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{{trope}}
[[File:CastleWulfenbach.jpg|link=Girl Genius (Webcomic)|frame|The only way to travel: by ''blimp castle''.]]
 
While airships in general are cool, the [[Cool Airship]] turns this [[Up to Eleven]]. Most of the time, it will have an [[Awesome but Impractical|impossibly cool design]] which would most likely be unable to fly in [[Real Life]]. (Fortunately, fiction has phlebotinum for that little problem). [[Cool Airship|Cool Airships]] also tend to be exceptionally big (sometimes so big that they double as [[Airborne Aircraft Carrier|Airborne Aircraft Carriers]] or even airborne cities) and are frequently decked out with various weapons.
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Unfortunately, with the destruction of the Hindenburg in 1939, airships mostly died out in [[Real Life]], so there are, unfortunately very few examples in that category, with most modern airships being used for advertising or research purposes due to their quiet nature. It's unlikely that they'll ever make a large scale comeback, since militarily, radar has made them pretty much useless, and modern jets are much faster.
 
See [[Zeppelins Fromfrom Another World]] for airships being used to help show the viewers that something is set in an [[Alternate Universe]] or [[Alternate History]]. The two can overlap, but [[Zeppelins Fromfrom Another World]] are often just a background detail, and [[Cool Airship|Cool Airships]] (including ones in [[Speculative Fiction]]) aren't always used to hint at an [[Alternate Universe]] setting.
 
A [[Sub-Trope]] of [[Cool Ship]], and so a [[Sister Trope]] of [[Cool Boat]] and [[Cool Starship]].
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** When the group gets to the Magic World, there are cool airships everywhere, although they're somehow combined with the [[Flying Seafood Special]]. {{spoiler|Haruna managed to get her hands on her own [[Cool Airship]] by drawing and selling dojinji to the lack of supply magic world and earned a fortune, and the Ala Alba uses it as their base.}}
* ''[[Gaiking]]: The Legend of Daiku-Maryu'', the ship being the titular ''Daikuu Maryuu''. The ''Daichi Maryuu'' and the ''Tenkuu Maryuu'' are also examples, though the Daichi is more like a Cool Tank. And they're all shaped like dragons.
* Lawrence III's airship Hikoukyuu from ''[[Pokémon: The Movie 2000 (Anime)|Pokémon 2000]]'' and Zero's Megarig from ''[[Pokémon Giratina and The Sky Warrior (Anime)|Pokémon: Giratina and The Sky Warrior]]''; also the Battle Pyramid (inhabited by Frontier Brain Brandon) most likely qualifies as an airship. All three of these {{spoiler|crashed in pursuit of a Legendary Pokémon}}, no less.
** In ''[[Pokémon Special (Manga)|Pokémon Special]]'', there's the Team Rocket Airship that can turn into a stadium with a push of a button. Giovanni probably designed it that way specifically for his rematch with Red.
** And Team Rockets' Meowth-shaped hot air balloon, which just happens to be their main form of transportation. However, after they [[Took a Level In Badass]] in the ''Best Wishes'' anime, they abandoned the Meowth balloon and replaced it with a simple purple hot air balloon with a stylized Team Rocket "R" insignia on it.
* ''[[Code Geass (Anime)|Code Geass]]'' has quite a few. The ''Ikaruga'', the Black Knights' [[Airborne Aircraft Carrier]], the Sky Fortress ''Damocles'', the ''Avalon'', which is Britannia's [[Airborne Aircraft Carrier]], and there's also the fact that the above carriers are a standard part of Britannia's military.
* [[Yu-Gi-Oh!]] gives us Seto Kaiba's airship, [http://www.yu-jyo.net/002/081.shtml which] [http://www.yu-jyo.net/images/081-120/081/81airship_u.jpg bears] [http://www.yu-jyo.net/images/081-120/081/81airship_j.jpg resemblance] to your stereotypical blimps or semi-rigid frames (although, considering what it was capable of, it was probably rigid). The gondola on the bottom was large and comfortable enough to host the Battle City finalists and their friends, as well as Kaiba and his employees. There was also a lift which took people to the top of the airship, where a large duelling arena was installed, notable for having Tristan and Duke almost fall of the edge. [[Yu-Gi-Oh!: The Abridged Series (Web Video)|Yup, children's card games]] [[Serious Business|are just that important]].
* {{spoiler|Hellywood}} from [[Now and Then Here Andand There]] is a prime example of this trope. It also leads to the possibility that the world that this show is set in is actually a dystopian steam punk world, since this beast of an airship flies on water! But probably (and hopefully) not.
 
