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Memetic Outfit
You instantly know who this is, but how often has he actually worn this outfit?

An outfit that, for whatever reason, sticks in the mind of the audience forever. This can happen even if it's not intended to be embarrassing or funny, but simply a strange fashion choice that is never commented on by anyone else... except fans. The character might never wear it again, nor even anything like it. Maybe the wardrobe people or artists were just bored one day. There's just something unique, inappropriate or just plain odd. Very rarely, the producers are aware of it, and it may become a sort of alternate outfit if a similar situation lets the makers bring it out again.

It can be even more noticeable in a character who rarely wears anything else. Nice Hats and Cool Shades are especially prone to this.

Sometimes the popularity of these outfits make the writers have the character wear the outfit as much as possible. Then you have Clothes Make the Legend. Being remembered for lack of clothing would (probably) be Everybody Remembers the Stripper.

Compare Iconic Item.

Examples:

    open/close all folders 

    Anime and Manga 
  • Everyone knows Dio Brando by his yellow jacket, yellow pants, black sleeveless undershirt, and heart-symbol headband.
  • Naruto's orange jumpsuit with the blue stripes and white collar.
    • As well as his Part 2 outfit with the black shoulders and collar. Double points with his Badass Long Coat.
    • Sakura's pink skirt thing and biker shorts.
    • Sasuke's outfit with the light purple "butt-bow" thing and the shirt revealing much of his chest...
      • More so his black part 1 outfit.
    • The Akatsuki's oufits: Cloak (w/Red Clouds) + Straw hat + Hat wind chime thing.
    • The standard Shinobi uniform, especially the Konoha flak vest, definitely counts. Bonus points to Kakashi for his mask, making him one of the few to actually resemble a ninja.
  • Haruhi in Ouran High School Host Club is first seen by the viewer in a plain, ugly sweater and glasses combo with messy hair. This is explained by a long string of coincidences and Haruhi's overall disinterest in fashion. Fans responded to the unflattering outfit she wears in the series by dubbing her "Haruhi Potter."
  • Urahara's hat. Also the black outfits they all wear, and Byakuya's weird...hair thingies.
  • Sailor Moon — that has got to be the most memetic outfit ever. She even has memetic hair.
    • There's also Sailor Mars's civilian outfit, a miko priestess outfit that is in some ways more recognizable than her Senshi uniform.
  • The Tokyo Mew Mew animators weren't so good with costume design, so most clothes that didn't first appear in the manga got weird looks. One recurring outfit, a white and lime green hooded top given to the resident bad boy, stuck out so much (both for the color scheme and for being out of character) that it appeared again, in a Tantei Gakuen Q ending theme, worn by his same-voiced Expy.
  • The Dragon Ball Z fandom is never going to let Vegeta live down the bright pink "Bad Man" shirt. The outfit was such an odd choice, the dub adds a line with Vegeta being defensive about it. It wouldn't have been quite as memorable if it hadn't been for those retina-searing yellow pants and green shoes that went with it.
    • Similarly, although it only happened in one episode, Piccolo in a bright yellow t-shirt and a baseball cap is a pretty well-known image...which is understandable, considering it's damn funny.
    • Goku, Gohan, and Goten's signature orange gi is pretty memetic itself. Also, the battle armor with shoulder wings/spandex underwear that the Ginyu Force, Nappa, and Zarbon all wear.
    • Speaking of the episodes with Vegeta in pink, Goku's Yardrat costume was an interesting lapse in fashion sense.
    • Where's Muten Roshi's turtle shell on this list? Seriously, it's the only one here that seems to have actually had a function.
  • Setsuna was once made to wear a cute alternate catgirl maid costume in Mahou Sensei Negima! to make her more attractive to the crowd watching her fights. She started wearing it later for no reason other than being popular with the readers - the Pactio can be registered with a variety of outfits for battle.
    • Maybe Konoka liked it...
      • Hey, this is quite possibly true. It's the default appearance of Setsuna's pactio with Konoka.
    • Negi's Opera Gloves got not small attention, especially that with his chinese clothes they gave a filling similar to Zettai Ryouiki.
  • Haruhi Suzumiya's Sailor Fuku, complete with yellow ribbon, is so universally known in the anime fandom, you'll get wry looks if you cannot immediately recognize the color patterns like here◊.
  • Neon Genesis Evangelion's plug suits are extremely iconic.
    • Likewise, Gendo's white gloves and amber shades as a part of the "Gendo Pose" meme.
  • Lelouch vi Britannia's Nice Hat after he became Emperor of Britannia started a fanclub... before the episode aired. That entire outfit he wore is also quite distinctive, having been described as a cross between pope and old-fashioned sea captain, resulting in him being drawn in it whenever he shows up in new fan art, as opposed to his old Zero outfit, which was already quite memetic by itself.
    • Not to mention CC's Bondage-riffic jumpsuit from the first episode. It's basically the only thing she wears until about halfway through the first season, at which point Lelouch got tired of seeing it and bought her an entire wardrobe. She puts it back on when Lelouch gets his sweet hat after usurping the throne.
    • I'd like to say that Suzaku's Lancelot outfit and all of the Knight of Rounds's outfits are some.
  • Sakura from Cardcaptor Sakura has her rubber Cat Girl Meido outfit, among others...
  • Kamina's Cool Shades.
    • Also, Simon's own star-shaped ones.
    • And Yoko's infamous "Starboobs" outfit from the last arc.
    • Kamina's ragged Badass Cape also.
    • Also, Simon's pleather Badass Cape. Just as (in)famous would be the leather man-corset haramaki and posture collar that came along with it.
  • In Minami-ke, Kana's "I AM BOSS" T-shirt led to her Fan Nickname.
  • The mechanized Bonta-kun outfit probably gets more attention than most Full Metal Panic characters do naturally. It is, after all, a super suit in a fairly hard science (for mecha combat) universe.
  • Knuckles' wonderful, wonderful hat from the Sonic the Hedgehog OVA.
    • It even carried over to the Alternate Timeline comic story Mobius: 25 Years Later, where it's finally complemented with a form-fitting gray sleeveless jumpsuit (with his trademark white chest swoosh on the front), Crocodile Dundee-esque leather vest, cowboy belt, and brown leather boots. It's Better Than It Sounds, enough so that, in the Furry Fandom at least, it's become a Memetic Outfit of its own.
    • It appeared briefly in the regular timeline too, as a piece of clothing once worn by an ancestor of his. According to one letters page, the reason he never wears it is so it won't get damaged.
  • Utena from Revolutionary Girl Utena wearing a boy's school uniform is part of the concept of her character. The red biker shorts have no such excuse, though, and probably get more attention from the fans.
  • The distinctiveness of Vash's yellow-tinted shades with the zig-zag bit and the red leather coat is probably only overshadowed by Wolfwood's massive Cross-Cannon.
  • Ryoma's outfit from Getter Robo Armageddon was supposed to be a reference to Shinichi from Maju Sensen, another series by Ken Ishikawa, but the popularity of the OVA led to the iconic outfit being attributed to him instead.
  • When Yami Yugi wears his jacket over his shoulders. Though he doesn't keep this look up for many episodes, it seems to be incredibly catchy among fans. It's probably his most memorable and unrealistic outfit until Millennium World, where he actually dresses like a pharaoh.
    • Kaiba is first seen in a purple trenchcoat, and is also seen in a school uniform at some points. But his white trenchcoat from the Battle City arc is the outfit everyone remembers.
    • Bakura went through something similar; He's been in school uniforms, rather fetching cricketing jumpers and a few other outfits including a Black Cloak/Badass Longcoat, but it's the blue-and-white striped tee with the impossibly light sky-blue shirt from the Battle City Arc that everyone remembers and cosplays with.
    • These two designs—The Hero in a jacket colored blue or red, The Rival in a Badass Longcoat colored white or black—have been carried over to the spin-offs. Jaden has his Slifer Red jacket while Chazz and Zane have their longcoats, black for Chazz and initially white and later black for Zane. Yusei has his blue jacket while Jack has his white trenchcoat. As of Zexal they're back to red for the jacket color with Yuma. His initial rival Shark has no longcoat and just wears a jacket (though still purple to draw back to Kaiba)...then Episode 13 introduced Kaito Tenjo as a new rival, with two longcoats—one white, one black.
