History Main / CostumesChangeYourSize

* ''Series/MidsommerMurders'': In "[[Recap/MidsomerMurdersS22E1 The Wolf Hunter of Little Worthy]]'', the Wolf Hunter suggests a tall antagonist. When the killer is revealed they are significantly shorter than the other suspects and shorter than the costume initially seemed to suggest.

-->-- '''Heinz Doofenshrmitz''', ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb''

* In the ''Series/{{Goosebumps}}'' episode "Attack of the Jack O'Lanterns," twin brother and sister Shane and Shana are revealed to be alien friends of the lead protagonist. When in their human disguises, they are at an average pre-teen kid size, but after removing their LatexPerfection masks to reveal their green Muppet-esque alien heads, suddenly they are ''way'' taller, appearing even larger than an average adult human.

* Some viewers of ''Series/GameOfThrones'' question how Arya Stark, a young girl, is able to disguise herself as Walder Frey, a much older and much larger man.

* ''Comicbook/NewAvengers''" The all-time prize for this trope ''has'' to go to Ronin turning out to be Echo. "He" was originally going to be Comicbook/{{Daredevil}}, and until the unmasking, there was nothing even remotely androgynous about the character's bulky, masculine body shape. Seriously, it's like pulling the cowl off [[Comicbook/TheDarkKnightReturns Frank Miller's hulking Batman]] and finding Harley Quinn underneath.

* Downplayed in ''ComicBook/{{Amulet}}'': Trellis spends the first five books wearing bulky armour, and looking roughly adult-sized. When he's finally is shown out of it in ''Escape From Lucien'', he's revealed to be a lot skinnier, and around [[OneHeadTaller half a head taller than Emily]].
* The ''ComicBook/{{Batman}}'' character Comicbook/{{Anarky}} is really a thirteen year old boy who wears a costume with a built in head extender to appear as a much taller man in his earliest stories, beginning in 1989. This costume element was eventually dropped by 1997, with the fictional explanation being that the character had grown to fill out the costume. This was in fact clever cover for the reality that the extender was difficult to draw in action scenes. Further, it had only been intended to fool the reader as a red herring in the character's first appearance, but other artists had continued using the extender needlessly, or dropped it on their own, creating confusion as to the costume's official design. Giving a direct explanation to never need the extender again created a uniformity for all artists to follow thereafter.
* [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] in the case of Zartan in ''ComicBook/GIJoe'': he's a trained contortionist.
* The all-time prize for this trope ''has'' to go to Ronin from ''Comicbook/NewAvenger''s turning out to be a beautiful woman. "He" was originally going to be Comicbook/{{Daredevil}}, and until the unmasking, there was nothing even remotely androgynous about the character's bulky, masculine body shape. Seriously, it's like pulling the cowl off [[Comicbook/TheDarkKnightReturns Frank Miller's hulking Batman]] and finding Harley Quinn underneath.
* During the "Gang War" arc in the ''Franchise/SpiderMan'' comics, ComicBook/{{Daredevil}} poses as the Kingpin by wearing a FatSuit. However, given the Kingpin is noticably taller than Daredevil, this does raise some questions about how he faked the greater limb length and could still use his hands.
* Downplayed in ''ComicBook/{{Watchmen}}'', where Rorshach is revealed to wear elevator shoes and a thick coat to make him look bigger and taller.

