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Somehow those suits are not heavy as hell, and somehow provide full protection.
"Your suit can stretch as far as you can without injuring yourself, and still retain its shape. Virtually indestructible... yet it breathes like Egyptian cotton!"
Animated characters can often be found wearing clothing that just looks too good to be real. This can be proven by the occasional attempt made to reproduce these clothes by the costume teams for Live Action Adaptations or by enthusiastic fans. Sometimes this is because of structural elements that flout or ignore real-world physical laws, or because the outfit in question requires an inhumanly perfect (or simply inhuman) body underneath it, or because real-world materials just don't look as good as ink and paint.
Alternately, it may be a version of a real-life style or uniform, cut in ways that would never be allowed in Real Life. dramatically-short dresses or skirts is a common example.
Such clothing is also often so tied to the character that they and only they can acquire it — it seems to come from nowhere, fits them perfectly both symbolically and physically, and may even sometimes appear from nowhere a la the Hyperspace Mallet.
Clothing in animated series also shows near-indestructibility in terms of almost never ripping, fraying, staining or wrinkling, no matter what kind of stresses are placed on it or substances flung at it. Sometimes this is given an explanation (the material is some experimental or magically enhanced substance), but most times it isn't. See: Magic Pants
Alternately, especially for the fancier outfits, the clothing can be destroyed or damaged, and the character somehow repairs the damage or acquires an identical outfit in next episode. Inu Yasha is a prime example of this.
Any character with clothing showing signs of distress is truly in a world of pain, and possibly close to death. Unless, of course, the character in question is a woman in Anime, as clothes-tearing near-misses are a hallmark of fanservice.
Not only is it indestructible, it's almost never a hindrance (unless the story explicitly states so), like an Impractically Fancy Outfit and Requisite Royal Regalia.
Note that despite the name given this trope, such outfits need not be cool, or even particularly good-looking. Shaggy's shapeless green shirt is just as indestructible as Superman's cape. Neither ever get as much as a grass stain. (Which, of course, might have been the point behind the color of Shaggy's shirt. ;)
Polar opposite of the Rummage Sale Reject. Subverted by Cheap Costume. Compare Bling Of War, Pimped Out Dress, Ermine Cape Effect, Impractically Fancy Outfit (which is the closest version in Real Life).
Examples:
Live Action TV
- The live-action version of The Flash had to resort to (movie) Batman-style sculpted rubber, which didn't look nearly as good as it did on Burton's Batman. It was explained as being originally designed as a Soviet space-suit (which, presumably, is why it was red).
- In the original Superman series, Superman's costume was, as a Seinfeld parody put it, "impervious to stain." It was never damaged, no matter how much of a beating he took. There have been a variety of pieces of Scotch Tape applied to this.
- The current canon explanation is that Superman's invulnerability is a field effect that extends a fraction of an inch beyond his skin — protecting his suit, but not the cape. Which, you know, makes lots more sense than the Magic Spandex.
- Clark also has a very unique way of cleaning the suit — he flies out into space and lets the vacuum and hard radiation take care of it.
- Lois And Clark included a scene with Clark, early in his superhero career, calling his mother for advice on how to get a "bomb stain" out of his outfit.
Anime
- In Read Or Die, Ms. Deep's leather catsuit with its impressively low-cut decolletage would be impossible to wear in the real world without its occupant suddenly violating indecent exposure laws every few minutes. (See Gainaxing, Theiss Titillation Theory.)
- Likewise, cosplayers have noted that the miniskirt worn by Noir's Mireille Bouquet actually facilitates panty shots in real life, but is a rare instance in anime where the expected fanservice doesn't occur.
- Revolutionary Girl Utena — I'm looking at any of the duelist and Rose Bride uniforms. Oddly somewhat averted by Utena herself, who wears a perfectly reasonable tank top and bicycle shorts under the impossible jacket.
- The uniforms worn by schoolgirls in many anime — Kare Kano comes specifically to mind — would be manifestly unsuitable for school in the real world, and some might even qualify as fetish wear.
- Pokemon — This was proven true with Pokemon Live!.
- Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon proved that the Sailor Senshi's uniforms are just shy of feasible in their original forms. And Tuxedo Kamen's is eminently doable — except it makes him look like a dork.
- Bloodberry's usual outfit in Saber Marionette J and its sequels includes two loops of rope which circle her shoulders at some distance, and simply can not be made to work (and look right) in the real world. (As seen in a brief clip of a live actress in a Bloodberry costume shown in the closing credits of Saber Marionette J To X.)
- In Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha the outfit one's Transformation Sequence produces is called a "Barrier Jacket" and is somewhat determined via the subconscious. As the series progresses, more and more barrier jackets are a pastiche of random pieces of medieval armor, capes, military uniforms, and exaggerated modern teenager apparel. Which actually makes sense, as later characters have more exposure to different cultures (Belka, Midchilda, and Earth) with those aspects. The military uniforms in the series, thankfully, are relatively plausible.
