History Main / GiantFlyer

* ''WesternAnimation/TheLandBeforeTime'' [[FranchiseZombie VII]] features a Giant Flyer (really as that's what Pterosaurs are called in this verse) who was able to transport ''all of the characters'' off the top of a volcano just before it erupts. Certainly, there were some impressive Pterosaurs in real life. Not so sure if one would give a young sauropod a ride.

* A huge number of the monsters in the ''VideoGame/MonsterHunter'' series are of this nature, the two most recognizable ones being the [[OurDragonsAreDifferent Rathalos]] and [[DistaffCounterpart Rathian]]. They seldom spend much time flying at a height where you can't reach them, generally only doing it when they're moving between areas or for specific attacks. Otherwise, they're usually seen moving about on foot or with a low hover.
** The Elder Dragons of Monster Hunter take it to another level, being much larger than the common monster species and sometimes having a special ability to account for how they stay in the air. Notable examples who don't abide to the traditional winged approach include Valstrax of ''Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate'' who basically has a natural jet-propulsion system and ''Portable 3rd''[='=]'s Amatsu using its control over wind to hover and remain high in the clouds.

** In the sequel, ''VideoGame/OriAndTheWillOfTheWisps'', the BigBad Shriek is a giant [[AnimalisticAbomination demonic owl]] who was deformed by and lost her parents to [[TheCorruption the Decay]] that arose in the wake of [[FisherKing the Spirit Willow]]'s [[PlotTriggeringDeath passing]], and was [[AllOfTheOtherReindeer rejected by the other owls]] due to her twisted appearance, leading her to shun the light and embrace the darkness.

* ''Franchise/{{Superman}}'':

* ''Franchise/WonderWoman'':

* ''VideoGame/{{Sky}}: Children of the Light'': The Krill are giant, insectoid abominations that float through the final areas of the game, hunting down the player with their spotlight-esque EyeBeams.

* These exist in ''Manga/HunterXHunter''. There a scene in both Anime and Manga where it cuts to Ging, sitting on the back of giant frog. It pans out, and it shows that giant frog is on the back of [[UpToEleven a giant dragon,]] which takes off and flies off into the distance.

* ''Fanfic/ChristianHumberReloaded'': Season-Bringer is [[UpToEleven a particularly extreme example]]. He's a flying dragon that's 120,000 feet long, 18,000 feet wide, and weighs ''900 quadrillion tons''.

Not to be confused with large airplanes and airships; for those, see CoolPlane, CoolAirship, and UsefulNotes/PlaneSpotting.

* In ''Manga/{{Naruto}}'', there is the Seven-Tailed Demon Beetle, a [[MixAndMatchCritters cross]] between a 6-winged dragonfly (plus tail) and an armored rhinoceros beetle.

* Though it was a sparrow compared to the above mentioned pterosaurs, ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harpactognathus Harpactognathus]]'' is the largest known non-pterodactyloid pterosaur, with an estimated wingspan of eight feet. It's also thought to have acted something like a large bird of prey, making it similar in both size and behavior to a modern eagle.

* In ''LightNovel/IveBeenKillingSlimesForThreeHundredYearsAndMaxedOutMyLevel'', leviathans look like flying whales so massive that they can carry small towns on their backs, although most of the time they appear in their humanoid forms.

* ''VideoGame/HorizonZeroDawn'' has the Stormbird, a machine that looks like a giant, mechanical eagle. It's size is at least vaguely justified in that, being a machine, it has engines mounted on its wings that give a machine the size of a small house the power needed to fly. Also, its size may have had an in-universe purpose as well due to its original role in [[spoiler: detoxifying the Earth's atmosphere after the Faro plague -- there's likely all sorts of air-purification equipment in there]]. For Aloy though, its size and weaponry make it a boss fight by itself.

* The most commonly depicted pterosaur in popular culture, ''Pteranodon'', was pretty large as well, with an average wingspan of 4-6 metres. In fact, before the discoveries of ''Hatzegopteryx'' and ''Quetzalcoatlus'', it was considered the largest flying animal to have existed.[[note]]Fun fact: ''Pteranodon'' was so large that, before ''Quetzalcoatlus'' was discovered, it was believed that if a flying animal got any bigger than ''Pteranodon'' it would physically unable to fly at all.[[/note]]

** Some early estimates of ''Quetzalcoatlus'', based on incomplete skeletons and extrapolations from better-known pterosaur species, was even larger as it ranged up to 16-21m. Better understanding of the azhdarchids (the family of pterosaurs to which Quetzalocoatlus belonged) anatomy brought the estimates down as ScienceMarchesOn.