  • Conan Edogawa's suit and bowtie. He did had a case of Limited Wardrobe earlier, but even now he has a larger variety of clothes, his suit and bowtie not only means him, but also the entire meaning of Great Detective. In modern comedic manga, changing to Conan's suit means s/he's going into Great Detective mode.
  • In Axis Powers Hetalia, England, in a single strip and most likely not in his right mind, dresses up in an angel outfit and calls himself "Britannia Angel". Only in one short strip did he do this, but there are a lot of fanworks of Britannia Angel.
    • Also, England scores again with his "Sexy Waiter" outfit, which is basically the lower half of a Hadaka Apron.
    • And then there's his Black Magic get-up, aka the cloak that seems to come with its own Dramatic Wind.
    • Poland crossdresses a grand total of three times in the entire series. The extent to which he does it fanart is....much, much higher.
    • Canada is commonly depicted in his military uniform... even though he has yet to actually wear it in the strips or anime.
  • Rena's hat from Higurashi No Naku Koro Ni is quite popular.
    • Likewise her main outfit.
  • And now, from Umineko No Naku Koro Ni, we've got George's TOMITAKE FLASH! shirt.
    • Kinzo's and Battler's cape is also fast-approaching this status.
  • If one tells you to imagine a red cloak with a serpent-on-the-cross sigil on, need they even mention the black not-supposed-to-be-leather outfit underneath?
  • From Kuso Miso Technique there's Abe Takakazu's jumpsuit.
  • Kenshiro's leather jacket and his brother Raoh's horned "Ken-Oh" helmet.
  • Yuna Roma Seiran's bright yellow pajamas mix this with Narm and Fashion Victim Villain.
  • In Ranma ˝, the titular character wears a wide variety of outfits throughout the course of the anime. He is likewise depicted wearing Chinese tangs in a variety of colors in promotional artwork for the manga. Try asking some fanfiction authors if he wears anything but his iconic red shirt.
  • The Knight Sabers in the original Bubblegum Crisis OVA had a variety of casual outfits, but the most memorable would probably be Linna's "cow sweater" and Sylia's inexplicably midriff-baring high-collared blouse.
    • The 2040 version of Sylia had a Little Red Dress with Absolute Cleavage that stuck in viewers' memory.
  • Ciel from Black Butler probably has more fan artwork of him in the dress he wore to the Viscount Druitt's ball than any other outfit he's worn. Cosplayers seem to love this outfit, too.
  • Four of the five main cast members of Lupin III get memetic outfits:
    • Lupin's red or green jacket paired with black or white pants and a black or blue shirt and necktie;
      • which is doubly famous thanks to Nabeshin's Author Avatar wearing it...
      • Hell, you don't even have to mention the name itself, all you have to say is "The Red Jacket" and a lot of people will instantly know what you're talking about.
    • Jigen's dark suit with the fedora slouched over his eyes;
    • Goemon's yukata and hakama;
    • and Zenigata's conservative brown plainclothes suit, trenchcoat and fedora.
    • Fujiko's doesn't wear her iconic black Spy Catsuit as much as the other four wear their outfits, but it's still memetic.
  • Although not exactly an outfit, in Princess Tutu Fakir manages to tear up his knight outfit and also has a poorly mended rip in the shirt of his casual clothing and seems to have decided to take out his teenage angst and rage on one of his sleeves. Thanks to this, some fans like to depict him as ripping holes into any outfit he can get away with, and feeling very uncomfortable unless his clothing is falling apart at the seams. Mytho's habit of wearing baggy white shirts without bottoms around his room has also garnered a lot of attention, as has the fact that he's jumped out of a high window twice dressed like this.
  • Ayashi No Ceres put Tooya into a Badass Longcoat, underneath which is a blue espionage suit which bares his midriff. Not even Aya comments on the exposure of his abs.
  • From Dirty Pair, there are Kei and Yuri's distinctive "battle bikinis."
  • Papillion Mask, especially his speedo or his post transformation outfit from Busou Renkin in all its bizarre battle ballet outfit glory..
    • Don't forget Captain Bravo's white coat-hat combo.
  • The black outfits Section 9 wear in the V Formation Team Shot from the opening to the second season of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex.
  • In Durarara, Shizuo Heiwajima is inseparably linked with his endless supply of bartender's uniforms to the point that they've wormed their way into both his fandom (the Gartender) and canon (God of Destruction in a Bartender Suit) nicknames.
    • Also Celty's Kitty-Cat-Eared yellow biking helmet, which was a joke by the illustrater but loved so much by the animators that it became her stock outfit in the Anime. And no, the cat ears don't have anything to do with anything, especially when you know that Celty is a Dullahan.
  • Going by fan works, one would think that Fate of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha wears her New Sonic Form outfit whenever she goes in battle, as opposed to it being a rarely used last resort kinda thing. One could only wonder why...
  • Pokémon: All of Ash's main outfits count, but his Ashley and meido outfits are remembered even though he only wore them once each.
    • Wait, no mention of the iconic Poké Ball-colored hat?
    • Misty is most remembered in her original style for the anime, even more so then any of her game looks. Super Smash Bros. even had her trophy with it, despite everything else being game-based.
  • Arguably, InuYasha's everyday attire of red robes and restraining necklace, not to mention his long, white hair and dog ears. While his design wasn't the first to popularize these fashion aspects, the combo is pretty much associated with him.
  • Raikou's infamous "USA-CHAN" outfit◊. It's amazingly well-known for something he was only shown wearing for a single panel in the manga.
  • Horo is often remembered in either the purple dress or... less...
  • The Protect Gears from Jin-Roh: The Wolf Brigade and the rest of Mamoru Oshii's Kerberos Saga are Heavily Armored Mooks with gas masks, red Glowing Eyes of Doom and an Ammunition Backpack while toting MG-42s. Their distinct appearance has influenced the Helghast to the point where they're often confused for the other.
  • In One Piece pretty much ALL of the Strawhat Pirates outfits are notable and memorable considering they never change.
    • Towards the end of the first half of the series, the crew starts to go through wardrobe changes. Though their default outfits are the best known
    • Interestingly enough, Nico Robin is the only Straw Hat without an iconic outfit. Some fans count her Stripperific cowboy hat/open corset combo from her days as Miss All-Sunday, but she's worn something different almost every episode since she joined the Straw Hats.
  • After an episode of Megaman Battle Network had most of the main cast (yes, even the males) Cosplay as Aki-chan to serve as decoys, with some of them looking patently ridiculous, drawing various characters in that cosplay caught on. Including characters who originally didn't do the cosplay in that particular episode, and especially characters who look even more ridiculous in it.
  • Inazuma Eleven had a gag where Endou's mom wrote "Endou" in marker across the back of a pair of his boxers in embarrassingly large handwriting, to ensure he wouldn't get his laundry mixed up with anyone else's at an overnight training camp. That pair of boxers tends to show up in fan works as Goofy Print Underwear whenever an I See London gag has Endou as one of the victims.
  • Madoka of Puella Magi Madoka Magica is quite often drawn in the white-dressed form she unveils when superpowered in the final episode, often referred to as "Goddess Madoka". This outfit showed for probably about 2 seconds.
  • Alucard has been seen in a few outfits and they're all very popular among the fandom, but the cake goes to Alucard's usual coat, hat, gloves and glasses. This ensemble is known among his VA as 'pimp'.
    • Both of Seras' outfits are quite popular, too.
  • Tiger & Bunny has what fans like to call the crapsuit, the spandex costume Kotetsu used to wear before Apollon Media made him don the Powered Armor. Despite the name, it's popular enough to warrant its own Pixiv tag.
  • As a broader, franchise-wide example, goggles on a Digimon character have such a strong association with being worn by The Hero of whatever particular series that Masaru not wearing them is downright unusual. It's more a franchise-wide thing than any particular character, but were it to be pinned to any particular character it would be Taichi (both of him) as a result of First Installment Wins, and because the exact same goggles were passed on to Daisuke.

