Rhino Rampage

CHAAAAAAAARGE!

"Love is like a rhino, short-sighted and hasty; if it cannot find a way, it will make a way."

— Magic: The Gathering card "Crash of Rhinos"

When portrayed in the media, rhinos are always hulkingly big, heavy, and intimidating herbivores that are known to have bad eyesight, short tempers, and a tendency to run down and trample (or gore to death) things that piss them off. They're not very smart, but they always use their heads. They are one of the truly tank-like species of animal in the world. If they appear in a game, expect a Smash Mook or maybe a Bullfight Boss. If they are in a group, they are likely to go on an Animal Stampede. If they're depicted in fiction, they're likely to be a dangerous obstacle. If it's a comedy, expect to see someone sent flying.

When a character is based on a rhinoceros, expect a tough brute capable of a lot of violence. If the character is a good guy, expect a lot of trampled Mooks. If the character is a bad guy, expect running. Lots and lots of running. Traditionally, rhinos were sometimes used as the Unpleasant Animal Counterpart to the Honorable Elephant and Huggy, Huggy Hippos, though the latter's capacity to be aggressive and dangerous has become more emphasized in later media.

In Real Life, a rhinoceros is essentially an armor-plated cow (though as an odd-toed ungulate, it's more closely related to the horse and the tapir). It isn't anywhere near as aggressive or mindlessly violent as it's been portrayed in the media. It can still be a dangerous animal, but by far more humans are killed each year by elephants and hippopotami (and cows). In fact, humans are probably more dangerous to it because all of the living species of rhino are threatened due to poaching and habitat loss. Baby rhinos are especially vulnerable and need to be watched and cared for 24/7, otherwise they'll literally die from the stress of being alone.

Fun fact: A group of rhinos is called a "crash". Three guesses why (and the first two don't count)...

When a more exotic, powerful or environment-specific variant is desired, woolly rhinos or elasmotheres may sometimes be used in lieu of the regular sort. The other well-known kind of prehistoric rhino, the gigantic Paraceratherium, is the odd exception to this trope, due to its lack of horns and resemblance to giraffes.

Not to be confused with the Rhino tank in the Grand Theft Auto series. Despite the fact that a good deal of players spent most or all of their playtime spawning a Rhino with a cheat code and going on a rampage.

See also Brutish Bulls and Full-Boar Action for similarly violent and aggressive fictional ungulates and Temper-Ceratops for horned dinosaurs with similar stock behaviors. Contrast Honorable Elephant and Huggy, Huggy Hippos, since rhinos are often portrayed as the Unpleasant Animal Counterpart to elephants and hippos (which is ironic since, as mentioned above, elephants and hippos are more dangerous than rhinos). However, elephants and hippos are not immune to this portrayal themselves.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• Shows up in a few Doraemon films.
  • While the gang explores the African jungles in Doraemon: Nobita and the Haunts of Evil, Gian complains the trip to too "boring" and "where are all the wild beasts"? Doraemon then complies by attaching a gadget on Gian who attracts wild animals, one of them being a rampaging rhino who nearly runs him over until Suneo knocks the rhino out using a tranquilizer gadget.
  • Doraemon: Nobita and the Island of Miracles ~Animal Adventure~ have Gian and Suneo running afoul of a woolly rhinoceros while exploring the island, which chases after them until they climbed up a tree. Doraemon comes to the rescue in time, but the rhino then accidentally destroyed the Anywhere Door, preventing the gang from using that gadget later on.
• Mazinger Z: Mechanical Beast Toros D7 resembled a mix between rhino and bull: it was four-legged, its body was armor-plated, and above its head it had a huge horn. It attacked charging at its adversary and impaling it or goring it with its large horn.
• Naruto: One of the summons of Pain's Animal Path is a giant rhino, using it to rampage in the building of Konoha's Intelligence Division. He later uses it to attack Sage Mode Naruto, who grabs it by the horn and tosses it into the air.
• One Piece:
  • One of Zoro's attacks is named "Sai Kuru" (Wheeling Rhino), and was also translated as "Rhino Rampage" in the 4Kids dub of Grand Adventure.
  • One of Impel Down four Jailer Beasts has eaten a still-unnamed Zoan fruit which allows him to become a Rhino Man.
  • Post Time Skip Franky has created a rhino-themed Cool Bike called the Kurosai (Black Rhino) FR-U #4.
• Kasai from Oumagadoki Doubutsuen is a rhino anthromorph, and is usually shy and quiet until something happens to make him angry, upon which he embodies this completely.
• In Pokémon Origins, during Red's Final Battle with Giovanni, Giovanni's first Pokémon is a Rhyhorn which is unusually strong, being able to easily beat four-sixths of Red's team (Victreebel, Kabutops, Snorlax and Jolteon) before tying with Hitmonlee when the Fighting-type's Mega Kick collides with Rhyhorn's Horn Drill despite the fact that in the games, Victreebel would be able to one-shot Rhyhorn all by itself and the Spikes Pok´mon beats Jolteon with a Thunderbolt despite its 30 special in the Gen 1 games. Giovanni's second and final Pokémon is a Rhydon which puts up a good fight against Charizard until Charizard dodges Horn Drill and takes down Rhydon with Seismic Toss.
• One of the earlier creatures in Toriko is the "Dom", a massive, long-tailed rhinoceros-like animal with plenty of spikes, capable of demolishing a whole building with a single charge. And it's far from being the most dangerous beast in that biotope.
• To the Abandoned Sacred Beasts: Danny Price is one of the Incarnates, former soldiers with the power to transform into mythological monsters. His monster form is a spriggan, which looks like a gigantic humanoid rhinoceros.

