Take Off Your Clothes

Archie doesn't beat around the bush.

Ryuko: You bastard! Which club do you belong to?
Tsumugu: Take off your clothes.
Ryuko: Huh? W-What the hell are you saying?! Oh I know, you're from the Pervert Club! You're from the Pervert Club, aren't you?!

— Kill la Kill, "Trigger"

A comedy trope, also commonly used for ship teasing. One character, most usually a man, asks another, most usually a woman, to take off her clothes (or maybe just one particular item of clothing).

The important point is that the demand is never prurient in nature, and there is a perfectly pragmatic reason for the man to demand that the woman disrobe. Maybe the clothes are wet and she could get too cold. Maybe they are too recognizable, and she needs to don a disguise. Maybe the man suspects there is a tracking bug (of the non-incredibly obvious kind) inside the outfit. Maybe he's a doctor and wants to give her a physical...

Whatever the case, however, the woman mistakenly concludes that the demand is sexual in nature, and reacts in kind... which can lead to different developments, among which:

• The woman slaps the man around for being a pervert...
• The woman, especially if she's romantically inclined toward the man, gets all flustered and bashful, arguing that it is too soon or not the right place and time, or even that they should wait for marriage... to the man's embarrassment (if he realizes how he's being misunderstood) or puzzlement (if he doesn't).
• The woman enthusiastically complies and strips, maybe taking off much more clothing than expected (like not stopping at the underwear), before trying to get frisky with the man before he could explain that he didn't mean it that way.

Either way, Hilarity Ensues.

To restate, this works only if the request is done innocently. If the man is just using the pragmatic reason as an excuse to see the woman naked, then it isn't this trope. If the pragmatic reason is to humiliate her or drive home that she's helpless, this falls into Shameful Strip.

