-'60s creature feature leads), though with a different backstory — his experiments in giving humans cockroach resilience turned him into a Half-Human Hybrid. Unlike Andre he still retains an ability to speak. His human appearance (briefly seen in the rundown of the various monsters' backstories), voice, and expressions are patterned after those of Vincent Price, The Fly's key supporting player.
- The title character of Beetlejuice, while trapped in the Maitlands' model, catches a fly, which screams "Help me!" as it gets dragged down to be eaten. (This might double as a sideways reference to the 1986 film because Barbara Maitland is played by Geena Davis, its leading lady.)
- In Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, an exhausted and shrunken Mike Teavee is moaning "Help meeeeeeee!" as his father pulls him out of the television set (the former having just endured the Oompa-Loompas' "The Villain Sucks" Song). Rather appropriate, given that his state is the result of a Teleporter Accident! Most of Wonka's Technobabble about his Wonkavision breakthrough is lifted from an analogy Andre draws, too.
- The tongue-in-cheek Clip Show It Came from Hollywood features a clip of the unmasking scene, with Gilda Radner's commentary poking fun at the less-than-convincing mask.
- Matinee features several affectionate parodies of late 1950s/early 1960s genre fare, but the Show Within a Show central to the story is Mant!, which sees a scientist accidentally transformed into a half-man, half-ant creature with an insect's head. Like Andre, he has a loving but desperate wife; unlike Andre — and incorporating elements of other monster movies of the era — he can speak, comes to side with insects more than humans, and in the third act even becomes a case of Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever.
- Terror in the Aisles, a 1984 Clip Show of highlights from Horror and Thriller movies, has clips from The Fly — including the unmasking scene and the spiderweb climax — included in a Montage of monsters near the end. The montage's song, the tongue-in-cheek "They're Not Very Nice", even includes the lyric "No fly's gonna get the best of me" timed to the clip of Andre trying to attend to Helene after she faints.
- In Living Color!'s mock commercial for "Cine-Globe Theaters", a chain that allows and encourages people to talk during the movie, has a typical audience watching this film (including the unmasking scene) and either shouting to the screen or just making small talk with each other. On top of that, the film is barely audible. When Jim Carrey's audience member asks for the others to quiet down so he can just watch the movie, he's escorted out.
- In the Magnum, P.I. episode, "Solo Flight" Magnum mentions remembering seeing the movie as a boy, and hallucinates a fly/man calling on him to help him.
- Mystery Science Theater 3000:
- In King Dinosaur, when one of the human heroes shoots down a giant bug, Crow adds "Help me! Help me!" to its death throes.
- Flies buzzing about at the top of Secret Agent Super Dragon inspire a few cries of "Help me!" from the gang.
- The Outer Limits (1995): In "Déjà Vu", there is a betting pool on the results of a teleportation experiment. One of the options is The Fly.
- On The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, a November 18, 2008 "Stuff we found on Ebay" segment included "Real Fly Baked Into Crust Of Bread Slice". Leno noted "And when you put it in the toaster, it goes 'Help me!' (audience laughs) Boy, how old are you to remember that movie?"
- Back in the days when he was only a regular guest host of the show, one poorly-worded "Headline" from a newspaper was "Helicopter powered by human flies". This appeared in one of the Headlines compilation books with Jay's commentary that it was "From the 'Old Movie' department" and "Human flies look like regular flies, except they say (in a little voice), 'Help me...help me...'"
- One The Far Side panel has a human-sized fly in a lab coat frantically working in a basement lab, much to the frustration of his human wife — "What? You're still a fly?"
- Kid Chameleon features a powerup that gives the eponymous kid a fly's head.
- In the RiffTrax take on the short "Measuring Man", when the titular not-so-superhero sends the little boy he's teaching back home with a goofy transition, the riff "Ahh, there's a fly here with me!" is added.
- In The Critic episode "Marathon Mensch", one of Jay's first attempts to reclaim his dignity after being rescued from a fire by his elderly makeup lady is scaling a New York City skyscraper as a "human fly". Unfortunately, he's not even a few feet up when a mugger with a gun demands his wallet, and since he has no means of defending himself, he squeaks "Help meeeeee..."
- Johnny Bravo: "I, Fly" has Johnny suffer the same fate as Andre after getting involved with Carl's teleporter. Carl rescues Johnny!Fly when he gets caught in a spider web.
- In "Night of the Living Duck", the Looney Tunes short that acts as a prologue to the Compilation Movie Daffy Duck's Quackbusters, one of the monsters in the audience of Daffy's nightmare is a giant fly in a suit, dolefully putting sugar cube after sugar cube into his coffee.
- The Simpsons
- In the B-plot of Season 4's "Duffless", Lisa has to come up with an alternative science fair project after Bart destroys her first one, and when someone suggests training a hamster to run through a maze, she imagines a hamster with Bart's head trapped in a maze squeaking "Help meeeeeeee!"
- The Season 9 Halloween Episode "Treehouse of Horror VIII" parodies this film and the 1986 version of the story in its second segment, "Fly vs Fly". As in 1958, Bart ends up with his head proportionally swapped with a fly's thanks to a matter transporter Homer picked up at Professor Frink's garage sale. While Fly!Bart is reluctantly accepted by the rest of his family, it's initially suggested Bart!Fly will meet the same untimely fate the Andre!fly — trapped in a spider's web, shrieking "Help meeeeeeee!" as the arachnid approaches...but it's actually a prank and he flies off laughing. When he tries to convince Fly!Bart to go back through the transporter with him, there's a quick "compound eyes" shot from its point of view before it starts trying to swat him. Bart!Fly enlists Lisa's help to change them back, and it works. Homer then declares he's "going to do what [he] should have done a long time ago..." and picks up a fire axe...to chase down Bart for fooling with his machine.
- In the animated special Tales from the Far Side, one segment features an airplane for flies. The in-flight movie turns out to be The Fly, and the actual clip of Helene unmasking Andre and shrieking in terror is shown to a round of applause from the passengers.
- In the Fairly OddParents episode “Fly Boy”, Timmy wants to watch a new horror movie titled "I Was a Teenage Blowfly" in which the main character turns into a human-fly mutant as a result of an accident with a teleporter. Timmy himself gets turned into a human-fly mutant by a wish gone wrong.