Asian Animation

• Pleasant Goat and Big Big Wolf: In episode 22, Weslie disguises a sleeping rhino as a goat to trick Wolnie. When Wolnie attacks him, the rhino wakes up and immediately gets angry at her, chasing her and Wolffy down without a second thought.

Card Games

• Magic: The Gathering:
  • Rhinos have been a predominantly Green creature type since Crash of Rhinos from Mirage, and often get the keyword Trample (meaning that if they deal more damage to a creature than would kill it they deal the rest of it to the defending player as if they had steamrolled right over their target), and occasionally an ability limiting the other player's ability to block them.
    • The biggest rhino in the game comes from Khans of Tarkir in the form of Siege Rhino, one of the huge war beasts used by the Abzan Houses.
    • There are also the Rhox, humanoid rhinoceri from Alara that unlike their bestial cousins lean towards White, the color of order, and are known for being fearsome, unwavering soldiers and knights. Some also live in New Capenna, where they're mostly associated with the Riveteers as workers and the Brokers as enforcers. Most of the other ones we see are prizefighters or private security.
  • Although they're only typed as regular Beasts, the krushoks of Tarkir resemble massive, one-horned rhinos and are mostly known for their great strength and extremely foul tempers.

Comic Books

• Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics)' Ixis Naugus is one third bat, one third rhinoceros, and one third lobster.
• Rhino, one of Spider-Man's central rogues is infamous for charging straight to his opponents as one of his primary means of combat and of course, while donning a heavily armored rhinoceros suit.
• Usagi Yojimbo: Gen, a rhino bounty hunter, is consistently shown to be a very aggressive and skilled offensive swordsman, but he often flounders against fighters like Zato-ino and Inazuma, who are equally skilled and more well-rounded.

Fan Works

• In the Kung Fu Panda Fic A Different Lesson, Commander Vachir shows a lot more of his combat skills than in canon, especially when possessed by BigBad Heian Chao. He actually manages to Curb-Stomp Battle Tai Lung initially. And that's not even getting into the undead Anvil of Heaven, AKA. Tai Lung's former guards.
• In the Harry Potter fanfic "The Lie I've Lived," Harry conjures a rhino and rides it through the Triwizard obstacle course. While the other champions are slowed down by the obstacles, he uses the rhino like a living tank/battering ram.
• In the Prehistoric Park/Walking with… crossover fanfic Prehistoric Earth, both species of ice age rhino rescued, plus a brontothere species and even a herd of arsinoitherium, prove incredibly vicious and aggressive, the males especially so, at the sight of the rescue team in their territories while in their home time periods. The subsequent territorial rages they undergo prove very useful for the team in allowing the beasts to end up charging straight through the portal to the titular zoo.
• The subsequent Continuity Reboot of Prehistoric Earth, Prehistoric Park Reimagined, similarly features prehistoric rhino and brontothere species that prove incredibly ill-tempered and charge happy at the sight of territorial intrusions by the rescue team over the course of their rescues.

Films — Animated

• Carl and Frank from Ice Age, a pair of brontotheres, which despite their appearances, aren't even actual rhinos at all (though they are distantly related). True to form, they're both portrayed as brutish thugs, and they get trounced by Manny the mammoth.
• Kung Fu Panda completely inverts this. Tai Lung goes on a rampage and thrashes Commander Vachir and all 1,000 of his rhino guards without even breaking a sweat.
  • Kung Fu Panda 2 likewise gives us Master Thundering Rhino, son of famed Master Flying Rhino. Sadly, he pretty much just exists so Shen's cannon can kill someone strong as proof of its power. Overall, it seems as though rhinos in the Kung Fu Panda universe exist solely to provide The Worf Effect.
• In The Lion King II: Simba's Pride, Kovu and Kiara scare away some birds so Timon and Pumbaa can eat the worms. Unfortunately, the birds happen to have a herd of angry rhinos on their side and like the wildebeests from the original, the rhinos stampede after Kiara and Kovu. Thankfully, no one got trampled!
• NIMONA (2023): The first animal form Nimona takes to reveal her Shapeshifting powers to Ballister is a rhinoceros. And sure enough, she uses it to cause quite the damage in the castle (though she also turned into other species during her rampage, including smaller ones).
• The halberd-carrying Mooks of Prince John in Robin Hood (1973) are rhinos. They are not portrayed as terribly bright, but they have a mean charge.
• The Sword in the Stone: The second to last animal Madam Mim turns into during the Wizard Duel is a pink rhinoceros, who is then head-butted off a cliff and into a river by Merlin (now turned into a billy goat), but then Mim comes out in the form of a...

