Temporary Bulk Change / Comic Books

• Several members of the X-Men have this as a power:
  • Ashley Crawford, better known as Big Bertha. In her civilian identity, she's a conventionally thin model; however, her mutant power allows her to swell her body mass immensely, transforming her into a Big Beautiful Woman with super-strength and durability.
  • Strong Guy can absorb vast amounts of kinetic energy and transfer it to his muscles, making them grow exponentially and granting him superhuman strength. However, in his case the Bulk Change must be temporary: if he doesn't expend the energy within ninety seconds, his body will be permanently warped into a grotesquely overmuscled form. This has happened once, and it causes him both physical and emotional pain.
  • Phat of X-Statix has the mutant ability to swell up parts of his body with extradimensional gunk.
• Superman:
  • Supermans Girlfriend Lois Lane #5: "The Fattest Girl in Metropolis" saw Lois Lane witnessing a murder and subsequently being tracked by the culprit. To help, Superman decided to go with the unconventional method of making her immensely fat with the help of a "growth ray," reasoning that this way, the killer won't be able to recognize her. After the criminal is captured and the growth ray reversed, Lois turns the tables by forcing Superman to take her to a fancy restaurant, where she binges on a huge amount of food — since the weight will all be gone by the next morning, it doesn't matter how much she eats that night.
  • In one Superboy 1941 story set during Clark Kent's teenage years, his family returns home from vacation to discover most of Smallville's young adults have suddenly grown obese. Clark suddenly comes down with the same affliction and it turns out it was due to the local milk supply being affected by an experimental energy ray created by a local scientist. The story was redone several years later in Adventure Comics #298, only now most of Smallville's adults become obese as well (except for Ma and Pa Kent). And this time, the milk wouldn't have initially changed Clark. Unfortunately for him, he's seen drinking it just as the cause of the obesity epidemic is revealed and uses Red Kryptonite to make himself fat to keep up appearances lest anyone suspects him of having Superboy's invulnerability. He only realizes too late he now has to hide his new fatness as Superboy.
  • In The Unknown Supergirl, exposure to Red Kryptonite makes Supergirl suddenly grow morbidly obese while she is visiting a fair. Since she cannot let anybody see her strange transformation, for it would jeopardize her secret identity, Kara ties one rope around her waist, floats up to the parade's big balloon figures and passes herself off as one of them until the Red-K's effect wears off.
• Legion of Super-Heroes:
  • Bouncing Boy's power allows him to swell up his body into a spherical, ball-like form capable of ricocheting around at deadly speeds. In one instance, after losing his power his body became slender despite that he'd already been chubby before he gained his power. In other instances where he'd lost his power his body size remained the same.
    • There were a couple of instances when another Legionnaire would briefly get Bouncing Boy's power. In one issue, Dynamo Boy (who happens to be The Mole for the Legion of Super-Villains) discreetly turns on a device that changes the power of several Legionnaires with Superboy getting Bouncing Boy's power. In another issue, a group of Legionnaires have their powers randomly switched to disorient them, with Bouncing Bow and Ultra Boy swapping powers. In both situations, the two Legionnaires turn bloated and spherical.
  • Matter-Eater Lad comes from the planet Bismoll, where all its native inhabitants are capable of consuming any form of matter and metabolizing it quickly because their bodies have metabolisms like nuclear furnaces. In one issue, M-E Lad is hit by an energy ray that unintentionally alters his metabolism by slowing it down to the same speed as a normal Earthling's. Unfortunately, this occurs after he'd eaten nearly a ton of dirt to create an escape tunnel and thus he immediately puts on weight equivalent to how much he consumed. He spends several issues overweight until a doctor manages to restore his metabolism to its previous state, making him slender again.
  • The third issue of the comic tie-in to the Legion cartoon has a bunch of Legionnaires hit by this when their powers are messed with. Legion applicant Infectious Lass accidentally unleashes a virus that causes her and several Legionnaires to swap superpowers.
    • Saturn Girl and Superman switch powers, causing Saturn Girl to become muscular as she gains Superman's strength while he gains her telepathy.
    • Bouncing Boy and Lightning Lad switch powers, so Bouncing Boy becomes slender and muscular while Lightning Lad becomes fat alongside being able to turn ball-like. Unfortunately for Lightning Lad, he's told the virus will last longer on him due to his greater mass.
• During the second volume of Titans, Raven once again undergoes a Face–Heel Turn when she learns of her six half-brothers and their connection to their father Trigon's evil influence. The seven siblings gain powers correlating with the Seven Deadly Sins, Raven representing Pride. She betrays her brothers and tries to give their powers to the other Titans (against their will). Donna Troy gets Lust and becomes noticeably skinnier while her breasts become gigantic, while Red Arrow gets Gluttony and briefly becomes obese before Raven's good side intervenes. The brother who represented Gluttony even had an attack that momentarily drained the energy from Donna and Starfire, making them horrifically emaciated until it wore off.
• This happens a few times in the comic adaption of The Simpsons:
  • "Dullards to Donuts" has this happens to Homer and all the other nuclear plant employees when Mr. Burns gets them addicted to genetically modified donuts. After offering them all the donuts they want in exchange for reduced salaries, the plant workers become morbidly obese a month into their addictions. Burns is forced to ax the plan and has the addictive qualities and fat content of the donuts reduced so his workers will lose weight and become productive again.
  • A two-fold example from "Fly Away Homer." Homer's not allowed on any airplanes because he's too fat, causing him to miss out on most of the family's cruise vacation. While Homer protests to get a flight company for heavyset people started, he's also forced to do repairs on the plane. All that hard work makes Homer slim down until he's no longer fat... just in time to get to the cruise and discover Marge and the kids have become overweight from relaxing and eating without his usual antics keeping them occupied.
  • In one issue, Nelson stops bullying the kids at Springfield Elementary for their lunch money, which allows them to buy the cafeteria's food such as Cream of Lard. After eating this on a regular basis, Bart, Milhouse and most of the other kids have gotten so fat that they can't fit in their desks.
• In the comic tie-in for The Super Hero Squad Show, the Blob gets tasked with retrieving an Infinity Fractal for Doctor Doom. As the Squaddies attempt to stop him, the Blob accidentally grabs the Fractal with his bare hands. The Fractal transfers the Blob's power to the Squaddies, making all of them obese while he becomes slender. Doctor Doom convinces an unhappy Blob to keep holding the Fractal to incapacitate the Squaddies, not realizing they've also acquired Blob's other abilities too which they use to stop the Wrecking Crew. The Blob eventually drops the Fractal after realizing staying so small and losing his powers did nothing to hinder the Squaddies.