Contrast Please Put Some Clothes On, Undressing the Unconscious or You Can Leave Your Hat On.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• Case Closed: After Kazuha is attacked by a mysterious assailant in one case, Conan and Heiji find evidence that she may have been tased. Cue the two men storming into the room where she's resting up and demanding that she take off her clothes (with Conan going as far as doing it for her). One panel later, Heiji has a slap mark on his face (Conan is spared because he's "just a kid"), and a very red-faced Ran confirms that Kazuha does indeed have taser burns.
• A Certain Magical Index:
  • In the Alchemist arc, a mind-controlled Esper girl uses magic against Touma, which causes serious bleeding due to an Esper's incompatibility with magic. After she's knocked unconscious, Aisa Himegami demands that the girl's shirt be removed. Touma hesitates, but Aisa chastises him, saying that they need to bandage her up and that his concerns about modesty are not only unwarranted but even disrespectful in this circumstance.
  • In the light novel version of the Angel Fall arc, Kaori Kanzaki orders Touma Kamijou to undress to prove that he doesn't have any injuries and thus is telling the truth that he has not performed any magic (if an esper performs magic, they will start bleeding, bruising, etc). When he protests, she gets angry and takes it as a sign that he's trying to hide his injuries, so he reluctantly undresses.
  • In the Three Stories arc, Accelerator eventually notices Last Order's Verbal Tic and asks her to take off her hood to show her face. Since she's a little girl wearing only rags (which the hood is part of), she starts protesting... until Accelerator gets impatient and tears said rags off. In the middle of the street. Granted, it was nighttime with no one else in sight and it's implied he really didn't know or believe she wasn't wearing anything else, but still. While she's covering herself and blushing like crazy, his reaction is a mere "huh" (as in, "oh, it's you").
• During episode 2 of D.C. III ~Da Capo III~, while in the school hallway, Charles tells Kiyotaka to "take it off" a couple of times, each time getting progressively louder. Every guy within earshot seems to get a bit jealous at the attention as well as the command she's telling him. Then it turns out she wanted him to take his jacket off because it had a loose button on it which she sews back on for him in the next scene.
• In Dandadan, Ayase orders Shiratori to strip, since water resistance on clothing makes it harder to swim away from the aliens that are attacking them. She also starts taking her clothes off (Okarun's already naked because of Clothing Damage).
• Female to male example: In Dragon Crisis!, Bianca tells Ryuuji to take off his clothes (since she's performing a physical examination on him). This being Dragon Crisis!, Hilarity Ensues.
• Eiken: Almost immediately after Densuke somehow ends up joining the Eiken club against his will, Kirika orders him to take off his clothes to wear a rather effeminate outfit. He begins to ask why and protest, but she forcefully makes him do it anyway... In fact, throughout the series, Kirika usually tells him to take off his clothes and then forcefully strips him mid-sentence.
• Not the exact example, but none of the Earthland characters in Fairy Tail can't quite bear to see Edo Gray in layer upon layer of jacket. They often demand that the counterpart to their guildmate wear about as much as their Gray does.
• Ho Yay example from From Eroica with Love: In "Achilles's Last Stand", flamboyantly gay hero Dorian ends up wearing a pair of underpants that has a top-secret microfilm hidden in the trim (he doesn't know about this). Major Klaus (the antagonist/Love Interest) hunts him down and demands he strip and hand over the undies, leading to a "why Klaus, I didn't know you cared" scene before Klaus puts him straight.
  Dorian: Oh my, are all military men this straightforward?
  Klaus: Shut up and strip!
• In Fullmetal Alchemist, Scar says this exact line to Marcoh, seemingly out of the blue. They use it to dress up a decoy Marcoh, made out of a chimera, to fake his death. Marcoh's initial reaction is one of complete bewilderment.
• In the last episode of Full Metal Panic? Fumoffu, after a seemingly deadly virus spread to the school, Sōsuke drags Kaname to the infirmary and asks her to take off her clothes. Kaname reacts all flustered, believing he wants to make love to her before they'd die. But Sōsuke learned that the "virus" only attacks synthetic fibers, including clothes, and only at the temperature of body heat, so he's just asking her to undress to save her school uniform before it'd disintegrate.
• Volume 6 of Futaba-kun Change! starts right away with female Futaba worriedly saying "You want my clothes... off?" In fact, Misaki and Negiri just intend to make her a swimsuit for an idol festival. Though it starts out rather innocently, plenty of ecchi antics follow.
• Gamble Fish: Tomu instructs Mika to take her ski clothing off. Mika misunderstands the instruction and ends up stripping naked.
• The Haruhi Suzumiya story arc The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya: Kyon, lost in an Alternate Universe, tries to talk to Mikuru, but she doesn't remember him. Then he mentions that the Mikuru he knows has a star-shaped birthmark on her chest — and he asks her dumbly to show hers. This earns him a punch in the face.
• In the Hetalia Bloodbath 2010, Germany asks both the Italy brothers to take off their clothes immediately after he chides them for wearing too little clothes for the winter weather. Italy enthusiastically complies, and so does Romano, who states that he is doing so only for his brother's sake. Turns out that Germany needs to find a chest marking in order to save a parallel world from destruction.
• Female-and-female example: In Hidamari Sketch, a slip on the stairs by Miyako and a good catch by Yuno leads to the strap on the outer part of her uniform to come loose. This isn't too bad, as the uniform also has a white shirt, and Miyako is wearing a T-shirt underneath, to the disappointment of some boys. The strap problem leads Miyako — and Yuno, who came along — to the art preparation room, where Yoshinoya-sensei would sew it back together. While there, however, Yoshinoya notices a loose button on Yuno's shirt, and has her take it off, to her shock. (Though it is temporarily replaced with... whatever that is.)
• A variation occurs in an early chapter of Imadoki!. The heroine, Tanpopo, overworks herself in the rain while already under the weather, and when she collapses, her love interest Koki finds her and takes her back to her apartment. When he gets her inside, he realizes that her clothes are soaked... but by this point she is unconscious, so he ends up being the one to take her clothes off for her.
• Inuyasha:
  • Happens early on: when he sees Kagome dressed as a miko, Inuyasha soon asks her to take off the outfit. To which Kagome respond with a rock to the head and calling him a pervert. But Inuyasha doesn't want to see her naked (yet); it's just that with the priestess garb, she looks too much like Kikyo, and that makes him uncomfortable.
  • In another episode, Kagome, wanting to apply treatment to Inuyasha's wounds, orders him to undress, much to his protests. Kaede and a group of village kids walk up a minute later.
• Early on in A Love Letter For The Marching Puppy, Kagami orders some new cadets at the Military Academy they attend to take off their clothes (everyone in the room is female). After the cadets' initial shock, Kagami explains that this is so she can teach them how to put on their uniform. Indou, the main character, is a bit annoyed that Kagami didn't explain herself earlier.
• In The Pet Girl of Sakurasou resident Idiot Savant artist Mashiro asks this of her Cloudcuckoolander's Minder Sorata... before telling him she just wants him to model for her.
• Kougami asks Tsunemori's friend Yuki to take off her clothes in Episode 10 of Psycho-Pass. She initially thinks he's some sort of pervert, but he has in fact realized that what he needs to escape the dungeon they're trapped in is her clothing.
• In School Rumble, Harima tells Tenma to take off her clothes in the creepiest way possible, to the point that the eavesdroppers think he's about to rape her. Even better, he opens his attempt to convince her by pulling his own shirt off in front of her! Thankfully, Tenma's brain works in much the same way as Harima's, so she realizes he just wants her to take off her wet clothes so she doesn't catch a cold.
• We Never Learn: In chapter 102, just after Nariyuki sees Mafuyu in nothing but a towel, he tells her to take off her clothes which cause the latter to give him a seething look. He clarifies that he wants her to change her clothes.
• In Yamada-kun and the Seven Witches, the first prediction Sarushima gives is that Yamada will soon take off his clothes. She cannot predict why he will do it, just that he will. Yamada, being like other guys in this series, of course thinks this means some kind of sexual activity, but soon Sarushima's brother bumps into him and spills drinks all over his clothes, meaning that Yamada would only take off his clothes to put on a change of dry clothes.

