History Main / MillionMookMarch

* Played for laughs in ''Film/ConanTheDestroyer'':
-->'''Jehnna''': "Conan! There are six of them against her!"\\
'''Conan''': "One, two, three...I think you're right!"

** However, military parades are given very little attention in the series.

* ''Literature/SecondApocalypse'': The Sranc are a genocidal BiologicalWeapon created by the Inchoroi. They are dog-sized goblinoid creatures with a sexual lust for violence that can survive on the most meager of nourishment and reproduce explosively. As such, their armies carpet the [[GrimUpNorth Ancient North]] in numbers that "break the back of reason."

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Animaniacs}}'' had one of these. Episode: 'King Yakko', a thinly disguised parody of ''DuckSoup'' with Yakko in the Groucho Marx role. He and his siblings search for the invading army, until it's pointed out. Yakko ends up seeing one of these. [[BreakingTheFourthWall He figures it'd take a commercial break to come up with a viable battle plan.]]

Of course it's important that they [[BadassArmy actually fight well]], and many {{Evil Overlord}}s heed that advice, while the logistics of providing food and toilet facilities for such a huge army are usually [[EasyLogistics ignored]] or {{Hand Wave}}d. Also, doesn't work if the heroes are using a bottleneck, like a narrow bridge. [[ThreeHundred Or, god forbid, a thin path between the mountain and the sea...]] In fact it's surprising how often [[ImperialStormtrooperMarksmanshipAcademy this trope]] [[ConservationOfNinjitsu goes south.]]

* Subverted when the communists did their victory parade after taking Saigon, ending the VietnamWar. Having fought mainly as guerrilla fighters the NVA and VC forces had never been trained to march, so they had to do the parade in trucks.

* The ChroniclesOfNarnia video game battle sequences featured endless swarms of enemies marching past in the background. The developers actually wrote a software app called Battlemarch to produce the effect.

* In Creator/AynRand's ''WeTheLiving'', one of the new Communist movies consists entirely of this.

* Jesus' army of saints at the Battle of Armageddon in the LeftBehind book ''Glorious Appearing''. Of course, they're mostly there to praise the Lord while Jesus does all the work of [[CurbStompBattle slaying His enemies]] with the [[Literature/TheBible Word Of God]].

* The children's novel ''New World Order'' takes place in a [[AlternateHistory timeline]] where [[AlienSpaceBats invaders from a parallel universe]] attack Britain during the English Civil War, using WW1 era technology; including radio, rifles, supply trains and zeppelin air support. At the end the majority of the invaders are finally repelled after almost a decade, the general leading the army is imprisoned and the portal to the other world is closed, but a large number of their forces are left behind. The remaining invaders invoke this by converging on Windsor Castle and start marching around it and performing parade manoeuvres, literally under the noses of [[TeethClenchedTeamwork King Charles II and Prime Minister Oliver Cromwell]], the message being "You can crush us but we'll take a whole mess of you down with us. Let our leader out of jail and let's negotiate". They do.
* Ungatt Trunn's Blue Hordes in the ''{{Redwall}}'' book ''Lord Brocktree'' do this when they march, and number enough to be able to intimidate his enemies by causing earthquakes by jumping in sync, making the stars "fall" by lighting torches and concealing the stars in the sky, and making the land "disappear" by standing on it. Of course this is one book where EasyLogistics is averted, the good guys attacking foraging parties in an effort to make them starve. For the most part they succeed, to the point where the "siege" that happens once Brocktree and his allies are in possession of Salamandastron again is more the woodlanders pretending that they're partying it up inside while the Blue Hordes sit and wait for scraps of food to be chucked out the window.
* Cao Cao's army that was set to invade the region of Wu in RomanceOfTheThreeKingdoms. Conveniently, always referred to as a million-man-army.

* In ''[[{{Literature/Temeraire}} Blood of Tyrants]]'', three hundred soldiers does not a Million Mook March make. Three hundred dragons, on the other hand, represents the largest aerial force ever assembled in Europe, which is itself still barely a fraction of China's full aerial corps [[note]]6,288 officially enlisted (because it's a lucky number), plus an unknown number of "unofficial" reserves[[/note]]. RealityEnsues: this massive army is only possible because China maintains an extensive network of supply depots across its territory and feeds its dragons on easily-stored grain porridge rather than expensive and logistically-intensive raw beef in the European style; finding a sustainable food supply for three hundred 20-ton dragons becomes a major concern after they cross into Russia.

* In ''[[Literature/Temeraire Blood of Tyrants]]'', three hundred soldiers does not a Million Mook March make. Three hundred dragons, on the other hand, represents the largest aerial force ever assembled in Europe, which is itself still barely a fraction of China's full aerial corps[[note]]6,288 officially enlisted (because it's a lucky number), plus an unknown number of "unofficial" reserves[[/note]]. RealityEnsues: this massive army is only possible because China maintains an extensive network of supply depots across its territory and feeds its dragons on easily-stored grain porridge rather than expensive and logistically-intensive raw beef in the European style; finding a sustainable food supply for three hundred 20-ton dragons becomes a major concern after they cross into Russia.

