Final Battle

The first time, the Rebels won. The next time, the Empire won. This time, there won't be a next time.^{"Are you really sure?"}Well, probably. Or afterwards. Maybe?^note But first, let’s go back in time. Maybe skip a few years. That’s better, but...

"Archers in your arches:
Raise your fingers for one last salute
And bleed this skyline dry.
Your history is mine".

— Funeral for a Friend, "History"

The Fight Scene on steroids, and the perfect climax to the Action Story: the forces of Good and the forces of Evil lock swords one last time. Everything the heroes have fought for hangs on the outcome of this fight. Consequently, the heroes (and sometimes the villains) throw everything they have into winning the Final Battle.

Often, the battle itself is the object, and, other times, the battle is merely a diversion: a Supporting Leader leads the army of Good into battle so the real heroes can sneak behind the Army of Evil's back to infiltrate the Supervillain Lair and destroy the Artifact of Doom or engage the Big Bad. Oddly enough, the real heroes' success often coincides with (or even causes) their allies' victory in the larger battle.

Expect Gondor to call for aid beforehand. Expect The Cavalry and/or the Big Damn Heroes to make their big damn entrance. Expect someone to say "This Is Something He's Got to Do Himself," or "Leave Him to Me!" (possibly followed by a Foe-Tossing Charge). And above all, expect the "Holy Shit!" Quotient to reach previously unheard-of heights.

If the story intends to have an "Everybody Dies" Ending, this is where most of them will die. If they were already killed, they may get brought back for a Climactic Battle Resurrection. For an extra-chaotic battle, make it a Mêlée à Trois (or even more than that).

Sometimes a Final Battle is rendered not-so-final by the events of the sequels and/or later seasons. On the other hand, if it's the Grand Finale of a particularly long series, the Final Battle can serve as a kind of retrospective; all manner of characters from previous books or seasons will show up to participate, allowing the audience to remember all the many stories that led up to this moment.

In Video Games, this overlaps with The Very Definitely Final Dungeon and the Final Boss. The Space Opera relies on the Space Battle, which can include this or show up at the beginning or middle of the show.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• Attack on Titan: The final battle, referred to in-series as "the Battle of Heaven and Earth", sees Armin, Mikasa, and what is left of their friends and enemies against Eren, who has used the power of the Founding Titan to command thousands of Colossal Titans to march forward and destroy the world outside of the Walls. The battles takes place on Eren's enormous titan form as the heroes try to defend humanity's last stronghold and stop the Rumbling.
• Bleach has the Thousand Year Blood War, the final conflict between the Gotei 13 and the Vandenreich (who previously fought together a 1,000 years prior to the series). If you want to be a bit more specific, you have the final fight between Ichigo and Yhwach, where Aizen and Uryu of all people actually help Ichigo in taking the evil Quincy monarch down.
• Subverted somewhat in the manga finale for Chrono Crusade. There are several important battles and victories leading up to Chrono and Aion's fight in the final two volumes—which covers just two consecutive days. However, when the time comes for the final battle, the perspective cuts away right before the first blows are exchanged, and we're never fully given the details of what happened.
• Code Geass plays with this trope as when Lelouch uses his army as a diversion while he singlehandedly attacks Cornelia in the last episode of season 1. The playing part comes when Lelouch does win but his army's losing the battle. However, upon closer look, he won the battle, but he did fail his objective, both in knowing who killed Marianne and taking Cornelia hostage.
  • The actual final battle kicked off with a showdown between Suzaku and Kallen, Lelouch and Nunnally of all people, over control of the nuclear death platform Damocles, and ended with Kallen destroying the Lancelot, but having her Guren disabled, and Lelouch victorious, having taken over the world by shedding his principles and wresting control of the nuclear death platform from Nunnaly via Geass. However, (besides Orange-kun) he has won at the price of losing everyone who loved and respected him. The viewer is left wondering how this is really his victory, especially since the world loathes him for the atrocities he has done in the name of "justice"; then the actual conclusion occurs, showing his tear-jerking triumph over the Crapsack World he was born in.
• Episode 26 of Cowboy Bebop, "The Real Folk Blues (Part 2)", is the Final Battle against the entire Red Dragon and Vicious. Both Spike and Vicious fall in the final showdown.
• Danganronpa 3: The brainwashed Future Foundation vs the Remnants of Despair.
• Though the fights between Goku and Frieza then Gohan and Cell could be considered examples, the ultimate final battle of Dragon Ball Z and by extension, the original Dragon Ball manga, is Goku and Vegeta vs. Kid Buu in the Sacred World of the Kai, with Goku's Super Spirit Bomb being the climatic event to end all climatic events.
• Eyeshield 21: Team America vs. Team Japan. They even went into overtime despite the tournament holder's orders. According to the ending, America won.
• Fairy Tail culminates in Natsu's showdown with Zeref, followed immediately by Natsu working with the other Dragon Slayers to destroy Acnologia's spirit in the Space Between of Time, while Lucy leads all the other wizards in keeping his rampaging body from destroying the world.
• For Fullmetal Alchemist, the The Promised Day arc, one that began after a months-long timeskip during which both sides prepared for the crux of the Big Bad's plan to resolve, appears to be the final Arc. Starting at Chapter 84, it eventually rolled up ALL the characters into a giant katamari of awesomeness.
  • The penultimate chapter (107) is even titled "The Final Battle".
• The final battle of Inuyasha takes place inside Naraku when he transformed into a giant, floating spider.
• Kemurikusa has Rin and Wakaba with Riku, Ryo and Ryoku joining midway trough against The Red Tree.
• In Kill la Kill the final episode has Ryuko using the power of her friends uniforms to defeat Ragyo to save the planet from the Life-Fibers.
• Episode 25 (actually the third episode) of the Kujibiki♡Unbalance OVA makes several references to the upcoming final battle of the Kujibiki tournament to decide the next student council. The episode cuts off just before we hear the actual rules of the battle.
• Macross:
  • Subverted in Super Dimension Fortress Macross, where the story continues for 10 more episodes after the final battle, showing the aftermath of the war as well as the fact that all isn't well yet.
  • Macross Frontier's final battle takes place above the Vajra homeworld, which most definitely raised the stakes to fit the bill.
• The Final Battle on each series of the Mazinger trilogy varies depending on if we are discussing the Go Nagai manga, the anime series or the Gosaku Ota manga:
  • Mazinger Z: Mazinger Z had two battles at the end of the series. At the final of the anime series, the main characters located Dr. Hell's Supervillain Lair at last. Quickly they began to make preparations for the final battle, but Hell used a last scheme to hinder them as he completed his own preparations. Mazinger-Z, Venus A and Boss Borot stormed Hell's Island, supported by the Japanese army, but Dr. Hell sent against them his last Mechanical Beasts. The three Humongous Mecha got severely trashed, but Mazinger-Z could still work. Kouji stormed the base, destroying and blowing up all what he saw. Hell set his Lair to self-destruct and he and Brocken tried to flee on the aerial fortress Guru. However, Mazinger-Z chased them and they faced off for last time on an aerial battle over the ocean. It was subverted, though, since all of it happened in the second-to-last episode, and the narration -and the scenes involving a smug Gorgon- warned the last episode would be NOT a happy day. The events were very different on the Go Nagai manga (Hell attacked first, deploying several dozens of Mechanical Beasts at once to invade Japan. Ashura and Brocken coordinated their squads in the assault, and the Japanese army used Mass-Production Mazingers against Hell. Finally, Kouji and Sayaka fought alone against the Island of Hell, what had transformed into a humongous Humongous Mecha). The Gosaku Ota episodes are similar to the anime, but Gorgon makes his move while Kouji is storming the base. He goads his Warrior Monsters against Mazinger-Z and backstabs Hell when he is distracted before leaving the base. Enraged and dying, Hell pulls a lever. Hell's Island takes off and flies towards the Institute to crash on it. However, Great Mazinger arrives, defeats the Mykene Beasts, fetches a defeated Mazinger-Z and runs away with it. Meanwhile, the battle has altered the course of the island, and it floats upwards, leaving the atmosphere and losing itself in the space...
  • Great Mazinger: In the anime version, Great Marshall of Darkness sent several Warrior Monsters to attack the Photon Energy Research Institute as Demonika -his Cool Airship- stealthily approached the Fortress of Science. Kouji fought a powerful Warrior Beast but Tetsuya (who was irrationally jealous) refused to sortie to help him. Finally he deployed Great Mazinger, and Great Marshall chose that moment to attack. A Warrior Monster attacked Tetsuya as Demonika started bombarding the Fortress. Tetsuya was easily shot down and cut off reinforcements. Dr. Kabuto then commited a Heroic Sacrifice to save him. After retrieving his corpse, Mazinger-Z, Great Mazinger, Venus A and Diana A regrouped and attacked Demonika together, blowing the Mykene army up to Hell. The manga versions are similar, but there is a very important difference in the Gosaku Ota version: Tetsuya commited Heroic Sacrifice, self-detonating Great Mazinger to destroy Demonika and the Mykene army.
  • UFO Robo Grendizer: In the anime version, after his daughter got murdered, King Vega decided he had got it: he had wasted military resources trying take over Earth as planet Vega imploded and everyting he had managed was using up their resources, running out of Robeasts, and losing his commanders, his best soldiers and his daughter. So he ordered his troops to destroy their Space Base to hammer in them the idea of they now had no choice but conquering Earth or die, and he launched a full attack with the remnants of his army. Meanwhile, Duke took off in Grendizer and Kouji, Hikaru and Maria on a new starship. Both sides fought in the space, between Earth and Moon. The Vegan army was finally destroyed in the final confrontation, and Duke killed King Vega. The Go Nagai manga version had no a definite ending, but the Gosaku Ota version did it, and the final was very different from the anime series. Things went From Bad to Worse. Like in The End of the World as We Know It worse.
• Any of the Mobile Suit Gundam series. From the original all the way to Mobile Suit Gundam 00, each series has concluded with an awesome final battle between the most powerful mobile suits and pilots.
  • The first show, Mobile Suit Gundam, subverts this to an extent, as the final battle of the series (the battle of A Baoa Qu) happens after the war has already turned in The Federation's favor. The deciding battles of the war happened at Odessa and Solomon Base, A Baoa Qu was Zeon's Last Stand before surrendering.
  • Mobile Suit Gundam Wing, like many others, gets away with a little title lampshading. The actual Final Battle takes up the last four episodes of the series, and the episode immediately before it begins is actually called "Signs of the Final Battle".
  • Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans features another unique twist on this trope. The heroes already fought the deciding battle against Gjallarhorn five episodes ago and lost. The battle that happens in the finale is Tekkadan fighting to hold off the enemy forces and buy time for the rest of their members to get to safety before Gjallarhorn closes in.
• Naruto:
  • Our hero himself fights a noteworthy one against Pain at the end of the Invasion of Pain arc. It results in a clash of ideals, Weapon of Mass Destruction spam and a long drawn out battle.
  • The last few arcs before Naruto's final duel with Sasuke is basically one giant battle between the Allied Shinobi Forces and Akatsuki, with almost every notable character (even the dead ones) making a reappearance, and which ends with Team 7 taking on the immortal being responsible for Akatsuki's very existence.
  • And of course, there is the epic final battle itself between Naruto and Sasuke.
  • For the entire series, one might say that the true final battle occurs in the final canon movie when Naruto, the other current kages, Sasuke, and Boruto face off against Momoshiki and Kinshiki which culminates in the final phase where Naruto, Sasuke, and Boruto battle against an empowered Momoshiki.
• Neon Genesis Evangelion: After the death of the seventeenth Angel, SEELE launches its final assault upon NERV. The army killed hundreds of people as Misato shoves a relunctant Shinji towards the cages and Asuka fights for her life the army and the MP-Evas.
  • Rebuild of Evangelion: The third act of 3.0+1.0 had Operation Yamato, which is Misato and her organization WILLE's last ditch effort to stop NERV from carrying out Instrumentality. However, the true final conflict of the movie (and by extension, the entire franchise) is a Battle in the Center of the Mind between Shinji/EVA-01 and Gendo/EVA-13 within the Golgotha Object in the Anti-Universe.
• The end of Overman King Gainer has the forces of the Yapan Exodus including the mechanics taking on the Overdevil and the Brainwashed and Crazy Gainer, Sara, and Cynthia in battle.
• Princess Tutu ends with a Final Battle that involves lots of dancing, ravens, and the occasional sword. Given the rest of the series it's not a surprise, but it's taken to an epic level.
• Rurouni Kenshin: The Kenshin Gumi along with Aoshi, Misao and Saitou go to Enishi's island to rescue Kaoru. Once there, it's Aoshi, Yahiko, Sanosuke and Saitou vs. Enishi's four henchmen and, of course, Kenshin vs. Enishi. And before that in the Kyoto Arc, we had Kenshin vs. Shishio for the Final battle of that particular arc.
• Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie has Ryu and Ken battle M. Bison, showcasing how powerful all three are. It was a battle so epic, it's turned into an extra fight in Street Fighter Alpha.
• Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. The final battle involves the heroes fighting the Anti-Spiral in a pocket universe, using the titular Mecha/Energy Being. Both sides are powerful enough to use galaxies as mechas.
• Yu-Gi-Oh! varies in regards to these, depending on the series due to the arc structure:
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! has the final battle against Zorc Necrophades in the Memory World; a recreation of the battle that took place in the past and ended with both Zorc and the Pharaoh having their memories sealed in the Millennium Puzzle, with series Greater-Scope Villain Yami Bakura aiming to ensure that Zorc wins this time and is reborn in the modern world.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V has the final battle against Zarc after Yuya absorbs his counterparts and revives him, resulting in almost every prominent supporting character taking Zarc on in a single duel where Zarc acts like a Raid Boss.
• In YuYu Hakusho, the final arc is the Three Kings saga, and the last fight the main characters are involved in is Yusuke vs. Yomi in the Demon World Tournament. Yomi wins but loses the fight after that.