Comic Books

• Even sweet and innocent Archie Comics get in on the act, with Archie doing it to Betty. Find full details of that story on the Stupid Comics website.
• In the original Barbarella comics by Jean-Claude Forest, Space Pirates board a rocketship and demand that Barbarella take off her clothes. The Captain is outraged, but our heroine takes it in stride, stating that it's not the first time she's taken off her clothes just to see what will happen. Turns out they just want to decontaminate her.

Comic Strips

• Subverted subtly in a SnarfQuest strip. Snarf and his allies are cowering behind some rocks while an enemy fires a machine gun their way. Snarf tells Telerie that he has a plan and asks her to remove her shirt. She does so and is then less than impressed to discover that Snarf's plan is waving her white shirt as a surrender flag.
  Telerie: Is that all you wanted my shirt for? What a cheap trick!!...
  Snarf: [smirking] Okay, okay. We had to surrender properly.

Fan Works

• A variation in The Dresden Fillies, where Harry is the one asked to strip for magical reasons, and Bob (being Bob) hoots.
  Bob: Now we're talking!
• In Discworld/The Big Bang Theory crossover The Many Worlds Interpretation, visiting Discworld assassin Johanna Smith-Rhodes is trying to blend into California as an "alien". ^note A South African in California, that is. She reckons this neatly explains any observed strangeness, and in any case she speaks the language. Sheldon Cooper haughtily demands she takes her clothes off. Fortunately for Sheldon, she understands his motivation — his sense of correctness has been offended by the fact the sports clothing she has bought, reproduction South African team strip, is incorrect. (Johanna's research had been faulty. Her athletics tracksuit relates to pre-1994 and The Apartheid Era.) Johanna obliges him and takes it off. Howard Wolowitz is rendered near-speechless.
• In Powers of Invisibility, Adrien helps Marinette pick out a date outfit for Juleka. When they're done, he excitedly tells her to try it on. It takes a raised eyebrow from Juleka and a comment from Marinette before he realizes she might want some privacy for this.
• In Chapter 39 of Whispers In The Night, Harry Potter, acting as Apprentice Healer, tells an injured Tonks to take off her shirt and jeans. She knows why, but she takes the opportunity to tease him a little anyway.
  Harry: Despite the fact they're glowing to my eyes because of diagnostic charms right now, I need to see the bruises and wounds directly. Take your shirt and jeans off.
  Tonks: If you wanted me naked, all you had to do was ask, Harry.
• Near the end of Yu-Gi-Oh: Lady of Dragons, Marik tells Ishizu to take her top down. Most of the heroic cast are aghast he'd say that to not only a married woman, but his own sister; Ishizu, however, realizes he's asking to see the scars on her back, which contain a ritual to seal breaches to the Shadow Realm, and does as he asks.

Films — Animated

• Arthur and the Invisibles: Arthur asks Selenia to give him the lace holding her top together, so he can use it as a grappling hook. She refuses. He takes it anyway when she is distracted.
• In Frozen, one of the trolls tells Kristoff to take off his clothes... so she can wash them. In front of Anna.
• In Your Name, when Mitsuha (who is in Taki's body) sees that Miki's skirt has been slashed, she takes her into the office and tells her to take her skirt off. It's only because she wants to mend it, but Miki is understandably flustered by the request.