* The Imperial Order in the later ''SwordOfTruth'' books fields an army that numbers in the millions. To put this in perspective, before they showed up, 100,000 troops was considered a large army.

* In ''TheWheelOfTime'' The Dragon Reborn has armies numbering in the hundreds of thousands. In ''The Path Of Daggers'', one character thinks to himself that he can remember when 5000 men was a large army, before the [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt coming of the Dragon]]. Several scenes describe the tiresome logistics of marching and supply, though that gets (much) easier with the advent of MassTeleportation.

** The army of the Last Alliance in ''Film/LordOfTheRingsTheFellowshipOfTheRing'' as a flashback.

* Saruman's army in ''[[Film/TheLordOfTheRings The Two Towers]]''.
** And Sauron's outside the gates of Minas Tirith in ''The Return of the King''.
* ''Film/TheHobbitTheDesolationOfSmaug'' has Azog's army of Orcs and Wargs marching out of Dol Guldur.

* In ''TheSilmarillion'', at the Great Battle of the War of Wrath, Morgoth's army of Orcs, Trolls and Balrogs has grown so large that it ''fills the entire plain'' on which the previous battles were fought.

* TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}} Imperial Guard forces are usually shown in this way in their codex books. Considering the Imperium of Man is TheEmpire of a million worlds, the amount of forces marching can literally go up to the horizon. It's said that if the SpaceMarines are the tip of the spear, the Imperial Guard are the spearhead, the spear's shaft, the spearman itself... and the three thousand others behind him.
** And that's not counting [[FlauntingYourFleets the tanks, artillery and other vehicles]].

* TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}} Imperial Guard forces are usually shown in this way in their codex books. Considering the Imperium of Man is TheEmpire of a million worlds, the amount of forces marching can literally go up to the horizon. It's said that if the SpaceMarines are the tip of the spear, the Imperial Guard are the spearhead, the spear's shaft, the guy holding the spear... and the three guys behind him.

* Webcomic/TheOrderOfTheStick makes use of this trope. %%A more specific example would be appreciated, of course.

* [[{{Music/Gorillaz}} Jamie]] [[ComicBook/TankGirl Hewlett's]] music video ''Monkey Bee'' is a remix of a song from his ''Monkey: Journey To The West'' album. As expected, it is loosely based on ''JourneyToTheWest''. At the end of the video, the Monkey King is faced with a massive amry of the undead, resulting in a BolivianArmyEnding. The video can be seen [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdZjO-i_vxg here]].

* TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}} Imperial Guard forces are usually shown in this way in their codex books, considering the Imperium of Man is TheEmpire of a million worlds, the amount of forces marching can literally go up to the horizon.

* Mongol armies of GenghisKhan and his successors zigzag between this and SuspiciouslySmallArmy. On the one hand, Mongol armies were rarely exceptionally large, if only because there weren't that many Mongolians to begin with. However, as a nomadic people, Mongols could divert much larger proportion of their small population into armies. Since Mongols, due to their nomadic culture and exceptional discipline, could advance far faster than any other army of the period, they could appear seemingly everywhere at once multiplying the appearance of their numbers--and in fact could ensure that their armies could converge where they were needed when they were needed in a manner that their enemies could not match. Finally, as each Mongol warrior had five or more horses, each Mongol army was accompanied by a vast herd of horses when horsed cavalry was relatively uncommon among agrarian peoples.

* Happens at least once in each of the ''Franchise/StarWars'' Prequels.

** Also happens in ''Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack'' with Death Squadron and in ''Film/ReturnOfTheJedi'' when the Imperials greet Palpatine.

** In one of the last scenes of ''Film/AttackOfTheClones'', where the clone army is shown marching in formation on Coruscant as they depart for war.

* [[{{Gorillaz}} Jamie]] [[ComicBook/TankGirl Hewlett's]] music video ''Monkey Bee'' is a remix of a song from his ''Monkey: Journey To The West'' album. As expected, it is loosely based on ''JourneyToTheWest''. At the end of the video, the Monkey King is faced with a massive amry of the undead, resulting in a BolivianArmyEnding. The video can be seen [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdZjO-i_vxg here]].

* This trope is invoked by the Sligs for an animation test for the canceled Oddworld game, Hand of Odd. Done infront of a picture of a burger.
* Invoked in cutscenes of ''RiseOfLegends'' by both Giacomo and the Doge of Venucci. Clockwork spiders and mechanical soldiers, bonus.
* Done at the beginning ''GearsOfWar 2'', complete with an inspiring speech.

* Both Rome and Medieval II of the Total War series end the intro videos for factions with this tropes.

* This tactic has also been recorded in Literature/TheBible - from an initial standing army of 32,000 men, Gideon selected 300 men and used this tactic against a much larger Midianite-Amalek combined force.

-->--'''Sun Tzu''', ''Literature/TheArtOfWar''