    Comic Books 
  • This is the reason why superhero characters wear brightly colored spandex. Also why most older characters are still wearing the same outfit they did decades earlier. The one time Superman had his outfit changed in canon is one of the bigger Dork Age moments of the 90s. And Superman's outfit was originally designed simply to be colorful and easy to draw, because comics had very limited printing capabilities in the 1940s.
    • Which isn't to say the costume doesn't get tweaked here and there (for example, in Superman Returns, where it was slightly less so). But the core design elements remain.
    • Whenever the comics change a character's look significantly, it likely won't stick to merchandising or adaptations. To wit; Spider-Man and his black outfit, Hulk and his gray skin, and Wolverine and his bone claws.
      • Gray Hulk actually came first — the design changed very early on because with contemporary printing technology, green was easier to print than gray.
  • Batman's silhouette is so iconic he has a villain whose goal in life is just to steal his cowl. The fight for Batman's successor was even called Battle for the Cowl.
  • The Hulk's most usual clothing, purple pants (that resist everything!).
  • Young Avengers has some:
    • Wiccan, his cape and his (no longer worn) winged head piece.◊ Everyone remembers the cape. Everyone remembers that time Wiccan worn the cape over his civilians. The Young Avengers el-jay comm has declared Wiccan/Cape to be canon and the comm's unanimously accepted OTP.
    • Kate Bishop's "original" outfit◊ consisting of a torn purple bridesmaid dress, Black Widow's belt, Mockingbird's mask, and the original Hawkeye's bow - ah remembered well. (This also led to her initially being referred to as "Hawkingbird")
  • That one time Deadpool wore Marvel Girl's outfit. Because it was burned into the eyes of readers, but still remembered (Though the panties turn up again later).
  • The X-Men are invariably remembered, redrawn, and cosplayed in their 90's era Jim Lee outfits, particularly Cyclops's blue-and-yellow chest belt and his Underwear of Power, Rogue's yellow-and-green bodysuit with headband and bomber jacket, Psylocke's Leotard of Power, Storm's white uniform◊, and Jubilee's bright yellow trench coat and pink sunglasses. That the X-Men wore these during the height of their popularity (and in the '90s cartoon) probably has something to do with it. Only Psylocke's bathing suit has survived to the present day.
  • If a Memetic outfit can be extended to other people, fanart of Silhouette from Watchmen shows her as pretty fond of nurses, probably because the girl she kisses in the movie is a nurse.
    • The canonical memetic outfit of Watchmen is Dr Manhattan's lack thereof.
    • Rorschach's mask is his face.
    • This goes more for the film than for the comic, but Adrian Veidt's delicious purple blazer so qualifies. He's dressed very innocuously most of the time, and the jacket's not exactly odd for the 80s, but when you think of Adrian Veidt, you probably think of him in that blazer. God, so purple.
  • Charlie Brown wouldn't be Charlie Brown without the zigzag stripe shirt. Ironically, in early comics he wore an ordinary blank shirt, but his zigzag has overshadowed it for good.
  • The Guy Fawkes mask from V for Vendetta. It's even used in Anonymous-based protests. Possibly subverted in that the mask is Older Than Steam.
  • Gwen Stacy's headband. The black headband has become such an iconic symbol that it's appeared in movies, cartoons, and even Gwen's long-lost daughter Sarah was given one to remind us she looks exactly like Gwen.
  • Delirium has a bunch of different hairstyles in The Sandman, but what the fandom thinks of when they picture Delirium's hair is a style with multicolored flowing locks on one side of her head and a buzzcut on the other side (she appeared to have that hairstyle in her first major appearance, but closer inspection reveals the long part to be more like a mohawk that doesn't stick up. Which is why it keeps changing sides).
  • From Transmetropolitan, there's Spider Jerusalem's open black shirt, black tattoos and especially his unusual sunglasses.
  • Little Orphan Annie's red dress and red curls. The musical plays off of this by only putting her in said outfit when she's adopted by Warbucks.
  • Zatanna's tuxedo shirt, coat, tails, top hat, fishnets and thigh-high hooker boots.
  • Wonder Woman with her corset and star spangled panties.
  • Calvin And Hobbes:
    • Calvin is never seen without his red T-shirt, sneakers, and shorts-that-are-too-long-for-his-legs.
    • Then there's STUPENDOUS Man! See above, but add a cape and a red Luchadore-esque mask.
    • Spaceman Spiff's jumpsuit and blaster, plus goggles.
    • Tracer Bullet's Fedora, cig, and Badass Longcoat.
  • The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have their masks, belts, and elbow/knee pads. It's especially memetic because that's the only thing they wear.
  • Stargirl's braces. She got them all the way back in issue 2 of ''Stars and S.T.R.I.P.E.", and even though she later got "invisible" braces, she still has them. Their possible removal was a central plot point in the last issue Geoff Johns wrote of the current volume.
  • Conan the Barbarian can't be illustrated without the loincloth. You can give him a BFS, long black hair, and otherwise make him a Walking Shirtless Scene, but he's still not Conan without a furry loincloth.
  • Iron Man has a memetic color scheme. His armor changes every few years (and with pretty much every artist change), but with a few notable exceptions (the Silver Centurion and War Machine armors), it's always red and yellow/gold ever since the late 60s. The helmet is also very consistent with its stylized eyes and mouth, with the Modular Armor being one of the few without a mouth.