 
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* Franky's flying RAF base 'Manta Station' in ''[[Sky Captain and The World of Tomorrow]]''.
* Three guesses about which airship it is in the Czech film ''The Stolen Airship''
* In ''[[Stardust (Filmfilm)|Stardust]]'', Captain Shakespeare pilots a flying ship, called the ''Caspartine''. Literally. Like a sea ship that flies. It also harvests lightning.
* The ''Luxembourg'' from ''[[The Rocketeer (Filmfilm)|The Rocketeer]]''.
* The ''Hyperion'', the airship that carried the expedition in ''[[wikipedia:Island at the Top of the World|Island at the Top of the World]]''.
* Valentine's flying, [[Companion Cube|possibly sentient]] Tower from ''[[Mirror Mask]]''.
** Have to watch again to double check but didn't it just jump really high not fly?
* [[Indiana Jones]] and his dad escape from one in ''[[TheIndiana Jones and the Last Crusade (Film)|The Last Crusade]]''.
** Made all the cooler because it's a REAL Cool Airship, the ''[[Hindenburg]]''.
* Max Zorin's airship from ''[[A View to A Kill (Film)|A View to Aa Kill]]'' may look like a boring old blimp, but does yours unfold from a construction shack and come with an [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmQnEyiGdGQ integrated deathtrap]? Max even gets to make a [[Bond One-Liner]].
* Lee Scorsby's marvelously baroque transport in ''[[The Golden Compass]]'' surely qualifies here.
* ''[[The Great Race]]'' - Professor Fate has an exceptionally ''small'' Cool Airship - two-person, pedal-powered - this troper seriously wants one.
* The C-21 Dragon Gunship from James Cameron's ''Avatar''.
* The [[The Three Musketeers (2011 (Filmfilm)|2011 version of ''The Three Musketeers'']] has a definitely cool British airship based (in-story) on a Leonardo da Vinci design. {{spoiler|Cardinal Richelieu's forces get an ever bigger one near the end of the film and use it to combat the former that the musketeers had hijacked. Both ships crash eventually, but [[The Stinger]] reveals Buckingham is back for a vengeance with a [[Up to Eleven|whole armada of airships]]}}.
* [[Punny Name|Al Oft]] the Lightyear blimp from ''[[Cars]]''.
* [[Vincent Price|Ratigan's]] pedal-powered blimp from ''[[The Great Mouse Detective (Disney)|The Great Mouse Detective]]'', as well as the Union Jack and sardine can-made blimp used by the heroes.
* The Gyro-evac from ''[[Atlantis: theThe Lost Empire (Disney)|Atlantis the Lost Empire]]''.
 
 
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* Kenneth Oppel's books, ''Airborn'', ''Skybreaker'', and ''Starclimber'', are the very embodiment of this trope: they take place in an alternate history in which airships never lost popularity, despite the Hindenburg incident, thanks to the new element 'hydrium'. This changes technological advancement to an enormous extent (for better or worse being extremely subjective) and airships and ornithopters are now several hundred times more popular than any sea-going vessel. The main character (Matt Cruse, a name which immediately screams "adventure/romance novel") starts out aboard the Aurora, an incredibly luxurious, enormous airship. {{spoiler|Later on in Skybreaker, a very low-class ship is shown, and then another high-price ship that can also reach incredible altitudes. In the same book, the plot centers around an absolutely immense derelict airship.}}
* Robur's airship from [[Jules Verne]]'s novel ''Robur the Conqueror''. First published in 1886, it is possibly the ur-example.
** Would Pushpaka Vimana in ''[[Ramayana (Literature)|Ramayana]]'' count as an ur-example? The book does not spare words in describing the "sun-equaling" splendor of this magical aerial vehicle which is "as fast as thought", capable of going anywhere at the pilot's will and is also apparently sentient enough to understand spoken commands.
** Though ''Albatross'' is not a lighter-than-air airship like most of these examples - it is a huge multi-propeller helicopter. The viability of heavier-than-air craft was disputed back then, and such a dispute is part of the plot, with Robur showing his ship is superior to any silly balloon.
* Every single novel in the ''Timeline Wars'' series by John Barnes involves a [[Cool Airship]]. The fact that the second book is named ''Washington's Dirigible'' is sort of a clue; that book ends with a climactic battle on the airship.
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* '70s novel ''A Game of Titans'' pits the Real Life Soviet aircraft carrier ''Kiev'' against the USAF nuclear-powered airship ''Grand Eagle''. The airship carries a contingent of Harriers. It also has cruise missiles and lasers.
* [[Edgar Rice Burroughs]]' Barsoom stories include airships lifted by 'Ray Tanks'.
* The [[Arthur C. Clarke (Creator)]] novella "A Meeting with Medusa" features a couple of Cool Airships. The story opens with the protagonist as captain of a 1500-foot-long helium-filled dirigible, intended to serve as a flying luxury cruise ship. Unfortunately, the ''Queen Elizabeth IV'' is destroyed in a freak accident during a test flight over the Grand Canyon. The action then flashes forward to seven years later, with the protagonist now about to embark on a voyage in the story's ''second'' Cool Airship, a nuclear-fusion-powered hot-hydrogen balloon--that will be dropped into the atmosphere of Jupiter.
* Jonathan Howard's [[Johannes Cabal the Detective]] has one with a murder mystery onboard. It also doubles as an aircraft carrier, with gryoscopic small fliers on its flat top.
* The ''[[Leviathan (Literaturenovel)|Leviathan]]'' from the eponymous novel, is a basically a [[Living Ship|flying whale]] which entire [[Organic Technology|onboard systems are also an ecosystem]].
* The Ketty Jay from Retribution Falls
* The eponymous vessel in ''[[The Voyage of the Jerle Shannara]]'' series is one of the coolest of the [[Magitek]] airships the Rovers have started piloting in the [[Time Skip|130 years]] since the previous ''Shannara'' saga.
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* ''[[Doctor Who]]'', "The Age of Steel".
** Also in ''[[Doctor Who]]'', the UNIT airship The Valiant featured in several episodes in 2007 and 2008.
* ''[[Team Knight Rider (TV)|Team Knight Rider]]'' has the heroes move around in one of these as well.
* SPECTRUM HQ in ''[[Captain Scarlet and The Mysterons]]''.
* ''[[Lazy TownLazyTown]]'s'' Sportacus not only travels in a cool airship, he [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZvzKoO3Ppaw lives in it too].
* The ''Aurora'' in ''[[The Secret Adventures of Jules Verne (TV)|The Secret Adventures of Jules Verne]]'' is the first dirigible in the world, owned by Phileas Fogg. It serves as the homebase of the main characters. Also, an episode is featured where villains make their own airship and arm it with heavy guns in order to support the South in [[The American Civil War]].
 