Comic Books

• Shakara: Shakara with his little ship vs. the entire Hierarchy armada as he's racing to stop the Big Bad from activating his Doomsday Device in time. He uses a World Engine in his possession to turn an entire planet into a spaceship, destroying the entire enemy fleet in one go.
• Infinite Crisis ends with a climatic brawl in Metropolis between all the villains and all the heroes.
• Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics)
  • Sonic had his final showdown with original Big Bad Doctor Robotnik at the climax of the seminal "Endgame" story arc. It ended with Robotnik being disintegrated due to sabotage of his Doomsday Device by Snively (the Robotnik/Eggman who's been in the comic since is a doppleganger from an Alternate Universe who took his counterpart's place).
  • The Scourge arc ended with a final battle to stop Scourge after he goes super which involves the Freedom Fighters, their alternate universe evil counterparts, Silver, Shadow, Metal Sonic and Amy's cousin, Rob O the Hedge teaming up after he goes super from Anarchy Beryls.
  • The Iron Dominion arc ends with Sonic, Sally, Tails and Monkey Khan arriving at new Robotropolios to reclaim it against the Iron Queen which sees all her allied forces dismantled (either through code of honor, force or cowardice) before finally fighting her directly.
  • The Worlds Collide crossover ended with Super Sonic and a Super infused Adapter Mega Man taking on Willy and Eggman in their Wily Egg mech.
  • The Worlds Unite crossover ended with various Sega and Capcom worlds fighting against Sigma's forces and concludes with a showdown between Super Sonic and Adapter Mega Man against Sigma-3.
  • The Shattered World arc (aka the Sonic Unleashed adaptation) ended with a short final battle between Eggman and Super Sonic alongside a Chip-controlled Gaia Colossus against Perfect Dark Gaia. And due to the series being cancelled immediately afterwards, it also serves as the final battle of the whole comic.
• Blaze of Glory ends with Clay Riley leading the nightriders into an all-out attack on Wonderment while our heroes do their best to drive him back, even if they have to die trying.
• The Ultimates: Herr Kleiser lost all his clothes in an explosion, the world is about to blow up, but he won't go out before he could force Captain America to surrender.
• Kingdom Come: The Rogues break out from the Gulag, the Justice League answers the call with anger until The Outsiders arrive to try to stop everyone from killing each other; it balloons into a battle that can consume the Earth, so the joint powers of humanity decide to nuke all fighters out of existence; the only two people that can stop the nuke are fighting each other; the nuke drops with the bomber asking for forgiveness for killing the heroes of the Earth; Captain Marvel emerges from his brainwashing to give a few seconds window to the people below; he triggers the bomb before the payload is deployed, allowing a handful to survive... though they are all dead to Superman's eyes... and he's pissed.
• Legion of Super-Heroes storyline The Great Darkness Saga ends with the Legion travelling to Daxam to fight Darkseid as their allies hold back an army of brainwashed Daxamites.

Fan Works

• Abraxas (Hrodvitnon): This occurs over the course of the lengthy penultimate chapter; and frankly it is epic. It sees Monster X, Godzilla, Mothra, Thor, Rodan and other hero-aligned Titans together with Monarch and the Russian military take on the partly-resurrected Keizer Ghidorah and MaNi/Elder Brother in the Ghost City of Berezniki. The author herself described it as being like its own miniature kaiju movie.
• Oh-so-averted in With Strings Attached, as the anticlimactic final battle lasts about thirty seconds and is depicted entirely in sound effects. The spellcasters in the warehouse are massively outgunned, having completely underestimated their opposition and been tricked by Paul and George to boot. (The real final battle was John and Ringo's struggle to get into the warehouse in the first place. Afterward, well....)
• Higher Learning: After Tabris' death, the JSSDF invasion happens. Misato must guide Shinji and a depressed Asuka to the Eva's cages, and both teenagers must fight the final battle against the MP-Evas together with Touji. Kaoru and Kaji join them riding Unit-04.
• My Little Avengers ends with the Avengers Storming the Castle (literally, as the villains have occupied the royal palace); while Big Mac goes after Loki personally (regaining Thor's powers along the way), the other Avengers seek out their Dark Avenger counterparts (though they make sure to Opponent Switch, so the Dark Avengers can't overpower them, like their previous fight).
• Ace Combat: The Equestrian War has chapter 19 and the battle in The Valley of Kings. Mobius defeats Echo, Firefly beats Black Star and he tells her the reasons behind Red Cyclone's thinking. Meanwhile, the other ponies fight the griffins off, the Mirage squadron destroys Fortress Intimidation Red Cyclone along with it. But there is still one more opponent left...
• Inner Demons has a two-part final battle. The first part occurs when the bearers of the Elements of Harmony and their allies storm into Tartarus in order to confront Queen!Twilight and purify her with the Elements. The second part kicks off when they succeed in doing so, only for the Darkness forced out of Twilight's body to take on a life of its own; circumstances lead to Twilight and Apple Bloom having to face it on their own.
• The Immortal Game has the Battle of the Everfree, as the Loyalists assault the Citadel in the heart of the titular forest in order to defeat Titan once and for all.
  • Though the actual final duel between Twilight and Titan ends up being fought in the ruins of Canterlot.
• The My Hostage, Not Yours series:
  • My Hostage, Not Yours: Subverted, since Zim deals with the Valkians without a fight, and their fight with the Irkens is a Curb-Stomp Battle in the Irkens' favor.
  • The Revenge of Player 2: The attack on Iggins' lair.
  • The Inevitable Takeover: The Swollen Eyeballs' assault on Zim's European base.
• In Perfection Is Overrated, the Himes confront The Usurper who is also possessing the Obsidian Lord, the last two SUEs, a brainwashed Mikoto, and Nagi and the Orphans at his command.
• In the Pony POV Series, the Dark World — which grew to the point of being declared a spinoff, with its own Story Arcs — has the End of Days Arc, which has the Dark World!Elements of Harmony finally confront Discord... only for him to turn out to be a puppet of true Big Bad, Nightmare Eclipse/Paradox, Twilight's potential self. This leads to massive, multi-chapter fight, eventually including several Eleventh Hour Rangers (Rainbow Dash, the Princesses, and Minty Pie) and a group of surprise Co-Dragons in the form of Nightmares of all the Mane Six (excluding Rarity, who's replaced by Spike). To say it's epic doesn't do it justice.
  • Back in the main series, there are also the final confrontations with the first two Big Bads, Loneliness and Princess Gaia/Nightmare Whisper.
  • The Shining Armor Arc has Shining — backed by Misfit Actual and Gilda — confronting Makarov one last time in the middle of a Big Badass Battle Sequence between their respective forces for the sake of the world. And since Makarov is a Large Ham Reality Warper, the whole thing plays out like a Final Boss battle in a videogame.
    • Then it turns out that Makarov was just the Disc-One Final Boss. The actual final battle occurs a few chapters later, when Shining and Cadence fight together to defeat the Blank Wolf and finally secure Shining's right to exist.
  • The Wedding Arc's final battle kicks off when Cadence and the Mane Six lead their army of allies (drawn from their friends and the citizens of Canterlot) in an assault on the castle, where Chrysalis and her remaining minions have barricaded themselves. This all leads to the actual final conflict of the arc, a duel between Cadence and Chrysalis (in her true Cadenza form) for control of the changelings.
  • A flashback episode posted after the Wedding Arc's conclusion shows the final conflict of the Age of Myths (the G1 era), where the G1 Mane Cast united all their various allies for a final confrontation with Hydia and her entire evil family, which grew so desperate that they unleashed Lilith, the First Witch to fight for them.
• The Azula Trilogy has the Battle of the Earth Kingdom Royal Palace in Soul of Fire, with three notable mini-battles ocurring roughly simultaenously: Zuko and Mai vs. Xang, Katara vs. Ilook, and Aang and Azula vs. Zhan Zheng.
• Shadows Awakening has its final battle play out in Chapter 14, as The Queen — who emerged from the Big Bad Ensemble as the main threat — launches a full-scale assault on San Francisco in order to lure out the heroes for one final confrontation.
• Aurora (PonyholicsAnonymous): The final battle is in Chapter 7, where Celestia, Luna, and Twilight lead the Royal Guard and their dragon allies against the Big Bad's army of Eldritch Abominations in the ruins of Canterlot
• The God Empress of Ponykind; after defeating the Forces of Chaos at Canterlot, Celestia travels to Everfree Castle for a final Duel to the Death against Nightmare Moon/Tzeentch.
• The Tangled Princess Bride. When you have a castle wide battle including representative from almost every Disney Animation Canon film and from other Disney shows and movies, It's gonna rock.
• Saetwo's Story has the Battle of Bubblewonder Abyss, wherein the Zoombinis and the friends they've made over their journey have a final showdown with the Fleens. When Romelau suffers a Disney Villain Death, the other Fleens immediately call off the fight and flee.
• Child of the Storm has a sprawling final battle which takes four entire chapters to tell. It starts when Excalibur, the Shadow Initiative (an emergency backup team of heroes Nick Fury secretly put together), the remaining Avengers, and Harry's proto-team of young heroes storm HYDRA headquarters in London in order to finally put an end to them and rescue the Avengers who were captured. And then Chthon manifests during the chaos, breaking down the barriers of reality and unleashing Hell on Earth, further spreading the fighting. This all culminates when Chthon tries to possess Harry, leading to a Battle in the Center of the Mind, wherein Harry, with the help of his parents (Lily manifesting through the Phoenix) casts Chthon out and burns his presence out of reality.
• Young Justice: Darkness Falls features one with the entire league and team fighting across the earth (and beyond) to save the world from Darkseid and Klarion.
• The Elements of Harmony and the Savior of Worlds begins its final battle in chapter 29 when Tirac comes out of hiding and reveals himself as the Big Bad, launching attacks on Ponyville and Canterlot. It ends in chapter 36 with him facing down the Mane Six and Megan in the throne room of the Castle of the Two Sisters.
• In Ages of Shadow, Chapter 6 features the final showdown between Trace and Jade, in a game of Yade Khan for control of the Sun Souls (and thus the power to either permanently seal Jade or let her conquer the world). When Jade is forced to cheat to win, it turns into a straight up magic duel, which ends with the combined Sun Souls locking her away for good.
• Earth's Alien History has a few examples, due to having several War Arcs:
  • The Battle of the Citadel effectively serves as this for the Mekon War. While there are a few more skirmishes with the Romulans and Gamilas afterwards, with the Mekon out of the picture and the Citadel recaptured by allied forces, his partners soon sue for peace.
  • Operation Harrowing essentially serves as this for the Vinn War, as it proves that the Daisy Cutter weapon can wipe out the Vinn in mass, bringing them to the negotiation table and bringing about a ceasefire.
  • The Final Offensive (most notably the Second Battle of Sol) serves as this for the Reaper War, as it breaks the Reapers' back and sends the survivors fleeing from the galaxy. Though technically, the actual final conflict of the war is the allied expeditionary force (which was launched years earlier) reaching and assaulting the Reapers' base in Dark Space.
  • The Battle of Hyrillka is this for the Revenant Crisis, as the rouge Decepticon-Klikiss alliance is left completely broken afterwards and unable to keep up their campaign.
• Queen of All Oni starts off its climax with Jade launching Operation Endgame, a full assault on Section 13 in order to break the masks and free the other Generals. This then leads into Jade freeing Tarakudo and the two coming to blows over control of the Shadowkhan. Simultaneously to this, in Jade's Mental World, Father (the Aspect of Jackie's influence) leads a final desperate gamble to free Jade's mind and soul from the influence of the Queen.
• An Empire of Ice and Fire uses a major battle to close out each of its major storylines:
  • An expanded version of the Battle of the Bastards (which sees Tyrell and Tully loyalists on Jon's side and the Freys on the Boltons' side) closes out the first part of the story and ends the early threat of the Villain Team-Up between Ramsay and Viserys.
  • The Battle of the Coastroad sees Jon leading the Targaryen Empire's forces in Essos in a final showdown with the Slavers Alliance, breaking the power of the Slaver Cities and ending that whole theatre of conflict for the rest of the story.
  • The Battle of King's Landing features Jon leading all his forces in an invasion of the capital to finally overthrow Joffrey's regime and unify Westeros to face the threat of the White Walkers.
  • The Battle of Winterfell is the final conflict of the whole story, as the combined forces of the Targaryen Empire make a Last Stand at Winterfell against the Night King and the Army of the Dead.
• The boxing fic Eight Count culminates in a title bout between Harley Quinn and defending champion Kate Kane.
• Guide To Recent Equestrian History:
  • The Second Battle of Ponyville. Final battle fought between the Equestrian Resistance Alliance and Discord and his Changeling minions. Brought down the Reign of Discord.
  • The Second Battle of Las Pegasus: Massive battle between the Armies of Equestria and the Changelings controlling Las Pegasus. End of any meaningful threat posed by the Changelings for over a thousand years.
• Hellsister Trilogy: At the climax of "The Apokolips Agenda", most of DC heroes are battling an army of super-villains to stop Darkseid from speaking the Anti-Life Equation and enslave the universe. Although the main heroes are easily beaten by Darkseid, Orion succeeds in killing him off. Maybe.
  The Phantom Stranger: There are champions I have aided, some years before, in a matter not unlike this. Now, I need even more aid than before. Should the forces of Darkseid prevail, even your kind may not be immune.
  Destruction: Darkseid. Again?
  Phantom Stranger: Again. But this must be the last time. For good, or for ill.
• In How Hogwarts Became a Nudist Colony, Harry and Voldemort are forced to fight the Final Battle with giant spoons, causing Voldemort to say "Potter, I will spoon you to death if it's the last thing I ever do."
• Kara of Rokyn: In "Last Walz with Luthor", the Justice League come together to fight Lex Luthor and his super-powered cronies for Superman's life. At the end, Lex dies while attempting to kill Superman, and Superman notes sadly their endless dance has finally concluded.
  Superman: Lex and I, we've done a strange dance for thirty years or so. I'm not sure who was leading, most of the time. We always wondered how long the dance would last. Now, I know. Lex Luthor and I... we've just had our last waltz, Lois.
• A New Hope (Final Fantasy VII): Cloud has his last battle with Sephiroth after his wedding. It almost kills him.
• For the Glory of Irk has its final conflict in Chapter 63, when the heroes finally confront Xia and Control Brain IX aboard the Massive.
• Becoming a True Invader has Zim's group's showdown with the Employer and Tak aboard their wrecked ship in the ruins of Irk, while their allies fight off the Employer's remaining soldiers.
• In A different weasel makes a difference, follows similar to An Empire of Ice and Fire with different final battles for different climaxes.
  • Downplayed with The Second Battle of King's Landing/The Battle of the Four Armies. The Lannister cause is completely destroyed, and Robb achieves all of his objectives (he didn't want to conquer the entire seven kingdoms after all), so the Starks and Tullys withdraw from the rest of the war. The other factions however keep fighting, the Martells and Aegon haven't even joined yet, leading to:
  • The Battle of Highgarden (also known as the Doom of Kings) is the true final battle of the War of the Eight Kings.
  • Interestingly played with for the Long Night. The Battle of the Bloody Gate (also known as the Battle of the Last Alliance) is acknowledged as the battle that will one way or another decide the war. Humanity wins and the Night's Queen is killed...but since the Others aren't a Keystone Army that doesn't actually end the war.
  • A few days later the Others' Iceberg Fleet is destroyed, and this is dubbed 'the Last Battle' as it was the last largescale engagement between humanity and the Others.
  • Even then, reclaiming the North still needs to happen. Officially, the retaking of Last Hearth is considered the last battle of the War.
• Frozen Turtles: The climax of Into the Unknown features the Turtles and Elsa's final confrontation with Shredder, in the palace he's created in the corrupted Ahtohallan, while their allies face off with his minions in the Enchanted Forest. It ends with Shredder's death and his minions fleeing.
• Code Prime: The second story, R2: Revolution, climaxes with the final showdown with Megatron. While the rest of the Autobot-Black Knight alliance takes on Megatron's remaining loyalists and Terrorcons by assaulting Darkmount, Optimus, Bumblebee, Lelouch, and Suzaku chase Megatron himself into C's World to stop him from enacting Neo-Ragnarök. This fight culminates with Lelouch being killed by Megatron, but being revived by the Primes as Zero Prime and ultimately killing Megatron.
• Tarkin's Fist: The decisive Battle on the Ares carried out by Task Force Odysseus determines the outcome of the Empire-Earth War. Mutually Assured Destruction is narrowly avoided, and the war ends in a tenuous ceasefire.