    Film 
  • Charlie Chaplin's Tramp outfit.
  • Buster Keaton occasionally played Upper Class Twits in well-tailored clothes, but is usually pictured in a baggy suit, slapshoes, and his trademark porkpie hat.
  • Harold Lloyd's horn rim glasses.
  • Indiana Jones' brown, tattered fedora, bomber jacket (Which he pretty much wears regardless of the weather or terrain) and bullwhip.
  • The trademark James Bond tuxedo, of course. This has lead to a misguided notion that he wears nothing but it (a staple of the typical Shallow Parody of the series), which isn't true. He wears plenty of normal, practical outfits (even military fatigues) and the tuxedo is limited mostly to social events. Bond's tuxedo is so emblematic that it's often invoked in things inspired by Bond, as a Shout Out.
    • The always-wears-a-suit idea might stem from a Crowning Moment of Suave in Goldfinger, where he climbs out of scuba gear to reveal full evening dress underneath, complete with carnation.
    • Casino Royale, in many ways about Bond becoming Bond, makes much ado about the first time he puts on the Tuxedo.
      • And Quantum of Solace has him wear the tuxedo for the first half of the movie. It gets increasingly unkempt as the story goes on. By the end, after having his money suspended, he's in a grubby fleece.
    • There is an urban legend (of unknown veracity) that actors who agree to play James Bond are forbidden to wear a tuxedo in any other role for the duration of their contract. Supposedly, this is why Pierce Brosnan's tuxedos in The Thomas Crown Affair were always "off" in some way, with something untied or missing.
    • Honey Ryder's white bikini from Dr. No.
  • The Dark Knight has a scene with the Joker dressed in drag as a nurse. The internet seems to have an odd obsession with this image.
  • Princess Leia's cinnamon-bun hairdo from Star Wars. Her white dress and blaster are also part of her classic look, but not as important as the hair. Her more famous outfit, (if you can call it that...), is the metal bikini. In fact, parody depictions will often combine the cinnabon hair and bikini, despite being from different movies.
    • Not to mention Han's vest, Luke's kimono... thing and boots, Obi-Wan's robe, Storm Trooper armor, Darth Frickin' Vader, as well as The Emperor's black cloak and Boba Fett's armor.
      • Boba Fett doesn't do anything in the movies. All he does is standing around, showing off his armor! And even though he suffered the most ridiculous (apparent) death in the entire series, he's still considered at least as Bad Ass as Vader, if not even more. And all because of his armor.
      • Incidentally, the memetic power of Leia's buns is a dramatic plot point in Transmetropolitan. Seriously.
    • Padmé's white outfit with the erotically slashed shirt from Attack of the Clones.
  • Clint Eastwood's poncho in the Leone Westerns. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, which takes place chronologically earlier during the war (whether the characters are the same or not), doesn't give it to him until two and a half hours in.
  • Bruce Lee's yellow and black tracksuit from Game of Death (although it only appeared in one movie for a few minutes), especially after Uma Thurman wore the same outfit in Kill Bill.
    • In fact, that track suit is one of the many ways to tell if someone's a Bruce Lee Clone.
    • A close second would be bare-chested in black pants as seen in Enter the Dragon.
  • A red and green striped sweater and fedora.
    • Although in Brazil people think it's red and black, mostly to make jokes with soccer team Flamengo◊.
  • Jason Voorhees' hockey mask from the Friday the 13th series, which he put on in Part III.
  • Die Hard's John McClane and his (soiled and bloody) wife-beater.
  • The Ghostbusters outfits are still a fancy dress mainstay, though the film was released over twenty years ago.
  • The Blues Brothers black suit pants and jackets, ties, shades, hats, and white shirts.
  • Jareth's tights. They could have been painted on.
    • Well, they are often referred to as "criminally tight" pants for a reason.
  • Harry Powell. Knuckle Tattoos. That is all.
  • Dr. Caligari has stolen the top hat forever. And Cesare made that whole look fashionable.
    • Has anyone told Zatanna this?
  • The cardigan and Jellies worn by The Dude, as well as Walter's jacket and aviator shades.
  • The Little Black Dress.
  • Betelgeuse's black and white striped suit is only one of about the six costumes he wears throughout the film, but it's the one everyone remembers.
  • Captain Jack's hair (and everything in it) alongside his bandanna and, of course, his hat.
    • Pretty much everything about Captain Jack's appearance is memetic, especially his sometimes drunken swagger-stagger.
    • Barbossa's wide-brimmed hat with a huge feather.
  • Stanley Ipkiss becomes The Mask four times. Only in one he wears that yellow zoot suit, but it's so iconic any derivative works, such as the video game and the Animated Adaptation, turns it into his regular outfit.
  • In Back to the Future, Marty McFly's denim jacket, checkered shirt over a red T-shirt, jean suspenders, tennis shoes and, of course, his red "life preserver". Understandable, seeing how he wears this in the most iconic scenes of the first movie. Marty gradually loses this outfit over the course of the sequels. It also makes him seem kind of "All-American" with the "red, white and blue". At the end of Part I, he has lost the vest ("life preserver", if you prefer) and denim jacket. At the start of Part II, he loses the checkered shirt shortly after his arrival in 2015 and then he wears the red T-shirt, jeans, and tennis shoes (along with accessories which come and go) for the whole rest of the movie. He's still wearing this at the start of Part III. Then he gets the '50s cowboy outfit, at which point the shoes are the only part of his iconic outfit to remain. He loses them after he arrives in 1885 and gets a proper Old West outfit.
  • Dracula's black suit and cape.
  • Hannibal Lecter's restraint mask. Not even mentioned in The Silence of the Lambs novel (he wore a hockey mask instead) and appearing only for a single scene in the movie, it went on to have a starring role in Hannibal, which opens with Mason Verger buying the mask for a ridiculous amount of money, has a scene of him wearing it and eventually putting it on Hannibal. It gets featured again in Red Dragon for a brief scene and Hannibal Rising features a moment with him putting on an ancient samurai mask that resembles his later restraint. The mask has become a symbol for Hannibal Lecter despite him wearing it for just a few minutes in every movie.
  • Bo Derek's yellow bathing suit and cornrows in 10.
  • Jake Gyllenhaal's skeleton outfit in Donnie Darko.
  • Carrie White's pig-blood-drenched prom dress.
  • Laurel and Hardy's bowler hats (often depicted in their movies' opening titles for instant identification) - gives them a little dignity against all odds. True to the Hat Shop trope, wearing them in Way Out West marks them as out of their element.
  • Alex's giant grey sweatshirt and red heels from Flashdance.
  • James Dean, in all post-mortem representations, is wearing the red windbreaker from Rebel Without a Cause.
    • To the point where Fry's outfit from Futurama is modeled after it.
  • From A Clockwork Orange, we have Alex with his boots, pajamas, jockstrap, bowler and fake eyelash on one eye.
    • Interestingly, fans who dress as Alex for costume parties often exaggerate the eyelashes in their makeup, sometimes putting them on both eyes. In the movie itself, the eyelash is quite subtle and only noticed in closeups (but then, since the very first shot of Alex in the movie is a closeup....).
  • From Inception, Eames's Paisley shirt, Arthur's waistcoat and Ariadne's scarf has pretty much become character identifiers in fandom.
  • In the Harry Potter movies, the main trio's most memorable outfits outside of the Hogwarts uniforms and robes are the regular clothes they wore in the third act of Prisoner of Azkaban. Especially Hermione's pink hoodie.
    • Don't forget the blue grey T-shirt with blue trim that Harry wore in the third act. He wears it throughout◊ the◊ series◊
  • Tony Monero in Saturday Night Fever wears different clothes throughout the movie but the white leisure suit is the one people remember most.
  • Carmen Miranda's fruit hat and samba outfit. Among younger people the outfit is more well-known than her.
  • Austin Powers' thick glasses, crushed velvet suits, Beatle boots and male symbol medallion.
  • Fred Astaire's Memetic Outfit has its own song: "Top Hat, White Tie and Tails."
  • Men in Black is named for the sinister outfit which was an established meme in UFO lore, conspiracy theory, and science fiction decades before the movie was released.
  • Johnny Depp's portrayal of Hunter S. Thompson in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is never without a pair of aviators, a cigarette holder sticking out of his mouth, and a bucket hat (or a green transparent visor.)
  • Mad Max's leather jacket with the one torn sleeve and the armoured shoulder pad is iconic not only of the series itself, but of post apocalyptic cinema in general.
  • The Ghostface Killer's (no, not him) black robe and distinctive elongated white mask from the Scream movies.