Films — Live-Action

• The Wesley Snipes film The Art of War has a scene where he tells his interpreter, Julia Fang (Marie Matiko), to disrobe because she might be bugged. Even after he explains, she's not happy with him. The irony is, he's the one who's bugged.
• Played for Laughs in Constantine when Angela is about to get in a tub so Constantine can teach her how to awaken her psychic abilities, and the following happens:
  Angela: Do I have to take the rest of my clothes off or can I leave them on?
  [Constantine does a long pause, staring at her, nodding to himself]
  Angela: ...John?
  Constantine: I'm thinking.
• A classic version of this happens twice in the second "Crocodile" Dundee movie.
  • First Mick tells Sue, "Take your bra off." She responds that it's "hardly the time" due to being on the run from a drug lord and his goons. He then uses the bra as bait for a booby trap for the goons (although he does look disappointed that Sue removes it without taking her shirt off).
  • Later in the same film, when he captures one of the two lead drug lords and holds a knife to his throat, Mick orders him to take his pants off... in order to disguise himself. The look on the captive's face says he believes a different interpretation.
• Brill asks this to Dean in order to search for bugs in Enemy of the State. Eventually he does... to the enjoyment of an Asian lady.
• In Evolution, Ira is reading the periodic table printed on the back of Allison's T-shirt. He has a sudden idea, and when Allison asks him, he explains and adds "Take off your shirt, I'll show you." Those Two Guys hanging around exclaim together, "YES!"
• Inverted in Gentlemen Explorers when Agent Rodriguez tells Charles to undo her dress. Charles comments that he usually like to get to know someone better first, but obliges; averting his eyes as he does so. However, the reason she asked him to do so was that she was wearing a more practical outfit of pants, boots, shirt and vest under the gown, and she couldn't undo it herself because Charles had handcuffed them together.
• I'm a Cyborg, but That's OK has Il-soon request this from Young-goon during the Rice Megatron scene. It gets subverted since Young-goon finds it perfectly reasonable, but Il-soon begins to realize how awkward the situation is once she actually undresses.
• James Bond
  • In Thunderball, Bond keeps sexually harassing the Ice Queen nurse at the health clinic. When she asks him to take off his bathrobe (for a checkup) Bond says in mock disappointment, "You never say that like you mean it."
  • In No Time to Die, when Bond makes contact with CIA agent Paloma, she immediately hauls him into a room and starts unbuttoning his shirt. When Bond suggests they might want to get to know each other a bit first, she looks flustered and produces the tuxedo she wants him to change into.
• This occurs in The Legend of Sleepy Hollow when Thelma tells Ichabod to take off his clothes. He's taken aback, but she just wants to mend them.
• In Logan's Run, after emerging from water into a frozen cave, Logan suggests to Jessica that they should take their clothes off, lest they freeze to death. Jessica complies. However, the presence of some dry clothes means that the nudity is short-lived.
• Mexican Hayride: At one point after Bascom assumes his alias of Humphrey Fish, Lambert ends up telling Bascom to take off some of his clothes and ultimately stripping most of them off by force, since Bascom's clothes all have his real initials on them and could expose his identity.
• Happens in Ninja Assassin, probably as a lukewarm attempt at establishing some UST. Anyway, she gives him a Flat "What", and he follows with, "Wash, but don't use soap." It Makes Sense in Context.
• In Parker, Parker orders Leslie to strip so he can see that she isn't wearing a wire.
• Spider-Man: Far From Home: During his rendezvous with a (absolutely stunning) S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, Peter repeatedly gets told to take off his clothes. So he can try the new stealth suit on, of course.
• A variation occurs in the French film Sur un arbre perché with Louis de Funès. The car containing the protagonists goes off a cliff but is caught in a tree on the way down. Later on, the girl decides to take her clothes off to sunbathe (keeping her undergarments on) and notices another man looking at her thoughtfully. She playfully asks whether she's giving him ideas, to which he responds: "Yes! A great idea! We'll take off our clothes and tie them together to climb down!" Unfortunately, the ladder isn't long enough and they end up losing it (and therefore all their clothes).
• Speak No Evil plays this, absolutely not for fanservice or comedy, but for horror when Patrick and Karin, having put Bjorn and Louise through physical and psychological torment besides mutilating their daughter Agnes, had the latter two cornered near a quarry. Patrick then name-drops the trope, word-for-word; suffering through a painful Heroic RRoD, Bjorn and Louise blindly complies, allowing Patrick and Karin to torture them to death while they're in the nude.
• Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines: Being Naked on Arrival after time-travelling, we have the requisite scene where the Terminator has to acquire clothes. This time he enters a club during Ladies Night and tells the male stripper there to take off his clothes, which he's already doing. "Patience, honey!"
• Up the Chastity Belt: While getting Lady Lobelia away from Sir Braggart, Lurkalot takes her into his workshop and tells her to take off her clothes. She starts to obey and then says, "But we haven't got time!" However, he actually wants to fit her with a chastity belt.
• Where Eagles Dare: When Smith and Mary meet up in the town outside the Schloss Adler he greets her with a kiss and tells her to take her clothes off. After Mary reacts to the comment Smith clarifies that he actually needs her to change into a disguise so she can sneak into the castle as a newly hired staffmember.

Jokes

• A lady returns home late at night and finds one of her servants in her bedroom. She approaches him and says "Take off my shoes." He takes off her shoes. "Take off my dress." He takes off her dress. "Take off my bra.", and he takes off her bra. "And if I see you one more time dressing up in my clothes, you're fired!"