* The ComicBook/{{Batman}} character Comicbook/{{Anarky}} is really a thirteen year old boy who wears a costume with a built in head extender to appear as a much taller man in his earliest stories, beginning in 1989. This costume element was eventually dropped by 1997, with the fictional explanation being that the character had grown to fill out the costume. This was in fact clever cover for the reality that the extender was difficult to draw in action scenes. Further, it had only been intended to fool the reader as a red herring in the character's first appearance, but other artists had continued using the extender needlessly, or dropped it on their own, creating confusion as to the costume's official design. Giving a direct explanation to never need the extender again created a uniformity for all artists to follow thereafter.
* The all-time prize for this trope ''has'' to go to Ronin from Comicbook/NewAvengers turning out to be a beautiful woman. "He" was originally going to be Comicbook/{{Daredevil}}, and until the unmasking, there was nothing even remotely androgynous about the character's bulky, masculine body shape. Seriously, it's like pulling the cowl off [[Comicbook/TheDarkKnightReturns Frank Miller's hulking Batman]] and finding Harley Quinn underneath.
* [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] in the case of [[ComicBook/GIJoe Zartan:]] he's a trained contortionist.
* During the "Gang War" arc in the ''Franchise/SpiderMan'' comics, ComicBook/{{Daredevil}} poses as the Kingpin by wearing a fat suit. However, given the Kingpin is noticably taller than Daredevil, this does raise some questions about how he faked the greater limb length and could still use his hands.
* Downplayed in ''ComicBook/{{Amulet}}'': Trellis spends the first five books wearing bulky armour, and looking roughly adult-sized. When he's finally is shown out of it in ''Escape From Lucien'', he's revealed to be a lot skinnier, and around [[OneHeadTaller half a head taller than Emily]].

* ''ComicStrip/WhatsNewWithPhilAndDixie'' from Dragon magazine #68 (December 1982). A man who's 6 feet tall and weighs maybe 300 lb. becomes an elven woman at least two feet shorter. When asked how he did it, he says "Special shoes". [[http://www.airshipentertainment.com/growfcomic.php?date=20070812 Read it here.]]

[[folder:Films -- Animation]]

[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]

** In "The Terror of the Autons", the Master infiltrates UNIT HQ in a disguise so convincing it was actually portrayed by a completely different actor -- who was significantly shorter than the undisguised Master.
** The Foamasi in "The Leisure Hive" were lizard-like aliens who infiltrated by wearing full-body disguises that made them appear human. When one was unmasked and stripped of his disguise, his true form was somehow considerably larger than his disguised form (since the latter was portrayed by a normal-sized human and the former by a normal-sized human in a bulky monster suit). The ExpandedUniverse says that Foamasi have telescopic bones and most of their bulk is a compressible liquid.
** The Slitheen, introduced in "Aliens of London", are a lampshaded version. Like the Foamasi, they're bulky-monster-suit aliens that disguise themselves as humans, but it's explicitly stated that their disguises incorporate advanced size-compression technology (and that even so they find it easier to impersonate large humans).

* An episode of ''Series/{{Eureka}}'' features Invisapparel, clothing which can hide a pregnant belly making it appear normal and flat.
* Some viewers question for [[Series/GameOfThrones Arya Stark]], a young girl, is able to disguise herself as Walder Frey, a much older and much larger man.

* In the ''Series/{{Goosebumps}}'' episode "Attack of the Jack O'Lanterns," twin brother and sister Shane and Shana are revealed to be alien friends of the lead protagonist. When in their human disguises, they are at an average pre-teen kid size, but after removing their LatexPerfection masks to reveal their green Muppet-esque alien heads, suddenly they are ''way'' taller, appearing even larger than an average adult human.

* ''VideoGame/TeamFortress2'': To his enemies, the Spy's disguises have LatexPerfection, including the body type. {{Fanon}} thinks that some sort of hologram technology is involved. However, while the Spy's apparent size changes, his physical size (his hitbox) does not. That size difference can occasionally be helpful to the Spy, such as an enemy player shooting at their Heavy and thinking he's been spy-checked, only to find their shots missed the Spy's real body within. Taken to absurd levels when disguising as the Scout, who's hunched stature means that the taller Spy's head is invisible over the disguise. Creative spies can hide all but their real invisible head behind a low barrier, giving them an invisible view of their surroundings.
* In ''VideoGame/ProfessorLaytonAndTheDiabolicalBox'', [[spoiler:Don Paolo]] spends most of the game [[LatexPerfection disguised as]] [[spoiler:Layton's adopted daughter Flora]], despite the former being much taller and broader-shouldered than the latter.