Films — Live-Action

• Subverted with the battle-rhinoceros from 300. If the Persians had been fighting anyone other than the frigging Spartans...
• Attack of the Clones have a three-horned alien beast called a Reek in the Arena battle, who nearly trampled over Anakin until he used the Force to tame the beast. The same animal went on a rampage later in the film and nearly tramples over Mace Windu and Jango Fett until Mace severs one of the Reek's front tusks via lightsaber followed by Jango Fett putting it down with a single shot.
• Avatar has the Hammerhead Titanotheres, enormous six-legged rhino-like alien beasts with a massive flat horn resembling a hammerhead shark's snout (hence their name) and a colorful frill atop their heads used for signaling and as a threat display.
• In Black Panther (2018), Wakanda has trained attack rhinos!
• The Chronicles of Narnia features a rhinoceros intentionally charging ahead of the centaur General Oreius in order to save King Peter from the advancing hordes of the White Witch. The beast handily tosses aside several attackers before being brought down.
• An Erumpent (see below in Literature) goes around rampaging in New York in the first Fantastic Beasts movie, after it escapes Newt's suitcase.
• This trope was going to be used in Gladiator, but eventually decided against the idea. There were a few reasons for this, mainly lack of time and money, but also because of how unbelievable it is in real life, as the summary above mentions.
• The Gods Must Be Crazy features a rhino going around stomping out fires the characters have set up; the Narrator claims that rhinos are like the fire marshals of the forest. The Gods Must Be Crazy II features a rhino charging the female lead for getting between it and its baby.
• A rhino is the occupant on one of the cars in the circus train at the start of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. When the action taking place on the roof of the car annoys it, it smashes its horn through the roof and comes very close to hitting Indy somewhere sensitive.
• Jumanji features several summoned rhinos, including one that casually shoulders aside a police car. This particular rhino gets its own gameplay mechanic in the tie-in board game. Simply put, when you land on a space with a rhino on it, you can use the rhino to block your adversaries' path. Subverted with another member of the rhino herd, a short, overweight specimen whose lumbering walk and weary, huffing breath are Played for Laughs. Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle features a herd of albino rhinos during the sequel's group trip to return the Jaguar's Eye to the Jaguar statue.
• In Prehistoric Women, Queen Kari later meets her fate Impaled with Extreme Prejudice on the horn of the rampaging white rhino.

Folklore

• Several cultures have folk tales that tell of a rhinoceros putting out a raging fire. By trampling it under its feet.
  • As noted above, The Gods Must Be Crazy features an example of this.
  • It is used again in an episode of The Simpsons as a Deus ex Machina.
  • Conversely, in heraldry they're sometimes depicted as breathing fire like mammalian dragons.
• It's generally believed unicorns were based on garbled descriptions of rhinos, which likely explains why in many descriptions of them from antiquity describe unicorns as being of aggressive temperament.