- In Inu Yasha, Ninja-esque Sango wears an incredibly intricate costume and makeup for Walking The Earth in feudal Japan. While timetraveler Kagome can just pop up back to the 21st century for supplies, bathing, and clothing maintenance (and this has been commented on), Sango has no such resources.
- For that matter; having impossibly immaculate and intricate period stage costuming seems to be a standard demonic power for "named Demons" in Inu Yasha. If the title character's "robe of the fire rat" is any indication, they're all semi-living things capable of regrowing by themselves.
- Chances are the Fire Rat Robe is unique; it is based on one of the treasures from "The Bamboo Cutter's Tale" (Taketori no Monogatari), the oldest known literary work in Japanese. In order to avoid unwanted marriages, Kaguya-hime demanded that her suitors perform impossible tasks, such as bringing to her the Buddha's begging bowl, the Dragon King's jeweled necklace, or a robe made from the fur of the Chinese fire-rats.
- Gundam Seed Destiny: In her guise as idol singer Lacus Clyne, impostor Meer Campbell wears a not-all-that-concealing skirt whose waistband seems to hover around her lower hips without actually touching her body.
- Come to think of it, how do either Lacus' or Meer's hair clips stay up?
- In fact, most of the clothing in the SEED saga skirts this trope due to the character designer's attempts to avoid the No New Fashions In The Future trope.
- For some reason, Ray, Joshua and Michael in Gun X Sword all wear what looks like extremely stylized clerical attire throughout the series. Joshua, at least, changes his clothes on several occasions, but Ray and Michael never do. And the less said about Carmen99 and Priscilla's outfits the better. At least Van's tuxedo is justified (he's fixated on the day his bride was killed). The series also subverts it, though, with the Claw — he has an impossibly cool outfit (the spacesuit he wore when he left Earth), but he hates it and only wears it on formal occasions, preferring a work shirt and overalls.
- Averted in Dragon Ball Z, where clothing is rather realistic without too many fancy doodads unless it's in that character's personality (like Cyborg Seventeen's gunbelt and holster). Also, once in a fight, clothes usually get destroyed with surprising quickness, leaving protagonist Son Goku at one point fighting almost in shorts after his pant legs and shirt were destroyed.
- Not so fast, don't forget the Frieza army's one-size-fits-all armor. According to Vegeta's explanation the material is so stretchy it didn't rip when he turned into a giant monkey.
- Not that Vegeta's clothes didn't get torn too, but he never got it to the level Goku did even when he stopped wearing the armor.
- There exist skin-tight "plug suits" in Neon Genesis Evangelion.
- Halfway through Spriggan the protagonist Yu Ominae is given a skin-tight combat-suit woven from high-tech fibers and artificial muscles which augments his strength and protects him against bullets. It helps that he is a special agent for a powerful shadowy organization, Arcan.
- Hinamori Amu from Shugo Chara always wears daily clothes that, well, at the very least much more stylized than others. Somewhat subverted that it does take her time to put all of it on.
- Subverted in Princess Tutu — Fakir's knight outfit is torn to shreds in a battle that takes place in the first season finale, and the only other time he's shown wearing it again, it looks slightly different (so it may actually be a different outfit). Also, his casual outfit includes an old, worn blue shirt that's torn up and clumsily sewn back together in a few places, which suggests he gets in situations that end up with him tearing his clothing a lot.
- This also might explain how Kreahe's bodice always stays in the exact right place with out any straps
- Gankutsuou. I'm looking at you, Haydee's opera dress.
- In Infinite Ryvius, Spaceship Girl Neya's metallic-pink bodysuit.
VideoGames
- Kasugano Sakura from the Street Fighter series wears a school uniform which not only allows for frequent upskirt shots (because of which she has the sense to wear her gym shorts underneath), but exposes her midriff too.
- Videogame example: Felicia and Morrigan of Darkstalkers, who have the excuse of them not actually being clothes (But rather fur and magically-shaped bats, respectively).
- The Final Fantasy series has this all over the place; for instance, Fran in Final Fantasy XII, and Lulu in Final Fantasy X, who wears clothing that's impossible on several levels. Pointing out the unrealistically eclectic character designs in recent Final Fantasy games is a common joke on imageboards, often revolving around sticking unnecessary belts and zippers onto every article of clothing imaginable. Older games aren't exempt from odd design choices, either.
- And God help the poor fanboy who tries to imitate Wakka's hair...
- Both sexes get this in the Kingdom Hearts games. Indeed, one of the most hilarious views in the game is Goofy, Donald and (in the sequel) Mickey Mouse and Pete, in anime-style Impossibly Cool Clothes. Mickey, Donald and Goofy's are also based on their classic looks. And, hey, Donald has a zipper on his hat, yet it works — according to some, anyway.