 
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** ''[[Forgotten Realms]]'' [[The Magocracy|magocracy]] Halruaa has levitating sailing skyships.
** ''[[Eberron]]'' has elemental airships, where elemental creatures are trapped in a crystal maze engine.
* ''[[Magic: theThe Gathering]]'' had ''The Weatherlight'', a flying ship that could travel across the planes, and also served as the centerpiece in an epic plan to protect the world from extraplanar invasion.
** There was also its flying rival, ''The Predator''.
* "Airlords of the Ozarks," an adventure for ''[[Twilight 2000]]'', had the players, having returned to the U.S.A., recruited to investigate what turned out to be a neo-fascist movement using airships for raids to build a power base.
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== Video Games ==
* A [[Global Airship]] is a frequent feature of RPGs, often it will be an actual [[Cool Airship]].
* ''[[Skies of Arcadia (Video Game)|Skies of Arcadia]]'' has all kinds of airships, but by far the coolest of the [[Cool Airship|Cool Airships]] is the ''Delphinus'', a [[Super Prototype]] battleship that your characters steal about halfway through the game. In a world where the majority of airships resemble old wooden sailing ships or World War I-era destroyers, the ''Delphinus'' is a sleek and angular death machine based on WWII-era battleships and armed to the teeth with cannons, ''magic'' cannons, torpedoes, and a [[Wave Motion Gun]] to make the [[Space Battleship Yamato|Yamato]] green with envy.
* The Airship Captain in ''[[Nox]]'' is, well, [[The Captain]] of a [[Cool Airship]].
* Orgrim's Hammer and the Skybreaker, airships used by Horde and Alliance as bases of operation in Icecrown in the new expansion to ''[[World of Warcraft]]'' are pretty cool. The Hammer is a larger, more badass version of the zeppelins Horde uses for transportation, while the Skybreaker is essentially a large ship with propellers fitted on it (and kept aloft by [[Rule of Cool]] alone). Both of them participate in the siege on Icecrown Citadel.
** More ships of the same models appear in Deepholm in the ''Cataclysm'' expansion, the Horde's having been shot down when the Alliance's was taken over by cultists. ''Another'' Alliance airship is in the final battle with Deathwing, chasing him when he flees to the Maelstrom. It gets shot down and {{spoiler|crashes onto the Wandering Isle, bringing the peaceful Pandaren race into the Alliance/Horde war.}}
* ''[[Super Mario Bros 3 (Video Game)|Super Mario Bros 3]]'' has an airship run for the Koopalings' fortresses! It's also the source of [[Crowning Music of Awesome|one of the most epic themes in the series]].
** And of course, the airships
 
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