Here he comes, here comes Speed Dexter, he's a genius on wheels!
Ever since it hit the airwaves in 1967, Speed Racer has been regarded as an Anime classic. And since then, several media have referenced it in some form.
Examples:
Anime & Manga- In the original anime, Speed Racer was known as Go Mifune (三船 剛), and Racer X was known as Kenichi Mifune (三船健一). The protagonist of Voltes V is called Kenichi Go, and he also turns out to have a long-lost older brother.
- Transformers: Cybertron: Override’s alt mode is based on the Mach 5.
- In Thunderbolts, once Abe Jenkins revealed his armor was now MACH-IV, he joked "one more and I have to carry around a monkey and a mechanic". Songbird didn't get it, to which he replied "you're too young".
Films — Animated
- In the Fairly OddParents movie Channel Chasers, One of the TV shows Timmy and his Godparents visit is a Speed Racer homage named Go Go Racer, with Timmy as Speed, Cosmo as Chim-Chim, and Wanda as Spritle; they were even hidden inside the trunk of the Mach 5. This segment also had a lot of fun with the "Oohhs" and "Aahhs"...to an annoying degree.
Films — Live-Action
- Lance wears a Speed Racer t-shirt in Pulp Fiction.
Live-Action TV
- In Friends, while trying to make small talk with his new roommate, Chandler asks if he thinks "that Speed Racer guy gets a lot of tickets".
- Roundhouse had three different parodies: "Speed Limit Racer", "Speed Eraser" and (again) "Speed Racist".
Music
- In the video for DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince's "Summertime", Fresh Prince is seen sporting a Speed Racer t-shirt.
- Ghostface Killah of the Wu-Tang Clan uses footage from Speed Racer on his music video for the song "Daytona 500" (featuring Raekwon and Cappadonna).
Webcomics
- Cyanide and Happiness has a skit titled "Speed Racist
".
- Stinkoman dresses as Speed Racer in the Homestar Runner cartoon "3 Times Halloween Funjob".
- One of Chester A. Bum’s first reviews was on the 2008 Live-Action Film.
- In the Catscratch episode "Go Gomez! Go!", the beginning hook of the opening theme can be heard before Mr. Blik, Gordon and Waffle start the race.
- Daria's Musical Episode has Jake Morgendorffer doing a Suspiciously Similar Song to the Speed Racer theme.
- Dexter's Laboratory made an Affectionate Parody of the anime in the episode "Mock 5". The episode features Dexter as Speed, his dad as Pops, DeeDee as both Spritle and Racer X, Monkey as Chim-Chim, and Mandark as Snake Oiler.
- Speed and his dad appear in a season 1 episode of Family Guy.
- Fudêncio e Seus Amigos: In the episode "Corrida Mambembe", which is in general a parody of Wacky Racing, there is a scene where Conrado is trying to win the race but gets interrupted by Racer X. The narrator then says "Actually, the mysterious Racer X is Rex, Conrado's brother who ran away when he was only five years old".
- The Powerpuff Girls: Mojo Jojo's overly elaborate manner of speaking is based how characters talked in the original English dub.
- Speed is a competitor in a race in "3 Fast 3 Furious" of Robot Chicken.
- A different sketch has Speed join NASCAR and touches upon the possible (messy) consequences of Spritle and Chim-Chim riding in the trunk of the Mach 5 that reaches ridiculously fast speeds.
Pops: Uhh...someone get a hose and a garbage bag...- A season 8 sketch has a conversation between Speed and Inspector Detector about how fast is the Mach 5.
- Sheep in the Big City: There's a sketch that parodies the anime. When the end of the intro is parodied, the Speed Racer Expy is knocked down by the Mach 5 turning around.
- On South Park, Craig likes to watch Red Racer.
- In the "Imaginationland" special, Speed makes a cameo appearance.
- Wander Over Yonder: In "The New Toy", as Lord Hater shows the H.A.T.E.R.V. to Lord Dominator, he strikes the same pose as Speed did in the show's theme song, albeit the camera angle is reversed (instead of rotating from the front to the side, it's from the side to the front).