History Main / InexplicablyIdenticalIndividuals

* In ''Film/ThePhantomMenace'', Queen Amidala's handmaidens all look identical. This, of course, is intentional, and part of the [[BodyDouble "decoy trick"]], where one of them, Sabé, posed as the Queen while the Queen dressed as one of the handmaidens in her identity as Padmé. (They have similar names too, at least in public; in addition to Sabé, the others were named Eirtaé, Rabé, Saché, Yané, Fé, and Dané); Padmé's name mentioned often make members of the royal court assume that the Queen has ''eight'' handmaidens. This Trope is [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] in the ''WesternAnimation/StarWarsCloneWars'' comic book ''In Triplicate'' with this exchange:

Why bother with UncannyFamilyResemblance, when you can have every member of a family or even complete strangers as the exact same person! Same taste in food, same way they style their hair, same profession, same mannerisms, and they all probably share the same HiveMind as well. They may even [[IdenticallyNamedGroup all have the same name.]] This isn't just a RecurringCharacter -- every town has their own. These are Inexplicably Identical Individuals; there's no ''reason'' for them to be perfectly identical-- though the series may try to HandWave it as them being related-- they simply are.

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]

** Originally named for Nurse Joys and Officer Jennys in the anime. They likely arose as a parody of the trope YouALLLookFamiliar or the result of the production staff running out of ideas for other nurse/police officer characters. Some weren't even related, but they all had the exact same personality and appearance. The series did its share of LampshadeHanging; at one point, one Jenny shows off a picture of her graduating class at the police academy, every single one of which is a Jenny. Regardless of whatever differences there are, Brock [[LovableSexManiac loves every last one of both kinds]]...and is able to tell them apart. For everyone else in the world (and the audience), the Jennys are told apart by having a different insignia on their hat to represent the town they're from. Joys, on the other hand, [[http://i66.photobucket.com/albums/h245/DRCEQ2/Anime/Pokemon/HordeofNurseJoys.jpg all have different colored crosses on their hats]] -- Any color except red at the request/demand of UsefulNotes/TheRedCross.

* In ''Manga/NewGame'', several extras have a very similar design- that of a young woman with short dark hair in a bowl cut and eyeglasses. These include the younger female nurse at the company checkup, the photographer who takes Ko's picture, the police officer who finds Aoba with a drunken Ko and Rin, and the waitress at the ramen shop.

* In the ''ComicBook/GIJoeARealAmericanHeroMarvel'' comic books, Cobra's elite troopers - the Crimson Guard - all underwent extensive plastic surgery to look like one of a handful of "original models." This allowed Cobra to infiltrate society by having its troopers take positions of importance in the local community; if one was killed, he could be replaced by a duplicate. It was justified with the years-later reveal that Cobra Commander is [[spoiler:the "original model"]]. The ''real'' reason for the "Fred" series of Crimson Guard was so that the paranoid Cobra Commander would have an [[spoiler:impenetrable disguise if he needed to escape from]] his treacherous lieutenants.

* In Carla Speed [=McNeil=]'s "aboriginal Sci-Fi" series ''ComicBook/{{Finder}},'' one of the main cities in the series is run by several different "clans." Most of these clans, in addition to a common name, share common features. The Llavrics are all women (yes, even the men are women. They are physically formed to be able to "tuck it in" with ease), and not just any women, the same slim, blonde woman. They all tend to be a bit on the artistic, dramatic side. The Mediwar clan has distinct male and female versions that are identical within their gender. They run military, police, and medical branches of the government, which leads to the fantastic insult - "copface." (Try that one on Officer Jenny!) These clans are most emphatically not made up of clones and not everyone born to clan parents is automatically given full clan status. There is a yearly examination which could be similar to defending a thesis - or winning a beauty pageant. It all depends on your clan. Clan members can and do intermarry and procreate (they're all human, after all); genetics determine if the offspring resemble one parent over the other.

* ''Literature/InCryptid'': All [[BackstoryInvader Johrlac]] look [[EeriePaleSkinnedBrunette remarkably similar]] when they're not using their psychic powers to make people think that they recognize them (the only differences being in age, sex, and aesthetic changes like haircuts). This is explained as a byproduct of their being psychic - since they don't recognize prey or each other by visual cues, they never had a reason to develop visual cues to distinguish themselves from each other.

-->''''[[Radio/TheJackBennyProgram Jack Benny]]'''': Oh, Sir, Sir.\\
''''Frank Nelson'''': Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesssssssssssss?\\
''''Jack Benny'''': [[LampshadeHanging You work at this airport too!?]]\\
''''Frank Nelson'''': No, I'm just a DC-4 with a mustache.\\
''''Jack Benny'''': Oh, never mind, I just want to know: Do these planes go to New York?\\
''''Frank Nelson'''': Oooooooooh, Do They!

** All of the above statements are, in the context of the show, true (except for Peggy Schuyler loving Hamilton - unlike the other two sisters, she only speaks once, in "The Schuyler Sisters", and after that is only shown, without lines, though in "Helpless" Hamilton says that Peggy "confides" in him).