    Literature 

    Live-Action TV 
  • The Tenth Doctor's pinstripe suit and Chuck Taylors in Doctor Who. As well as the Fourth Doctor's bohemian outfit with the long scarf and the Fifth's cricket outfit, with, um, decorative vegetable. The Sixth and Seventh Doctors were intentionally designed to be as memetic as possible (the former involving a profusion of colors, the latter a shirt with question marks on it and an umbrella carried in any weather), but weren't as successful as the subtler examples.
    • The earlier Doctors were more iconic for a specific style, but it wasn't until John Nathan-Turner's run as producer that their outfits literally became more like uniforms than styles. While the Third Doctor was always seen in some elegant outfit, it was often enough a different outfit each time. In the case of both the Fifth and Sixth Doctors, they more or less wore an identical outfit in every single story.
      • And the Eighth Doctor also bears a distinct resemblance to Wilde, in what seems to be a more obvious way. Evidently, the costume department will keep making this joke until you get it.
      • The scarf is probably the most iconic item of any Doctor's outfit, based at least partially on Toulouse-Lautrec's painting◊ of Aristide Bruant.
    • "City of Death". Romana. School Uniform.
    • Sarah Jane's 'Nandy Pandy' from Hand of Fear.
    • And Captain Jack's indestructible greatcoat, a World War II-era coat which has by now lived through World War II at least twice and survived from 1869 to 2008, and then again from 27 AD to 2009 (though roughly a century of that period was in stasis).
    • Also, the Ninth Doctor's leather jacket, always paired with a complementary colorful sweater.
    • The Third Doctor had his velvet smoking jacket and the puffy sleeved shirt under it.
    • Even the Eighth Doctor gets in on it with his Victorian waistcoat.
    • The first season of the Fifth Doctor was deliberately attempting to invoke this trope, with the characters pretty much staying in the same costumes for most of the season.
      • Adric's pyjamas and gold star.
      • Tegan's purple flight attendant uniform, which was a short, tight dress.
      • Nyssa's puffy maroon trouser-suit.
    • Ace - most fans picture her in their head as wearing some t-shirt, a big black bomber jacket, short black skirt, black tights, and trainers. And carrying a ghetto blaster.
    • Zoe, in the (in)famous sparkly sequinned catsuit; she actually only wore it for one and a half stories (all but the first few minutes of "The Mind Robber", and about half of "The Invasion").
    • Jamie - being a proper Scotsman, always wore a kilt; usually paired with a pullover and a waistcost (sometimes not).
    • Turlough - despite not actually being school-aged, and not even being human, always wore the uniform of the Earth boarding school that he had been exiled to from his home planet.
    • Leela's cavewoman outfit.
    • Eleven's tweed jacket and bowtie. Bowties are cool.
      • Also, Fezes - of course there was an intervention.
      • In "The Impossible Astronaut", he wore a Stetson for all of a minute. That was all it needed.
    • Fitz, in the Eighth Doctor Adventures, wears a leather jacket most of the time, but is hardly ever seen not wearing it in fanfiction. It's fanon that Nine's leather jacket was formerly Fitz's, although the supposed circumstances behind this range from, well, bittersweet to tragic.
  • Ugly Betty's Guadalajara! poncho.
  • Sue Sylvester's red track suit.
  • Catwoman's costume from the 1960s Batman.
  • The Fonz in his iconic leather jacket, now hanging in the Smithsonian. Ironically, in his first few appearances he wore an ordinary windbreaker.
    • He only wore a windbreaker early on because the network that Happy Days was on wouldn't allow his character to be portrayed as a juvenile delinquent even though he was, but later allowed the jacket to be worn.
  • Mork's rainbow braces/suspenders.
  • Emma Peel of The Avengers: black leather Spy Catsuits. The thing is that they weren't very rugged and after any action scene all the seams would be ripped out so after the first few episodes she stopped wearing them, but that is all that anybody remembers her wearing.
  • In Power Rangers Wild Force, the previous season's Rangers came back during a teamup two-parter that the fandom remembers fondly. The fandom also fondly remembers the apocalyptic future-based black leather/PVC outfit◊ the Pink Ranger was dressed in during her first appearance in said episodes as she singly handedly saves everybody else in the cast.
  • Much like Power Rangers above, Kamen Rider is known for his bug-eye lenses, antennae, silver mandible mouthpiece, Scarf of Asskicking (at least early on) and always, ALWAYS, the chunky belt buckle.
  • The Star Trek episode "A Piece of the Action" dresses Kirk and Spock as gangsters. The crew of Deep Space Nine in uniforms from the original series is widely thought to fit the bill as well.
    • Or, y'know, the regular Star Trek uniforms.
  • Jayne's clever homeknit hat in Firefly—"A man walks down the street in that hat, you know he's not afraid of anything."
  • From Whose Line Is It Anyway?, Ryan's Shoes.
    • And Colin's "tacky shirt," though he only wears it for one taping (which spawned two episodes).
  • Beakman's fluorescent green labcoat.
  • From Robin Hood: Much's hat. He wore it for three seasons straight.
  • Red Green's red-and-green suspenders and plaid shirt.
  • Merlin's Neckerchiefs. Also, the Hat.
  • Number Six from The Prisoner, with his white-piped black blazer.
  • On Heroes, Claire was defined by the writers as "The Cheerleader" from day one, so they always have to find a way to show her in a cheerleader outfit, even when it stretches credibility, and everyone still refers to her as "The Cheerleader".
    • Mohinder's hot-pink shirt (matched with striped purple-and-yellow scarf). There are multiple crack fics starring it.
  • Al Borland's flannel shirts.
  • Captain Peacock's executive red carnation.
  • Dean's leatherjacket, and even more so, Castiel's trenchcoat (which is modelled on John Constantine's trenchcoat) and blue tie. In "The Rapture", it is fairly weird to see Jimmy in other clothes.
    • So that's the reason he's referred to as the Holy Tax Accountant.
  • Daisy Duke's incredibly high-cut, tight jean short-shorts. So much that they were named after her.
  • Minnie Pearl's flowery straw hat with the price tag hanging from it.
  • Spike's leather trench coat, (which he took from the second Slayer he killed), combined with his bleached blond hair made for a pretty distinctive look. Angel's own Badass Longcoat also took on this status in the spinoff show.
  • Chuck Bass' signature scarf.