Literature

• Happens in Arcadia Snips and the Steamwork Consortium. William asks Miss Snips for her belt, "struggling to be as polite as a gentleman asking for a lady's article of clothing could be," while standing on the top of a burning building.
• In Artemis Fowl, The Time Paradox, N*1 does this to Artemis and Holly at the same time, because the time stream is too fragile to allow extra objects in.
• In Dragon Bones, Ward tells Oreg "Give me your shirt!" ... as if the two of them hadn't enough Ho Yay going already. It's for a completely innocent reason — Ward needs something to blindfold himself, so it's not as if he would be able to see anything, anyway.
• Another version occurs in Robert A. Heinlein's novel Friday.
  One evening Boss showed up, tapping his canes and whuffling [snip]. He settled heavily into the visitor's chair [and] said [snip] to me, "Take off your clothes." From any other man that would be either offensive or welcome, depending. From Boss it merely meant that he wanted my clothes off.
• Harry Potter: Hermione tells Ron and Harry to do just this in book 7. It is simply because they would draw too much attention to themselves out in the Muggle world in their robes. (She has spare clothes in her Bag of Holding.) Note that the clothes she's telling them to take off aren't just robes, they're dress robes, since they had fled from Bill and Fleur's wedding reception.
• Heralds of Valdemar: In The Black Gryphon, Urtho orders Winterhart to be treated for a back injury. She assumes she's being sent to a regular Healer, so she's already shocked when she realizes that she was sent to the kestra'chern Amberdrake. When he tells her to undress and get on the (massage) table.... (Kestra'chern are a subset of Healers, but a lot of people in the novels assume they're just high-priced prostitutes. At this point in the novel, Winterhart is one of those people.)
• In one of the Mary Russell books, during the She Is Not My Girlfriend stage of their friendship, Sherlock Holmes says absentmindedly to Mary to take off her clothes so they can put together her disguise for a case. He says this so matter-of-factly that she actually begins to do it. Then Mycroft interrupts.
  Mycroft: Perhaps this isn't the best idea.
  Sherlock: What are you talking abo— [looks at Russell] Oh.
  [major blushing ensues for both Holmes and Russell]
• Parker: In Flashfire, Lesley tells Parker that she is not interested in him sexually and has no desire to get naked in front of him. He then tells her that she has to. He is checking to see if she is wearing a wire.
• A scene from Emily Rodda's Rowan of Rin counts. Strong Jonn, Marlie, and Rowan just swam through an underground ice-cold lake, and on the other side Marlie is all businesslike about, "Let's change clothes immediately so we don't get sick." — but Rowan just utterly refuses. Marlie's astounded by this: the whole crux of the plot is about overcoming fear, and they've been through X number of horribly frightening things so far, and how can Rowan think this is a big deal? But Strong Jonn knowingly tells Marlie to turn her back so that modesty can be preserved.
• X-Wing Series: In Solo Command, Wedge orders his 2IC Wes to strip while doing so himself. It's part of an elaborate prank.