Literature

• The Animorphs often favored morphing into rhinos (and elephants) for situations requiring lots of collateral damage. Jake originally acquired his when he needed to smash through the walls of a heavily guarded compound, and Marco got one in book 22 for pretty much the same reason (though he only ever used it that one time).
  • Though the rhinos (the real ones or the instincts of the ones they morphed) weren't portrayed as being aggressive or mean, they were just really tough.
• The Babar series gave us Rataxes, the aggressive King of Rhinoland and Babar's arch-rival. That the Rhinos have a destructive holiday called (you guessed it) the "Rhino Rampage" makes things all the more troperiffic!
• In Bravelands, some rhinos resent elephants for having the Great Mother as their matriarch. They even start acting aggressive towards Sky the elephant for stumbling across them and refuse to let her speak reasonably. A case of rhinos actually charging is when Fearless the lion stumbles across a rhino herd while on his travels. The rhinos' aggressive reputation gets harder in Code Of Honor, where it's revealed that Stronghide had murdered the Great Mother, though goaded into doing so by Stinger. Also in this book, Stronghide boasts that a rhino can easily replace an elephant as a Great Parent and is even willing to become the Great Father of the Bravelands.
• The old children's series Abelard and Liverwurst is about a farmer (Abelard) who finds a baby rhino (Liverwurst) after the latter falls off a circus train. A monster that terrorizes farms and towns in the first book turns out to be Liverwurst's mother, who's angry because she thinks someone kidnapped her baby.
• Clue: In the Midnight Phone Calls chapter "The Guest Who Couldn't Shoot Straight", a vicious rhino escapes from the nearby zoo and shows up at the mansion, trying to attack the guests and briefly getting stuck in the outside wall of the Billiard Room.
• Woolly rhinos crop up a few times in the Earth's Children series. In all cases, they are described as being stubborn, unpredictable and vicious:
  • Broud, the main antagonist of The Clan of the Cave Bear, has a woolly rhinoceros totem. His personality traits include impulsiveness, being quick to anger and resenting those (especially Ayla) who detract attention from him.
  • In The Valley of Horses, Thonolan is gored by a woolly rhino, leading to him and Jondalar meeting the Sharamudoi, the tribe into which Thonolan marries.
  • Towards the end of their post-Matrimonial isolation in The Shelters of Stone, Ayla and Jondalar come across a group of adolescent boys baiting a woolly rhino. Needless to say, none of the boys have any experience hunting rhinos and one of them ends up getting injured.
• The Erumpent in Harry Potter's Fantastic Beasts is basically a rhinoceros whose horn is Made of Explodium.
• At the start of James and the Giant Peach, both of James' parents are killed (check that, eaten) by an escaped rhino. The Film of the Book makes it worse. The Rhino is basically turned into an Eldritch Abomination made of clouds that represents all of James' fears.
• Journey to the West: In one of their last adventures, Sun Wukong and co. encountered a trio of rhinoceros demons who impersonated Buddhas to steal sacred lamp oil from monasteries. They ended up pursuing the monsters into the ocean where they had to muster up some of the Dragon King's army and a few of the constellation gods to help defeat them.
• In the Just-So Story "How the Rhinoceros Got his Skin", the titular rhino is a foul-tempered, bullying Jerkass.
• Katt Loves Dogg: Oscar and Molly find out they're in the rhino sector of Eastern Wilderness Reserve when an angry rhino chases them. When they cross into katt territory, he angrily orders them not to come back, then decides to spite them by making a lot of noice to alert all the katts of a dogg (Oscar) being in their sector.
• The rhino from My Father's Dragon. He's quite fierce and angry, but he mostly just wants people to stay out of his weeping pool.
• A Porcupine Named Fluffy features a rhinoceros character with the name of... ...Hippo. He starts out very antagonistic, threatening to give Fluffy "a rough time," but eventually, he and the little porcupine bond over their contradictory names.
• The Reluctant King: The unicorn inside the Grandduke's menagerie is actually an elasmotherium, or wooly rhinoceros.
• There's a lesser-known Little Golden Books title from the early 1960s, Rupert the Rhinoceros (which was also adapted into a Golden Book Video in 1985) that has a realistic version of this trope. Rupert keeps charging whenever someone comes near, and after this gets him into a car accident when he ends up in the city (after a series of silly events), the doctor tests his eyesight and diagnoses that he can't see very well, thus prompting Rupert to get nervous and charge, just like in real life. So the doctor prescribes Rupert a pair of eyeglasses to improve his vision and all is well.
• Safari: In chapter 5, Henson's and Mansfield's group comes across a rhinocerous dozing in some shrubbery. They all try to sneak past it without disturbing it, but the wind blows their scent in its direction, waking it up and alerting it to intruders. It immediately charges, scattering the natives they got to carry their stuff.
• Douglas Adams's unfinished novel The Salmon of Doubt has a chapter written from the point of view of a rhino which escapes from a zoo and goes on a rampage, killing several people before being shot to death.
• In Son of Spellsinger, the young travelers recruit an alcoholic rhino as both transport and bodyguard. When he's not drunk off his feet, he's an armor-wearing badass.

Live-Action TV

• Remember Ace Lightning, one of the live action CGI hybrid pioneers? One of Ace's enemies was a Rhino-headed Monster named Anvil, who was physically the strongest character, and had an anvil for a hand.
• In Only Fools and Horses episode "Video Nasty", Rodney is trying to come up with an idea for a feature film. Del suggests There's a Rhino Loose in the City. Once the sheer implausibility of this is explored (How do you lose a rhino and not notice? Where would it hide? And what is it doing in the city?), a deflated Del sarcastically suggests that they change the title to There's a Rhino Loose out in the Sticks Where No Sod Lives.
• The Judoon, from Doctor Who, are a race of humanoid rhinoceros Space Police. They're depicted as extremely blunt and no-nonsense, which at worst results in a Judge, Jury, and Executioner attitude.
• Kamen Rider:
  • Kamen Rider Thrust from Kamen Rider Dragon Knight and his Japanese counterpart Gai from Kamen Rider Ryuki have a rhino motif and use the Advent Beast Metalgelas, a hulking humanoid armored rhino.
  • Kamen Rider OOO has the Rhinoceros as one of his Core Medals, which naturally grants him a big horn for headbutts. It's partnered with two other heavy mammals (Gorilla and Elephant), which let OOO assume Sagohzo Combo, a Mighty Glacier with gravity powers.
• Prehistoric Park: In "A Mammoth Undertaking", when Nigel goes back to Ice Age Siberia to find a mammoth to take back to the park, he runs afoul of a bull Elasmotherium, which is noted to be — much like modern rhinoceri — prone to charging down anything that surprises it. Nigel later uses this to his advantage by goading the beast into charging him and following him through the time portal, allowing him to get it to the present and into the park.
• Pushing Daisies. The episode "Window Dressed to Kill" has Ned resurrecting a dead rhinoceros named Aloysius for no reason really connected to the plot. But a rampaging rhinoceros is always badass...
• Super Sentai / Power Rangers:
  • Hyakujuu Sentai Gaoranger / Power Rangers Wild Force features a Rhino-Armadillo tagteam as part of the season's enormous Mecha Expansion Pack. The Rhino forms an alternative set of legs for the combined mecha, which kicks the Armadillo at the enemy as part of a soccer-themed finishing move.
  • Those two may or may not have been a Shout-Out to two American-exclusive monsters from the original Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers, the American Football-themed Rhinoblaster & the Association Football-themed Soccadillo.
  • Dominic, the second extra Ranger in Power Rangers Jungle Fury, channels the power of the rhino. Ironically, while the rhino's raw strength is played up as unrivaled in the animal kingdom, Dominic is more of The Trickster than The Big Guy you'd expect. His Japanese counterpart, Ken from Juken Sentai Gekiranger, is much the same.
  • Misao Mondo, Zyuoh The World of Doubutsu Sentai Zyuohger, has this as his primary animal motif, though he also comes with crocodile and wolf motifs, modes, and mecha. Interestingly, it's the Jack of All Stats, while the crocodile represents raw brute strength. He can only do the typical ramming attack when empowered by all three of his animals. Likewise ( once freed from his brainwashing), his personality is more of a socially and emotionally insecure man.
  • Choujuu Sentai Liveman gives us our first rhino-themed ranger, Jun'ichi Aikawa/Green Sai ("sai" being Japanese for "rhino"), a high school rugby player intent on avenging the death of his sister at the hands of the Big Bad. He also has a brotherly relationship with Black Bison Tetsuya Yano.
• Walking with Beasts: One of the animals featured in the Ice Age episode is a European woolly rhino, a Coelodonta antiquitatis. It features only in one scene, where it spots a passing neanderthal man while grazing, charges him down and hurls him over its shoulder after snagging him with its horns. Luckily, the neanderthal's sturdy body allows him to survive his ordeal.

