Zerg Rush / Live-Action TV

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• Alien Worlds (2020): The day side of Janus is home to small, insect-like creatures that can overwhelm the must larger and stronger pentapods by attacking them in large swarms, which can quickly overwhelm and cover the larger creatures.
• Andromeda: The Magog favor this tactic, most of the time not even bothering with weapons other than their claws and paralytic spit. It's later revealed that these are unknowingly scouts for the real invasion, which have weapons and strategies on par with the other factions as well as numbers.
• Battlestar Galactica (2003): The Cylons' favored tactic for aerial combat is to deploy a massive number of Raiders against the much smaller human fleet. The shots of them emerging from Basestar ships has been compared to a swarm of insects emerging from a hive.
• Blackadder Goes Forth: Deconstructed, but sadly for the characters, practiced anyway:
  Melchett: Field Marshal Haig has formulated a brilliant new tactical plan to ensure final victory in the field.
  Blackadder: Ah. Would this brilliant plan involve us climbing out of our trenches and walking very slowly towards the enemy?
• Deadliest Warrior: In one episode, the team runs a pseudo match of vampires versus zombies. It's admitted that in a single combat scenario, a super human vampire versus one zombie would end with the zombie being demolished. This results in the team running three vampires vs two hundred and ninety-seven zombies (ninety-nine per vampire). The idea is demonstrated in the fight, where two of the vampires fall to the attacking zombie forces simply and entirely because they're overpowered by massive numbers. The last one barely survives the battle.
• Doctor Who: The Daleks did this in "Destiny of the Daleks", draping some of their own number with bombs and sending them off to blow up the Movellans with predictable results: the Doctor blows them up before they arrive.
• The Expanse: To disable the giant railguns that can annihilate even the largest ships with a single shot that are guarding Medina Station, the heroes cobbled together dozens of one person drop pods for a massed commando assault. Even with every shot being an instant kill, the guns just can't fire fast enough to destroy more than a fraction of the drop pods before they are too close to aim it, making a zerg rush actually the approach with by far the highest survival chance.
• Game of Thrones:
  • Tywin's method for fighting Robb's forces is to continue to send wave after wave of enemies at him as opposed to actually use legitimate tactics or rely on skill. Although Robb wins every battle, Tywin has a greater number of forces. Naturally, this comes back to bite him in the ass when the losses finally pile up so that House Lannister is forced to band with House Tyrell for security.
  • The Army of the Dead's primary strategy is this, overwhelming the living's forces through sheer numbers (they have well over 100,000 corpses) and a willingness to do whatever it takes to kill, climbing on top of each other to climb walls and drown enemies in a sea of corpses and using their own bodies to extinguish flames. It's pretty terrifying each time it happens, especially at Hardhome and their final battle against the living at Winterfell.
• GoGo Sentai Boukenger has a heroic example. After their combined mecha fail to defeat Gaja, they separate all their vehicles and swarm him with all of them at once (combined with a good dose of Heroic Resolve), successfully overwhelming and destroying him.
• Kamen Rider Ryuki: Kamen Rider Imperer (a.k.a. Spear in Kamen Rider Dragon Knight) is contracted to an entire herd of gazelle Mirror Monsters instead of the one monster most Riders have a contract with. His Finishing Move involves the herd running at the foe and hitting him (using looped CG footage), building it up to Imperer himself kneeing the villain for the final blow.
• Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation: After an initial attack by a relatively small number of Foot Clan ninja in the first episodes, the Shredder angrily declares his intention to rally all of his followers in New York City and crush the Turtles with sheer numbers. It likely would have succeeded without the intervention of Venus de Milo, who proceeded to Mind Rape Shredder.
• Power Rangers Lost Galaxy: In the Grand Finale, this is how the Centaurus and Stratoforce megazords meet their demise. They form the first line of defense as Trakeena sends her entire army of Stingwingers on a Suicide Attack against Terra Venture and the rangers. The megazords are build for fighting giant monsters, and thus have great trouble to even hit the human sized Stingwingers. Eventually the Stingwingers completely cover the megazords from head to toe, and then trigger the bombs they were wearing. Goodbye Stratoforce and Centaurus.
• Stargate-verse:
  • Stargate Atlantis: The Wraith prefer this kind of tactic. Their tech may have been inferior to the Ancients, but with wave after wave of meat shields at their disposal, it didn't really matter.
  • Stargate Universe: The drones are somewhat closer to the trope than the Wraith. They use nothing except fighter-sized attack ships controlled by an unarmed command ship, and their sole battle tactic is to attack from every direction until the enemy dies.
• Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: This is one of the tactics the Dominion employs. Case in point, when the Tal Shiar and Obsidian Order attack the Changeling homeworld with a "large" fleet of 23 capital ships, the Dominion retaliate with 150 small attack ships, which completely swarm and overwhelm the Romulans and the Cardies.
• The Walking Dead: The Governor admits his people aren't as skilled as Rick's group, but that their numerical advantage makes up for it.
  • In general, walkers are at their most dangerous when gathered into large groups. Massive 'herds' numbering in the thousands(or even millions) wander the countryside and can easily overwhelm most settlements. Fighting a herd directly is usually suicide, the best options either being to draw it away or avoid getting it's attention until it passes.

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