    Machinima 
  • The immense popularity of Half Life Full Life Consequences means that almost every video made using Gary's Mod uses the same "John Freeman" sprite as it?s star.
    • Even before John Freeman, Male 07 had been a popular character model due to its starring role as Gordon Frohman in the webcomic Concerned.

    Music 
  • The Beatles' outfits (mostly the dark suits they wore on the Ed Sullivan Show, the tan Nehru jackets at Shea Stadium, and the colorful military outfits with epaulettes from Sgt Pepper).
  • Elvis Presley and his white jumpsuit and shades he performed in during the Seventies.
    • The black leather outfit he wore at his '68 Comeback Special.
  • The green US army jacket John Lennon wore in the early Seventies.
    • Also his distinctive round NHS glasses.
  • Michael Jackson's glove. Just the one.
    • The Thriller red jumpsuit as well.
    • And the leather jacket with the assload of zippers he wore in Beat It.
      • Never forget the white/glittery silver socks with black penny loafers.
      • His fedora.
      • Pinstripe suit and blue armband.
      • His faux-military outfits. Dad gone it, anything he ever wore!
  • KISS.
  • Hair Metal in general.
  • Björk's swan dress.
    • At the 2006 Academy Awards, Jon Stewart joked that "We're sorry Bjork couldn't join us this year. She was getting into her dress and Dick Cheney shot her."
    • Mad Tv paid homage to this outfit when a recurring character wore it. Her name: Ms. Swan.
  • Many outfits worn by Lady Gaga, including the origami dress, the mirrored dress, the meat dress, the bleeding bodysuit, and the Poker Face suit.
  • Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson is known for the long black frock-coat, tight ballet tights, exaggerated codpiece, thigh-high boots and bedraggled long hair and beard he wore in The Seventies, all of which Tull used for publicity long after he stopped adopting that style of clothing or hairstyle (he's actually balding and wears a short goatee and less dramatic clothing in his old age).
  • The white trousers and yellow leather jacket (and mustache) worn by Freddie Mercury during Queen's last tour in 1986.
  • Angus Young's school uniform.
  • Billy Corgan's Zero Star Shirt.
  • The lightning bolt makeup David Bowie wore on the album cover and inner sleeve of Aladdin Sane (1973). The official Bowie website regularly rounds up references to it in pop culture, it's so popular.
  • Owl City's "I AM" raglan.
  • Kurt Cobain only wore a flannel shirt for a few months in 1990, but it is the article of clothing most frequently associated with both him and grunge fashion in general.
    • Otherwise, his stripped shirt and jeans outfit from the "Smells Like Teen Spirit" video and that green sweater, jeans and sneakers outfit he wore during his MTV unplugged performance (Neversoft went with this look when he appeared on Guitar Hero 5).
  • Madonna's conic bra. Honorable mention to the wedding dress on the Like a Virgin cover and the black dress from the "Like a Prayer" video.
  • Geri Halliwell of the Spice Girls is usually remembered for wearing a dress with the Union Jack on it, which was surprisingly lampshaded at the Royal Wedding between Prince William and Kate Middleton when a reporter pointed out a similar dress that an attendant was wearing. More recently, she teamed up with British clothing retailer Next to release her own line of Union Jack-designed clothing.
    • Earlier, you had Pete Townshend wearing a Union Jack suit during the early days of The Who.
  • Rapper Flavor Flav always wears a large clock around his neck.
  • Similar to the Elvis example, Jim Morrison's own leather outfit that he wore in 1967 - '68.

    Tabletop Games 

    Theater 
  • Mark Cohen's scarf from Rent. Heck, some people even ship him with it.
  • The popular dress from Wicked. Cheeseypoofs has seen people tried to find it so they can go as Galinda for halloween.
  • Quite a few from Les Misérables (Valjean's national guard outfit, Eponine's trenchcoat and hat, Cosette's black dress), but most notably the red vest that Enjolras wears from the Act 1 finale onwards. It is known as the "Red Vest Of Doom" to fans.