Magazines

• The "Rhinos" issue of ZooBooks theorizes that this trope may be the result of a rhino's poor eyesight: when you can't tell if something is a threat, it's better to charge at it just to be safe. Accompanying this text is an illustration of a black rhino charging a speeding jeep. Another page has this illustration of a mother rhino attacking a tiger that wanted her baby.

Music

• Rhino Records has their mascot named Rocky, a rhino done up in full Greaser Delinquent regalia.

Other

• An old Russian joke: "Rhinos have bad eyesight, but given their weight it's not their problem".

Professional Wrestling

• Terry Gerin, aka Rhino/Rhyno, who has found success in ECW, WWE and TNA. A powerhouse wrestler, his Signature Move is a running tackle called The Gore.

Tabletop Games

• The Champions Universe features a villain named Ironhorn, who is basically a Captain Ersatz of Marvel's Rhino.
• Dungeons & Dragons:
  • The Rhek are a race of hulking, anthropomorphic, Lawful Good humanoid rhinos. Their entry included one with levels in the Monk class. That's right, not only is this one a badass man-rhino, but it knows kung-fu.
  • Normal rhinos and prehistoric woolly rhinos are often statted up in Monster Manuals as among the more dangerous regular animals players can run into.
• The Fighting Fantasy series features Rhino-Men as the mooks of Big Bad Balthus Dire.
• Pathfinder:
  • Regular and woolly rhinoceri, as well as elasmotheres, feature as possible enemies and tend to be among the more dangerous of the regular animals players are likely to encounter. They tend to be quite aggressive, and to attack with little or no provocation.
  • Fire giants are known to build iron rhinoceri, constructs resembling enormous metallic rhinoceri with blazing furnaces in their bellies and smokestack horns, wrapped in coils of prehensile chains and animated by the bound spirits of actual rhinos. They are infamous for their terrible tempers, intense aggression and propensity for viciously attacking anyone who isn't their master or some type of giant, and are very popular among fire giant kings and warlords as powerful battle mounts and Siege Engine/Beast of Battle crosses.
• Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000:
  • All Juggernauts of Khorne are unholy rhino-shaped amalgamations of daemon, metal, and hellfire, and, like all of Khorne's daemons, are locked in a state of perpetual homicidal fury. The Blood Crushers are especially large versions.
  • Warhammer Fantasy also has "Rhinoxen" as the answer to the question "what the hell could an Ogre ride on the back of?" The result is a breed of creatures resembling shaggy rhinos with two horns side-by-side, noted for their high aggressiveness, violent tempers and extreme stupidity. This suits the Ogres fine — repeated applications of clubs to the head are generally enough to get a Rhinox to bear a rider, and their propensity towards charing anything that moves is quite handy in the thick of battle.
  • Also in Warhammer 40,000 is the Rhino APC, the Space Marines' primary transport vehicle.