* In ''VideoGame/CrisisCore'', one sidequest involves Zack finding Wutai spies disguised as various people in Midgar. The last one to find is disguised as a ''small child'' whose NPC dialogue is "[[HiddenInPlainSight I'm a Wutai spy!]]" before you actually do this sidequest. When you speak to him with the sidequest active, he'll run off and ditch the disguise behind a convenient SceneryCensor and suddenly is the size of a regular, tall adult.
* The opera level in ''VideoGame/{{Psychonauts}}'' involves chasing after the Phantom, a very gaunt masked figure. When the Phantom is finally unmasked, he turns out to be the huge, obese Jasper the Critic. The protagonist lampshades how this doesn't make sense, [[AWizardDidIt but you are in someone's mind, so it doesn't have to]].
* Mr. Fizwidget in ''VideoGame/RatchetAndClankGoingCommando'' turns out to be [[spoiler:Captain Quark]] in disguise, who's at least half again as tall as Fizwidget and [[TopHeavyGuy much broader at the shoulder]].

* In the first installment of VideoGame/TheSims, different clothing items changed the apparent weight of the wearer.

* The episode of ''WesternAnimation/JohnnyBravo'' "A League of his Own" both plays straight and subverts this trope. Johnny has to disguise himself as school girl to play in a girls softball team, and is obviously still a giant man in a wig. However, it turns out later that even more grown men were disguised as girls to play in the teams, and had magically shrunk when wearing their costumes.

* In ''WesternAnimation/AlvinAndTheChipmunks'', Eleanor seems to experience a sort of instant slim down whenever she wears something other than her signature outfit, despite being "chubby" being one of her identifiable characteristics.
* This is standard on ''Franchise/ScoobyDoo.'' The size of a suspect rarely has any correlation to the size of the "ghost" running around. Probably comes from movie serials being at least partly the inspiration for ''Franchise/ScoobyDoo''; in the serials, sometimes at the beginning the writers had no idea which character was going to be the true identity of the villain, even after shooting began on the first chapters. The hooded mastermind would be played by an actor who was not part of the actual cast. This would not-infrequently result in the Mysterious Cloaked Bad Guy being quite a bit taller than the cast member eventually revealed as his true identity.
* In ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants'' at the end of the episode "Spy Buddies", we have Mr. Krabs flawlessly disguised as Plankton. Note that the latter is one of the smallest members of the show's entire cast. Then immediately afterward we have [=SpongeBob=] and Patrick turning out to actually be other random characters that all vary wildly in size and shape from each other.

* An odd example in the very first episode of ''WesternAnimation/GIJoeARealAmericanHero:'' the heavyset female Pentagon representative has just revealed herself to be the Baroness in disguise, by pulling off a mask and wig. She runs over to join the invading Cobra forces — and has somehow suddenly lost whatever padding she was wearing under her clothes, because she now looks like her usual sveldt self.
* The final ''WesternAnimation/KaBlam'' episode "Just Chillin'" has a scene where Henry and June, in an effort to make their show more exciting and action-packed, engage in a TraintopBattle with sasquatch Mr. Foot wearing a [[EvilWearsBlack black leather villains' outfit]] with his huge bulky form still showing through. But then at one point [[SuddenlySpeaking the normally-mute Mr. Foot suddenly speaks in a gruff voice]] and then peels off his LatexPerfection ape mask to reveal Creator/JonVoight, after which the rest of his body [[YourSizeMayVary inexplicably shrinks down]] to a normal human body size and shape, still wearing the black outfit.
* Happens in [[RuleOfFunny a humorous fashion]] in the early ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'' episode "15 Minutes of Shame", when a talk show hosted by Diane Simmons features a dating couple parodying TheReveal trope; the male Mario was really a woman in a latex mask and mens' shirt, but then confesses that she is not even a woman, and unzips her FullBodyDisguise to reveal a horse much larger than Mario's human size, and then confesses that he is a ''broom'', removing the horse suit to reveal a broom only a little smaller than Mario's man/woman getup that lifelessly falls over.
* In the climax of the ''WesternAnimation/{{Jellystone}}'' episode "VIP Baby You Know Me", [[WesternAnimation/TheHillbillyBears Shag Rugg]] dupes Series/TheBananaSplits by having several of his friends disguise themselves flawlessly as doubles of Shag using costumes from a trunk within the Splits' warehouse. Two of Shag's pals who help to trick the Splits, WesternAnimation/YakkyDoodle and WesternAnimation/PeterPotamus, are respectively smaller and ''much'' bigger than the bear cub and yet are as flawlessly disguised as Shag as [[WesternAnimation/AugieDoggieAndDoggieDaddy Augie Doggie]] is.