    Video Games 
  • Brink has near-infinite potential for memetic outfits, but one, created in the early days of Brink, stands out-Designing a black guy with skull facepaint, The Wasted jacket, The G pants, and dreadlocks is a very popular choice among players, possibly because of how grungy it looks and how it is damn near invisible on the infamous Container City map and Shipyard map is very popular. It may have originated with an Xbox player named Haru Daniels.
  • That
  • Maxwell. Rooster helmet. That is all.
  • Red cap, white gloves, blue overalls. You already know who I'm talking about.
    • Pauline's torn red dress is enforced as this in the Mario vs. Donkey Kong series, as whenever Donkey Kong kidnaps her, Mario grabs for her but only grabs the hem of her dress and tears it (the same way, every time).
  • Castlevania has a few of these in the latter days, for example the infamous 'Black leather skirt and high-heeled Dominatrix boots' that Simon Belmont was saddled with for Castlevania Chronicles.
    • And Soma's ever-loving white, fur-collared, and blue-trimmed Pimp Coat. Even with the questionable change in artists he kept the iconic coat.
    • Isaac's pants are quite infamous.
  • Link's green dress tunic, leather boots, and hat.
    • Zelda's purple and white dress from Twilight Princess also counts to the point that it's practically her default outfit. It even shows up in fanarts for other games where she wore mostly pink.
  • Final Fantasy has the jobs come with recurring costumes. Final Fantasy I gave four of its six classes (White Mage, Black Mage, Red Mage and Monk) ones that are still being used. Final Fantasy III did it for Summoners, Dragoons, Geomancers and Thieves. Final Fantasy V gave Time Mages a red hat with a star.
    • While Final Fantasy VI has many popular outfits worn by the main characters, none of them are as memorable as Big Bad Kefka's truly bizarre mismatch of various outfits.
      • The same could also be said for Kuja as his villainous man-panties.
    • Kain Highwind's Dragoon armor, featured as a part of Kain's iconic pose for the game's logo. Richard may have worn it first, and the Final Fantasy III Dragoons came before Kain too, but Kain wore it better
    • Celes is depicted in FMV renders and concept art as wearing yellow leggings with a deep purple top and a yellow jacket, but her sprite's appearance is far more iconic. The outfit consists of a green Leotard of Power with white boots and a white Badass Cape, and that's about it.
    • Tifa's Cowgirl outfit has hit this status thanks to the fact Tifa is Ms. Fanservice, and the cowgirl uniform makes her Hotter and Sexier than ever. There was much rejoicing when this outfit was revealed as an alternate costume for her in Dissidia 012 Final Fantasy. Canonically though, her midriff-baring tank top and her Advent Children barmaid outfits are worn more often while the cowgirl outfit was only worn in Crisis Core, but it is much more infamous.
    • Cloud's Kingdom Hearts uniform. He only wore it in the first two games, and ditched it for his Advent Children outfit in Kingdom Hearts II. However, it's famous as his trademark gear in the series. The developers took notice and brought it back for his appearance in coded. As with Tifa above, the fandom cheered when the outfit got in as a bonus costume for Cloud in Dissidia 012.
    • For Final Fantasy V, the Job System features virtually every iconic Job look, but there are also two within the game itself, specific to Bartz: his Freelancer◊ or 'jobless' look, remarkable for being very simplistic compared to most other Final Fantasy protagonist looks, has nevertheless become very popular, and was chosen for his additional alt for Dissidia 012, where even Penelo notes it as a fan-favourite getup. Even more memetic is his Dancer outfit; in fan art of Bartz, if he isn't in his Freelancer or Amano looks, chances are he's wearing his Dancer costume. It became easily the most popular choice for Bartz's DLC costume for Dissidia 012, and much like the previous two examples, it did.
  • Solid Snake's sneaking suit in Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons Of Liberty has become a fondly remarked-upon outfit, especially for the the way it highlights his nice ass - remember that he only wore it for about two hours, in a game where he wasn't even the lead character, and yet it's eclipsed everything else he's ever worn to the point where it's considered his 'default' look. See what an impression a little bit of cleavage makes? The Bandanna would probably fall under this as well, if it wasn't already an in-game meme/Infinity-plus-one-bandanna
    • Not to mention his trusty cardboard box...
    • Certainly the mullet. Even though he wore his hair short in as many games as he wore his hair long, including in his first appearance on the PlayStation, and even though it's not even technically a mullet, the meme's stuck and the haircut is invariably associated with him. Although as a charm point rather than a means of mockery.
    • Don't forget Raiden's Skull Suit. Although, does his lack of Skull Suit count?
  • Niko Bellic is often portrayed wearing fingerless gloves, even though he never actually wore them in-game. The reason for this is because of early artwork showing him wearing them, although they were removed from the game later on. Asking where Niko's fingerless gloves were became a popular meme on GTA message boards.
    • Niko's starting outfit, a leather jacket and tracksuit, has become rather memetic, too, to the point where he wears them in all his appearances in the expansion packs, despite having access to a designer clothing store and plenty of money.
  • Master Chief's armor in the Halo trilogy.
    • That might be because he never wears anything else.
  • Pyramid Head's, um, pyramid head, a huge, implied-to-be-very-heavy torture helmet that may or may not be his actual head. Note that the original is solid and has five sides, whereas the most popular version from the movie is four-sided and included grating (because it was impossible for the actor to wear otherwise).
  • Dr. Freeman's HEV Suit.
  • Wolf O'Donnell's Super Smash Bros. Brawl outfit - combined with Leon's proclamation of sadomasochistic love for him - has since cemented the Star Wolf leader firmly in the crack between Memetic Badass and Memetic Molester.
  • Captain Falcon's "Captain Fabulous" pink and white outfit from Super Smash Bros. Brawl has become so popular, sometimes it's referenced as a different character.
    • Ditto for the red on pink ensamble worn by Gay Luigi AKA Mama Luigi.
    • And also Marth in his white, "Wedding Marth" outfit.
  • Ryu's sleeveless white gi. Ken's red and Akuma's gray ones follow on from this.
  • Banjo the Bear of Banjo-Kazooie is memorable for his yellow shorts. He was granted the chance to talk about it in a Facebook Q&A promoting his latest game. Of course, he also has the backpack that houses his longtime friend Kazooie, but uh...that may cause some uncomfortable conversations these days.
    • His shorts and backpack are so memetic that they appear on every. single. transformation. that the pair have been through in both the original and sequel. Yes, even the ones that don't make any semblance of sense, like a pumpkin, a snowball, or a washing machine.
  • Power armor for the Fallout series.
    • As well as the iconic blue-and-yellow-trimmed Vault suits, complete with PipBoy 3000. (Though more so for its most recent title. The previous PipBoys were basically giant bricks, and no hint was given as to whether or not it was worn on the wrist.)
      • Unlikely; it had full sized vacuum tubes (3-5 inches tall or so; miniature vacuum tubes existed but did not look like those) and a mono CRT screen about the same size that would have been around a foot long and weighed roughly 8 pounds.
      • It's described in Fallout 2. Apparently it's box shaped and has the size of a VHS tape. So Vault Dweller and Chosen One most likely carried it around in the same bag as all their other stuff.
  • The Varia Suit from Metroid. Although Samus rarely starts the game with it (and if she does, there's a pretty good chance she loses it pretty soon) and usually gets another upgrade or two to her suit, its design (complete with the iconic Shoulders of Doom) and color scheme are synonymous with her Powered Armor.
  • Archer of course is identified by his not-quite-a-longcoat. Technically, it's two red sleeves and a battle skirt. Try and imagine him without it and, at best, you get a tanned Shirou.
  • Pokémon: "I like shorts. They're comfy and easy to wear!" The playable characters are also easily recognizable in their attire.
    • Lampshaded in Hotel Dusk sequel Last Window by player character Kyle Hyde: "I like suits. They're comfy and easy to wear."
  • Zero from Mega Man X has his armor's Booblights.
    • And his square shoulders.
  • Koei is responsible for doing this to the Romance Of The Three Kingdoms characters. While many elements of the more iconic characters' appearance, like Guan Yu with his long flowing beard, do exist in the original literature, the Dynasty Warriors games and any predecessors and successors therein always depict recurring characters with now-signature features, to the extent that other properties depicting Three Kingdoms, like this Three Kingdoms webcomic and the toyline BB Senshi Sangokuden also use them - Lu Bu with his pheasant-feathered headgear, Ma Chao with spiky anime hair, Sun Ce's choice of weapons, the list goes on.
  • Isaac Clarke's gothic-looking, horror-show engineer suit. Other people obviously wear it, as you'll see in Downfall and Extraction, but none wear it as stoically and as facelessly as Isaac does.
    • Moreover, in most promo and fan art, Isaac's wearing the midgame level 3 suit, rather than the basic or fully upgraded versions.
  • Touhou girls have some pretty iconic and unmistakeable outfits:
    • Suwako's combination of a purple dress with long wide sleeves paired with her epic wide-brimmed frog-eyed hat makes her stand out in the divine crowd.
    • Two-toned red/blue nurse's dress that Two-Face would approve of? It's Eirin!
    • Red-white number with Detached Sleeves? Reimu's Incident-resolving dress!
      • Oh wait! We forgot to mention the new good green haired miko in white and blue who lives with Suwako and Kanako in the Moriya Shrine. That's right guys! It's Sanae Kochiya (or Kotiya, depends upon your choice)
    • Reisen Udongein Inaba only wore a suit jacket in one game out of all the other official games which she had been in. In all the other official works she doesn't wear it; but even so it has become her Memetic Outfit (probably cause without it her outfit looks too plain)
    • Flandre Scarlet's distinctive metal-and-"Christmas lights" wings certainly make an impression (unfortunately missing in the picture is a single glowing eye peering out of the darkness at you).
      • Although, the Memeticness might partly come from the fact that Flandre's wings resemble Marx's wings.
    • Cirno's ice wings.
    • A red, plaid dress and vest, with a white shirt and a parasol? Yuuka Kazami.
    • In fact, a rather famous Fan Vid uses the incredible number of unique outfits by showing only silhouettes of the characters. Behold the variety! More experienced Touhou fans can identify each character shown.
  • All of the Team Fortress 2 classes' outfits, and for good reason - they were designed so that players would be able to identify their opponents at a glance.
    • More than that. They were designed and tested to be instantly recognizable in silhouette, in low lighting, to contrast with the backgrounds, and to draw focus towards the torso and head, the two parts you aim for. They have a big presentation on it floating around the interblag, that includes the fiendishly complex shading algorithms.
  • Nick's $3,000 white suit with blue shirt underneath. The style has recently come back in Real Life, causing many fans' heads to whiplash whenever they see it in stores or on TV on unrelated people.
  • White Karate Gi with Red Headband. Blue female outfits with spiked wristbands and white hair-puffs work too.
  • Hazama/Terumi from BlazBlue became playable in Continuum Shift, complete with a white color scheme for his suit that confirms his status as a Smooth Criminal.
  • The standard Assassin outfit in Assassin's Creed is this. White robes with a blood-red ribbon tied around the waist, a hood shaped to resemble an eagle's head, and a bracer on the left wrist with a surprise attached. No matter the time period, every Assassin will wear some variant of this: the Roman Empire, the Crusades, the Renaissance, the Russian Revolution...
  • The Mishima studded gloves and Heihachi's tiger's head gi.
    • His fundoshi from the third fourth game is hard to forget, too...
  • Dead or Alive has several of these, especially for the women in the game (Lei Fang's Little Black Dress, for instance). But one of the most memorable belongs to a male character: Zack's silver "Teletubby" outfit.
  • Mai Shiranui's famously Stripperiffic red kimono(?) in Fatal Fury and The King of Fighters — a classic example of the Theiss Titillation Theory in action.
  • Miles Edgeworth's maroon suit and cravat in Ace Attorney.
    • Phoenix Wright's blue suit is iconic within the game universe. Want to impersonate him? Just wear the suit and spike your hair. Nobody will be able to tell.
  • Commander Shepard's N7 Onyx armor in Mass Effect.
    • So much so it became the only suit s/he could wear in the sequel. Though you can modify the colors and tweak the armor pieces. Though other armors became available due to Pre-order bonuses and other DLC.
      • The reason for this was because in the original game, hardly anyone wore the Onyx armor once they had other options due to its lousy stats. 'Tis the curse of starting equipment.
    • Phoenix armor. It's pink and white and you can put Wrex in it. The fandom has not failed to run with this.
      • Made even more notorious because the Virmire Survivor starts the second game with it. Complete with a close-up of their pink-delineated butt-cheeks as they dart through the halls of the Normandy.
  • Dragon Quest IX plays with this: among the many equipment options you can discover are an array of Mythology Gag gear that lets you dress up your current party to look like heroes from all of the previous games in the series. You even gain Accolades by collecting and donning a complete set, as well as several Accolades if you manage to match what the representatives for each class are wearing in the example illustrations. On top of this, a lot of the gear that isn't directly connected to one of the past heroes are still references and holdovers from older games in the series, like the Water Flying Cloth/Flowing Robe.
  • In the Tokimeki Memorial series : Shiori Fujisaki and her hairband. Yumi Saotome and Megumi Juuichiya, and their hair ribbons. Minori Akiho, and her X-shaped hair decs. Rhythmy Kyono and her headphones.
  • In Mitsumete Knight, Raizze and her red gloves. There's actually a reason why she wears them at all times : it's to hide the bedsores she got with her constant sword training, as one of the Eight Generals and a spy for the enemy mercenary army, and red is the color of said army.
  • Sonic's sneakers.
  • Three words: Giant. Yellow. Shoes.
    • Three more words: Black hooded trenchcoats.
  • Jill Valentine and the (in)famous blue tube top, miniskirt, and sweater wrapped around the waist combo that she wears in Resident Evil 3. This crossed over to the film version, as well. Her purple battlesuit seems to be heading this way, as well, with appearances in Resident Evil: Afterlife and Marvel vs. Capcom 3.
    • Likewise, Claire Redfield and her iconic pink cycling suit from the second game.
    • Wesker and his penchant for sunglasses at night and wearing all black.
  • Donkey Kong's monogrammed necktie.
  • Agent 47 has a really snazzy black suit with a striped white shirt, a diagonally striped red tie and black leather gloves, with those specific details. The suit's almost as recognizable as his barcode (which it should be, considering how much it costs).
  • Sparkster's awesome armor.
  • MAXIMUM OUTFIT
  • Professor Layton's top hat.
  • Sho Minamimoto's hat.
  • Travis Touchdown. His red-dyed leather jacket with the Santa Destroy star is quite popular, as well as his Bizarre Jelly T-shirt. His pink and white Bizare Jelly outfit is pretty popular as well.
  • The standard Iron Helmet from Skyrim has come to represent the main character, due to its appearance in the first trailer.