Films — Animated

• The Lion King (1994) features the battle of Pride Rock, with Scar and his Hyenas fighting a pitched battle against Simba and his allies, culminating all the way with an extremely brutal, gruesome Battle Amongst the Flames between Simba and Scar.
• Tarzan has the pitched jungle fight between Clayton and his forces against Tarzan and his allies.
• The Powerpuff Girls Movie climaxes in a final battle between the girls and a monstrous Mojo Jojo (who had become monstrous from Chemical X), as the girls, defeated and captured, are entreated to join Mojo as the outcasts Townsville saw them as and as he himself saw until the girls reach an epiphany that they have to fight what Mojo has become.
• Yellow Submarine had two climactic battles. The originally released version had the Beatles freeing Sgt. Pepper's band from the big glass ball with the Meanies in retreat from the incursion of color and positivism leading to the Boob's confrontation with the Chief Blue Meanie. The 1999 re-release (re-re-released in 2012) features a segment that was animated but unused, with the Beatles and Sgt. Pepper's Band discussing the situation and flummoxing the Meanies' multi-headed dog (featuring the song "Hey Bulldog"), then leading into the Boob and the Chief Meanie.
• Invader Zim: Enter the Florpus climaxes with the whole Membrane family fighting Zim and his army of Mecha-Mooks for control of Minimoose, who is the key to teleporting Earth back to its proper location before the world is destroyed by either the Irken Armada or the Florpus.
• Trollhunters: Rise of the Titans: The surviving heroes face-off with Bellroc and her Fire Titan order to prevent her from using the Hearthstone to destroy the world.

Films — Live-Action

• Parodied, like everthing else, Blazing Saddles; the big brawl at the end of the film gets so wild it spills off the movie set into the rest of Hollywood!
• DC Extended Universe:
  • Man of Steel: Big time with Zod, ends with Superman twisting Zod's neck 180 degrees.
  • Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice ends with Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman taking on Doomsday.
  • Suicide Squad (2016) has the Squad's assault on Enchantress' lair to stop her from destroying the world.
  • Wonder Woman (2017) has Diana's showdown with Ares at the German air base.
  • Justice League (2017) has the League fighting Steppenwolf and his army of Parademons to stop the conversion of Earth.
    • Zack Snyder's Justice League: The battle is longer, more dramatic, richer in action setpieces and more epic than in the above theatrical cut.
  • Aquaman (2018): Interestingly, the film's main hero doesn't take part to it on the ground alongside a particular side, and rather comes in to end it. More specifically, Aquaman shows up riding Karathen. Karathen's arrival surely does some damage to the Brine army, but Aquaman has no specific connection to them and primarily attacks Orm's army with creatures of the sea to stop his folly. That said though, the deciding factor is a rematch between Arthur and Orm, this time on the surface of the ocean aboard one of the warships.
  • SHAZAM! (2019): Billy shares his powers with his foster siblings, allowing them all to team up against Sivana and the Seven Sins.
  • Birds of Prey (2020): Harley, Cassandra, Renee, Dinah, and Helena all have to team up in order to survive as Sionis sends his entire army of Mooks after them in the abandoned amusement park they all ended up in.
  • Wonder Woman 1984: Diana facing off against Cheetah, followed by her trying to stop Maxwell Lord from trying to use his wishes to destroy the world.
  • The Suicide Squad: Starro the Conqueror escapes captivity and goes on a rampage, leaving the Squad members to throw everything they have at it.
  • Black Adam: Teth-Adam and the Justice Society face off with SABBAC, while Adrianna leads the people of Kahndaq against the latter's demonic armies.
  • SHAZAM! Fury of the Gods: Billy/Shazam fighting against Kalypso and Ladon at Citizen's Bank Park to stop her from using the Golden Apple to destroy the world.
  • The Flash: The two Flashes, Supergirl and Batman fight Zod and his army to save Earth. Or not. This battle is doomed to be a Zod victory no matter what happens. The actual final confrontation is Prime Barry and Alternate Barry against Dark Flash, within the Speedforce.
  • Blue Beetle: The Reyes family and Jenny Storming the Castle in order to rescue Jaime, followed by the latter facing off with an upgraded OMAC.
• In Enter the Dragon, this is the key sign the film was made in China. Han's mooks are in white gi, while the freed prisoners are in black robes. It is an inversion of the Western convention of Good Colors, Evil Colors.
• In all three Fallen movies:
  • Olympus Has Fallen climaxes with a fistfight between Mike and Kang.
  • London Has Fallen involves Banning along with a team of SAS and Delta Force commandos attacking a heavily fortified terrorist hideout at the end of the movie.
  • Angel Has Fallen has Wade and his mercenaries making another attempt on Trumbull's life, with only Mike and a small security detail standing between them, eventually culminating in a Duel to the Death between Mike and Wade.
• The Fast and the Furious series has a few of them. The first two movies weren't really battles so much as final encounters with the villains that ends fairly quickly. Heck The Fast and the Furious (2001) was more a race between Dom and Bryan to see if Dom goes free. Past the second movie however...
  • The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift ends with in a one on one drift race between Sean and Takashi on a mountain road.
  • Fast & Furious had Dom and Bryan trying to outrun Braga's henchmen while trying to deliver Braga himself to authorities across the Mexican border.
  • Fast Five had the crew trying to outrun Reyes and the police on his payroll while towing a vault with his money across the streets of Rio.
  • Fast & Furious 6 results in a final battle against Owen Shaw and his crew on and around his getaway plane to save Mia.
  • The showdown with Deckard Shaw and Jakande in the streets of L.A. in Furious 7.
  Dom Toretto: (points a shotgun at Deckard) You thought this was gonna be a street fight? (fires the shotgun into the air, drops it, grabs a wrench) You're damn right it is.
  • The Fate of the Furious had the crew trying to stop Cipher from stealing a Nuclear sub, this battle ends up taking place in Russia right above frozen waters.
  • Hobbs & Shaw has the titular duo teaming up with the former's family against Brixton and his men in Samoa, eventually culminating in a chase near the cliffs of the island followed by a rain-soaked fistfight between Hobbs, Shaw, and Brixton.
  • F9 has Dom and the team chasing Otto's truck through the streets of Tbilisi while Roman and Tej attempt to stop Aries in outer space, followed by Cipher attacking the team in her fighter jet.
• Hardcore Henry ends with Henry and Jimmy and Jimmy's remaining clones storming Akan's headquarters, fighting their way up the building, and culminating with Henry taking on Akan himself and his army of cyborgs on the roof.
• Hot Fuzz has Angel's return to the village after his fake death. The only living characters that don't end up partaking in the battle are the Sergeants Turner, Mr. Weaver, the London-based characters and a few minor Sandford residents like Mr. Staker.
• James Bond:
  • Spectre ends with a showdown with Blofeld, Max, and the remaining SPECTRE agents in London, ranging from the CNS building and the MI6 ruins.
  • No Time to Die has Bond facing off against Safin's men on his own, including Primo and Safin himself.
• Jurassic Park:
  • Jurassic Park (1993): The heroes escaping from the Raptor pack in the Visitor Center, with the T-Rex/Rexy inadvertently taking out the raptors for them.
  • The Lost World: Jurassic Park: A chase through the streets of San Diego with the heroes using the T-Rex baby to lure the latter's parent back into captivity.
  • Jurassic Park III has the Spinosaurus attacking the boat that the heroes are trying to use to escape Isla Sorna, followed by a Post-Climax Confrontation with the Raptor pack.
  • Jurassic World has one that pits the Indominus rex, Tyrannosaurus rex and Blue the Velociraptor. In a twist, the battle ends with a surprise appearance from the Mosasaurus.
  • Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom: The heroes fighting the Indoraptor after it gets loose and goes on a rampage in the mansion.
  • Jurassic World Dominion: As the heroes are escaping the Biosyn Sanctuary, Rexy and the Giganotosaurus show up from opposite sides to settle their rivalry, battling it out with the humans caught in the middle.
• In Knockout, Belle Alvarado faces Tanya "The Terminator" Tessaro for the WFBA lightwight world boxing championship.
• Immortan Joe and his forces chasing after Max and Furiosa across the Wasteland returning to the Citadel in Mad Max: Fury Road.
• The big shootout in Rose Creek in The Magnificent Seven (2016).
• Marvel Cinematic Universe
  • Iron Man: Tony vs Stane in his Iron Monger Suit.
  • The Incredible Hulk: Hulk vs the Abomination on the streets of Harlem.
  • Iron Man 2: Tony and Rhodes in their suits vs the Hammer Drone army controlled by Whiplash followed by a final encounter with Whiplash himself.
  • Thor: A sorta one of Thor vs Loki.
  • Captain America: The First Avenger: Naturally Cap vs Red Skull on the latter's plane heading for New York.
  • The Avengers: The portal opens, alien invaders pour into New York City and our heroes have to fight them off in the movie's climax. Technically against Loki as well but the aliens are the main threat.
  • Iron Man 3: Tony and Rhodes with all of Tony's remote controlled Iron Men suits against Killan and his Extremis powered henchmen.
  • Thor: The Dark World: Thor vs Malekith.
  • Captain America: The Winter Soldier: A two prong one: Cap against the titled Winter Solider and the SHIELD loyalists against the HYDRA moles in order to keep them from activating the Helicarriers and killing people.
  • Guardians of the Galaxy: The Guardians against Ronan the Accuser.
  • Avengers: Age of Ultron: The team fighting against Ultron and his many clones from dropping Sokovia onto the earth.
  • Ant-Man: Scott vs Darren Cross aka Yellowjacket.
  • Captain America: Civil War: Between Tony and Steve. Ultimately ends with no one really "winning".
  • Doctor Strange: Not so much a battle than a confrontation with Dormammu and trying to "bargain" with him through some creative use of magic.
  • Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2: The Guardians (including Nebula and Yondu) vs Peter's father, Ego the Living Planet
  • Spider-Man: Homecoming: Spider-Man versus the Vulture, first atop the plane that Toomes is trying to hijack, then among the wreckage when it crashes on Coney Island.
  • Thor: Ragnarok: Thor, Hulk, Valkyrie, Loki and Heimdall fighting Hela and her army of undead to buy time for the Asgardian civilians to flee. And ends with Surtur being unleashed to kill Hela by destroying Asgard itself.
  • Black Panther: T'Challa's rematch with Killmonger, while his allies fight Killmonger's forces and try to stop them from getting any Vibranium out of the country.
  • Avengers: Infinity War: The Wakandan army, led by T'Challa and joined by all the Avengers currently on Earth and later joined by Thor, Groot, and Rocket battle with Thanos' army, led by his remaining Children. Simultaneously, the Guardians of the Galaxy, Tony, Strange, Spider-Man, and Nebula face off with Thanos himself on Titan.
  • Ant-Man and the Wasp: A three-way fight across San Francisco between Scott's team, Sonny Burch, and Ava/Ghost for possession of the shrunken-down Pym laboratory.
  • Captain Marvel (2019): Carol and her friends face off with Yon-Rogg's Starforce and Ronan's fleet in orbit, with a brief dogfight with Minn-Erva also taking place in Earth's atmosphere.
  • Avengers: Endgame: The Thanos of 2014 follows the time-traveling Avengers back to the present in order to steal back the Infinity Stones, leading to a truly massive final confrontation between his forces and every hero still alive for control of the Stones.
  • Spider-Man: Far From Home: Spider-Man interferes with Mysterio's attack on London, taking on him and his army of illusion-generating Attack Drones.
  • Black Widow: Natasha's family team fighting their way out of the Red Room, culminating in a Free-Fall Fight between Nat and Taskmaster.
  • Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings: Wenwu leads the Ten Rings in an attack on Ta Lo, in order to reach the gate that he believes will allow him to resurrect his dead wife, while Shang-Chi, Xialing, and Katy join with the villagers to fight them off. When the gate is opened and the Dweller-in-Darkness is freed from imprisonment, the two sides quickly ally to fight it and its minions.
  • Eternals: The Eternals face off with Ikaris and Sprite to stop the Emergence of the Celestial Tiamut, which would destroy Earth. There's also a side battle between Thena and the intelligent Deviant Kro, which is a personal grudge match after Kro killed Gilgamesh in front of her.
  • Spider-Man: No Way Home: Peter teams up with his alternate counterparts to face off with the villains from their respective universes at the Statue of Liberty, which culminates with a one-on-one match between a vengeance-driven MCU Peter and Green Goblin.
  • Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness: Doctor Strange possessing Defender Strange's corpse vs Scarlet Witch Wanda at the temple atop Mount Wundagore to save America Chavez.
  • Thor: Love and Thunder: Thor leads the Asgardian children into battle with Gorr and his shadow monsters as the latter tries to open the gateway to Eternity and use its power to wipe out all gods. Jane joins in near the battle's end, helping save Thor (and indirectly the other gods) at the cost of her life.
  • Werewolf by Night (2022): Jack, now in his wolf form, and Elsa take on the assembled monster hunters.
  • Black Panther: Wakanda Forever: The armies of Wakanda and Talokan clash onboard a Wakandan battleship, while Shuri (now the new Black Panther) takes on Namor personally.
  • Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania: Scott and Hope Storm the Castle to rescue Janet and Cassie from Kang's clutches. Cassie inspires a rebellion amongst the conquered peoples of the Quantum Realm against Kang's forces. All hope seems to be lost until Hank brings The Cavalry in the form of technologically advanced giant ants. Kang is severely damaged and ends up in one last one on one fistfight against Scott.
  • Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3: The Guardians and their allies storm the High Evolutionary's ship to rescue the captive Nebula, Mantis, and Drax, which then shifts to taking him down to save all his imprisoned test subjects.
  • The Marvels (2023): Carol, Monica, and Kamala fighting Dar-Benn aboard her ship to prevent her from draining the Earth's sun in order to restore Hala's.
• The battle for Zion in The Matrix Revolutions, with the Zion forces battling the Machines in the Real World and Neo fighting Smith for the final time in the Matrix itself.
• Every installment of the Mission: Impossible Film Series has ended with this:
  • Mission: Impossible (1996) has Ethan pursuing Phelps and Krieger aboard a speeding train to prevent their escape.
  • Mission: Impossible II has Ethan escaping Ambrose and his men in a high-speed motorcycle chase, followed by a fistfight between Ethan and Ambrose on a beach.
  • Mission: Impossible III has Ethan fighting Davian to rescue Julia. Julia also has to fend off a henchman and Musgrave before reviving Ethan after he is shocked unconscious.
  • Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol has Ethan pursuing and fighting Hendricks in a high-tech parking garage to get the briefcase to stop the nuclear missile. Brandt also has to deal with Wistrom at the station to get the relay back online.
  • Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation has Ethan and Ilsa fighting their way through Syndicate members in the streets of London. Ilsa engages in a Knife Fight with Janik Vinter while Ethan lures Lane out into the open.
  • Mission: Impossible – Fallout has Ethan trying to stop Walker from escaping with the nuclear detonator in a helicopter, followed by a fistfight between the two at the top of a cliff. At the same time, Ilsa and Benji also have to fight off Lane before diffusing one of the bombs he's guarding.
  • Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning has Ethan fighting Gabriel on top of a train for the key.
• MonsterVerse:
  • Godzilla (2014): The only fight between Godzilla and the MUTOs that's seen up-close by the audience; taking place in an apocalyptic San Francisco.
  • Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019): After Monarch have successfully revived Godzilla so he can take his kingship back from King Ghidorah and end the latter's global apocalypse, Godzilla meets Ghidorah in the evacuated Boston accompanied by the combined military forces of Monarch and what's left of the four branches of the military, whilst either Alpha Titan's respective vanguards Mothra and Rodan duel each-other.
  • Godzilla vs. Kong has Godzilla and Kong double-teaming against Mechagodzilla.
  • Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire: After Mothra intervenes to break up the fight between Godzilla and Kong, all three Kaiju confront the Skar King and Shimo in both the Hollow Earth and Rio, in order to prevent Skar King and his army from conquering the surface world, alongside some assistance from Suko and the humans.
• The Day of the Dead sequence in Once Upon a Time in Mexico.
• Pacific Rim: The battle of the breach, with Gipsy Danger and Striker Eureka vs Scunner, Raiju, and Slattern.
• Pacific Rim: Uprising: The remaining Jaegers fighting the Super Kaiju in Tokyo to stop it reaching Mount Fuji.
• Pirates of the Caribbean:
  • Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl had the battle at Isla de Muerta.
  • Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest had the fight against the Kraken.
  • Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End had the battle at Shipwreck Island, with all the pirates of the world against the entire British Armada.
  • Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides had the three-way fight between Blackbeard's crew, Barbosa's crew, and the Spanish.
  • Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales had the battle with the undead pirates at the bottom of the ocean for control of the Trident.
• Present in the Rambo series:
  • First Blood involves a cat-and-mouse game between Rambo and Teasle after the small town of Hope has been evacuated.
  • Rambo: First Blood Part II has a helicopter chase between Rambo and Podovsky.
  • Rambo III has Rambo and Trautman battling an army of Soviet soldiers led by Zaysen and aided by the Mujahideen.
  • Rambo IV involves Rambo fighting Major Tint and the Tatmadaw alongside the mercenaries and the Karen Rebels.
  • Rambo: Last Blood has Hugo Martinez leading his men on the raid against Rambo's ranch, and Rambo picking them off one by one.
• The Battle at Ramelle in Saving Private Ryan is a major one.
• Soldier ends with a final battle between Todd and Caine in the middle of a rainstorm.
• Spider-Man Trilogy:
  • In Spider-Man, the final battle is a simple, one-on-one fistfight between Spider-Man and the Goblin in a collapsing building.
  • Spider-Man 3 pits Spider-Man and Harry against Sandman and Venom.
  • Somewhat subverted in Spider-Man 2, in which case the final fight consists of little physical fighting at all.
• Star Wars had several. There's a reason why it (currently) provides this trope's page image and its captions.
  • A New Hope had the Battle of Yavin, where the rebels blew up the Death Star. It didn't stick, so Return of the Jedi had the more definitively final Battle of Endor, where they did it again and got Palpatine, too. In the prequel trilogy, the victory against the Trade Federation at the Battle of Naboo actually ends up playing into Sidious' hand (aka the future Emperor Palpatine).
  • The Battle of Exegol from The Rise of Skywalker is the final battle of the entire Skywalker Saga. The remaining remnants of the Resistance, backed by forces from across the galaxy, launch a desperate final attack against the First Order's armada to prevent it from launching. Meanwhile, on the planet's surface, Rey and a redeemed Ben Solo face off with the Not Quite Dead Palpatine.
• Magneto's attack on the Alcatraz research facility in X-Men: The Last Stand.