** ''Series/KamenRiderZiO'': In the post-series CrossOver with ''Series/KamenRiderDecade'', an alternate version of Sougo awakens to the power of [[FutureMeScaresMe Ohma Zi-O]] while still a child, but looks identical to the original adult Ohma Zi-O while transformed (he can also ''[[VocalDissonance speak]]'' in Ohma's BadassBaritone without transforming). As Ohma Zi-O is a RealityWarper and [[TimeMaster "supreme overlord of past, present and future"]], he may have simply [[OlderAlterEgo aged himself up to fit the suit]].

** Happens twice in a row in ''Series/ZyudenSentaiKyoryuger''; when the overweight Ramirez morphs, his ranger form starts out thinner and explicitly shrinks down further as the transformation sequence goes on. Possible a JustifiedTrope since Ramirez is long dead and isn't really restricted to the physics of the living.

[[quoteright:300:[[WesternAnimation/JohnnyBravo https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/costumes_size.png]]]]

[[quoteright:300:[[WesternAnimation/JohnnyBravo https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ec3d18341ebc1e9c8f72cfb16759c06a.jpg]]]]

* A strange minor example in ''Manga/AyakashiTriangle'': Snegurochka has normal human feet, but typical wears almost perfectly-cylindrical snow boots that aren't wide enough for them to possibly fit inside.

Maybe this is done to keep someone's identity hidden from the viewer, or maybe just for a joke. But, whatever the reason may be, the people wearing these seem to be a lot more elastic than when they stop.

[[quoteright:348:[[WesternAnimation/JohnnyBravo https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ec3d18341ebc1e9c8f72cfb16759c06a.jpg]]]]

[[folder: Western Animation]]

* ''ComicStrip/WhatsNewWithPhilAndDixie'' from Dragon magazine #68 (December 1982). A man who's 6 feet tall and weighs maybe 300 lb. becomes an elven woman at least two feet shorter. When asked how he did it, he says "Special shoes". Read it [[http://www.airshipentertainment.com/growfcomic.php?date=20070812 here]].

* In ''VideoGame/ProfessorLaytonAndTheDiabolicalBox'', [[spoiler: Don Paolo]] spends most of the game [[LatexPerfection disguised as]] [[spoiler: Layton's adopted daughter Flora]], despite the former being much taller and broader-shouldered than the latter.
* The ending to ''[[VideoGame/EarthwormJim Earthworm Jim 2]]'' reveals that the entirely humanoid Jim, Psycrow and Princess Whats-Her-Name were all [[spoiler: large, non-anthropomorphic cows in disguises the whole time]]. Jim also wears a salamander costume for an entire level with no regard given to the complete change in body shape, voice and movement ability.

* Mr. Fizwidget in ''VideoGame/RatchetAndClankGoingCommando'' turns out to be [[spoiler: Captain Quark]] in disguise, who's at least half again as tall as Fizwidget and [[TopHeavyGuy much broader at the shoulder]].

* The Franchise/BatMan character Comicbook/{{Anarky}} is really a thirteen year old boy who wears a costume with a built in head extender to appear as a much taller man in his earliest stories, beginning in 1989. This costume element was eventually dropped by 1997, with the fictional explanation being that the character had grown to fill out the costume. This was in fact clever cover for the reality that the extender was difficult to draw in action scenes. Further, it had only been intended to fool the reader as a red herring in the character's first appearance, but other artists had continued using the extender needlessly, or dropped it on their own, creating confusion as to the costume's official design. Giving a direct explanation to never need the extender again created a uniformity for all artists to follow thereafter.

* In ''WesternAnimation/AnAmericanTail'', villain Warren T. Rat spends most of the movie disguised as a rat, and not much bigger than the mouse protagonists. When removes his costume to reveal that he's actually a cat, he becomes much bigger.

-->-- '''Hanz Doofenshrmitz, lampshading the trope.''' ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb''