Chimera in popular culture
Chimera, originally found in Greek mythology, is a monstrous fire-breathing creature composed of the parts of multiple animals. The term, and often the general concept, has since been adopted by various works of popular culture, and chimeras of differing description can be found in contemporary works of fantasy and science fiction.
Television
- In My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, a chimera (referenced as draconequus in show) named Discord is the main antagonist of the season 2 opener. He uses hypnotic powers to drain the elements of Harmony from the ponies.
- In Mahou Sentai Magiranger, one of the main villains, Meemy, creates a Chimera monster by fusing together the spirits of dead monsters. This act is repeated in the shows American counterpart: Power Rangers: Mystic Force, by Meemy's counterpart, Imperious.
- In Mon Colle Knights, the Chimera is depicted as having three heads (a lion head, a goat head, and a hawk head), the body of a lion, and the wings of a dragon.
- In the manga and anime versions of Fullmetal Alchemist as the result of a specific alchemic transmutation. Though some of them are a fusion of two animals, there are some that were humans infused with animals which play a role in the series' storyline.
- In "Ben 10, Kevin Levin (a human/Osmosian hybrid) can modify his own genetic structure by absorbing the energy of other aliens (which allows him to simultaneously scan, absorb, and infuse himself their DNA) acquiring 1/10 of that creature's powers (this is the biological limit for Osmosians) as well as the mutations needed for him to gain that creature's powers. If he were to attempt to absorb the energy and DNA of several aliens at once, or the transformative, gene-altering energy of the Omnitrix/Ultimatrix, he will permanently mutate into a chimeric fusion of most, if not all of the aliens he has absorbed. His human DNA restores itself over time and will eventually overwrite the alien DNA completely, thus allowing him to return to his human form.
- In American Dragon: Jake Long, Jake and his friends battle a Chimera in a dreamrealm. It has three heads (a lion head, a goat head, and a cobra head), the body of a humanoid lion, the legs of a goat, and the tail of a snake. The creators of the show list the Chimera as one of the 13 Greatest Threats of the magical world.
- In Digimon Adventure 02, the DigiDestined face a Digimon called Kimeramon, which had the following body parts - Kabuterimon's head, Angemon and Airdramon's wings, Garurumon's legs, Monochromon's tail, Kuwagamon's, SkullGreymon's and Devimon's arms, Greymon's body, and MetalGreymon's hair.
- In episodes 224-226 of the Japanese anime Bleach, a Chimera-like creature called Ayon (shown with a deer's head and legs, a long lion-like mane, and a classic tail with a snake at the end) is an apparent battle tactic of the Current 3rd espada Harribel's Faccion Apache, Mila-Rose, and Sun-Sun.
- In The X-Files, there is an episode titled 'Chimera', which takes place in Vermont.
- The NCIS season 5 episode 6 was titled "Chimera" and took place on the USNS Chimera, a top-secret naval research ship sailing in the middle of the ocean. On a related note, Ziva also mentions to Tony about what the mythical Chimera was.
- In the television series Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Chimera was the name of episode 714 in which Odo meets one of "The Hundred" changelings sent abroad in the universe by The Founders to learn more about other cultures and eventually return home.
- Chimera (TV series), a 1991 British science fiction miniseries (in the US it was released as Monkey Boy).
Movies
Chimera is referenced when describing the shape shifting guardian creature that follows and protects John smith in the movie "I Am Number Four"
- In the film "The Relic," the creature is described as a combination of creatures, derived from the Brazilian relic statue described to Sizemore's character as a Chimera. The creature is a modern incarnation of the mythological Chimera.
Video games
- In the video game series Golden Sun, the Chimera appears numerous times. First as a pair of bosses on Crossbone Isle, then as a normal enemy under the names Chimera Mage. In Golden Sun: The Lost Age, the stronger Grand Chimera was a boss. All forms are Mars(Fire) creatures, and have a goat's body, a snake for a tail, and the head of a lion and an eagle instead of knees on their forelegs.