* The most commonly depicted pterosaur in popular culture: ''Pteranodon'', was pretty large as well, with an average wingspan of 4-6 metres (not quite as big as ''Quetzalcoatlus'' but still). In fact, [[ScienceMarchesOn before]] ''[[ScienceMarchesOn Hatzegopteryx]]'' [[ScienceMarchesOn came along]], ''Pteranodon'' was considered the second largest flying animal to have ever lived. And before ''Quetzalcoatlus'' was discovered, ''Pteranodon'' was considered the largest flying animal, ''of all time''[[note]]Fun fact: ''Pteranodon'' was so large, that before ''Quetzalcoatlus'' was discovered, it was believed that if a flying animal got any bigger than ''Pteranodon'' it would physically unable to fly at all[[/note]].

** Other modern birds with very large wingspans include the Steller's sea eagle (2.7 meters), the California condor (2.8 meters), the cinereous vulture (3 meters), the Andean condor (3 meters), the marabou stork (3 meters), the great white pelican (3.5 meters), and the southern royal albatross (3.6 meters).

* Bats are definitely the losers in the "real life giant flyer" competition, as even the largest living flying fox species' wingspan is 1.7 meters at most. Fossils of Eocene bats of approximately flying-fox-size have been found, but as yet there are no specimens with sufficient wing bones to tell us if they exceeded that scale. Weirdly enough, [[https://aeroevo.blogspot.com/2012/04/giant-flyers-to-limit-or-not.html studies on their morphology indicate that a bat could very well attain wingspans of at least 3 meters and still be capable of flight]].

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Epic}}'': ALL birds from Leafman perspective, but in particular the hummingbirds and crows which are actually used as mounts.

* Grown up shadow dragons from ''Manga/ShadowStar''.
* ''Franchise/YuGiOh'' Slifer The Sky Dragon, The Winged Dragon of Ra, and many others.

** The Elder Dragons of Monster Hunter take it to another level, being much larger than the common monster species and sometimes having a special ability to account for how they stay in the air. Notable examples include Valstrax of ''Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate'' basically having a natural jet-propulsion system and ''Tri''[='=]'s Amatsu using its control over wind to hover and remain high in the clouds.
** ''VideoGame/MonsterHunterRise'' also introduced Ibushi and Narwa, two enormous Elder Dragons who use special organs to generate strong wind currents (for Ibushi) or electromagnetic fields (for Narwa) which allow the two to remain airborne when their massive sizes would otherwise make it impossible.

* ''Series/MonsterWarriors'': The Warriors battle monstrous pterodactyls in "Pterodactyl Terror" and "The Secrets of the Lost Canyon". The inaccuracies are {{Justified}} is this case these are not supposed to be real pterodactyls, but creatures conjured out of an old monster movie by the series' BigBad.

* The Roc in ''Literature/TheThousandAndOneNights'' doesn't menace the hero of the story, but she is big enough to carry off an elephant.

* Film/{{Rodan}}, of ''Franchise/{{Godzilla}}'' fame, is a bit of an odd duck here as he's just as likely to fit into any one of the other categories, depending on the director's mood. More often than not, he's a good monster.
** There's Film/{{Mothra}}, especially in her "giant butterfly" form.
** Or Mothra's EvilTwin, [[Film/GodzillaAndMothraTheBattleForEarth Battra]].
** There's quite a few of these like King Ghidorah, [[Film/GodzillaVsDestoroyah Destoroyah]], [[Film/GodzillaVsHedorah Hedorah]] among others.
* The male Muto from ''Film/{{Godzilla 2014}}'' has a pair of enormous wings in place of one set of legs.
* Creator/RayHarryhausen was a big fan of this trope. (How's that for an animation challenge?) In addition to the Pterosaurs mentioned above:
** The two-headed Roc in ''Film/The7thVoyageOfSinbad''.
** The Harpies in ''Film/JasonAndTheArgonauts''.
** The one-headed Roc in ''Film/{{Clash of the Titans|1981}}''.
* It's unclear yet exactly ''how'' big he is due to limited points of comparison, but the [[Film/TheHobbit film]] incarnation of Smaug is ''enormous''. To put it into perspective, the Fell Beasts in ''Film/TheLordOfTheRings'' already have a wingspan as big as or bigger than a 747 jumbo jet. Smaug ''utterly dwarfs'' them.

* A more obscure example is ''[[http://www.reddwarf.co.uk/features/history/in-the-stocks/gappa-1l.jpg Gappa]]: The [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Triphibian]] Monster'', which was even used in a ''Series/RedDwarf'' [[Recap/RedDwarfSeasonIVMeltdown episode]].
* The dragons from ''Film/ReignOfFire'' qualify, especially the male.

* The short story "Literature/SafeAtAnySpeed" features the Roc, a gigantic alien bird large enough to swallow a car.
* A mother Roc and her chick appear in the short story "Selim, Shadows, and the Sea" by Pamela Love.