Video Games

• ANNO: Mutationem: One of the various enemies are Mooks wearing metallic rhino armor who'll pull out powerful swings or a charged rush to deliver heavy damage.
• Akuji the Heartless has zombie rhinos serving as Giant Mook-type enemies, who can sopak up plenty of hits before going down.
• Gohma Chargers from Asura's Wrath, along with charging like a traditional rhino, are capable of causing small tremors by stomping it's front legs.
• Atelier Iris 3 has a rhino-like Mana called Diemia, which deals physical damage to an enemy row and knocks back the targets when summoned, delaying their turns. Provided the enemies aren't resistant to physical attacks, it is arguably the strongest Mana in the entire game.
• In Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers, rhino football players serve as enemies in Stages G and J. They charge at Chip and Dale and knock away any boxes in their path. While they are bigger than Chip and Dale, they're still very small for rhinos.
• In the Congo Bongo level Rhino Rampage, the enemies are rhinoceroses charging from all directions.
• In the Donkey Kong Country games one of your animal buddies is Rambi. He automatically tramples over enemies when running and can charge a, umm, charging attack that can break through some walls. One of the few animal buddies to be in most of the games, and the only one to make it into Donkey Kong Country Returns and Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze.
• Dungeon of the Endless has the Hurna Rider, basically a Hurna riding a Rhinoceros-like creature. It's capable of bashing open doors, which counts as the player taking a turn and hence can spawn even more waves of enemies (including more Hurna Riders) from dark rooms if it succeeds at doing so. This makes it a very dangerous enemy.
• Dusty Revenge and Dusty Raging Fist have rhino enemies who will attempt to inflict a Horn Attack at you repeatedly.
• Eastern Exorcist has a one-shot boss battle against Marquis Xi, a rhino-demon who alternates between smashing you to a pulp with it's mighty ax to trying to gore you with it's nasal horn.
• Exit Limbo: Opening, set in a world of andromorphic animals, have you playing as a rhino fighter who spends the entire game kicking all sorts of ass and ripping apart your foes.
• Season 5 of Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout introduces mechanical Rhinos in certain levels, most notably the survival round Stompin' Ground. They periodically go berserk and charge at players, flinging them far away if they don't avoid them in time.
• Indian rhinos are one of the many animal species players can encounter in Far Cry 4. Ostensibly a docile herbivore, they're actually one of the most dangerous creatures in Kyrat thanks to their Hair-Trigger Temper, massive health pool, high speed and devastating charge attacks. They're also one of only two animal species (the other being the actually docile elephants) that can attack you while you're in a vehicle, resulting in a One-Hit Kill. Last but not least, rhinos almost never come alone, and if you piss off one, you'll usually have to deal with all of them at once, which isn't helped by how deceptively sneaky they can be - it's not uncommon to get flattened by a rampaging rhino out of nowhere because you moved past it without even realizing it was there.
• Far Cry Primal, set in prehistoric Central Europe, features woolly rhinoceroses as one of the dangerous animals that try attacking Takkar, the player character. There's also a rare Megacerops living among the rhinoceros herds (admittedly, Megacerops was not a rhinoceros, but close enough). Neither of these animals can be tamed by Takkar, and Sabertooths or cave bears are the only predators that can kill them.
• Hearthstone: Rhinos show up occasionally, being multi-horned wooly rhinos from World of Warcraft. They typically have Rush or Charge to emphasize their rampage (both let the minion attack the turn it comes into play, but Charge minions can attack the opponent directly while Rush minions can only attack other minions).
  • Tundra Rhino is a basic Hunter minion that gives friendly Beast-type minions the Charge ability, including itself.
  • Akali the Rhino is the Warrior's Loa in the Rastakhan's Rumble set. He has Rush, and if he overkills an enemy minion, you draw another Rush minion from your deck and give it +5/+5. His spirit card, Spirit of the Rhino, makes your Rush minions immune to damage the turn they come into play.
  • Trampling Rhino (pictured) is another Hunter minion. It has Rush, and after it attacks and kills an enemy minion, any excess damage is dealt to the enemy hero. It's a deliberate Shout-Out to Magic: The Gathering's Trample mechanic.
• There is a hero in Heroes of Newerth appropriately named as Rampage who is riding a rhino.
• Jitsu Squad have a rhino-man boss, Balthazar, fought in Pirate Bay. Who alternates between using a Horn Attack and smashing you with an anchor that he swings around like a club.
• The Drill Sye ("sai" meaning "rhino" in Japanese) Dream Eater in Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance]. They manage to be quite the Goddamned Bats, specializing in attacks that hit multiple times and/or send you flying, leaving you open for abuse from other enemies or in a bad position to fight back.
• The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild: Woolly rhinos, found in the Hebra region, are a downplayed example. They're peaceful herbivores that will flee from Link and monsters should they spot them but, if Link startles one while standing in front of it, it will charge him down and deal a fair amount of damage while doing so. The Hyrule Compendium notes that, due to their toughness and strength, only the most experienced hunters should tackle these animals.
• The Rhino Team led by Maxim in Library of Ruina is known for their durability, strength and...enormous rampages with tremendous collateral damage. They also wield huge sledgehammers and are the only one out of their 'pack' to wear powered armor that makes them significantly larger.
• Mega Man
  • Tunnel Rhino from Mega Man X3, whose horn and right arm are drills that help him tunnel underground. In true rhino fashion, he mainly fights by ramming the player.
  • In Mega Man ZX, there's Protectos the Goreroid. Unlike your typical rhino, he doesn't try to ram you, as he is very slow and bulky. However, he more than makes up for it by attacking you with his upper horn, which is actually a nuke missile that he can launch out of his body.
• One of the more dangerous mechanical Chimera you'll encounter in Mother 3 is the Rhinocerocket◊. It's capable of charging forward and badly hurting multiple members of your party at a time, and then doing even more damage on its return trip.
• Ori and the Blind Forest has Rams, which more resemble rhinos than their real-life namesake, and can only be defeated once Ori has the Ground Pound ability to break their armor. Later variants attack by rolling into a ball and exploding on contact. The sequel has Rhino Beetles filling the Rams' niche.
• In Pokémon, Rhyhorn is a squat, rhino-like Pokémon described as very strong, very fond of charging and very stupid, to the point that it can only remember one thing at a time. As a result, it tends to forget why it started running to begin with, and ends up running in a straight line through any obstacles in its path (it's been known to charge straight through buildings) until it falls asleep. Notably, it and its evolution lines are the Signature Mon of Team Rocket's leader, Giovanni.
• The Infinity +1 Gun in each game of the Ratchet & Clank series is usually called the RYNO. In Name Only as "RYNO" is an acronym for "Rip You a New One".
• Sonic the Hedgehog:
  • Sonic 3 & Knuckles has Rhinobot, a robotic rhino who inhabits Angel Island Zone. Rhinobots stand on one wheel, driving back and forth on flat terrain, but will charge at the player if they see them.
  • Sonic Adventure has Rhinotank, a robotic rhino who inhabits Emerald Coast and Windy Valley. Rhinotanks move around terrain, but when they notice the player, they start charging towards them in a straight line.
  • Sonic Heroes has Rhinoliner, a robotic rhino who inhabits Rail Canyon and Bullet Station. Rhinoliners are mounted to rails and have speeds that rival that of the players as they travel across them. They can attack by shooting spiked cannonballs, but can be destroyed by either strong attacks or running out of rail.
• Spelling Jungle: One of the four deadly animals in Spelling Jungle, rhinos pace back and forth unless bribed or blocked by another obstacle. Contact with their horn end is lethal.
• The grand majority of the mooks the player encounters in Spyro: Year of the Dragon are the Rhynocs, a race of rhino-like creature under the employ of the Sorceress. They return in the handheld games as well, this time under the employ of Ripto.
• Rhoulder from Temtem is a Mighty Glacier rhino with rock-like skin that learns attacks such as Goring and Bestial Charge.
• In Vectorman 2, there are rhino beetle enemies in Stage 14, "Cave Fear", who charge at Vectorman when they see him. When he destroys them, they leave behind power-ups that temporarily transform him into a rhino, allowing him to charge like they do.
• In Viewtiful Joe, Hulk Davidson is a green humanoid rhinoceros creature that works as one of Jadow's agents and serves as the second major boss of the game. He fights using his giant axe, although one of his moves involves charging towards Joe. A second encounter happens in a boss rush later in the game.
• Sour Limeoceros from Viva Piñata will wreck the stuff you had Willy build for you. The tame versions of this piñata will boot Professor Pester out of your garden.
• Warframe features a rhinoceros-themed warframe called Rhino, using rhino-themed skills like Charge, Iron Skin, Roar and Stomp.
• The World Ends with You: Rhino Noises, very powerful variants of enemies, appear as end-of-the-day bosses before becoming regular enemies a few days later.
• World of Warcraft: The Wrath of the Lich King expansion introduced rhinos, although they're woolly and live on arctic tundra. Moorabi, a Drakkari troll, has the ability to transform into a rhino and charge players, as well as goring them on his horn.
• In Yoshi's Crafted World, several aggressive rhinos appear in the Rumble Jungle. They ram on Yoshi on sight and are very persistent. This can prove useful, as they can be tricked into destroying obstacles Yoshi would otherwise be unable to pass.
• One of the challenges in Zoo Tycoon 2's "Endangered Species" expansion-pack involves providing for a Javan Rhinoceros and getting it to breed.