    Web Comics 
  • Marten's 'TEH' t-shirt in Questionable Content.
  • Due to the fact that everyone is a stick figure in xkcd, the one extravagance worn by recurring characters is this. Black Hat Guy is the most prominent, followed by the guy in the beret.
  • In-universe example: the white dress from Agatha's holographic message in Girl Genius.
  • The Adventures of Dr. McNinja: It's probably justified because we never see him wearing anything else, or his face through it, but Dr. McNinja's lab coat and Ninja mask. When Franz Rayner made an army of Doc clones, he even made sure to equip each and every single one of them with that same lab coat and mask.
  • From Homestuck we get Courtyard Droll's absolutely ridiculous hat, and to a lesser extent the rest of his outfit. Though it's more just 'odd hats in general'.
    • Each of the kids has a shirt design that is iconic of them, and almost all of their alchemised clothing still has a basis in their original shirts in that they share the logo. Pink hairband and shirt with a defaced purple octopus? Rose. Broken record and baggy pants? Dave. Japanese Slimer t-shirt and cargo shorts (or these days, blue God Tier gear with a windy symbol)? John. Shirt with a dog-head silhouette and a long buttoned skirt? Jade. All the trolls get this too because they almost never wear anything else; trolls think fashion is stupid.
    • Although it's more of a case of Off Model, Pantskat probably counts, especially since it became an Ascended Meme when his ancestor was intentionally designed with extremely high-waisted Righteous Leggings.
  • Gabe in yellow and Tycho in blue.
  • What, no love for Sluggy Freelance? Torg's plaid jacket (with vertical and horizontal only stripes) and riffs Badass Longcoat

    Web Original 
  • Some of the "Fanservice" outfits in SOTF-TV qualify both in "Survival of the Snarkiest" and among the handlers, especially the ones that are actually worn by the characters. This includes Panya Bishara's Smokey the Bear fursuit, Mae St. Clair's geisha costume, Sidney Rice's Playboy Bunny gear, and Jeanette Buendia's hula girl outfit.

    Western Animation 

    Other 
  • Coincidentally, our favorite master of hiding was nowhere to be found on this page. That being said, the red and white striped shirt, hat with a red puffball, and round glasses are infamous.
    • Popular, too; so much so that everyone in the damn books wears something that looks like it.
  • Board 8 has a wiki. The very first line in the page for one longtime regular is that he has an awesome shirt...with a link to the wiki page for the shirt.
  • Holly Hobbie's patchwork dress and bonnet.
  • Appearing (or not) in a variety of media, Carmen Sandiego has her matching red hat and trenchcoat.
  • Also appearing in a variety of media: The outfits The Beatles wore as Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.
  • Miku Hatsune of Vocaloid. Both her futuristic schoolgirl uniform and green-and-white striped panties are very memetic.
  • In virtually every form of visual media that Conan has appeared in, he's worn some manner of loincloth. As does virtually every other Barbarian Hero modeled after him.

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