- In Okami, Chimeras appear and turtle-like steam pot beasts who classify as level two out of three in difficulty to defeat.
- In Gauntlet Legends, the player(s) must face a large Chimera as the boss of the second level, the Valkyrie's Castle.
- In Castlevania: Legacy of Darkness when facing Ortega, he transforms into a chimera. shown as a winged creature with a lion head breathing fire, a snakehead spitting poison and a bird head using a sonic attack.
- Chimeras appear as random creatures in the Final Fantasy series with various descriptions for each one:
- In the original Final Fantasy, up to four could be encountered at once. It is shown to have three heads (a lion head, a goat head, a dragon head), the wings of a dragon, and the body of a goat.
- In Final Fantasy II, a Chimera serves as a boss and later appears as a random creature encounter. It is shown to have three heads (a lion head, a goat head, and a dragon head), the wings of a dragon, and the body of a lion.
- In Final Fantasy III, a Chimera appears as a random encounter in the skies of the surface world.
- In the game Final Fantasy IV, Chimera are also random creature encounters in the Tower of Babil. They have three heads (a lion head, a goat head, and a dragon head) and the body of a goat. It attacks with Blaze.
- In Final Fantasy V, the Dhorme Chimera is a randomly-encountered enemy. Not only does it have the heads of a lion, goat, and dragon, it has the front legs of a lion, the wings of a dragon, the back legs of a goat, and a snake-headed tail.
- In Final Fantasy VI, the Chimera is shown to have 5 heads (a lion head, a goat head, a dragon head, an eagle head, a boar head), the wings of a dragon, the front legs of a lion, the back legs of a goat, and a snake-headed tail.
- In Final Fantasy VII, the Maximum Chimera is a randomly-encountered enemy.
- In Final Fantasy VIII, the Chimera is a randomly-encountered enemy with four heads (a lion head, a goat head, a hawk head, a lizard head), the body of a lion, the wings of a dragon, and a cobra-headed tail.
- In Final Fantasy IX, it is a three-headed demon that is tough to beat.
- In Final Fantasy X and Final Fantasy X-2, there are random creature encounters that are Chimera. They have a bull head, a wolf head, a griffin head, a snake-headed tail, and have what appears to be somewhat like a bull's upright body. To attack, they use a combination of elements (fire, water, lightning).
- In Final Fantasy XI Khimaira (Similar sound to Chimera) is a High Notorious Monster. With a head of a lion and a tail of a serpent, it has the horns of a goat.
- In Dragon Quest, a feather-shaped item allowing inter-city travel is called Chimera Wing.
- In GrimGrimoire, one of the most powerful Alchemy-based units is a Chimera, which takes the form of an enormous spinning spider with a gaping lion's head at its center. It can be upgraded into consuming ally units in order to heal itself.
- In Blue Dragon Plus, a Chimera appears as the Shadow creature of Nene, one of the game's playable characters and the main antagonist of the original Blue Dragon game.
- In Tekken 3, the final boss, True Ogre, takes on the form of a Chimera-like demon, with the horns of a ram, the head of a lion, and his right arm is a snake.
- In Resident Evil 4, when first entering the castle stage of the game, there is an obstacle that requires three ornaments to unlock it. After retrieving the three pieces, one of Lion, Goat, and Snake, the puzzle reveals itself as a Chimera.
- In Mother 3, Chimeras are corrupted animals that were engineered by the main antagonist's "Pigmask Army" as a result of either combing them with other species or adding mechanical parts, which appear as bosses throughout the game.
- In Shining Force, the chimera are very powerful and dangerous enemies near at the end of the game, lion torso and head, the wings of the dragon, goat's head and snake tail and the goat head have an ability to breath the fire can inflict massive damage on their opponent there only weakness is the ice.
- In Warcraft III and World of Warcraft The Chimaera is seen as a creature with a winged lion body, two dragon heads with goat horns and two tails that seem to have scorpion type stingers on them. In Warcraft III the Night Elves can train them as flying siege beasts from a late game structure. Examples: [1].