Literature

• A pretty epic one in Animorphs too, although the main characters don't directly participate in it. (Jake even describes it as the "final battle.")
• In The Lord of the Rings:
  • Aragorn leads Gondor, Rohan, and their allies to fight the armies of Mordor at the Black Gate. Aragorn and the other commanders know full well that they have a very slim chance of actually defeating Sauron's army, and that their actual purpose is to distract Sauron so Frodo can do his job. Once the ring is destroyed, Sauron's will will be broken and his armies will be much easier to defeat.
  • The Battle of the Five Armies that ends The Hobbit is rather odd, in that the good armies — the Dwarves, Humans, and Elves (as well as the eagles later on) — are Enemy Mine who only discover the army of evil — the Orcs and Wargs — as it attacks. (Gandalf's warning does give them a short time to prepare.)
  • The Scouring of the Shire later in Return of the King (but not in the movie), has Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin leading a rebellion of the hobbits to take back the Shire from the evil men under Saruman's command, culminating in a furious battle that drives the men from the Shire.
• The Silmarillion is full of this, Nírnaeth Arnoediad (though not final, both sides build up for a confrontation and the good guys gets wiped to never assemble a credible threat against Morgoth again while Beleriand becomes as dark and edgy as something out of the Norse mythology Tolkien so liked). Then it gets worse... finally the Valar sends Eönwe with the armies of Aman to subdue Morgoth in a cataclysmic battle destroying Beleriand. There are several instances of the Valar and Morgoth battling it out before the arrival of The Children of Ilúvatar.
• Almost every Redwall book culminates in a Final Battle.
• The Chronicles of Narnia:
  • The last book is actually called The Last Battle, and it really is the last battle before the unmaking of Narnia.
  • The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, Prince Caspian and The Horse and His Boy also ended in full-blown final battles, at least within the context of the book.
• Harry Potter has the Battle of Hogwarts, in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. The teachers and students of Hogwarts, plus various relatives, friends, etc, vs Voldemort's assembled forces. So that's two small armies of witches and wizards going at it, along with centaurs, elves, giants, werewolves, Dementors and a colony of giant spiders who see the whole thing as a buffet.
• The entire Codex Alera series ended with an epic one of these, as the Vord Queen marshaled millions of soldiers to try to crush the survivors at their Last Stand, while the First Lord attempts to find and defeat their leader. Said leader is highly intelligent, possesses great strength and speed AND powerful furycraft.
• Most Nasuverse works end with one. Being multi-path stories, there are generally many variations.
  • Tsukihime may end with Shiki fighting Roa, an enraged Arcueid, the other Shiki, or an inverted Akiha. Kagetsu Tohya's last fight ends with Shiki killing his own personification of death inside his own mind.
  • Fate/stay night's three scenarios lead to radically different Final Battles:
    • Fate ends with Shiro and Saber fighting Kotomine and Gilgamesh, respectively.
    • Unlimited Blade Works has Shiro facing Gilgamesh alone, not to mention the My Name Is Inigo Montoya moment in an earlier battle.
    • In Heaven's Feel, Shirou, with his Deadly Upgrade faces Black Saber, with help from Rider, whilst Rin fights Dark Sakura. After he defeats (and kills) Saber Alter, he then proceeds to free Sakura from Angra Mainyu's control, before then fighting Kotomine and, depending on which ending you get, either projecting and fires Excalibur (before dying from a Heroic RRoD), or being saved by Ilya, who shuts down the Grail and gives Shirou a new body.
• Honor Harrington: At All Costs, Book 11 of the main series, was originally going to be the end of the Arc and set the stage for another series a generation later. The battle at the end of the book was designed as the final battle of Honor's series: The Battle of Manticore is the largest battle ever dreamed about, the sheer number of ships being at least an order of magnitude higher than the next largest battle, and the deaths number at over a million for both sides. The original plan was to kill Honor in the final battle — at the height of her greatest victory — and set the stage for her son and daughter to continue the fight 20 years later against the Solarian League. Then author Eric Flint joined the Wages of Sin subseries, forcing the ultimate Big Bad to enact their plan early and giving Weber a way to continue the plot without killing off the main character. What's worse is this battle, despite the horrors, is not decisive. Honor wins and keeps the Star Empire free, but despite the massive fleet destroyed Manticore has no ability to strike back. Her fleet is the only thing protecting the homeworlds, freeing Haven to create a new fleet and try it again. Then Haven finds out that it had been manipulated into war with Manticore. Haven's President, Eloise Pritchart, takes this a bit amiss and makes an unannounced visit to Manticore itself, signs not only a peace treaty but a military alliance with Manticore, and combines the best of the best in three star nations in the Grand Alliance to face down Mesa and the Solarian League. It's going to be awesome.
• Both Sword of Shannara and the Elfstones of Shannara have the big battle with the majority of the characters on one side trying to survive as long as they can while the covert mission that is really what matters racing against time.
• The first Conqueror book, Wolf of the Plains, climaxed with Temujin (AKA Genghis Khan) leading a Chin-backed alliance of Wolves, Olkhun'ut, and Kerait against the united Tartars. The second book, Lords of the Bow, subverted this trope - the Mongols have laid siege to Yenking and are preparing to attack it, but Kokchu persuades Genghis Khan to accept surrender at the last minute.
• Star Wars:
  • In the expanded universe Aftermath novel trilogy, the war against the Empire ends about a year after Return of the Jedi with the Battle of Jakku, where the surviving remnants of the Empire flee from the battle into the Unknown Regions. This also coincides with the official surrender of the Empire by the Emperor's former vizier Mas Amedda, who was being used as a Puppet King after Palpatine's death.
  • The Star Wars Legends X-Wing Series starts out as the Rebel Alliance's attempt to conquer the galactic capital world Coruscant to put the final death blow to the severely weakened Empire. Which ends in a massive (apparently) Final Battle. But it soon becomes obvious that the Imperial administration considered the planet not to be worth defending against a determined attacker and actually planned to lose the battle, while making sure the New Republic would inherit a massive humanitarian disaster.
• The first Warrior Cats series ended with a massive battle against BloodClan to determine the fate of the forest. The sequels took away its finalness, but another comes at the end of Omen Of The Stars.
• The Outsiders has the rumble between the Greasers and the Socs.
• The Wheel of Time is all about this, culminating in most of The Memory of Light, where the whole novel involves Tarmon Gai'don itself with everyone being Big Damn Heroes. The chapter of the Battle itself is 200 pages long and take up one fifth of the book.
• In The Leonard Regime, the entire rebellion fights for its survival at the end of the book.
• Happens in the Tortall Universe a few times.
  • Happens during Jonathan's coronation in Song of the Lioness With Big Bad Duke Roger back and worse than ever, Alanna has to get sage advice from Thom's Old Master, defeats Princess Josiane, and goes to face The Dragon and the Big Bad. Jon is busy using the Dominion Jewel to stop a massive earthquake caused by said Big Bad. Meanwhile George has to face Claw, then he, Rispah Coram, Buri, Raoul, Thayet, Myles, and Mistress Cooper have to deal with the combined forces of Claw's rogues and the Tirragen/Eldorne revolutionaries.
  • The final confrontation at the end of The Immortals. Numerous characters come Back for the Finale for the fight between mortals and Ozorne's forces. Daine has a final showdown with Ozorne, dragons get involved, and it ends up in the Divine Realms as the gods fight the incarnation of Chaos.
  • Near the end of the second Trickster's Duet book, the plans of La Résistance are pushed up when a prison breakout turns into a full-blown riot, revolts spring up on country estates, and fighting begins in the streets of Rajmuat. Ulasim rolls with it and the rebels lead an attack on the Palace. Meanwhile, Kyprioth and the lesser Trickster Gods duel with Mithros and the Great Goddess in the skies and Dove rides above the city on a winged horse to inspire the rebels.
• In Gregor and The Code of Claw almost all of Underland's species come together against the Bane's army on the Plains of Tartarus.
• The final battle simulation in Ender's Game pits 80 or so human ships against thousands of Bugger ships. Even worse, these are the older, less powerful human ships. However, Ender has had enough and decides to screw up so badly to be kicked out of the program, ordering the fleet to make a direct run for the planet being protected by the alien armada. Most of the human ships are destroyed during the run, but a few make it through. He then gives the unthinkable order to fire the Little Doctor at the planet. The weapon creates an expanding field that breaks the bonds between molecules, which literally turns the planet into dust, as well as any ship nearby. However, what Ender doesn't know is that all the simulations are actual battles controlled by him in real-time via the Subspace Ansible. The final simulation really was the final battle of the Third Invasion, wiping out the entire Bugger race, not to mention casually sacrificing an entire human fleet. When Ender finds out, he has a Heroic BSoD. Additionally, it's slightly subverted in that, while humans think that losing this battle will doom humanity to a devastating strike by the Buggers, Ender eventually finds out that the Buggers had no intention of attacking a third time.
• After two terrific showdowns, one being an all-out battle at the Zuytdorp cliffs and the other being an elaborate one-sided trap for the Pteranodon, The Fatal Dream concludes with a brutal one-on-one fight between Steven and the prehistoric reptile.
• The Hunger Games: The Battle for the Capitol.
• In The Dinosaur Lords, the grand battle against Raguel's horde serves to cap off the first story arc of the series, with all POV characters participating and having their own triumphs.
• There's a properly big one of these in The Fionavar Tapestry, with part of Kimberley's job description being in fact to recruit help for it as bearer of the Baelrath. Then it subverts both the regular and the "just a diversion" takes on the trope when it's the Big Bad's response to a completely unanticipated distraction that just happens to coincide with the clash of armies that seals his fate.
• In The Traitor Son Cycle, the first arc of the story ends with a giant battle that spans almost a fifth of the third book, with the alliance of Men and Wild battling against Thorn's forces.
• The climax of The Spirit Thief series is an Enemy Mine forming between the main characters and their biggest enemies to battle the greater threat in a glorious, trans-dimensional clash.
• The Battle of Hoshi's Point in Lucifer's Star is the end of the Archduchy-Commonwealth War. The Interstellar Commonwealth sends its best ships and soldiers on a Suicide Mission against the entire Archduchy of Crius Navy which believes this is their only chance to cripple their enemy's slow march to their capital. The entire battle is a distraction so the Commonwealth can Colony Drop Crius itself.
• Starting with Galactic Patrol, each of the Lensman books ends with a Final Battle of Civilization against Boskone. The final Final Battle, in Children of the Lens, is necessarily a psychic one since the Eddorians cannot be killed by any physical force, however applied.
• The Camp Half-Blood Series
  • Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Power Trio fighting against Kronos at the Olympians' Throne Room in The Last Olympian.
  • The Heroes of Olympus: The Seven fighting Gaia in order to put her back to sleep in The Blood of Olympus.
  • The Trials of Apollo: Apollo/Lester fighting against Python alone at the Delphi durng The Tower of Nero.
• The Kane Chronicles: The United Magicians and Gods fighting against Apophis in The Serpent's Shadow.
• Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard: Played With. While Magnus faces off with Loki during The Ship of the Dead, he doesn't actually fight him in combat, only in an insult contest. The former and his allies still have to fight their way off the Naglfar though.

