Giant Flyer: Difference between revisions

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==Examples of Large Flying Predators==

=== Anime & Manga ===

* In ''[[Great Mazinger]]'' -one of the ''[[Mazinger Z]]'' sequels-, one entire division of the army of[[Robeast~~|Robeasts~~]] were giant birds.

* In ''[[Great Mazinger]]'' -one of the ''[[Mazinger Z]]'' sequels-, one entire division of the army of[[Robeast]]s were giant birds.

* ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh!]]!'' Slifer The Sky Dragon, The Winged Dragon of Ra, and many others.

* Lots and lots of these in ''[[Digimon]]''. Often times it's someone's partner Digimon (such as ShineGreymon), though there are a few notable exceptions (such as Azulongmon).

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* The Cliff-Ghasts of ''[[His Dark Materials]]''.

** In the book ''The Amber Spyglass'' there's a mention of enemy soldiers riding a giant bird, later falling to their deaths due to a laser beam from the Intention Craft.

* Normal-sized owls, crows, ~~hawks -- and~~ Kehaar the ~~gull -- in~~ ''Watership Down'', since the heroes are rabbits.

* Normal-sized owls, crows, hawks—and Kehaar the gull—in ''Watership Down'', since the heroes are rabbits.

* Blood Hawks in the [[Robert A. Heinlein]] novel ''[[Glory Road (novel)|Glory Road]]''.

* Icebones is a novel that follows the journey of a herd of Mammoths on Mars (just stay with us here), and at one point their youngest member is menaced by a giant seabird.

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* Skywhales and Kites in ''Blue Moon''.

* The Red Dragon Thunderzord and platform in [[Mighty Morphin Power Rangers]] season two. Besides the Fire Bird Thunderzord (which, as a fairly traditional aircraft doesn't count for this trope), the rest of Thunderzords could at least hover.

* In ''[[The Outer Limits]]'' revival episode "Tempests" the gas giant Leviathan's atmosphere harbored two giant flyers: "pteranodons," gigantic winged predators that had only been seen on "deep radar" (the characters encounter a skeleton) and "baleens," kilometer-sized jellyfish-blobs that float through the clouds and have dog-sized [[Giant Spider~~|Giant Spiders~~]] in their guts, either as parasites or symbiotic organisms.

* In ''[[The Outer Limits]]'' revival episode "Tempests" the gas giant Leviathan's atmosphere harbored two giant flyers: "pteranodons," gigantic winged predators that had only been seen on "deep radar" (the characters encounter a skeleton) and "baleens," kilometer-sized jellyfish-blobs that float through the clouds and have dog-sized [[Giant Spider]]s in their guts, either as parasites or symbiotic organisms.

* The flying werepanther that Freya turned into in ''[[Merlin (TV series)|Merlin]]''

* A whole flock of man-eating pterosaurs menaces ''[[Terra Nova]]''.

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* The Roc colossus in ''[[Shadow of the Colossus]]'' falls into this category as it does actively attack you, whereas the Serpent pictured above simply flies around.

** To be fair, it only attacks you after you shoot at it with arrows. Otherwise it just watches you from its perch.

** Though the serpent pictured above simply flies around, thank goodness it doesn't attack. According to the [[Word of God]] in the artbook, the sucker is the longest (largest?) colossus, measuring in at about 200 meters (for non-metric folks, that's a whooping 656 ft.) The evidence is [http://picasaweb.google.com/SotCartbook/ShadowOfTheColossusOfficialArtbook?feat=directlink#5069723636180432930 here,] though in Japanese.

** Though the serpent pictured above simply flies around, thank goodness it doesn't attack. According to the [[Word of God]] in the artbook, the sucker is the longest (largest?) colossus, measuring in at about 200 meters (for non-metric folks, that's a whooping 656 ft.) The evidence is [http://picasaweb.google.com/SotCartbook/ShadowOfTheColossusOfficialArtbook?feat=directlink#5069723636180432930 here,] though in Japanese.

* The overlord and guardian in [[Starcraft]].

** The campaign mode of the sequel has the Leviathan, which is somewhere between thirty to fifty times the size of a battlecruiser. Even though the game's units [[Units Not to Scale|aren't to scale]], it's clearly meant to be ''enormous''.

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* ... the titular characters in ''The Minnipins''. They're tiny gnomes who ride upon birds. Of course, they happen to know a huge Mute Swan who can carry their new human friend.

* Long before he wrote it into Discworld, Pratchett gave geese to the Floridian Gnomes in ''Wings'', the last part of the [[Nomes Trilogy]].

* Gnomes in the ''Gnomes'' and ''Secrets of the Gnomes'' illustrated books hopped a lift on large birds quite often. One slightly [[Narm~~|Narmy~~]] illustration shows a pair of gnome newlyweds being carried off to their honeymoon by a swan.

* Gnomes in the ''Gnomes'' and ''Secrets of the Gnomes'' illustrated books hopped a lift on large birds quite often. One slightly [[Narm]]y illustration shows a pair of gnome newlyweds being carried off to their honeymoon by a swan.

* ''The Fledgling'' [[Justified Trope|justifies]] this by hinting that there's [[Waif Prophet|something up with the heroine]] that allows her to ride upon the Goose Prince {{spoiler|and that allows her to fly on her own}}.

* Woe betide the person who says it's cute how the [[Proud Warrior Race Guy|Gallivespians]] of ''His Dark Materials'' ride around on dragonflies...

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** We also catch a glimpse of a giant bird [[Monster of the Week|Jewel Seed monster]] in the first season, during the period where the [[The Federation|Time-Space Administration Bureau]] was already helping Nanoha.

* Many species of giant insect from ''[[Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind]]'', at least one of which has an uncanny resemblance to the colossus in the page image here.

* ''[[End of Evangelion]]'' shows us what happen if you give the resident [[Apocalypse Maiden]] the power of two godlike [[Cosmic Horror~~|Cosmic Horrors~~]]: even the resident [[Humongous Mecha]] are TINY when compared to [[Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever|Rei's]] [[Power Glows|final]] [[Winged Humanoid|form]] who has '''a wingspan of several THOUSAND kilometres'''. True, she's not really flying but still.

* ''[[End of Evangelion]]'' shows us what happen if you give the resident [[Apocalypse Maiden]] the power of two godlike [[Cosmic Horror]]s: even the resident [[Humongous Mecha]] are TINY when compared to [[Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever|Rei's]] [[Power Glows|final]] [[Winged Humanoid|form]] who has '''a wingspan of several THOUSAND kilometres'''. True, she's not really flying but still.

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=== Real Life ===

* The species of Pterosaur known as [[wikipedia:Quetzalcoatlus northropi|Quetzalcoatlus]] (where "quetzalcoatl" is Aztec for "feathered snake" and was the name of a major god) had a wingspan of 12 metres and was pretty damn tall (see the wikipedia article).

** The most commonly adapted Pterosaur, Pteranodon, was also pretty large as well, with an average wingspan of ~~7-10~~ metres (not quite as big as Quetzalcoatlus but still).

** The most commonly adapted Pterosaur, Pteranodon, was also pretty large as well, with an average wingspan of 7–10 metres (not quite as big as Quetzalcoatlus but still).

** New evidence give possible suggestion that Quetzalcoatlus was in fact too massive to fly, but this is [http://scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/2010/09/desmostylians_svpca-2010-ii.php not well accepted] among mainstream pterosaur workers.

* Another extinct animal: the [[wikipedia:Giant Teratorn|Giant Teratorn]] (''Argentavis'') had a smaller wingspan of up to 8 metres.