Mass Resurrection

"One after another, eh? Was there a sale on resurrection tech?"

— Gunvolt, Azure Striker Gunvolt

You have a large number of characters who have been killed and you need to bring them back to life for some reason or another?

Then this trope is for you!

Maybe you can ask a powerful healer, pray to a God, or maybe the defeat of the Big Bad spawns a World-Healing Wave which brings everyone he killed back. Most versions of Warrior Heaven also have the dead get back up at the end of the day so they can continue feasting and fighting.

Remember, this is a full resurrection. If you are looking at bringing back a whole bunch of zombies then Night of the Living Mooks is for you. Or if you need help from some allies, but don't have this trope at hand, then the Cavalry of the Dead may be just what you needed.

For a version specific to certain types of Christianity, see Caught Up in the Rapture.

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Examples

Anime & Manga

• In Naruto, one of the many powers of the Rinnegan is this. However, there is a catch; resurrecting someone is very chakra-taxing and can potentially kill the user if done on a large-scale basis. Nagato performs the jutsu to resurrect everyone killed during the Akatsuki's invasion of Konoha (including Kakashi, Shizune, and Fukasaku), but dies shortly afterward. This despite the fact that he is an Uzumaki, whose claim of fame is longevity. Later, Obito Uchiha attempts to use it to resurrect people killed during the Fourth Ninja World War, which would surely kill him due to the scale of the event, but gets his body hijacked by Black Zetsu and forced to resurrect Madara Uchiha instead.
• Dragon Ball:
  • Shenron can revive a virtually limitless number of people at one time, with some restrictions. At one point, it is used to revive everyone killed by Frieza in the past year, or on his orders, which effects a staggering number of people, including most of the population of the planet Namek.
  • This happens again on a larger scale in the Buu Arc, where the Namekian dragon Porunga restores the destroyed Earth and its entire population.
  • On an even bigger scale, Dragon Ball Super brings in Super Shenron, which has no limits on its wishes. At the end of the Tournament of Power, Android 17 wishes for all of the universes erased by Zen-Oh to be restored.
• At the end of the first season of Sailor Moon, Usagi's dying wish on the silver crystal brings the entire team back to life, herself included. Unfortunately, this comes at the cost of losing all their memories of their battle and their friendship.
• In the climax of Fullmetal Alchemist, Father is initially successful of stealing all of the souls of virtually everyone in all of Amestris, giving him enough power to usurp God as he had planned. However, Hohenheim's countermeasure he'd spent the series setting up finally kicks in and ends up reversing Father's initial spell, returning everyone in the country back to life and leaving Father devastatingly unstable.

Art

• Sistine Chapel: Saints rise from their graves to ascend into Heaven, including some that appear to only have their skeletons intact for the moment.

Comic Books

• In Secret Wars (1984):
  • Doctor Doom steals the Beyonder's power and kills all the heroes. His lackey Klaw (who secretly is possessed by the Beyonder at the time) talks Doom into thinking about the heroes reviving & attacking, and given that the Beyonder had Reality Warper powers which Doom stole this becomes true.
  • In the second series the Beyonder killed and later resurrected the New Mutants.
• In the Marvel Comics Crisis Crossover The Infinity Gauntlet half of the universe is killed, but they're resurrected by the end of the series. Notably, while the heroes intent is to get the Infinity Gauntlet and use it to undo the deaths, the deed is instead accomplished via someone else gaining control of the Gauntlet and then retconing that they'd had control of it since two days ago, undoing everything that it had been used for in the meantime.
• The Transformers (Marvel): When the majority of the Autobots are slaughtered in a Decepticon ambush in issue #80, the day is saved by the arrival of the nearly mythical Last Autobot, who at Optimus' behest begins resurrecting fallen Autobots faster than the Decepticons can kill them. It's implied that he does not perform this task on batches of fallen Autobots, but is instead very fast at rebuilding and restoring them serially.

Fan Works

• In the My Little Pony/World of Warcraft crossover World of Ponycraft Princess Celestia resurrects almost all of Ponyville at once after Neltharion razes it.
• Averted in A Hollow in Equestria with Princess Celestia imploring Discord to resurrect the victims of Nightmare Moon's return, only to be informed that bringing the dead back to life is far beyond anything he can actually do.

Films — Live-Action

• Marvel Cinematic Universe:
  • In Avengers: Endgame, the heroes' main goal is to find a way to reverse the Snap, essentially bringing back half of all life in the universe. They succeed, but the resurrection only applies to victims of the Badass Fingersnap, meaning that everyone who died before or after the Snap stays dead. Also, two of their number die over the course of the film.
  • The first third of Spider-Man: Far From Home depicts a lot of the strangeness and drama that would come about from half the world coming back to life. Peter suddenly finds that his classmates who weren't killed have graduated and kids that were in middle school are now the same age as him, including a kid who became super-handsome after hitting puberty and who wants to make a move on Peter's crush, MJ.
• In The Sorcerer's Apprentice, this is Morgana's final goal: to resurrect a legion of Sorcerers for world domination.

Literature

• The Divine Comedy: The Catholic dogma of the Resurrection of the Dead^note the idea that God will resurrect every person who has ever lived at the end of time is referenced by various ghosts suffering from their separation from their bodies. The ghosts in Heaven in particular long for their bodies again so they can enjoy Heaven in body and soul, but the damned in Hell fear the Resurrection because their tortures will only grow worse when they have a body to fully feel pain with.
• The Locked Tomb: The Empire was founded when a man somehow ascended to godhood as the first Necromancer, resurrected the nine planets of the Dominicus star system and their populations, and installed himself as eternal God-Emperor. Of course, ten thousand years later, his is the only word on the subject...
• In Riverworld, the entire human race is brought back in the titular world after a cataclysm.
• In the Star Shards Chronicles, the main characters discover they can combine their powers to raise the dead. Once they figure this out, they go to Germany and resurrect the victims of the Holocaust.