Live-Action TV

• The Grand Finale of 12 Monkeys is built entirely around Team Splinter's showdown with the Army of the Twelve Monkeys, in a desperate final gamble to prevent the Witness from collapsing time.
• Jack Bauer and Belcheck storming the Letitcia to stop Cheng Zhi in 24: Live Another Day.
• The 100 Season 1 ends with a huge battle when the Grounder army assaults the 100's camp.
  • Subverted in the Season 2 finale: we're all geared up for the allied armies of the Grounders and Sky People to invade Mount Weather, but the Grounders cut a deal with Mount Weather and retreat from the battle, and the Sky People retreat now that they're outnumbered. In the end, our Main Characters have to rely on infiltration and sabotage to resolve the plot, instead.
• Each Chouseishin Series installment naturally has one in the finale, given the kind of show it is.
  • Chouseishin Gransazer actually has the heroes trying to stop the final battle from happening, as if the Warp Monarch chose to go all out in their Alien Invasion the Earth would be ravaged and humanity would most certainly be killed off.
  • Genseishin Justiriser features a more traditional final battle, once Kaiser Hades decides to get serious and sends the Magneshielder to Earth, with the Justirisers having to fight to stop him from destroying the planet. And then he turns out to be a a fake final boss. The true final battle occurs later on when Kurogane calls his Diglos fortress to Earth and begins deploying waves and waves of Bulgarios to the planet, while the Justirisers pilot their Genseishin and make a desperate attempt to hold them off and stop Kurogane from blowing up the planet with his Gigatron Cannon.
  • The finale of Chousei Kantai Sazer X sees Sazer-X battling the leaders of Neo Descal and their forces as they attempt to engulf Earth in darkness using the Dark Alumer and Dark Geran.
• Crisis on Earth-X, the Arrowverse's 2017 Crisis Crossover, culminates with a truly massive battle, with all the Earth-1 heroes (as well as Supergirl and Alex and a couple of Freedom Fighters) joining together to take on the army of Nazis from Earth-X led by Dark Arrow/the Fuhrer, Overgirl, and Reverse-Flash.
• Doctor Who:
  • "The Last Adventure" audio series features the Sixth Doctor in his final encounter with the Valeyard.
  • The first Un-Cancelled series finale, "Bad Wolf"/"The Parting of the Ways", ends in a Final Battle between the controllers and contestants of the Game Station and the Daleks.
  • The second, "Army of Ghosts"/"Doomsday", in a Mêlée à Trois between the Cybermen, Torchwood and the Daleks.
  • "The Day of the Doctor": The final battle of the Time War is shown, with all of the Dalek fleet bombarding Gallifrey. It appears to end in the destruction of both sides when the War Doctor activated "The Moment", however it is revealed that in reality the first 13 incarnations of the Doctor teamed up to move Gallifrey into another universe, causing the Daleks to destroy themselves.
  • "The Doctor Falls" has the Twelfth Doctor fighting three generations of Cybermen and two incarnations of the Master. Steven Moffat actually billed it as "the Doctor's final battle", with an ending that leads directly into the 2017 Christmas Episode that depicts his regeneration into his thirteenth numbered self.
• Game of Thrones became famous for its intricate, well-executed and massively expensive final battles. Prominent examples include the battle at Castle Black between the Night's Watch and the invading wildlings, which ended the wildling invasion, the Battle of the Bastards, which ended the war between the remaining Starks and Ramsey Bolton, the Battle of Winterfell, which was the final confrontation between the army of the dead and the army of man, and Daenerys Targaryen's storming of King's Landing in the final season, which ended being less of a battle and more of a horrifying holocaust that ended Cersei's reign.
• Kamen Rider
  • In Kamen Rider Kuuga, the final battle between Yuusuke and the Big Bad goes from a generic tokusatsu final battle, to something a little more realistic: a fist fight in their human forms. It's pretty brutal compared to other final battles in Kamen Rider, with bleeding from both sides and the battle ends not with a finishing move, but with a Double Knockout that lead to a Mutual Kill for the Big Bad.
  • Kamen Rider Ryuki is also a separation from the norm since its Final Battle doesn't even involve its protagonist. Instead, it is Kamen Rider Knight who faces off against Kamen Rider Odin. Besides this deviation, the battle is carried out in total sombriety and Knight only 'wins' when the Big Bad destroys Odin in a fit of rage that ultimately does nothing to prevent the fact that Knight had been dealt a fatal blow and dies moments later after using the Rider War's prize to save his girlfriend.
• The Mandalorian: The Season 3 finale features the final showdown between the Mandalorians and Moff Gideon in a conflict for control of Mandalore, with a massive aerial battle between most of the Mandalorians and Gideon's beskar-enhanced Dark Troopers being just a backdrop to Din and Bo-Katan's personal fight with Gideon himself.
• Merlin (2008) ends with the final battle from the legends, the Battle of Camlann.
• The Outpost: The final conflict of the series comes in the Grand Finale, where Talon and her allies face off one last time with the Masters in order to stop them from raising their army to conquer the world with.
• The Grand Finale of Person of Interest, "return 0", shows Team Machine's Last Stand against Samaritan and its men.
• Siren (2018): The Season 3 finale, which ended up concluding the series, has a huge underwater battle between the rival merpeople factions. Ryn's side ultimately wins it after she kills Tia.
• As expected (as it's based on historical events), the final season of Spartacus: Blood and Sand ends with the final large-scale battle between Spartacus' rebels and Crassus' army. The romans win, with the majority of the rebels (including Spartacus himself) falling in battle. However, a handful survive and escape, and Spartacus went out content, knowing he died a free man.
• Stargate SG-1 episode "Reckoning", part 2. SG-1, the Jaffa, and the Tok'ra vs. the Goa'uld and the Replicators as the fate of the Galaxy hangs in the balance. Originally was intended as the Grand Finale.
  • The same applies to the battle of Antarctica in the the two-part episode "Lost City", which was also meant to be a Grand Finale.
• Star Trek: Deep Space Nine has the final Battle of Cardassia in the ep "What You Leave Behind". Klingons, Romulans, and Federation vs. the Dominion and all their allies. Massive ship wrecking ensues.
• On the Super Sentai side of Toei's live action Toku Cash Cow Franchises, Choujuu Sentai Liveman had a unique final battle: a regular battle with a Monster of the Week, with a short break where Yuusuke duels The Dragon, Guardnoid Gash. It's a Post-Climax Confrontation too, since Yusuke already thwarted Bias's Fountain of Youth / Mass Hypnosis plan an episode before, leaving him an old man with rapidly declining health who dies with Gash in their collapsing lair.
• The Walking Dead (2010):
  • The prison community has its final face-off with the Governor in the Season 4 midseason finale "Too Far Gone", when he returns to take the prison with the aid of his new group (which includes a tank). The resulting fight destroys the prison, and includes a personal throw down between Rick and the Governor.
  • After two and a half seasons of conflict, the Alexandria-Hilltop-Kingdom alliance has its final conflict with the Saviors in the Season 8 finale "Wrath". Again, there's a personal brawl in the middle of this, between Rick and Negan.
  • The end of Season 10 sees the remaining survivors of the allied communities having their final confrontation with the Whisperers, as the latter lead their horde against the survivors' safe zone at an Abandoned Hospital. Once more, this climaxes with a personal brawl, as Daryl and Negan take on Beta.
• Wonder Woman: Wonder Woman vastly out-matched most of her foes, so true examples were rare. For example, she once tore into the submarine that Sheldon Como was using as his main base. Despite being singlehanded against presumably his best defenses, she rips open the door and announces, "Party's over, boys!" However, two examples did occur. The Zardor in "Mind Stealers from Outer Space" and the Shapeshifter in "The Boy Who Knew Her Secret". Zardor was a truly strong opponent that Wonder Woman could not overpower. She was forced to send him plummeting to his death. The Shapeshifter became a barbarian and put up a reasonable fight in the climax to a two part episode. He even threw Wonder Woman around and through some things, until it pissed her off enough to flip, smack, and kick him into the Glowing Pyramid.
• Z Nation: The Season 2 finale ends the Story Arc that had been running since the pilot, and subsequently features the heroes' final showdown with the Zeroes Cartel, the main antagonists of the season, who had also been The Man Behind the Man in Season 1.

Mythology

• In Norse Mythology, it all comes down to Ragnarok, the Final Battle at the End of the World. First there are three years of war in the world of the mortals, followed by three years of endless winter. Then the Sun and the Moon are caught by Skoll and Hati, the wolves that chase them over the sky, which causes the stars to fall down on earth. As a result, massive earthquakes shake the world and collapse the mountains and flood the land. And that's just for starters. Loki's children - the giant wolf Fenrir and the Midgard-Serpent Jörmungandr - escape from their prisons. And in the midst of all this chaos and destruction, Surtr, the King of the fire-giants, arrives from the south with his entire army to attack the gods in Valhalla, while Hrym and his army of common giants arrive with their fleet to join the battle. Soon the frost-giants come also marching from the north. Heimdall blows his horn and the gods attack the giants and monsters, with all the fallen heroes of Valhalla, the Einherjar, pitching in. And then Loki's third child Hel arrives, bringing with her an undead army made of the souls of every single human that has ever died and is not an Einherjar. Odin is killed by Fenrir, who in turn has his head torn in two parts by Odin's son Vidarr. Thor kills Jörmungandr, but dies from his venom. Garm and Tyr kill each other and Freyr is killed by Surtr. Then Loki and Heimdall also kill each other. As the corpses pile up in heaps and the blood gets hip-deep, Surtr decides that defeat is not an option and, being the God of Fire, takes almost everyone with him by blowing himself up in a massive explosion that roasts the entire world.
• Apocalyptic Jewish and Christian predictions often included Final Battles. The expectations of such battles often influenced the way actual wars were carried out.
  • The Book of Revelation has this occur at an actual location named Armageddon. Today, it is known as Tel Megiddo, and coincidentally, several battles have already been fought on the site, two occurring before Revelations was written.
  • The Left Behind series books Glorious Appearing and Kingdom Come feature both Final Battles from the book of Revelation, with the Final Final Battle before the Great White Throne judgment taking up only a few pages when God just smokes Satan's entire army into ashes in seconds.
• The Battle of Camlann in Arthurian Legend, where he and his knights fought against Mordred's forces one last time before almost completely perishing. The climax of this is when Arthur and Mordred engage in a mortal duel.

Podcasts

• In The Adventure Zone: Balance there's almost everyone that has appeared in the story up to this point versus the Hunger's forces, with Tres Horny Boys facing off against its avatar John.

Professional Wrestling

• While Aniversario is probably the biggest CMLL show of the year, Sin Piedad always closed out the year whenever it took place. It used to be an annual event until 2012 and it was flipped in 2016, where it was the opening show of the year.
• The twelve man elimination rumble that was the main even of RCW Last War of '94.
• The World Wrestling Federation's "Hell In A Cell" match was made to put an end to long feuds, at least for the foreseeable future. However, they started moving away from this, as John Cena has refused to abandon his feuds with Randy Orton and Alberto Del Rio even after losing to them in Hell In A Cell, immediately coming back at them on the following installment of Monday Night Raw and laying the feud to rest in a different gimmick match.
• NOAHful Gift in Differ settled in as the final Pro Wrestling NOAH show of the year during their first decade in operation, Joyful Gift in the second year not withstanding, but they got away from this in 2014 when they had an additional show in Korakuen with the promise it was truly the end of their year after it. In 2015 they didn't even make it to Differ, in 2016 they didn't even bother with anymore shows after the Winter Navigation series and by that point it was clear the tradition was done.
• Final Battle is the last Ring of Honor show of the year and is usually used for wrapping up ongoing angles. However, that doesn't mean new angles will not be started or teased during the event. In 2017 Final Battle was followed by a television taping and thus became an Artifact Title, at least concerning ROH's live matches.
• Dragon Gate has Final Gate, except for 2012 and 2013, where it was followed by "The Last Gate Of".
• The very last GAEA show in 2005 was title Eternal Last Gong and featured the retirement matches of Sakura Hirota and company founder Chigusa Nagayo. Hirota's didn't really stick but Nagayo has only returned for promotional appearances until Pro Wrestling ZERO1 basically made her a belt, effectively Passing the Torch until then to protege Meiko Satomura.
• Jd' Joan Of Arc ~ Jd' & JD Star Grapple Beauty Final in 2007 was the last Yoshimoto Women's Pro Wrestling Jd' and JD Star event. However, the first match was booked as the Career Resurrection of jd dojo graduate Yumi Ohka, who was returning to the ring after a two year absence.
• SMASH FINAL in 2012 was the last show of the Japanese version of the brand with The FINAL SMASH Match seeing Yoshihiro Tajiri and AKIRA defeat Hajime Ohara and StarBuck. Tajiri then announced he was starting a new promotion, which would become known as Wrestling New Classic. The Canadian SMASH was also starting up as it closed down.
• In the same vein as CMLL before it, Joshi fed REINA stared doing definitive year closeout shows in 2013, though it hasn't settled on a consistent name for them.
• World Wonder Ring STARDOM began it's Year End Climax in 2014, the 2015 show used the modifier ~ Annual Final Battle, but it did not stick.

Tabletop Games

• In Arkham Horror, the Ancient One will awaken and engage the Investigators in a Last Battle if they fail to seal enough Gates before the Doom Track fills. The only Ancient One to not engage the Investigators in a Last Battle is Azathoth, who immediately destroys the world when he awakens.
• Atmosfear: Khufu has one in the form of "Khufu's Ultimate Challenge". The challenge plays out as a poker duel, in which the player tries to beat Khufu's own hand to win the game.
• Risk can have this as well, when large sets of risk cards are turned in and a pair of giant armies duke it out over someone's very last territory.
• A well-played game of Victory in the Pacific between approximately equal opponents has a good chance of coming down to a giant battle in the Sea of Japan with the game at stake.

Toys

• The 2008 BIONICLE storyline was marketed like this, even being referred to as such in-universe:
  Kopaka: If this is the final battle... let's make it one to remember."
  • It was, however, all a set-up for a Wham Episode. The 2010 story was probably supposed to be this, but it got severely hampered as the toy line was suddenly ended and the ending was very rushed.
  • Of course, that's isn't to say the Final Battle we did get in 2010's story wasn't short of amazing.

Video Games

• Assault Suits Valken: The aptly-named final mission "Last Stand", which takes place in the enemy capital. It is here where the war ends; whether the price for it is high or low will depend on the previous missions' outcomes, but Jake will invariably face strong opposition and aggressiveness from the still-living enemies, who by this point know that they're in the brink of defeat.
• Most campaings in Battle for Wesnoth ends with a battle between the units you've built up and improved throughout the campaign against the Big Bad and their army.
  • A Tale of Two Brothers has Arvith and Baran's troops vs. Talrach and his orcs to defend Baran's village.
  • The outlaw branch of The South Guard has a battle between Deoran leading the titular army against Mal M'brin and his undead army.
  • Formerly mainline (until version 1.15) campaign An Orcish Incursion has Erlornas's elves vs. Rualsha's orcish army to stop the orcs from invading the elves. The scenario encourages you to just assassinate Rualsha using 4 new, free ambusher units though, making the battle just a distraction.
  • Liberty doesn't have a Big Bad, rather Baldras's men storms the Halstead fortress in the final scenario so they can bring it down or else Asheviere's grip on the northwestern land would be too strong to fight off.
  • In the final scenario of Heir to the Throne, Konrad's army faces off against Queen Asheviere's in the capital city of Weldyn to defeat Asheviere and makes Li'sar the queen.
  • The finale of The Hammer of Thursagan has Aiglondur's team invading Karrag's lair and fights off Karrag's minions until reaching Karrag himself.
  • Both possible final scenario of Eastern Invasion has Gweddry, Dacyn, and their troops against Mal Ravanal's undead army to stop Ravanal's titular invasion, with the main difference between the two scenario is the amount of troops that Gweddry and Ravanal brought.
  • Dead Water has Kai Krellis bringing his now experienced merfolk fighters along with Tyegëa's priestesses to fight and take back Jotha from the undead army.
  • Unlike in other campaigns, the Final Battle of Delfador's Memoirs takes place 3 scenarios before the final one. Delfador brings everyone he can to defeat Iliah-Malal's undead army. The big conflict against Iliah-Malal ends here. The remaining scenarios are less climatic and more of a setup for Heir to the Throne.
  • The Rise of Wesnoth has Haldric and his experienced refugees fighting to finish off Lich Lord Jevyan so they can finally be safe.
  • The main and original conflict againsts the orcs in Legends of Wesmere doesn't end with a battle, but an assassination. The final conflict ends up being Kalenz vs. Landar which is settled in a battle between their forces in the final scenario.
  • Son of the Black Eye has Kapou'e's army and the Northern Aliance vs. the army of Earl Lanbec'h and the traitor Shan Taum to finish the current orcs-humans war.
  • Northern Rebirth has Tallin leading an army composed of a lot of races to storm Rakhsas's last castle and stops his conquest.
• From Dragon Age:
  • Dragon Age: Origins ends with the Battle of Denerim, the capital of Ferelden. After spending the whole game forging alliances with Redcliffe, Dalish Elves/Werewolves, Mages/Templars, and Dwarves/Golems you can finally call for them as allied soldiers during the multiple battles throughout the city as the darkspawn threatens to overrun the capital. Higlights include clearing an entire marketplace of Darkspawn, saving an elven alienage from being overrun, and playing as your secondary party members while they cover your advance.
  • Dragon Age II has Hawke and the co. making their stance clear about the Kirkwall Crisis that ultimately ends with the First Enchanter and Knight-Commander getting killed by them, their actions is just one of the many cases that lead to the collapse of the Chantry and Mage-Templar War.
  • Dragon Age: Inquisition has the Inquisitor and co. fighting against Corypheus, now exhausted of his resources after his defeat at the Arbor Wilds.
• EXTRAPOWER: Attack of Darkforce pulls off a massive final battle sequence for a Sim RPG Maker 95 game. First nearly every ally made over the course of the game comes together to either help send the heroes to the Dark Force mothership or provide support in an unseen space battle to busy the enemy fleet. Then there are back to back missions where the player has to disable the Dark Strike Cannon under a strict turn limit before the Earth gets reduced to dust, then fight through room after room of dense enemies, reinforcements teleporting in as ground is covered, to face off against the Co-Dragons and their Elite Mook entourage. And once all that is complete... cue the EXTRAPOWER series theme song cuz now you've got the final battle with Dark Force himself: on one end of the map, the cluster of your chosen party. On the other, Dark Force and his Co-Dragons, now amplified with dark energy into monstrous, ultimate forms. And between you and them are swarms of Elite Mook with several Boss in Mook Clothing warping in. Even once you make it to the far end of Dark Force's chamber, possibly having lost a few teammates and very likely low on available health and mana, before having to face a final boss at his best and he's no armchair general. Victory requires a lot of strategy, a little luck, and makes you earn the title of Victory Hero.
• The Battle for Hoover Dam in Fallout: New Vegas is the final showdown between the New California Republic and Caesar's Legion. The Courier is the deciding factor, determining not only potential allies and ultimately whether the NCR or the Legion come out as victors or are both defeated by either Mr. House or The Courier him/herself.
  • In an added twist, the Battle of Hoover Dam was actually INVOKED. NCR General Lee Oliver wanted a big final battle to defeat the Legion so that his name will go down in history. Most of the NCR, the Legion, House, Civilians, the Courier, and all the other factions know this is a really really really dumb idea (House even refers to this as "Tunnel Vision"). The only reason the battle actually takes place is because General Oliver moved 90% of the NCR troops onto the Dam, wouldn't allow for small skirmishes to wear down the Legion numbers, or battles to take back the large swath of land in the South Eastern Mojave that the Legion claimed. Since the Legion knew this was going on, they take advantage of the General's desire for one of these and pulls off simultaneous raids on the other NCR bases in the region with most of the NCR force at the Dam. This ultimately also deconstructs the concept of the end game final battle.
  • New Vegas' DLCs concludes its Myth Arc (at least if played in order of release) by having the Courier face Ulysses in a pre-war nuclear missile silo at the end of the Divide's Lonesome Road. Ulysses plans to use the facility's complement of ICBMs to destroy either the NCR or Arizona (depending on the Courier's loyalties) as revenge for the Courier inadvertantly being the reason for the destruction of the community that was growing at the Divide. It can be played straight as an actual battle between the two, or subverted if the Courier can pass some very difficult speech checks, found all of Ulysses' journals, or got all the ED-E upgrades, and succeed in talking Ulysses down from his plan. In that case, the two Couriers and ED-E have to fight off a horde of Marked Men that come to invade the facility. Either way, the two Couriers fought beneath an old world flag at the Divide.
• Fallout 4 continues this with the three faction-specific variants of The Nuclear Option (destroying The Institute for either the Commonwealth Minutemen, the Brotherhood of Steel, or the Underground Railroad) and the Institute's opposing version, Airship Down.
  • The Nuclear Option involves invading The Institute (possibly with the help of a giant, communist-hating robot if doing it for the Brotherhood), fighting your way through hordes of Synths including three elite units to destroy the entire underground lab complex with the aid of your faction's allies (and maybe giving the Institute scientists time to evacuate, or not and letting them die), and having a final encounter with the Institute's Director and your son Shaun, Father.
  • The Institute's version takes place after the Minutemen have been pacified and the Railroad completely destroyed (by you), leaving only The Institute itself and the Brotherhood of Steel as the two big powers vvying for control of the Commonwealth Wasteland. It involves attacking the Brotherhood's base of operations at the airport, fighting your way through its entire complement of soldiers, including Powered Armor equipped Paladins and its leader, Arthur Maxson, setting beacons to teleport in squadrons of Institute Synths and uploading a virus into the same giant robot that would have helped you destroy the Institute for the Brotherhood so that it will target the Brotherhood's massive airship the Prydwen with its weapons, causing it to crash into the aiport, destroying it, the base, and the giant robot (as well as any Institute Synths that were around too), wiping the Brotherhood out completely and leaving The Institute as the sole remaining power in the Commonwealth.
• Numerous video games have a Final Boss battle; usually, the plot gets resolved by defeating whoever the final boss is. Especially if the plot is resolved by rescuing a Damsel in Distress, such as in Super Mario Bros. or The Legend of Zelda.
• Warcraft 3 has a final battle where the scourge tries to get to the world tree with ever larger waves of their undead warriors and demon heros. The battle was so epic, that it was implemented in World of Warcraft in the caverns of time.
  • World of Warcraft have one itself for each expansion: In Classic, it's against the Lich King's Dragon, Kel'Thuzad in his floating fortress, Naxxramas, after beating your way through four wings of different undead forces. In the Burning Crusade, it's against Kil'jaeden, the de facto leader of the Burning Legion, in the middle of him being summoned through the Sunwell. In Wrath of the Lich King, it's against the titular character, on a giant block of ice held between the spires of his fortress, at the highest point in the game world. In Cataclysm, it's against the giant dragon Deathwing the Destroyer, first on his back tearing away his armour plates, then his ruined and completely insane remains in the Maelstrom, a whirlpool so big that it takes a significant part of the world map. In Mists of Pandaria, it is against Garrosh Hellscream, the leader for one of the two player factions, taking place in the Horde capital, Orgrimmar. In Legion, it’s against the giant demon Sargeras, who leads the Burning Legion. In Battle for Azeroth, it’s against N'Zoth, the last living Old God and the one who corrupted Sylvanus into becoming a tyrant.
• The True Demon Ending of Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne ends with you marching towards one. With you as the Antichrist, leading the Legions of Hell to their Final Battle against YHVH himself.
• At the end of both neutral routes of Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse has you battle YHVH himself.
• The main quest of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim concludes with the player facing off against a god-like dragon. The battle takes place on the fields of Sovngarde where the player is assisted by three of the greatest heroes of Nord history.
• The pinnacle of your godly powers in Populous is to declare Armageddon, which turns out every person from their house to head for the centre of the map and fight anyone from another faction, until only one side remains.
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 has the final mission "Dust to Dust", where Captain Price and Yuri assaults a hotel occupied by Makarov's inner circle to kill Vladimir Makarov before he escapes.
• The fifth and final act of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, Old Sun.
• Asura's Wrath: Episode 22, A Life Well Lived. Basically, the ultimate culmination of the games infamous Serial Escalation, starting with Asura turning into his planet sized Destructor form that dwarfs Gaea, from being destroyed by a "small" laser from the True Final Boss, Chakravartin, before flying off into space while destroying planets and stars, including a super giant planet as big as a sun by punching through it, and destroying a solar system sized Red Giant, ending with punching through the forehead of Chakravartin, who has literally become so big he dwarfs galaxies to the point of making them look like tiny lights! And that's just the first battle phase!
• The Mass Effect universe has three, one for each game:
  • Mass Effect has the Battle of the Citadel where Shepard and his/her team face off against Saren. Shepard has to get to the Citadel which has been attacked and overun by Saren and Sovereign who are trying to summon the other Reapers from dark space. You manage to fight your way to the council chamber and then you can convince him to shoot himself at which point he's controlled by Sovereign. At the same time, the Alliance is facing off with Sovereign and trying to retake the Citadel.
  • Mass Effect 2 has the Suicide Mission. This involves flying through the Omega 4 relay (which no ship has ever survived) and then make it to the Collector Base. Once inside the base Shepard and their crew must fight through hordes of Collectors and your crew (assuming there is a crew to rescue by this point). THEN you have to go toe-to-toe with a Human Reaper, decide to either destroy of preserve the Collector Base and then escape again with your squad who may all be dead unless you earnt their loyalty.
  • Mass Effect 3 has the Battle for Earth. The Victory Fleet all converge on Earth and attack the Reaper forces there to protect the Citadel. Meanwhile, the Normandy manages to skirt around the battle and drop Shepard down on Earth in London, which has been overrun and practically destroyed. You meet up with Anderson who comes up with a plan to get a small force onto the Citadel via a beam. You and your squad must then race through the city to the beam whilst mowing down hordes of Reaper ground troops to reach the beam, only then for Harbinger to show up and start killing left right and centre. You call the Normandy to pick up your injured squadmates and then you're one your own as you race to the beam.
• In Gruntz, the final stage of the final level has a TON of enemy gruntz with different tools at the end. Fortunately, you have a large army of gruntz with you as well. Don't expect most of your gruntz to survive.
  • You can soften this a bit by having your Gunhat user pick off some of them first, though.
• A fair number of MechWarrior games culminate in a big, smashy battle for the ages.
  • The best examples are probably the Mercenaries titles from 2 and 4. 2: Mercenaries ends in the Battle of Luthien, a Hold the Line type fight consisting of you and your lancemates against a dozen Smoke Jaguars to safeguard the Imperial Capital of the Draconis Combine.
  • 4: Mercenaries ends with three possible endings, two of them ending with enormous battles - working for Peter Steiner Davion leads to a fight in the capital of Tharkad, a war-torn city scarred by heavy civil war, with your mercenary fighting alongside Peter's army to liberate the city from military rule. Going rogue leads you to a battle to capture a mercenary base, asking you to fight no less than 16 enemy 'Mechs with your own 8-man squad as tanks and aircraft trade fire all around you.
• In Airfix Dogfighter, both of the campaigns have one as the last mission.
• Transformers: Fall of Cybertron has an absolutely incredible variant: showing both Autobots and Decepticon perspectives of the final assault on the Ark.
  • Starting with Soundwave, as he sabotages the Ark's defense turrets, using his minions to their fullest potential.
  • Jetfire as he destroys the Nemesis's tow cables, and single-handedly defends any more ground forces arriving.
  • Bruticus as he decimates his way through the Ark's engines.
  • Jazz fighting^note not distracting or running from Bruticus with nothing but a tiny gun and a Grappling-Hook Pistol.
  • And to cap it all off, the game lets you choose who to play as in the final segment: Optimus Prime or Megatron. Both fights are so unique, that it warrants going back to that level just for that Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny alone.
• Wolfenstein: The New Order ends with one with the heroes attacking Deathshead's compound.
• The final battle in the civil war in the second game for The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel has Class VII and their allies going through a hellish version of Valflame Palace, now called the Infernal Palace, to rescue Prince Cedric while also fighting through several strong members of Ouroboros.
• Tekken 7 ends with an epic showdown between Kazuya and Heihachi Mishima at the center of an erupting volcano. Kazuya manages to kill Heihachi for good at the end of this battle.
  • Tekken 8 also has one of these between Jin Kazama and Kazuya Mishima. Jin defeats Kazuya.
• Played with in the Event Mode for various Super Smash Bros. games:
  • Super Smash Bros. Melee has the 50th event, "Final Destination Match", a Dual Boss battle against Master Hand and Crazy Hand (the Final Bosses of Classic Mode). If this and the other events are cleared, however, an extra event is unlocked, titled "The Showdown". This is a battle against Giga Bowser, the True Final Boss of Adventure Mode, accompanied by Mewtwo and Ganondorf.
  • Super Smash Bros. Brawl's 40th match is entitled "The Final Battle", and pits you against Bowser, Ganondorf, and King Dedede. As before, completing all events unlocks and extra one titled "The FINAL Final Battle". It's similar to "The Showdown", except instead of Giga Bowser, you fight a giant Mario, with Mewtwo and Ganondorf replaced with Sonic the Hedgehog and Solid Snake. Meanwhile, the 20th Co-Op Event is "The Final Battle for Two", which is the regular final battle except the opponents are joined by Wario, Wolf, and Meta Knight. Completing all the Co-Op Events, however, unlocks an extra one titled, "The True All-Star Battle", a horde battle on Battlefield against the entire fighter roster.
  • Super Smash Bros. for Wii U reuses the "The Final Battle" from Brawl, but "The FINAL Final Battle" (or "The True Final Battle" in the British English version) is changed to a battle against Sonic, Mega Man, Pac-Man, and a regular-sized Mario. The apparent final Co-Op Event, "Final Battle Team-Up", takes the regular Final Battle lineup and adds Dark Pit, along with Link, Samus, and Meta Knight in evil color swaps. The actual final Co-Op Event is entitled "The Ultimate Battle", and is similar to "The True All-Star Battle", except DLC fighters and the Mii Fighters aren't included.
  • Played straight in the World of Light mode of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate: the last stretch of the game involves being thrust into a battle between the dueling Big Bads Galeem and Dharkon. In order to get the best ending, the player must carefully maneuver their way through both villains' forces such that neither side gets an overwhelming advantage, then challenge them both in a Dual Boss battle.
• Subverted in Xenoblade Chronicles 1. The allied force attacks the Mechon on the Mechonis’ sword to distract Egil and draw his forces away so the heroes can climb Mechonis and avoid being noticed. The subversion comes when Egil awakens Mechonis, forcing the allied force to retreat by pulling Mechonis’ sword out of Bionis, leading to the return of Zanza and the game’s final arc.
• Doom Eternal has two: The battle against the Icon of Sin in the main campaign and the battle against the Dark Lord in The Ancient Gods - Part 2.
• The LEGO Adaptation Games with original plots tend to end with these.
  • LEGO Batman: The Video Game: Batman and Robin fighting against The Joker and Harley Quinn at Gotham Cathedral.
    • LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes: The Justice League fighting The Joker and Lex Luthor among the ruins of the crashed Joker Robot.
    • LEGO Batman 3: Beyond Gotham: The Justice League and Legion of Doom doing battle with Sinestro, Larfleez and Atrocitus at the Fortress of Solitude in order to restore the Earth to it's original size, followed by fighting against a giant mind-controlled Superman.
    • LEGO DC Super-Villains: The United Heroes and Villains Storming the Castle in order to rescue the Rookie from Darkseid, ending with fighting the latter after he gains the Anti-Life Equation.
  • LEGO Marvel Super Heroes: The assembled Heroes and Villains fighting against Galactus on the deck of the Helicarrier
    • Lego Marvel Superheroes 2: The Heroes storming Kang's Citadel, ending with a duel between giant-sized versions of Kang and Captain America.

Webcomics

• The final story arc of Checkerboard Nightmare, "In Continuum", culminates in a massive final battle — saddled with an inherent risk that even doing something as serious as an "ultimate battle royale with the Unraveled" would worsen Chex's canonitis. Yeah, long story.
• Coga Suro's entire fifteenth and final chapter is spent on a Final battle, which essentially comprises of Styx covering half of London with a massive dome, underneath which pretty much everyone gets an on- or- off- panel boss fight.
• Dracula: Ruler of the Night ends in a final confrontation with the hunters vs Dracula and his brides (which include Lucy, her mother Minerva and Helsing's wife, Milly). Ultimately in the end, Drac and two of his brides are killed, Milly seriously wounded and taken into Helsing's custody as he can't bear to stake her and the rest fleeing into the night with Quincy's body, as per Dracula's order to ensure vampirism continues into modern society, even if it won't be dominant as he intended.
• Homestuck's End of Act 6 had an 18 minute flash animation called "[S] Collide" depicting (most of) the final battle. Actually, final battles. There were something like six or seven fights happening simultaneously. Most of them were wrapped up in that animation, the one exception being the war against Lord English himself, which lasted a few more updates.
• The final battle of the war against Dr. Deathe's army actually occurs at the beginning of Recursion. Of course, it doesn't quite go as planned.
• One of these concludes the "Dangerous Days" arc of Sluggy Freelance, with the good guys pulling out every last ally and trump card they've got to take down Hereti Corp.
• Kill Six Billion Demons: The Discordance of the Demiurges, a battle that makes up most of Breaker of Infinities: Jagganoth has finally declared war on all of existence, and all six demiurges stand together against him, as well as Allison, Cio and White Chain. The fact that Breaker of Infinities is the second last book of the comic gives some indication of its finality. Jagganoth wins, but Solomon succeeds at turning him into Sealed Evil in a Can and gives Allison a second shot at him later.
  Jagganoth: THERE IS WORK TO BE DONE, AND I AM FINISHED WITH THIS FARCE. LET US HAVE ONE MORE CONTEST.

Web Original

• In Fine Structure, it comes down to Oul versus powered-up Ching. Both perish, completing the series' all but total "Everybody Dies" Ending.
• Limyaael's Fantasy Rants: Limyaael's suggestions how to manage the final battle.
• Look to the West: After the republican authorities in Paris, steadily losing ground to pretty much the rest of Europe, surrender and restore the monarchy, the 80,000-strong Grande Armée under Pierre Boulanger remains in the field and blitzes the capital, defended by 55,000 French, British, Irish, and American soldiers. This is both the largest battle of the Jacobin Wars and the last: not only do the defenders hold out long enough for the Russo-Curono-Lithuanian expeditionary force to relieve them, Boulanger himself dies very dramatically.
• A More Personal Union has the Battle of Toledo serving as this for the Great War. And it is suitably epic — on one side, 90,000 Grande Alliance troops commanded by King Henri III of France, on the other, 200,000 Spanish soldiers and Italian mercenaries led by Henri's cousin and nemesis Crown Prince Ferdinand of Spain. There's an Alliance siege of Madrid after they win, but it's more a denouncement than anything.
• RWBY has an offscreen example in the Vacuo Campaign that ended the Great Offscreen War; After years of war, the Atlas-Mistral alliance attempted to end the war by conquering Vacuo, hoping to sever the Vacuo-Vale alliance's supply of Dust. In the battle, the King of Vale took to the field personally. The death toll was so great that Atlas and Mistral surrendered, and even Vacuo willingly bent the knee to Vale's power. The King refused their fealty, instead making them abdicate and turn their kingdoms into democracies. Historians would later insist that the death toll was caused by the hostile desert climate, but survivors would insist that it was all because of the king himself.

Western Animation

• Amphibia has Anne, Sasha and Marcy in space and in their respective Calamity Forms fighting The Core in order to keeping it from crashing Amphibia's moon onto the titular location.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender actually had four final battles at once. The most important was Aang vs. Ozai which both started first and ended last. There was also Zuko and Katara vs. Azula, Suki, Toph, and Sokka vs. Airships, and Iroh and the White Lotus taking back Ba Sing Se.
  • The sequel series, The Legend of Korra, has one at the end of each season. Season 1 was Korra vs. Amon. Season 2 is Korra vs. Unalaq and Vaatu combined in what's practically a kaiju battle in Republic City. Season 3 is a verry pissed off Korra in the Avatar State fighting against Zaheer in a battle that wouldn't be out of place in Dragonball Z. Season 4 ends with Team Korra fighting against Kuvira and her Colossus, a battle which just about destroys the city as well as open up a third Spirit Realm portal!
• Gravity Falls has the final fight begin with the town of Gravity Falls against Bill Cipher which culminates with the Pines family taking one last stand against Bill.
• Justice League Unlimited:
  • Before being renewed for a post-script season, the show ended with the expanded roster fighting off an invasion of Ultimen clones led by Galatea on the Watchtower while the founding members fought Luthor-Brainiac in Metropolis.
  • Season 3, the official Series Finale to the show instead of Season 2, ends with the entire Justice League unexpectedly falling into an Enemy Mine with the Legion to defend Earth from the armies of a resurrected Darkseid.
• The My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic episode "The Ending of the End, Part 2" (which was the penultimate episode of the series) has a final battle between three of the show's main villains and almost every character who'd appeared in the series.
• Ninjago: Before the show was Un-Canceled, the intended Final Battle was between Lloyd's Golden Dragon form and the Overlord incarnated in his original form: a giant, purple-black wyvern.
• The Owl House has Eda, King, and Luz (the latter empowered by the last of the Titan's energy) facing off one last time against Belos, who has hijacked the Titan's power in an attempt to destroy the Boiling Isles for good.
• Robot Chicken parodied the Star Wars situation here.
• The last episode of the fifth and final season of Samurai Jack features one of a suitable scope. Every major ally that Jack's ever made rallies together in a tremendous army to try and knock down Aku,while Jack has a one-on-one battle of his own against an Aku-controlled Ashi. Once he manages to free her, she uses the powers of Aku to send Jack back to the past, where Aku was the most vulnerable he's ever been, so that Jack can fulfil his destiny, and slay the demon once and for all.
• The two-part finale of Storm Hawks has the titular team rallying the Sky Knights of Atmos into a massive assault against the Cyclonian Empire, which has gained the Lost Technology necessary to unleash its own world-wide campaign against the planet. Initially, Cyclonia wins, forces Atmos to surrender and capture most of the Sky Knights with the Storm Hawks on the run, but a creative counterattack with their few remaining allies allows them to free the Sky Knights and initiate the proper final battle. It ends with the Sky Knights victorious, the Dark Ace killed, and the power of the empire finally broken. However, Master Cyclonis escapes through the portal to the Far Side of Atmos where she obtained her Lost Technology, with the Storm Hawks leaving their friends to pursue her in a story for another day.
• Tales of Arcadia:
  • Trollhunters: The heroes and all their allies fighting Gunmar's army, Angor Rot, and Morgana in the Season 3 finale.
  • 3Below: The Tarrons and their friends facing off with General Morando and his OMEN army in the Season 2 finale.
  • Wizards (2020): The heroes fighting the Bellroc, Skrael and the Green Knight to keep Nari out of their hands so they can't activate the Genesis Seals.
• The fifth season finale of Teen Titans (2003), just before "Things Change", ends with a massive battle between the expanded Teen Titan army and the Brotherhood of Evil.
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2003) ends season 5 with this. The series comes back as Fast Forward and then as Back to the Sewers, but the original 2003 series wraps up with all the characters in one huge battle.
• Transformers:
  • Beast Wars ended with the two-part "Nemesis", which is essentially one big battle to hold off an ancient warship.
    • The Transformers Wiki has several articles with that name.
    • The other Transformers Wiki has an obscure bit of fan terminology for this: the Really Big Fight at the End, or RBFATE.
  • The last two episodes of Beast Machines are this; especially the last one with it featuring a 20 minute Optimus Primal vs. Megatron fight...which Megatron says is just to pass the time until his drones finish repairing the Spark chamber so he can reformat Cybertron.
  • From Transformers: Prime, we have the battle on Cybertron between the Autobots, Predacons and a Unicron-possessed Megatron for the fate of Primus's rebooted spark. The show technically could do more with the result, but it ends with the end of the Decepticons (except to confirm what happened to Shockwave), and the end of the line of Primes due to complications protecting The Allspark.
• Season one of W.I.T.C.H. features the aptly-named episode "The Final Battle", in which the Guardians team up with Caleb and the Rebel army to storm Phobos' castle. Of course, it turned out to be not so final, as there was a second season.
• The finale of every season of Winx Club features the Winx in a final showdown with the Arc Villain of the season. The third season finale was even titled "The Final Battle" on Nickelodeon.
• The final two episodes of X-Men: Evolution had the X-Men and their assorted allies fighting Apocalypse and his Horsemen.