- In World of Warcraft one of the bosses in the Blackwing Descent raid in the Cataclysm expansion is a 2-headed dragon called Chimaeron, named after this mythical creature.
- In Altered Beast: Guardian of the Realms, in the two last levels, Dreamscape and Palace of the Gods, you play as the Chimera. It is shown to have a snake-like bottom, lion torso, dragon's wings and goat horns. It attacks using fists and sonic waves.
- In God of War III, Kratos (the game's protagonist) fights the Chimera as a boss on Mt. Olympus and later fights many more on the way to Tartarus. It is shown to bears a lion's face on its "chest," with the three-horned, demonic-looking goat's head as the "normal" one on top of the lion head, and the snake in its usual position as the tail.
- In S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat chimeras are large, cerberus-like dogs with no fur, large bodies, two heads and a broad tail. Chimeras are also know to possess the body and posture of a lion, the roar of a bear, and one face that somewhat bears a visage of a human head with the other one, a cat creature.
- In Fallout New Vegas you encounter dog-like creatures called Night Stalkers that were created by splicing the DNA of dogs and Rattlesnakes together.
- In Demon's Souls the second boss at the Tower Of Latria is a beast with the body of a humanoid lion and a tail with a snakes head on the end that bites the lion temporarily increasing its power.
- You face Chimeras in the upcoming game "Scarab" you fight them four times first on the level "Export", second on the level "Call For The God", Third "Resistance Over The Titans", and last you face the Chimera while facing Apollo in the Titan Temple on the level "Modern War"
Role-playing
- In the roleplaying game Dungeons & Dragons, the chimera is an evil-aligned creature which looks like a lion with leathery wings on its back. To either side of its lion's head is the head of a goat and the head of a dragon.
Books
- Chimeras were mentioned in the Harry Potter books. In "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them," it is described to have a lion head, a goat body, and dragon tail. The Ministry of Magic classifies them as XXXXX (very dangerous). It is said that Bellerophon (not mentioned by name) was the only one who ever managed to kill a Chimera and shortly after fell to his death from the winged horse due to exhaustion. Also, in "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows", Elphias Doge is said to have encountered Chimeras in Greece.
- The Chimera was featured as a story element in its first appearance in Tomb Of Dracula #26 Appears in: 2 issues later. CHIMERA - magic power item in three pieces (serpent's tail, lion's head, goat's body), created ?30000? (20000 more likely) years ago in Atlantis by C'Thunda, used against Kull, involved in the times of the Black Plague, sought in recent times by Dracula + Dr. Sun + David Eschol, destroyed by Sheila Wittier to prevent Dracula or Dr.Sun from using it. Apparently, in Tomb of Dracula#26, King Kull appeared or was referenced in a flashback. The cosmic-powered Chimera and a Legion of Doom unlike any other item in creation, that causes havok for our heroes.
Conan encounters a Chira like beast in the Marvel Comic adaption of The Flame Winds of Wan Tengri by Norvell Page.
- In Alan Dean Foster's Mad Amos short story, "Witchen Woes," Amos Malone defeats a "kitchen witch" in a cooking contest by making "chimera chili." He later commented that the hardest part of the recipe was finding chimera meat.
- In Piers Anthony's Chthon, a chimera kills stragglers from a party of travellers. Quote: "The chimera is the enemy you *don't* see".
- In Marjorie Liu's Dirk and Steele series, the book The Fire King the main male character Karr is a Chimera, being the offspring of two shape shifters of different animals. His mother was a dragon and his father was a lion.
- Amazonean warrior women ride Chimea in Wonder Woman;Amazon Attacks.
- In nthWORD, chimeras are regularly used to illustrate stories, including "Me and Sally" by David Henry Sterry in issue #5 and "Being Jewish in a Small Town" by Lyn Lifshin in issue #7.
Web Comics
In Wapsi Square the Chimera is an ancient weapon of mass destruction; the three independent parts are disguised as humans and living in modern Minneapolis.
Chimera is a recurring character in the comic strip Yet Another Fantasy Gamer Comic.