Live-Action TV

• The Crisis on Infinite Earths (2019) event in the Arrowverse includes whole worlds being created, destroyed, and reborn, along with their entire populations. The series finale of Arrow goes into the most detail with this: all of the people in the multiverse but seven are killed, but Oliver Queen uses the power of the Spectre to create a new Earth where one version of every person is brought back to life (including a few of his loved ones who died before the crisis.
• Doctor Who:
  • The conclusion of "The Doctor Dances", the Trope Namer for Everybody Lives — everyone who was turned into a gas-mask zombie is restored to life and health, leading to one of the Doctor's happiest on-screen moments.
  • People, planets, stars, entire species, and the Doctor themselves are all restored to life and existence at the conclusion of "The Big Bang", thanks to Amy Pond's Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory. "Raggedy man, I remember you, and you are late for my wedding!"

Myths & Religion

• The Bible:
  • In Book of Ezekiel, God commands Ezekiel to resurrect a whole army of skeletons into living beings in order to reclaim Israel.
  • Books of Thessalonians: According to the Book of 1st Thessalonians, a mass resurrection of "the dead in Christ" shall occur. They will then be swept up to heaven along with the believers that still live.
  • According to the Book of Revelation, God will do this on the Last Day to everyone who had ever lived, raising them from the dead just before the Judgment.
• Even prior to Christianity, some Jews (e.g. the Pharisees) believed this would happen, and some still do.
• Islam, too, teaches a mass resurrection will happen before God judges all human beings.
• Perhaps the Trope Maker is Zoroastrianism, whose teachings first held that a mass resurrection and then judgment would occur when Ahura Mazda defeated his evil rival Ahriman.

Tabletop Games

• Dungeons & Dragons:
  • 2nd Edition supplement Book of Artifacts. The silver Orb of Dragonkind could resurrect 20-200 bodies once per year.
  • Module T1-4 Temple of Elemental Evil. If the deity St. Cuthbert is summoned, he will Raise all slain PCs from the dead with a gesture.
  • In early editions of the game, the Wish spell was able to resurrect a group of characters.
• In Pathfinder, one monk variant has the ability to do this for all of their fallen allies in exchange for completely wiping themselves out of existence (subverting Death Is a Slap on the Wrist), making them not just Deader than Dead, but an Un-person to the point where even their name disappears from where it was written down.

Video Games

• Baldur's Gate: In the Throne of Bhaal expansion, high-level clerics can get Mass Raise Dead, which raises all dead party members and then heals the entire party for a significant amount. A very convenient way to recover after an intense battle.
  Once one has such powers at one's disposal, can immortality itself be far behind? - Volo
  There is more to being immortal than merely possessing great power...or so I have heard. - Elminster
• Black & White 2: Battle of the Gods: One of the Miracles you can learn is Life, an Area of Effect that resurrects dead bodies (who become your citizens in gratitude, if they weren't already) and destroys the undead.
• Dawn of War: The Necron Lord can bring back a large number of Necron infantry in an area around him, using an ability 'called' Mass Resurrection.
• Healers in Final Fantasy XIV have a level 3 Limit Break (only available in a full party of 8 players) where they can fully revive all knocked out party members within range of the player using the skill.
• Overwatch: Mercy's original ultimate ability Resurrect allowed her to resurrect all nearby allies who hadn't respawned yet. The original "Huge Rez" achievement was achieved when she resurrected four or more allies at once. In the September 2017 patch, her Resurrect was changed to a normal ability which can only resurrect one person, making it no longer an example.
• Planescape: Torment: In the end, the Nameless One can manage to resurrect his entire party who have all suffered a Plotline Death in the final dungeon if certain pre-conditions are met.
• Warcraft:
  • Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos: The Paladin's ultimate ability resurrects up to six of your own dead units at full health (if their corpses are still around, that is).
  • World of Warcraft
    • Mass Resurrection was a Guild Perk added in Cataclysm that allowed any member of the guild to resurrect their party or raid group, although it was removed in Legion. It was replaced with a lore-appropriate but otherwise identical mass resurrection spell available to every healer class.
    • The ghost of Terenas Menethil II resurrects your entire raid party after Arthas does a One-Hit Kill on you in the final fight of Wrath of the Lich King.
    • High Inquisitor Whitemane, the final boss in the Scarlet Monastery, can resurrect all of her guards to assist her in battle. She also puts the party to sleep and resurrects her champion Mograine (in Classic) or Durand (in Mists of Pandaria onward) after reaching 50% health, becoming a Dual Boss.
  • Hearthstone:
    • Priest has a few ways to resurrect multiple minions at once. One of their strongest is Lesser Diamond Spellstone, which can be empowered by playing other spells while it's in your hand and resurrects up to four different minions when fully powered. They also have a spell called Mass Resurrection, which resurrects three minions without jumping through any hoops, but is much more expensive.
    • At the end of each turn, Kel'Thuzad resurrects all other friendly minions that died that turn. His human version from Scholomance Academy will also resurrect all minions killed by the first spell cast while he's in play, and puts them all under your control.
    • The Old God N'Zoth typically resurrects a full board with his effect. His original form resurrects every friendly Deathrattle minion that died this game, while N'Zoth, God of the Deep from Madness at the Darkmoon Faire resurrects one minion from every unique minion type.

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