* The Thunderbirds and Piasa of Myth/NativeAmericanMythology, although the Piasa wasn't always this.
* The legend of the roc (a bird of prey big enough to carry elephants) might have been inspired by ostriches, since being huge and flightless they were thought to be the roc's chicks; a similar theory proposes the giant -- and extinct since the beginning of the second millennium -- elephant birds of Madagascar instead, formerly some of the biggest living birds on Earth and situated just at the edge of the known world of the Arabs.
* The Jewish version of the roc is known as the ziz. It's slightly less famous than the other two gigantic animals of Jewish lore, the behemoth and the leviathan.
** Luckily, Nintendo still did their research when they based the main legendary trio of ''VideoGame/PokemonRubyAndSapphire'' on these 3. Ironically, Rayquaza is probably now more well known than its inspiration.

* The Banshee in ''Pinball/{{Avatar}},'' as part of the "Ride the Banshee" mode. The Limited Edition game also has one on the playfield.

* At the end of the ''Podcast/CoolKidsTable'' game ''Small Magic'''s first arc, [[spoiler: Byrb the blue jay]] becomes one thanks to the Tenshi's magic.

* The Mighty Eagle in ''VideoGame/AngryBirds'', which will wipe out all the pigs in a level.

** The flying standard megabeasts, rocs and dragons. A newly-hatched roc is as big as a grizzly bear, and they eventually become as large as a whale shark. Dragons are even larger, growing to the same size as a sperm whale.

* Armaura, the BigBad featured in ''VideoGame/EagleIsland'', is a giant eagle deity.
* The main antagonists of ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim'' are large, ANGRY dragons. Much of the time spent fighting them will be trying to get away from them when they're in the air raining fire down on all the things.
* The Zu in the ''Franchise/FinalFantasy'' series. Lampshaded in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyX'' by Tidus if he encounters on in the desert around Home.
--> "How can a bird grow so big?"
* The Mountain Roc in ''VideoGame/GoldenSunDarkDawn'', which is a) large enough to carry off human prey when Amiti recalls indirectly encountering it as a child, b) large enough that the nation of Morgal worships it as a god, c) large enough to force the camera to zoom out during your boss fight against the damn thing (and you still don't get the whole thing on your screen), and d) large enough that its gizzard acts as a WombLevel, albeit a short one.

* ''VideoGame/ShadowOfTheColossus'': The Roc Colossus falls into this category as it does actively attack you once you shoot at it with arrows, whereas the Serpent pictured above simply flies around -- thank goodness, as by WordOfGod in the artbook, it's the longest colossus at 200 meters (656 ft.) long.

* Abyssgreymon from ''Transcendence: Digital Curse'' is a Super Ultimate digimon who is about the same size as a Sovereign. He is forced into servitude by the first villain of the series.
* The Shadow Roc in ''Fanfic/AGrowingAffection'', which is similar to the Tailed Beasts, allied with Orochimaru to gain control of his Jinchuriki. The Roc is described as being weaker than Shukaku, but so large all nine Beasts could ride on its back and have space between them.
* [[http://i.imgur.com/Xu27n1y.jpg Bahamut]] from ''Roleplay/LordsAmongTheAshes'' is an incredibly powerful [[{{Kaiju}} Titan]] that swims through the sky of [[DeathWorld the Dark Continent]] and, like the [[WebAnimaiton/{{RWBY}} Grimm]], [[KillAllHumans lusts for the death of all humans]].
* Season-Bringer in ''Fanfic/ChristianHumberReloaded'' is [[UpToEleven a particularly extreme example]]. He's a flying dragon that's 120,000 feet long, 18,000 feet wide, and weighs ''900 quadrillion tons''.

* In ''Roleplay/ThereIsNoGATEWeDidNotFightThere'', the titular King of the Sky from the interlude *The Myth, The Legend, The King of The Sky* is an enormous Thunderbird composed of storm channels, blotting out the entire sky. Kytheus compares its size to that of the earth dragon his grandfather had slain before his birth, and whose bones have the ''main city of the Rhavenfell built into them.''

* In ''VideoGame/Haven2020'', Yu and Kay meet an insectoid flyer that they name Birble and can use for [[WarpWhistle fast travel to previously cleared Islets]]. Shortly afterwards, they discover another individual of the same species, known as Katefulai, who transports them to an otherwise inaccessible set of islets in the swamp region of Source.

* In the cancelled ''VideoGame/{{Shantae}}'' game for the UsefulNotes/GameBoyAdvance, ''[[http://www.twitch.tv/wayforwardtv/b/467113071 Risky Revolution]]'', Sky's bird, Wrench, was going to be revealed as having grown really big in the period after the first game, and would have served as the GlobalAirship for Shantae. Played straight in ''Half-Genie Hero,'' where Wrench serves as Shantae's transport between levels.