Web Comics

• Gustine Greene from Endtown was mutated into a rhino during the Class-2 apocalypse, which mutated much of the surviving human population. She demonstrates incredible strength, especially when enraged, despite being fairly mild-mannered most of the time.
• One-Punch Man: Rhino Wrestler is rhino monster who works as middle management in the Monster Association.
• Prestige Perkins from Rusty and Co. has combined some magical items into a gun that launches a stampeding rhino, which she uses to send a derro flying. The fans were quick to call it her Rhino-Propelling Gun.
• Tuesday Titans: One type of Titan resembles rhinoceroses, being heavily muscled, thick-limbed, and sporting large, singular horns growing from their snouts. A group is shown charging a line of enemy robots, dwarfing many attacking machines and smashing them with their fists. Oddly, colored art shows them to be red rather than grey.
• Played with in the case of Rachel Einhorn in Kevin & Kell: She's a rhino who "instinctively charges at anything unfamiliar". When she's not doing that, she's really even-tempered.

Web Original

• The Descendants has Embarr, the mount of the Ape Knight. An evil sorceress mistook her for a fat, slow unicorn and used magic to make her faster, smarter and gave her a ton more endurance.
• In the Homestar Runner universe, Strong Bad invents a videogame called "Rhino Feeder" which is exactly what it sounds like.
• "Rhinoceroses don't play games. They f**king charge your ass." (Warning: NSFW)
• The Rhino and the Redbill features a downplayed example with one of its portagonists, Niles. He is blind, good in hand-to-hand combat and is often frowning, like most stereotypical rhinos in media, but he's also a reasonable and even-tempered fella when he has a chance to settle down. If anything, it's his friend Red that is the reckless one of the duo.