Real Life

• In history, there are both final battles and pivotal battles, but it's rather rare to see a pivotal final battle. Most final battles are lopsided affairs, and tend to be short, vicious, and winner-kills-all affairs with little hope of even survival for the defender, while the fights that actually matter rarely end up actually ending the conflict on the spot. There are some good examples of some wars that end only on the last note, such as the Battle of Alesia, which very well could have ended with Julius Caesar dead and his conquests rendered nil, but instead ended with the Gallic rebellion crushed.
  • Alesia is a good example, Marius' battles against the Cimbrii and Teutons as well, and another Caesarian battle; Pharsalus where he and Pompey the Great decided who would be master of Rome. Gaius Octavian ('s general) against Marcus Antonius at Actium is a very good example. A later Roman one, Battle of the Milvian Bridge... Rome had many of those.
  • Also: The Battle of Phillipi was the last hurrah for the Optimate faction. Brutus and Cassius versus Antony and Octavian. This was Antony's Moment of Awesome. He managed to beat both Cassius and Brutus, while Octavian's forces were overrun by Brutus's in the first phase of the battle.
    • Roman history was rife with these. The best examples come from the Third Servile War and the Second Punic War. In the former, Spartacus had been chased to Rhegium (The "toe" of Italy's "boot") and cut off from supplies. Cornered by Crassus, they made one final stand at the Battle of the Siler River. Despite the fact that much of Spartacus' army was comprised of slaves who knew little of fighting, they still brought their full force against Crassus, seeing no alternative. In the end, they lost, but it was a narrow defeat and had Spartacus won, he likely could have led his people to freedom.
    • One that isn't talked about as much is the Battle of Munda of 45 BC. By this point, Caesar was dictator for most of the past seven years, Pompey, Scipio, and Cato were all dead, and most of the Republic was securely under Caesarian leadership — except for Spain, where Titus Labienus had joined with the sons of Pompey in raising the local legions in rebellion. Representing the very last Republican opposition, Labienus, who was Caesar's Number Two in Gaul, was the closest to his equal, spending the better part of a decade subduing the Gallic tribes and being significantly responsible for the Republic's success. Labienus managed to raised thirteen legions, more than the nine and eight that Pompey and Cato had, respectively. The battle ended in a total rout for the Pompeians, with Labienus dying in the fighting. Caesar had his erstwhile friend buried with full honors. It was his last battle, and almost exactly a year later, Caesar would be assassinated.
    • As nearly 17 years of war drew to a close, Carthage opted to make a final stand in the Second Punic War. They had already sued for peace with Rome, having lost their lucrative Spanish colonies while Hannibal campaign in Italy, but the Romans demanded outrageous terms and so the Carthaginians rebuffed them and recalled Hannibal and his army to Africa. This truly was the final battle in many ways. On one side you had Hannibal, one of the most brilliant leaders in history, marshaling out with a force of veteran mercenaries, monstrous war elephants, and a massive levy of troops to help bolster his numbers. On the other side was Scipio Africanus, son of a wealthy Roman stateman, marching with a force of elite Roman infantry. Scipio was also a brilliant general, and he had fought Hannibal's forces before early into the war, in a battle that almost got his father killed. In the end, the battle was pivotal for many reasons, not the least of which revolved around Hannibal. Hannibal himself had won three crushing victories against the Roman Republic at Trebia, Trasimene, and Cannae. This made him the most feared enemy the Romans had ever encountered. In the end, Hannibal was decisively defeated at the Battle of Zama, mostly because Scipio had adapted to Hannibal's tactics of using light cavalry as flankers, and against his elephant charge, which the Romans swiftly brought down with the use of pilum. In the end, the fate of the Mediterranean was decided at that battle, and it was one of the largest territorial gains for the Republic, as well as a huge boon to Scipio's reputation.
• The Battle of Berlin was sufficiently epic, bloody, stubborn, featured in a Very Special Final City and signified the downfall of the Nazi regime, so it definitely qualifies. However, despite being a Last Stand for the Third Reich, their defeat was assured long before it began. Nazi Germany was on its very last legs for several months before the Soviets even assaulted its Capital, with its infrastructure destroyed, cities bombed, and was barely able to scramble together a coherent defense for the city. And even then, whatever forces they could muster were under-equipped, poorly supplied, and much of the soldiers were either young adolescent boys, older men, maimed infantrymen.
• Salamis, Hastings, half the battles in the Hundred Year War, virtually every naval battle in the Imjin War. Basically, any battle containing either a national leader or a 'lynchpin' commander.
• When Edward the Confessor of England died childless, three men claimed the throne: Anglo-Saxon noble Harold Godwinson, King Harald Hardrada of Norway, and Duke William the Bastard of Normandy. Godwinson destroyed Hardrada and his invasion army at Stamford Bridge on September 25, 1066, and then marched south for the final showdown with William at Hastings on October 14. The battle was a close-run thing, but the eventual result was that Harold lost his life, the Normans and their allies swept the field, and William got himself crowned king. What's often forgotten is that William spent many years afterward subduing resistance in the north of England, but his victory at Hastings eliminated his only serious remaining rival for the crown and ensured that extending his control over the country was just a matter of time.
• The Battle of Castillon, fought in Gascony on July 17, 1453, was the last battle of the Hundred Years War and is considered in hindsight to have marked its end. The forces of King Charles VII of France led by Jean Bereau used their guns to decimate the English, killing John Talbot, Earl of Shrewsberry and sending the English army into retreat. The French retook Bordeaux, thus expelling the English from everywhere in France except Callais, and the War of the Roses that began shortly afterward ensured that the English would be too busy fighting each other to launch another invasion of France for decades.
• The Battle of Waterloo is a pretty straight example though. Two almost evenly matched armies, with total victory in the war up for grabs. The defeat of Napoleon's army was so devastating that he abdicated the French throne just 4 days later. Ever since then, the word "Waterloo" has been synonymous with final and permanent defeat.
  • Although that may be seeing things a little optimistic from the French point of view as large parts of the Allied forces (about one third of the Prussian field army and the entire Russian and Austrian armies, for starters) did not even see action before Waterloo in the 1815 campaign. Napoleon's gambit for 1815 was to beat the Anglo-Dutch army under Wellington and the Prussians at Belgium first to knock them out of the war, and build up strength to eventually face off against the approaching Austrian and Russian armies.
  • Probably more then a bit optimistic. However it was the last battle of the war and dramatic enough to fit the trope.
• One historian argued that the Battle of Leipzig, fought two years, also fits this trope, for this really was the last feasible chance Napoleon had at scoring a big victory negotiating a lasting peace with his empire intact. It certainly was epic enough to fit the bill - it wasn't dubbed "The Battle of the Nations" for nothing: six different nations gambled everything they had on this fight, the largest before World War I. It also featured the biggest artillery barrage of the Napoleonic age and a very close call where Tsar Alexander and the core of the Allied army staff almost got captured in the night by French units.
• Arguably, the Battle of Vittorio Veneto in World War I in late October 1918. While there was already movement for peace, matters accelerated because of this battle. Two evenly matched armies (Italians with British/French support v. Austria-Hungary), with the fate of Italy and Eastern Europe to be determined. Midway through the battle, though, the Austro-Hungarian Empire begins to fantastically self-destruct behind them, literally splitting their army in half. In less than five days, the battle ends with Italy completing its 70-year unification, and the Empire fragmenting into several smaller nations. In turn, this led the Germans to revolt, and force the other Empire (which swiftly became a republic) to eventually call for armistice that ends the war.
• Leyte Gulf was the last battle in the epic clash between the US Navy and the Imperial Japanese Navy. It was also, depending on how you count such things the biggest naval battle ever. It is also widely believed that it will be the final naval battle ever.
  • It wasn't quite the very last sea battle of the war, but it was the final major battle.
  • Apparently the Japanese navy knew they couldn't win, but asked to go on one last mission to fulfill their duty.
    • They couldn't have flipped the outcome of the war, but they did at least have an outside chance to wreck the Allied amphibious landing. The Pacific War didn't really have a "final decisive battle". Midway was decisive, but the Japanese still had carrier parity for the next year or two of the war. And Guadalcanal wasn't a crushing battle but rather an additional campaign victory achieved by a series of battles that went both ways.
  • Technically it was the final large scale naval battle. There hasn't been a clash of carrier fleets, battleships, battlecruisers, heavy cruisers, light cruisers, and destroyers since World War II.
  • A part of Leyte Gulf, The Battle of Surigao Strait, has the distinction of being the Final Battle ever engaged in between battleships, in the war that saw the end of the battleship as a primary weapons platform, and the cessation of all construction of that class of ship.
    • Not only the last naval clash between battleships, but also the last time the classic "crossing the T" maneuver was executed, and the last naval battle that did not involve airpower.
• The Battle of Sardarapat was the deciding battle in the Turkish-Armenian War (basically a sub-war of World War I). The weakened Ottoman Empire was looking to conquer Armenia (newly independent after the Russian Empire collapsed) and extend its territory to the Caspian Sea. Although hugely out-numbered the Armenians fought off the Ottomans using pretty much any citizen who could carry a gun, and this may be the reason Armenia even exists today. But, a few years later, the Soviets took over Armenia anyway and gave most of the land to Turkey.
• While the War of 1812 was already technically over, due to a peace accord having been signed between Great Britain and the United States, the news hadn't reached either the American or British armies at New Orleans by the time the British launched their attack. It was a fitting final battle (at least for the Americans, anyway) as less than 5,000 American soldiers managed to crush a British force twice their size, saving New Orleans and catapulting General Andrew Jackson to national prominence; in fact, had the peace news come in time to prevent the battle, it is likely Jackson would never have become President of the United States.
• The Battle of Bosworth Field on August 22, 1485 decided the Wars of the Roses once and for all. It had Richard III and Henry Tudor literally feet away from each other, fighting for the throne of England, and ended with a climactic betrayal by Lord Stanley which resulted in Richard's death and Henry's victory. Now king, Henry symbolically united the two houses by marrying Elizabeth of York and very effectively established his dynasty's power.
• The Battle of San Jacinto was the final, decisive battle between Sam Houston's Texas revolutionaries, and the Mexican forces under the command of General Santa Anna. Probably the most lopsided example on this page, as the Texans utterly defeated the Mexicans in a mere 18 minutes.
• The Battle of Culloden was the final serious attempt at Scottish independence from England, and ended in less than half an hour.
• The Battle of Sekigahara. The Western clans of Toyotomi consolidated 120,000 of their troops to challenge the 75,000 Eastern clan soldiers of Tokugawa. Both sides brought their ultimate weapons: the Toyotomi had their elite cavalry, while the Tokugawa brought their firearms. The battle was incredibly close and historians agree the smallest alteration (reinforcements of 2000 troops had shown up for Toyotomi, or the rain lasted an hour longer) would have changed who ruled Japan. The victor's clan reigned absolute as Shogun of Japan for almost three centuries, and it was Tokugawa.
  • Surprisingly, the battle received a follow-up fifteen years later at the siege of Osaka Castle: an army of 120,000 Toyotomi loyalists flocked to Osaka Castle, the largest citadel in Japan, to support the last Toyotomi heir. Tokugawa Ieyasu, now the master of all Japan, assembles 165,000 men - as well as several battalions of early cannons - in an epic siege campaign that lasted throught the winter and the summer (with a brief respite in between the seasons). In the end, the Toyotomi heir was slain, the rebel forces crushed, and the rule of the Tokugawa solidifed for the next 200 years. It has been dubbed "the last battle of the samurai" by historians.
• The Battle of Moscow. While overshadowed by the far bloodier Battle of Stalingrad, had the Nazis taken Moscow, their chances of winning the Eastern Front and in turn World War II in Europe would have increased. The Slavic people would have been wiped off the face of the Earth in a now Mega Holocaust. Thankfully, the Russians stood their ground and pushed the Nazi invaders out of Moscow, starting their own invasion to Berlin.

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