Live-Action TV

• The Avengers: In The New Avengers episode "To Catch a Rat", Purdey tells Cromwell to take of his trousers, to his obvious surprise. It turns out she had ripped his trousers during the struggle and intends to sew up the rip.
• Babylon 5: In one scene, Ivanova walks into a slum clinic run by Dr. Franklin, and Franklin, without turning around, tells her to start by removing all her clothes. Ivanova replies, "not without dinner and flowers first."
• Non-verbal example in Bones, episode "The Goop on the Girl". After Booth is nearly caught in a suicide bomber explosion, Brennan is busy recovering the human fragments on his clothes, and undresses him herself so he doesn't compromise the evidence. Naturally, Camille enters the room when Booth is down to his underwear (and Bones is kneeling in front of him), to everybody's embarrassment (except Angela's).
• In The Brittas Empire, Gordon demands Tim take his clothes off to prove that he isn't a pregnant woman. When Tim refuses, Gordon rather disturbingly assaults him and attempts to rip his clothes off in an Ambiguously Gay moment.
• Daredevil: Elektra does this trope when she wants Matt Murdock to change clothes for a Black-Tie Infiltration. However it's likely deliberate just to troll him.
• Doctor Who:
  • A variation in "Asylum of the Daleks"; Oswin tells Rory, "Pop off your shirt, quick as you like." He assumes there's a legitimate reason for the request... there isn't.
  • The Doctor tells Clara to take off her Pimped-Out Dress in "The Snowmen", since said garment gets stuck in the window, making it harder for her to climb out. Not helping is the fact that he says it just after a Suggestive Collision. This is followed by the Doctor awkwardly clearing up what he meant.
• Friends:
  • In an episode, Joey asks for one of the girls to remove her bra (after first asking who had the biggest breasts). It turns out he wants a piece of wire to pop the lock on a car door — they were locked out and it was snowing.
    Joey: The bigger the boobs, the bigger the bra, the bigger the bra, the bigger the wire! [makes "duh" gesture]
  • Played with in another episode. Monica suspects Chandler, who is acting very drunk, of having consumed all the (blue) jello shots. Monica tells Chandler to stick out his tongue. Without missing a beat, Chandler tells her to take off her shirt.
• In the 2010 Hawaii Five-0 episode "Pilot", as Kono is doing an infiltration job, the villain Sang Min order her to take off her dress, so he can check she isn't carrying any wire. She has no choice but to comply, leading to a Lingerie Scene. Fortunately, the spying was being done with a pinpoint microphone from outside. Though this isn't entirely innocent — not only does Sang Min clearly enjoy the show, he also takes a cell phone picture of her in her underwear, which he then sends to a mole inside the police department, to doublecheck her identity. Since a headshot should have been enough to confirm this — how many officers see their co-workers in their underwear? — this pushes it into Shameful Strip category.
• Done in Human Target at least a few times. In one episode the hero and an attractive district attorney are speeding away from a bunch of bad guys, hero tells her to take off her clothes since she has a tracking device on her. The tracking device is actually inside her. She gets all naked on the back seat of the car while hero drives. After a while he tells her to put some clothes on since it's very distracting.
• The first episode of I Dream of Jeannie has Jeannie, newly arrived in Captain Nelson's house, dressed in one of his white shirts. Captain Nelson tells her to take off the shirt. Cue Jeannie shrugging and starting to unbutton it, whereupon he corrects himself, and tells her to change back to her genie outfit.
• A different version in Jack of All Trades. Jack asks the Damsel in Distress her weight and dress size and gets slapped each time. Turns out he's intending to use her dress as a Parachute Petticoat.
• Jessica Jones: Used for Les Yay when Claire Temple has to sew up the title character after she gets a lower leg injury.
  Claire: Take off your pants.
  Jessica: I usually like a little more romancing.
  Claire: Don't we all?
• In Lost season 3 episode "Tricia Tanaka Is Dead", during a flashback, Hurley is consulting a medium with his father about the curse of the numbers that's pursuing him. After reading the tarot for him, she suddenly leave the table while telling Hugo he'll have to take off his clothes. Hurley is naturally quite puzzled, until she comes from the kitchen with a large pan, announcing that she needs to perform an exorcism.
• Lucifer: Lucifer Morningstar asks Chloe Decker to take her shirt off, because he wants to check to see if she has angel wings. It says a lot about how their relationship has progressed that Chloe complies with the bizarre request, despite Lucifer having made blatant sexual advances to her in the past.
• Played seriously in an episode of Murdoch Mysteries, when the protagonist (a detective in 1890s' Toronto) actually does tell a black woman to take off her dress... and is horrified and embarrassed when she immediately does so. She assumed he meant to rape her in return for her co-operation; he just wanted to examine the bloodstains on it.
• The Office has this subverted when Dwight is trying to get information from Kevin.
  Dwight: Meredith, take off your dress!
  Meredith: Okey-dokey.
  Kevin: No, dear God! They're in the trash can! In the kitchen!
  Meredith: It's coming off anyway.
• Pandora: Jax asks Ralen to give her his shirt (because of the blood on it she needs for a blood sample). He misunderstands and starts taking off the shirt he is currently wearing, until she clarifies this.
• Robin Hood: In "Too Hot to Handle", Robin instructs Isabella to take off her dress whilst they're floating in a water tank. He combines it with his arrow to make a rope.
• Round the Twist: The episode "Know All" has Pete telling Linda (who is his twin sister) to take off the clown's outfit, which was causing the scarecrow clown to chase her. She misunderstands him at first.
• Shadow and Bone: In a rare case of a female character demanding this of a male one, in "The Heart is an Arrow" Nina insists that Matthias take off his wet clothes so they can share body heat.
• There's one in Stargate Atlantis when McKay, Carter and Dr. Keller are trapped in an abandoned mine: McKay suggests that everyone disrobe so they can make a rope by tying their clothes together. Keller is about to comply... then Carter produces a coil of actual rope which was in one of the boxes. And earlier, he suggested that Carter flash some young boys who are standing at the edge of the hole in order to get them to help.
• Star Trek: Voyager: Lampshaded in "Flashback" when a female officer is Mugged for Disguise by Tuvok, so Captain Janeway can borrow her uniform.
  Janeway: We could have just asked her.
  Tuvok: Asking female officers for their clothing could lead to misunderstanding.
• In The Two Ronnies' "Limerick Clinic" sketch, the doctor asks his patient to undress; a nurse, also in the room, promptly strips.
• Victorious: In "Robarazzi", Tori's mom tells her to take off her shirt, as she wants to test an new depilatory cream to shave the hair on Tori armpits.
• Wild Boys: In one episode, Jack and Dan encounter a woman who asks them to take their trousers off. They have no idea what to make of this and assume it is a joke until she draws a pistol and reiterates her demand. She is actually a bush ranger and wants their trousers for a disguise.
• Young Blades: In "The Exile", Charles demands this of Jacqueline so he can use the Musketeer uniform in a Dressing as the Enemy ploy. It's perfectly innocent to him because she's disguised as a man (her "brother", Jacques). She ends up distracting him with the apparent Non Sequitur, "Would you speak to my sister like that?"

