History Main / FearfulSymmetry

* One moment stands out in particular. After spending several minutes beating each other to a pulp, Snake and his "brother", Liquid Ocelot, each find themselves facing each other and holding a syringe full of fast-healing nanotech. Instead of jumping back to inject themselves or trying to knock away the other's syringe, they ''inject each other'', knowing that the the other will do the exact same thing. Fearful symmetry, indeed...
** That was a homage to the fight scene in ''[[VideoGame/MetalGearSolid The Twin Snakes]]'' between Liquid and Snake, who were twins... snakes.

* In the ''SonicTheHedgehog'' OVA, Sonic faces Metal Sonic; a robot programmed to think and fight exactly like him. Naturally, they spend half the fight simply canceling each other out.
--->'''Sonic:''' You may know everything I'm going to do, but that's not going to help you since I know everything YOU'RE going to do! STRANGE, ISN'T IT?!

Compare JuxtaposedHalvesShot (where half of two characters sides/faces are juxtaposed to or beside each other), MirroredConfrontationShot (a similar but conflict exclusive trope), BashBrothers, and MirrorMatch. May result in a DoubleKnockout or MutualDisadvantage. See DittoFighter for the fighting game equivalent. Not to be confused with ''Series/TheXFiles'' episode of the same name. The TropeNamer, William Blake's poem "The Tyger", doesn't have anything to do with the trope.

* Ptilol and Cyprine in ''SailorMoon S'' were also one person split into two. They are finally destroyed when an attack from one mistakenly hits the other.

-->--'''Professor Farnsworth''', ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}''

* The fight between Wesley and Cross in ''{{Wanted}}'' has shades of this, such as when they continuously deflect each other's bullets with their shots.
* In ''{{Replicant}}'', JeanClaudeVanDamme plays a serial killer and his [[CloningBlues clone]] grown by the government to catch him. In the climactic fight, both Garrotte and the Replicant try to hit each other but end up punching each other's fists and kicking each other's legs. The weird thing is, they actually ''mirror'' each other's moves literally (i.e. one punches with his right, while the other with his left).

* In ''KickAss'', the protagonist and his enemy wind up knocking each other out at the same time using identical weapons.

Compare JuxtaposedHalvesShot (where half of two characters sides/faces are juxtaposed to or beside each other), MirroredConfrontationShot (a similar but conflict exclusive trope), BashBrothers, and MirrorMatch. May result in a DoubleKnockout or MutualDisadvantage. See DittoFighter for the fighting game equivalent. Not to be confused with TheXFiles episode of the same name. The TropeNamer, William Blake's poem "The Tyger", doesn't have anything to do with the trope.

* Happens in ''Series/{{Farscape}}'' when Crichton is duplicated. He plays rock-paper-scissors against his other self for hours at a time, and it's always a tie, [[spoiler: even when he plays against a ''recording'' of his other self.]]

* ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'', in Episode 9, features the angel Israfel, which splits into two and can only be defeated by two pilots using an identical sequence of simultaneous attacks. By way of dance. In fact, generally speaking, this trope ''encapsulates'' the episode: Shinji and Asuka's arguments with each other, their attempts to synchronize their everyday lives, and their final dance number '''all''' typify it.

* ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'' features the angel Israfel, which splits into two and can only be defeated by two pilots using an identical sequence of simultaneous attacks. By way of dance. This trope ''encapsulates'' the episode referenced - Shinji and Asuka's arguments with each other, their attempts to synchronize their everyday lives, and their final dance number '''all''' typify this trope.

* ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'' features the angel Israfel, which splits into two and can only be defeated by two pilots using an identical sequence of simultaneous attacks. By way of dance. This trope ''encapsulates'' the episode referenced - Shinji and Asuka's arguments with each other, their attempts to synchronize their everyday life, and their final dance number '''all''' typify this trope.

* ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'' features the angel Israfel, which splits into two and can only be defeated by two pilots using an identical sequence of simultaneous attacks. By way of dance.

* Jaster Rogue's darker (and should I say hotter?) [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFkDGTLEypA doppleganger]] in ''RogueGalaxy''.

Compare MirroredConfrontationShot, BashBrothers, and MirrorMatch. May result in a DoubleKnockout or MutualDisadvantage. See DittoFighter for the fighting game equivalent. Not to be confused with TheXFiles episode of the same name. The TropeNamer, William Blake's poem "The Tyger", doesn't have anything to do with the trope.