Western Animation

• Avatar: The Last Airbender: The Fire Nation uses Komodo Rhinos as mounts in battle. That's right, a rhino crossed with a freakin' komodo dragon.
• Rhinox from Beast Wars is very badass (and part-time Number Two to Optimus Primal).
  • As a subversion, he is also the resident scientist in the group.
  • The original Transformers had three, Ramhorn for the Autobots and Headstrong and Stranglehold for the Decepticons. In a somewhat unusual twist for a rhino-themed character, Headstrong was noted for being relatively weak physically (especially compared to his fellow Predacons) but was the Determinator.
  • The Japan-only G1 sequel Transformers Victory has the Breastforce, Decepticons whose breastplates can turn into weapons or animal-like minions. One of them is Drillhorn, a four-treaded drill-tank partnered with the mechanical rhinoceros/gun Rhinobreast.
  • Transformers: Cybertron has Backstop, the Jamaican-accented pacifistic rhino.
• Subverted with Clam from Camp Lazlo, who's generally more of a Cloudcuckoolander. Played straight if you're Scoutmaster Lumpus, however.
• In the Classic Disney Short African Diary, Great White Hunter Goofy goes out hunting for wild game and finds a black rhinoceros. Three guesses as to who wins that match.
• Flying Rhino Junior High has Principal Mulligan, who is a humanoid rhino. And no one knows why.
• Subverted in The Lion Guard where rhinoceroses are usually friendly. Kifaru the white rhinoceros, from the episode "Ono the Tickbird", caused some destruction in his path at the beginning, but that's only because his eyesight is very poor even by rhino standards and he didn't have his tickbird companion Mwenzi around to guide him. Although he does turn dangerous when Makuu threatens Mwenzi.
• Mao Mao: Heroes of Pure Heart: Pinky is a rhinoceros, though he's less of an actual threat and more of a gross little gremlin.
• Megas XLR: In "Department of Megas Violations", Darklos summons giant rhinoceros aliens to battle Coop.
• Downplayed with Roy from The Penguins of Madagascar; he is short-tempered, but is otherwise a decent fellow.
• In The Raccoons Mr. Mammoth who is one of the richest, most powerful characters in the setting and is also presented as ruthless business man. He is also The Unintelligible.
• The Simpsons:
  • In "Two Dozen and One Greyhounds" Kent Brockman reports that a two-ton rhino escaped from the Springfield Zoo, but zoo officials safely put her back in captivity. As people are attacked by a rhino, he notes a three-ton rhino that escaped from the zoo the previous week is still at large.
  • In one episode Homer sets off a chain-reaction of events at the zoo by shooting a lemur with a slingshot, that eventually culminates in a rhino stampede.
• Two-Legs Joe from Spliced is technically only half of a rhinoceros with a bird for a rear end, but his Hair-Trigger Temper and superpowered stomping ensure that Rank Scales with Asskicking for him.
• Sea Rhinoceroses from SpongeBob SquarePants, which are drawn to the sounds of a Sea Bear attack, and the only protection from them is to wear specialized undergarments.
• The Wallop species in Storm Hawks resemble humanoid rhinos and are generally characterized by their great strength (even as infants). Their main representative, Junko, who is The Big Guy of the Storm Hawks, is generally a pretty nice guy, but a few antagonistic individuals do appear.
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles:
  • Rocksteady from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987) was a street punk under The Shredder's employ. He got mutated into a rhino, whereas his associate Bebop became a warthog / boar. Though both are portrayed as not being very bright, having the strength to pick up and hurl cars at the turtles more than made up for it.
  • The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2012) introduced him as Ivan Steranko, a Russian mob boss and an old ally of the Shredder; he didn't become the mutant Rocksteady until he had failed Shredder one too many times and was mutated as punishment. Though originally he was a cunning strategist who had no problem fighting toe-to-toe with the turtles, he got noticeably sillier as the series went on.
  • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem has a new version of Rocksteady, this time portrayed as a black rhinoceros who got mutated into a roughly humanoid form, and is portrayed as The Brute of the gang of evil mutants led by Superfly - even moreso than the almost-as-big Bebop. By his own admission, he is angry most of the time. However, the turtles are eventually able to appeal to the other mutants' better natures and talk all of them (except Superfly himself) into pulling a Heel–Face Turn, making this the first time Rocksteady and Bebop get to be good guys. He is voiced by John Cena.
• The Monster of the Week of the What's New, Scooby-Doo? episode "Safari, So Good" are African demons that take the form of animals. Naturally, a rhino is among them. Subverted since it's revealed near the end of episode that the "demons" are actually ordinary animals that had been hypnotized by episode's villains.
• Zig-zagged in The Wild Thornberrys, where Eliza would either befriend a rhino or run from one.

Real Life

• Most rhino species aren’t particularly aggressive but the black rhino (Diceros bicornis) has a reputation for being high-strung and charging at people without provocation, and most rhino attacks in Africa are attributed to this species. They have also been documented to be very aggressive with each other, especially the males, with some estimates suggesting that up to 50% of all males die from combat-related injuries. It’s likely that a lot of the rhino’s bad rap can be traced back to this species. The larger and sympatric white rhino (Ceratotherium simum), on the other hand, is much more mild-mannered and social, and is unlikely to charge unless it’s a mother with a calf or you invade its personal boundary.
  • It's worth noting that a large part of the rhino's reputation is due to their terrible eyesight. When one literally can't tell what the approaching creature is, sometimes the best option is to trample it just in case. It's worth noting that some zoo rhinos, when acclimated to humans, are apparently quite friendly.

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