Video Games

• Agarest Senki: After an earthquake swallows Ladius and one of the heroines they end up in a cave and fall into an underground river. Once he assesses the situation, Ladius concludes that they should probably wait for rescue. However, since they are soaking wet the cold is a major problem, so, to best conserve heat, Ladius promptly asks the heroine to remove her clothes, to their varying levels of confusion and embarrassment on her part.
• At the end of the DeathGate computer game, Haplo rips his shirt open and dares his double (Sang-Drax in disguise) to do the same. When Sang-Drax complies, he reveals massive wounds crossing over his heart rune, which would have been fatal if Sang-Drax was who he claimed to be.
• In Final Fantasy V, when the party finds a room to rest in at the Ship Graveyard after running around underwater, Lenna goes to change so she can dry her clothes by a fire, while Bartz and Galuf start shedding their clothing for the same purpose. Faris refuses to take his clothes off, and eventually reveals that he is actually a woman who's been disguising herself as a man.
• One scene in the first chapter of the Neverwinter Nights 2 mod "Dark Waters" has Heather demanding Daniel's belt so that she can construct a device to go rescue the player. Daniel has evinced an attraction to Heather before this point, so his responses are quite humorous.
• In Persona 4: Arena, Akihiko Sanada, already walking around topless, asks Kanji to take his clothes off. While he was well-meaning (he thought Kanji wouldn't be able to fight to his fullest with his coat on), the sexually confused/insecure Kanji takes it as an attempt to hit on him, and he goes right into rage mode.
• One skit in Tales of the Abyss involves the party (minus Anise) complaining that inside a volcano, Jade seems to be walking off coolly while the rest is obviously getting too hot with the temperature... then the party suspects he's hiding some cooling Fon technique under his cloak... then Luke and the rest told Jade to take off his clothes and tried to strip him... only to be stopped by Tear.
• A girl-to-guy example occurs in The World Ends with You. When Shiki sees that a button on Neku's pants isn't sewn on right, she demands he take off his pants to let her fix them. He doesn't really interpret it as a come-on, but he's incredibly uncomfortable around people and it's pretty awkward.

Visual Novels

• A non-heterosexual version appears in Fate/stay night, when (heterosexual but very socially awkward) Shirou does this to (Ambiguously Gay) Issei in order to check his body for a magical tattoo. Issei responds appropriately, leading Shirou to forcibly strip him.
• Happens on Hanzo's route in Nightshade; Hanzo and Enju get caught out in the rain, and once they finally make it to a cave, Hanzo is rather blunt about telling Enju that she needs to get out of her clothes so that they can dry. The player can choose to do it immediately or protest, but it happens regardless of what you pick, and simply following Hanzo's instructions is the right choice in order to gain points with him.
• Plumbers Don't Wear Ties has Jane discovering dirty reasons behind her job interview once this line is delivered. And when the guy repeats it, it's unsubtle:
  "TAKE YOUR DAMN CLOTHES OFF!"

Web Animation

• In season 15 of Red vs. Blue, Washington asks Carolina to take off her combat armor, as he's realized that whomever is tracking down their fellow Freelancers is using their suit's homing beacons and wants to set up a trap. As this is just after a tender moment, Carolina gets the wrong idea until Wash explains himself.
• A very fucked-up variation in You Wanna See My Pecker. It makes MUCH more sense in context.
  Guy: OH GOD, PLEASE! SHOW ME YOUR DICK!
  Bird: That's nasty, you're a pervert.
  Guy: YOU STARTED ALL THIS!

