History ShapeshifterBaggage / AnimeAndManga

* In ''Manga/NausicaaOfTheValleyOfTheWind'' manga, when a [[HumongousMecha God Warrior]] discovered in ancient ruins is activated, its flesh grows over its ceramic skeleton (albeit relatively slowly). Where does the matter for this comes from is not explained.

* In ''Manga/NausicaaOfTheValleyOfTheWind'' manga, when the [[HumongousMecha God Warrior]] discovered in ancient ruins is activated, its flesh grows over its ceramic skeleton (albeit relatively slowly). Where does the matter for this comes from is not explained.

* ''Anime/SCryEd'' is a good example of a justification of this trope, although transformation is only seen in one character and in a subset of the typical creation power. Whenever an Alter User summons their Alter, the mass they require for it is taken from surrounding objects or the environment itself. When protagonist Kazuma's Alter upgrades to the point where it's a true transformation rather than just a gauntlet, summoning it seems to involve breaking down his own regular arm to turn it into Shell Bullet, to say nothing of a few other uses of Alters that break down dead bodies, human or animal, for mass. Yikes. Taken up a further notch with another Alter User whose Alter is a HumongousMecha. His first use of it, in response to a bunch of villagers backing him to the edge of a cliff, was to vaporize ''them'' as material.
* In Kenichi Sonoda's ''Manga/CannonGodExaxxion'', the RobotGirl sidekick can shapeshift into a [[CoolBike hoverbike]]. She stores the excess mass needed to change in her breasts.

* In ''Manga/CaseClosed'', the APTX-4869 toxin has a million-to-one chance will [[FountainOfYouth de-age]] a victim back to when they're 8 years old. This is explained that it causes apoptosis to occur within non-neural cells, so that a large portion of tissue gets killed off and simply evaporates away. Shinichi described the sensation like his bones melting. However this doesn't explain how the re-aging antidote causes the mass to return.

* [[RidiculouslyHumanRobots Boomers]] in the ''Anime/BubblegumCrisis'' series present this problem. How can a man-sized android shaped like an ordinary salaryman sprout enough mass to turn into a HumongousMecha with [[CombatTentacles flailing tentacles]]? At least in one case it was because it was an absorbing type Boomer that used nanotechnology to fuse machinery, and eventually even scenery to its mass.
* The Invaders in ''Shin Manga/GetterRobo Armageddon''. For example, in one episode, the main characters respond to a distress signal from the ruins of New York City. When they get to the origin of the signal, they find two puppies and a dead person at a radio station, but the puppies afterwards turn out to be a pair of ''building-sized'' Invaders from a larger group that set a trap.
* The Saiyan ''Oozaru'' form from ''Manga/DragonBall'' is never fully explained; how does one quickly transform from a human-sized alien to a full-blown giant monkey? Of course, not much else makes "scientific" sense in that series. However, Oolong the pig's physical strength and body mass remain constant regardless of his current shape. Simply becoming a motorbike, for instance, doesn't guarantee he's strong enough for Bulma to ride.
** Likewise, Namekians regrow limbs and occasionally grow to the size of buildings, among other powers that make the Saiyans look plausible in comparison (for instance, Namekians don't need food - even plants in real life need nutrients from other sources in addition to air and water).
* Happens often in ''Manga/{{Naruto}}'', as it seems [[{{Mana}} chakra]] has NoConservationOfEnergy.
** [[spoiler:Orochimaru]]'s [[OneWingedAngel true form]] is revealed when he spits out a baseball-sized piece of something through his throat... which grows into a monster ''several times the size of his body''.
** Kimimaro can grow bones from his body and use them as weapons, apparently just by controlling the hormones of his body. Putting aside that [[RequiredSecondaryPowers he apparently needs to be able to survive removing his own bones without bleeding to death]] this would also require his body to have an infinite amount of calcium to make the bones out of.
*** The manga Kimimaro seems to have an accelerated healing factor which attempts to explain this, but really just invokes the "Biomass from thin air" part of this trope.
** While not exactly a shapeshifter himself, Shikamaru is able to change the shape of his shadow, and he is specifically limited by his shadow's current area.
* In ''Manga/{{Gantz}}'', the final boss of the Osaka mission "Nurarihyon" could change shape and size from a little old man to a monster the size of a high rise building, and is capable of splitting to multiple variable life forms of himself and demonstrates different powers with every different forms he assumes. He could survive being squashed to a puddle of blood and reform to another different gigantic monster instantly. [[spoiler:He was eventually killed off by consecutive blasts that squashed him to a blood puddle (again) by the main team leader, taking the bridge along with him.]]
** There was also a PuppeteerParasite which had the unique ability to clone and grow the body parts of its host, until they became a shambling BodyHorror of screaming heads, limbs, and even metal weapons. No explanation is given for their abilities or where the mass comes from, [[spoiler:only that they're one of many stowaway species accidentally collected by the Giants' ark ship.]]
* In ''Manga/AttackOnTitan'', [[spoiler:Titan Shifters are otherwise ordinary humans who]] can generate an entire Titan body out of thin air. It's implied that this is only possible because Titan flesh is about as dense as smoke, held together by their consciousness or something; Titans are noted to weigh a great deal less than something their size should, and dead Titans [[NoBodyLeftBehind rapidly evaporate]]. Despite this, Titans still exhibit many attributes that match the mass one would expect from something their size; they can crush buildings and fortifications by falling on or striking them, can be heard coming with thundering footsteps (and can leave deep footprints), and can pick up and wield massive objects.
* In the manga, ''Manga/{{NEEDLESS}}'', users of the Doppelganger Fragment (Mainly Eve Neuschwanstein) require large amounts of calories to shapeshift. Because of this, Eve drinks large amounts of a soda called Super Gel Dero Doro Drink that contains around 5,000 calories per can.
* In ''Manga/RosarioPlusVampire'', the bat narrator Kou-chan functions as the ShapeShifting weapon for Kokoa. The trope is subverted because Kou keeps his weight in any form, which is PlayedForLaughs on several occasions.
* ''Anime/Gundam00AwakeningOfTheTrailblazer'' actually averts this with the shapeshifting ELS: they are never shown turning into something larger or smaller than their original shape, and when they do want to form something larger, several of them combine themselves together into one mass to do it. They also are shown to take at least some time to seal a hole that gets blown in their bodies: they can't just regenerate the lost mass, they have to rearrange their structure to plug the hole.