* The Support Reapers in ''VideoGame/TheWorldEndsWithYou'' come in two breeds - red-hoody-baseball-cap and black-hoody-red-bandana. Only two of them (BJ and Tenho of Def March) ever get names.

* ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'' reveals that there are ''lots'' of [[SeriesMascot Annas]] floating around, which explains how she appears in every single game. [[spoiler: They're all from different alternative universes.]]

** In ''VideoGame/DragonAgeII'', when Orsino and Meredith are having their confrontation at the climax of Act 3, Orsino is accompanied by a small handful of lower-ranked mages whose faces and outfits are completely identical to one another. The lone exception, in games where she survives and is sent to the Circle, is Hawke's sister Bethany - whose unique design makes the identical nature of all of the other mages that much more glaring.

* ''VideoGame/CreeperWorld'' makes it into a plot point in Particle Fleet, where the Ticon crew find out [[spoiler: from the Codex]] that certain names, or indeed certain people, have been repeating throughout history. Examples include:

* ''Webcomic/{{Homestuck}}'': [[spoiler: Dad Egbert and Dad Crocker]] may be an example, since they seem to not be clones of each other but still appear identical. On the other hand, their appearance is [[InvisibleAnatomy not entirely literal]], so it's not certain that they are in fact identical.

* In ''WebVideo/ScreenRantPitchMeetings'', the Producer and the Screenwriter, whose conversations are the basis for each episode, look exactly alike. The out-of-universe reason is obvious- Ryan George plays both roles- but apparently, everyone looks like them in-universe. In one episode the Producer claims he got surgery to look exactly like the Screenwriter, causing the latter to admit with relief that he'd thought he was going mad.

* Played with in ''WesternAnimation/StrokerAndHoop''. One of the voice actors plays a different background guy in almost every episode (usually with only one or two lines). It turns out [[spoiler: they're all the same guy, but with extensive surgery after each appearance, and he's out for revenge against Stroker and Hoop for ruining his life.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/MonstersUniversity'' has the the girls of [[GirlPosse Python Nu Kappa]], who all look identical save for different colored skin.

** Conversely, to many animals, all humans look alike. They look at us and just see "human" and don't really make a distinction between different humans as encountering a human means the same thing to them regardless of which person it is - be on alert, because humans often eat animals (even apex predators) as food.

* In the [[UsefulNotes/TheGoldenAgeOfComicBooks Golden Age]], ComicBook/{{Aquaman}} was a nameless human mutant who grew up in an undersea lab. The far more [[SequelDisplacement famous]] Arthur Curry[=/=]Orin[=/=]King of Atlantis version of the character first appeared in the [[UsefulNotes/TheSilverAgeOfComicBooks Silver Age]] and continued through to [[UsefulNotes/TheModernAgeOfComicBooks today]]. However, in 2022 DC retconned a bunch of UsefulNotes/WorldWarII-era characters into continuity, including the original Aquaman. As such, it is now canon that in TheForties there was an undersea hero who looked almost identical to the current day Aquaman, had the same powers and was also called Aquaman; yet seems to have had no connection to him whatsoever.

* Thompson and Thomson from ''Franchise/{{Tintin}}'' look completely identical save for the shape of their moustaches. However, it is explicitly stated that they are not twins, or even biologically related, despite usually behaving like a pair of SingleMindedTwins (and despite being [[WriteWhoYouKnow modeled after Hergé's father and uncle]], who were twins.

* Thompson and Thomson from ''Franchise/{{Tintin}}'' look completely identical save for the shape of their moustaches. However, it is explicitly stated that they are not twins, or even biologically related, despite usually behaving like a pair of SingleMindedTwins.

* The special ''WesternAnimation/{{Garfield|Specials}} in Paradise'' had a Great Gildersleeve-style [[HonestJohnsDealership sleazy salesman type]] show up as a hotel clerk and then a car rental agent successively, prompting the lines, "You look familiar." "I have a brother in the hotel business."

*** ''Film/CaptainMarvel''. He plays himself in this cameo: he's reading a script for ''Film/{{Mallrats}}'' and rehearsing his cameo in ''that'' film.

Why bother with UncannyFamilyResemblance, when you can have every member of a family or even perfect strangers as the exact same person! Same taste in food, same way they style their hair, same profession, same mannerisms, and they all probably share the same HiveMind as well. They may even [[IdenticallyNamedGroup all have the same name.]] This isn't just a RecurringCharacter -- every town has their own. These are Inexplicably Identical Individuals; there's no ''reason'' for them to be perfectly identical-- though the series may try to HandWave it as them being related-- they simply are.

* The special ''WesternAnimation/{{Garfield}} in Paradise'' had a Great Gildersleeve-style [[HonestJohnsDealership sleazy salesman type]] show up as a hotel clerk and then a car rental agent successively, prompting the lines, "You look familiar." "I have a brother in the hotel business."