Webcomics

• One strip from Arthur, King of Time and Space. Although Nimue doesn't think Merlin means it that way; she just doesn't have a nudity taboo.
• El Goonish Shive has a scene where Girl Elliot certainly looks ready to hammer Tedd for telling her to take her shirt off before he can hastily explain his wanting to test the particulars of Elliot's transformations. Of course, it doesn't help that Tedd both has a certain reputation and had suggested the same thing earlier for entirely perverted reasons.
• Freaking Romance: Played with. Zylith tells this to Zelan in a teasing manner after they agree that they should remove their clothes for the purely pragmatic reason of protecting themselves from the monsters in the dangerous world. Beings from different dimensions cannot touch each other, after all.
• Gunnerkrigg Court has an example of this:
  Jack: The court tracks us through our food. I haven't eaten anything in days, so they can't find me.
  Annie: Wouldn't it make more sense for them to track us through our clothes? Those are also provided by the court.
  Jack: Good point. Maybe we should—
  Reynardine: Do not finish this sentence if you know what's good for you, boy.
• In Magick Chicks, Cerise asks Brooke (from Eerie Cuties) for dating tips with girls (despite being straight; it's solely to get more popular at the all-girl school). Brooke thus drags Cerise to her bedroom and asks her to strip; Cerise obeys, despite being convinced that they'll end up having lesbian sex — but in truth, Brooke just wants her to model for some nude painting.
• A girl-to-girl example is Erika and Kimiko in a strip of MegaTokyo. Kimiko's expression in panel three says it all.
• Nerf NOW!!: BLU Engie-tan says it to RED Engie-tan, but all she wants is bet their rares on a team on DOTA. Given the latter's reaction, that she expected the naughty interpretation is quite justified...
  RED Engie: B-but the readers are looking! Can't we wait until bed time?
• In a strip of PepsiaPhobia, Phobia doesn't take well to being asked "Take off your belt!" To be clear, if Filby wants the chronologium belt, it's only because he believe the material can help bring him back to his time.
• Siren's Lament: When Shon brings Ian some clothes so he can Please Put Some Clothes On, Ian decides he likes the clothes Shon is wearing the best and yanks his jacket off him. Shon even starts to take off his shirt for Ian before Lyra steps in and tell Ian to stop acting like a child.
• Yumi's Cells: When Woong visits Yumi's home, he accidentally turns on the shower and gets his shirt wet. While Yumi's cells are concerned about Woong being wet, her Naughty Cell gets her to blurt out, "Take your clothes off, Woong." Yumi quickly backpedals, but Woong obliges, much to her embarrassment.

Web Videos

• In the second campaign of Critical Role the Mighty Nein come to the exploration camp of the Xhorhasian forces in Eiselkross, and, as soon as they meet him, immediately ask their friend drow wizard Essek to take his clothes of — it's only to find out whether he was magically marked by their opponents, but they don't tell him that until he asks.
• In Dragon Ball Z Abridged episode 24, Vegeta takes Goku, Gohan and Krillin to Freeza's ship to recover after the battle with the Ginryu Force. Goku is put in a healing tank while Krillin and Gohan...
  Vegeta: Now, both of you, [close-up to his mouth, slow motion] strip.
  Krillin: ...Ah...
  Vegeta: I got body armors for you two.
  Krillin: Less awkward.
• In Yu-Gi-Oh! The Abridged Series episode 15, Tristan practically yells this to Mai and Tea when they are dueling.

Western Animation

• In an episode of Animaniacs, a Betty Boop Expy is told that her outfit is too risqué and she'll have to remove it. Trigger a surprised response and a "Goodnight, everybody!" from Yakko.
• In the "Steerminator" episode of Darkwing Duck, Gosalyn and Honker are trapped in a cage in Taurus Bulba's secret lair behind a water fall. Goslyn tells Honker to take off his clothes, and his eyes bug out. She insists she needs his shirt and backpack, and throws them onto a branch near the water. Some paint that was in his backpack spills out, creating a stream in the waterfall that lets Darkwing see where they are.
• DC Super Hero Girls: In "#HateTriangle", while in the boys' locker room, Jessica Cruz (Green Lantern) unexpectedly tells Garth Bernstein (Aqualad) to take off his clothes, to his confusion. What she wants is to "borrow his style" to make Hal Jordan unattractive.
• Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends: Most of the imaginary friends (who don't normally wear clothes) are wearing one or two items of clothing that are merchandise of "Funny Bunny"—i.e. of Mr. Herriman, who had starred in a viral video against his will. Eduardo realized that, if Mr. Herriman saw that merchandise, he'd blow a gasket, so he rushed toward the other imaginary friends, shouting this trope word-for-word at the top of his lungs. Madame Foster, who wasn't in on this, obliged with a "Yee-haw!"
• The Ren & Stimpy Show:
  • In episode "Nurse Stimpy", Stimpy decides to give Ren a sponge bath. Ren's reluctant about taking off his fur, so Stimpy has to ask him to do that, eventually suggesting that he does it for Ren.
  • Another example is contained in "The Great Outdoors", where Stimpy decides to go skinny-dipping and has to talk Ren into stripping.
• Star vs. the Forces of Evil, season 3 episode "Sophomore Slump": At the end of their date, after a hug, Jackie suddenly tells Marco "Take off your shirt." Naturally, he blushes and acts very bashful, but all Jackie wants is to confirm the suspicion that he's still wearing his Mewni knight cape under his hoodie.
• Wakfu, "The Justice Knight": While imprisoned in an Anti-Magic cell, the heroes have to throw some cloth over the device that neutralize their powers. However, all the first few attempts are failures, until the three males of the group are down to their underwear. Thus they turn toward their two female companions, Evangelyne and Amalia... who staunchly refuse to disrobe. Even when Sadlygrove points out that he'd already seen Eva nude... which she denies, seriously embarrassed. But then they realize they omitted one piece of clothing: Yugo's hat.

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