I'm suprised me and Myoga were the only ones to get this one; the spooky human faced lion of the latest chapter has probably been inspired by the famous dog in horror classic Invasion of the body snatchers:
http://img106.imageshack.us/img106/994/qsdfcustomnn2.jpg
This arc's going to be a riot for horror enthusiasts like me.
Interesting, never heard of "Invasion of the body snatchers". I actually always thought that the lion (and possibly the entire story behind the zombies on Thriller Bark) is based on a story from the Captain Future anime. Unfortunally its quite difficult to find images of that series online but the last adventure the protagonists had was on a planet where half man half animal creatures lived of whoom the leader of the creatures resembles the lion zombie (except for the fact that it is a tiger with a human fac). Furthermore all those creatures once were humans and have been turnded into what they are now through some weird experiments with a strange device.
Could be very well that Oda is familiar with that. After all it was a Toei series from 1978.