- In the (relatively few) RPGs that actually show injury on your character, through blood and torn clothes, drinking a healing potion or using a medicine syringe will, for some reason, also repair your clothing. This is lampshaded in The Order Of The Stick.
- Clothing in the Devil May Cry series seems to boast a Healing Factor, as they appear to regenerate from wounds inflicted on their wearers. Some fans have taken issue with Capcom's laziness in not properly modeling the Clothing Damage.
- Everyone's clothing in The World Ends With You is just too hip for the living.
- Strangely enough, the real Shiki has a practical, realistic outfit, despite the fact that [[she's shown to be more interested in fashion than any of the other characters are]]. This troper thinks it works for her, though.
- Much of the outfits in Disgaea either feature impossible-to-replicate add-ons, or are prone to Superbowl style wardrobe malfunctions. Usually both. Just try to pull off a half decent Laharl cosplay. Or, for the sake of everyone's sanity, don't.
- Snake's Sneaking Suit is very form-fitting without any wrinkles or bends, and seem to do an impossible amount of tricks such as protecting him from the cold despite it's presumably thin material, reduce damage he gets, and helping him hide in plain sight while making him so even guys want that sweet, sweet ass.
- Tekken. Go on, try to last in a serious fight wearing Christie Montaro's clothes — without flashing someone. Double-dog dare you.
Comic Books
- The Unstable Molecules created by Reed Richards to allow the powers of the Fantastic Four to not burn away their clothes, or force them to go naked if they want to be invisible, of course, were what The Incredibles' Edna Mode was paying homage to in the first place... They were also used to explain why the X-Men and other spandex clad Marvelites were so hard to hurt — the unstable molecules used in their costumes were flexible under normal circumstances, but hardened to bulletproof levels when subjected to the appropriate stresses. A rare subversion of the Reed Richards Is Useless trope.
- And surprisingly, close to Truth In Television — D3O
 is a material that is now available for a variety of sport clothes which flexes under normal use but hardens into armor under impact.
- Spoofed in Garfield, where Jon wears an outfit with "six gajillion zippers" in an attempt to appear macho, and ends up rummaging through them for his keys at his doorstep (as Garfield notes, "This could take months!").
- Spiderman seems to openly oppose this trope in most of its formats, other than the movie. In the comics and the original animated series, Peter Parker as known to occasionally patch up his costume with needle and thread. In Ultimate Spiderman, Mary Jane makes and repairs his costume, and there have been several episodes where he's had to go in less than perfect versions of it due to fights with Mary Jane, or because he damaged it so much that she's not finished fixing it.
- In one 1970s comic story, he lost his cowl and had to resort to stealing a copy from a costume shop — one that did not render his eyes blank white shapes but acted like a "real" mask would.
Film
Western Animation
- Parodied in The Incredibles with the character Edna Mode, costume designer for the superheroes (herself a parody of real-life Hollywood costume designer Edith Head). The super-suits she designed could absorb tremendous levels of damage and stretch incredibly without significant tearing or abrasion. Also somewhat deconstructed, as it's shown that Edna stopped making her suits with capes because if they ever got caught on anything, they're indestructible and you'd be stuck to or sucked into such things as rockets, jet engines... which begs the question of "why did they go to the extra effort of making the cape indestructable.
- Jessica Rabbit's dress might exist in the real world if it were painted on, so it makes sense that only an animated character could wear it. Not to mention the impossible body underneath.
- Ditto Betty Boop's most featured cut of clothing.
- Jessica's dress appears to be based off of a dress◊ worn by Marilyn Monroe, which was so impossible she had to be sewn into it.
Webcomics
Tabletop Games
- GURPS has the Costume advantage, which is immune to one's powers (a la Human Torch), and approximately all other powers as well, though not giving any sort of armor effect. There is also an add-some-color article sidebar in the Supers supplement that mentions something like "...modern superheroines need not resort to tape or the glue pot, thanks to modern elasto-polymers" or something like that.
- Of course, it also has an optional set of rules covering Bulletproof Nudity, so yeah.
Literature
- Lampshaded in A Hat Full of Sky, when Tiffany visits a magical supply shop and expresses interest in a particular cloak, the "Zephyr". As the shopkeeper puts it, absolutely useless at keeping you warm or dry but looks fantastic in the slightest breeze.
- Just outside Whateley Academy, in the Whateley Universe, Cecilia Rogers has a clothing boutique where she makes supersuits for the students... and also for big-name superheroes. She uses special fabrics and has a superpower over fabric, so the outfits she makes can be (mostly) bulletproof, acid- and stain-resistant, knife-resistant, etc. And she repairs them too. She also tailors school uniforms for the impossibly cool who have to meet school rules.
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