* Played with in ''Manga/MissKobayashisDragonMaid''. Dragons are capable of using magic to alter their size and (with enough skill) take on human form, with the excess mass being converted into {{mana}}. While this doesn't cause any weight problems, Tohru compares the feeling of all that compressed magic to wearing a suit that's several sizes too small.

* ''Anime/{{Scryed}}'' is a good example of a justification of this trope, although transformation is only seen in one character and in a subset of the typical creation power. Whenever an Alter User summons their Alter, the mass they require for it is taken from surrounding objects or the environment itself. When protagonist Kazuma's Alter upgrades to the point where it's a true transformation rather than just a gauntlet, summoning it seems to involve breaking down his own regular arm to turn it into Shell Bullet, to say nothing of a few other uses of Alters that break down dead bodies, human or animal, for mass. Yikes. Taken up a further notch with another Alter User whose Alter is a HumongousMecha. His first use of it, in response to a bunch of villagers backing him to the edge of a cliff, was to vaporize ''them'' as material.

* Averted in ''Manga/{{Devilman}}''. When [[spoiler:Ryo's "father" died after being possessed by a demon, Ryo moves the corpse and discovers the weight is double what it should be]].
* ''[[Anime/{{Scryed}} s-CRY-ed]]'' is a good example of a justification of this trope, although transformation is only seen in one character and in a subset of the typical creation power. Whenever an Alter User summons their Alter, the mass they require for it is taken from surrounding objects or the environment itself. When protagonist Kazuma's Alter upgrades to the point where it's a true transformation rather than just a gauntlet, summoning it seems to involve breaking down his own regular arm to turn it into Shell Bullet, to say nothing of a few other uses of Alters that break down dead bodies, human or animal, for mass. Yikes. Taken up a further notch with another Alter User whose Alter is a HumongousMecha. His first use of it, in response to a bunch of villagers backing him to the edge of a cliff, was to vaporize ''them'' as material.

** [[Anime/FullmetalAlchemist The 2003 anime's]] version of Envy, meanwhile, only ever takes human forms within a certain size range and seems to weigh as much as a normal human. [[spoiler:The exception is the huge dragon thing in the climax, a form they shifted into once they passed through the Gates and got stuck in.]]

* Played straight in ''Manga/UFOPrincessValkyrie''. Laine is incapable of modifying her height let alone her huge breasts. Because of the latter she is very bad at impersonating men. Her attempt at transforming into a small male dog goes as well as you'd expect.