* In the ''SonicTheHedgehog'' OVA, Sonic faces Metal Sonic; a robot programmed to think and fight exactly like him. Naturally, they spend half the fight simply canceling each other out. See the quote at the top of the page.

* In [[{{Disney/Aladdin}} Aladdin: the animated series]] when a {{trickster}} called Chaos pairs Aladdin against an EvilTwin the results are to be expected.

Compare MirroredConfrontationShot, BashBrothers, and MirrorMatch. May result in a DoubleKnockout. See DittoFighter for the fighting game equivalent. Not to be confused with TheXFiles episode of the same name. The TropeNamer, William Blake's poem "The Tyger", doesn't have anything to do with the trope.

* In the ''{{Futurama}}'' episode "The Farnsworth Parabox", the two Leelas do this, to no effect. After they lunge at each other and end up simply colliding in midair, one of the Professor Farnsworths tells them "Now, now, perfectly symmetrical violence never solved anything."

This trope runs on the rather dubious idea that since the combatants know everything the other knows they must know what they would do in this situation. This completely ignores the fact that both are facing a completely new situation (being faced with a copy of them-self) and therefore couldn't possibly know exactly how the other will react.

* A variant occurs at the end of Terra's story in ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsBirthBySleep''. [[spoiler:After Master Xehanort possesses Terra, and the Lingering Sentiment forms, the two fight. Terranort has the same appearance as Terra ( golden eyes, darker skin, and [[WhiteHairedPrettyBoy white hair]] notwithstanding), but most of Terranort's moves are ones Terra can acquire.]]

* In ''KamenRiderDecade'', the flashback to the Rider War ends with [[KamenRiderKuuga Kuuga Ultimate Form]] and Decade throwing identical punches at each other, creating a SphereOfDestruction. The image was iconic enough that the ''Climax Heroes'' series of video games uses it as the animation when one character attempts to counter another's FinishingMove.

* An interesting variation is with the Kyosuke vs Axel fights in [[SuperRobotWarsOriginalGeneration Super Robot Wars Original Generation: The Inspector]]. Initially Axel fights [[AlternateUniverse Shadow-Mirror]] Kyosuke and they grapple with each other and try to overpower one another, and when Kyosuke starts to win Axel surprises him with an energy blast that damages him and forces him to active his hidden Einst power, making him a much bigger target. When Axel fights regular Kyosuke the battle is initially a perfect copy of this, right down to similar animation frames and identical dialogue. However when Axel tries the surprise energy blast, Kyosuke reacts faster than he expects to interrupt it and then open fire on the wide open Axel, as regular Kyosuke turns out to be more skilled fighter than his alternate self since he has no Einst power to rely on.

* There's a (possibly apocryphal) story about a pair of twins, one left-handed and one right-handed, who got into a GentlemansDuel. They took the required 10 paces, turned, fired... and their bullets met and melded at the halfway point.

** StreetFighterIII has this for Makoto and Ibuki's intros.

** The battle between Knives and Vash in the finale of {{Trigun}} is similar in this respect.

* {{Saiyuki}} both plays this straight and subverts this in both the anime and the manga when an enemy creates clones of the main cast programmed with their entire moveset, with every move he's observed up until the day prior to when he chose to unleash them on the team. The main characters quickly realize they'll just copy and counter all their known moves and switch to trying different things, making quick work of the clones and rendering them a minor nuisance, chiding the enemy that created them by saying "the us you knew yesterday isn't the us that exists today". Hilariously, in the manga, although Goku, Gojyo, and Hakkai figure this out quickly, Sanzo doesn't catch on until they find him and tell him...after enjoying watching him fight against himself for a while.

* ''NeonGenesisEvangelion'' features the angel Israfel, which splits into two and can only be defeated by two pilots using an identical sequence of simultaneous attacks. By way of dance.

->''"You may know everything I'm going to do, but that's not going to help you since I know everything you're going to do! Strange, isn't it?"''
-->--'''Sonic''', ''Anime/SonicTheHedgehogTheMovie''

Compare MirroredConfrontationShot, BashBrothers, and MirrorMatch. May result in a DoubleKnockout. Not to be confused with TheXFiles episode of the same name. The TropeNamer, William Blake's poem "The Tyger", doesn't have anything to do with the trope.