History Main / ImpossiblyCompactFolding

* ''ChromeShelledRegios'': The dites, which, for something that collapses into a perfect box the size of a remote control, can be anything from a pistol to a surfboard-sized {{BFS}}.

* On TheSimpsons, Marge buys Homer some large underwear for Christmas. After making sure it'll fit him by asking to two Clerks to wear it together, one clark then folds up the bed sheet size underwear and stuffs into a gift box that would fit a wedding ring. He warns her to be careful when opening it.

* ''DungeonsAndDragons'' module I12 "Egg of the Phoenix". The title egg is an homage to the foldbox in the ''GloryRoad'' entry in the {{Literature}} section. It can be opened up multiple times, each time becoming larger.

[[quoteright:300:[[PhineasAndFerb http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/P_F_5163.png]][[caption-width:300: [[ToonPhysics And to think all of this was unfolded from a normal sized brochure.]]]]]]

-->-- ''SpongebobSquarepants''

[[AC: Comic Books]]:

* In ''TheSimpsonsMovie'', Homer has a small billboard-sized poster of Alaska folded up to the size of a business card.

* ''PhineasAndFerb'' loves using this.

** In the short story "AndHeBuiltACrookedHouse", a [[MadArtist mad architect]] designs a house in the form of an unfolded tesseract (four-dimensional cube); it is constructed in Southern California; an earthquake causes it to fold up. ''[[AlienGeometries Into the fourth dimension]].''

* In the Silver and Bronze Ages, {{Superman}} used to hide his [[Muggle civilian]] clothes by folding it up to the safe of a wafer; everything he wore was [[AppliedPhlebtonium chemically treated]] to survive the super-pressure this required. This process, oddly enough, only worked on items which were red, white, or blue, resulting in a very limited wardrobe for Clark. No word on what he did with his shoes [[AWizardDidIt (or how he hid his boots and cape under Clark's socks and shirt while wearing both)]].

[[AC: ComicBooks]]:

[[quoteright:300:[[PhineasAndFerb http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/P_F_5163.png]][[caption-width:300: [[ToonPhysics And to think all of this was unfolded from a normal sized brochure.]]]]]]
->'''Barnacle Boy:''' Drive? What do you know about driving the Invisible Boatmobile?
->'''Spongebob:''' Tons. Like the windshield wipers are right here. (pushes a button)
->'''Barnacle Boy''': Don't touch that button, that's the... (folds into origami swan) ... Origami Button.
-->-- ''SpongebobSquarepants''

In some works, a character will pull out a small piece of paper or metal, which will then unfold to an object many times its original size. In others, a large object will fold itself up into a smaller one. Either way, the object becomes much smaller than is at all reasonable (and may also [[ShapeshifterBaggage change mass accordingly]]) through folding.

A subtrope of {{Hammerspace}} and ToonPhysics, and a supertrope of TelescopingRobot. May overlap with TransformingMecha, BagOfHolding, SwissArmyWeapon. or RetractableWeapon.

!! Examples:

[[AC: {{Advertising}}]]:
* A commercial for the SciFiChannel featured a car folding into a briefcase. May be a ShoutOut to ''TheJetsons'' (see WesternAnimation entry below).

[[AC: ComicBooks]]:
* TheFlash's entire costume is stored inside his ring.
* ''{{Iznogoud}}'' features an example of this. In "Iznogoud's Nightmarish Birthday", he opens a very small box and extracts a small piece of paper and proceeds to unfold it (it's so small that he needs a magnifying glass to start to unfold it). When completely unfold, the paper is several metres large. Of course, the box had been given to him by the guild of mages...
* At one point in the original comic-book version of ''TheTick'', the Tick and Arthur take a road trip; the Tick insists that he knows how to fold up their (standard US-style) road map, but every time he tries, he produces an even larger wad of paper, until he's filled up the entire backseat of the car with it.

[[AC: {{Film}}]]:
* In ''SorcerersApprentice'', when Dalthazar gives Dave the book, Dave unfolds it from tinyness.
* In ''Film/{{Transformers}}'', the allspark cube-thing goes from the size of a house to the size of a basketball.
* In ''TheSimpsonsMovie'', Homer has a small billboard-sized poster of Alaska folded up to the size of a business card.

[[AC: {{Literature}}]]:
* One [[NorseMythology Norse]] god can fold up a ship and stick it into his pocket.

** ''Literature/GloryRoad''. The foldbox which carries all of the team's equipment.
--->Rufo's baggage turned out to be a little black box about the size and shape of a portable typewriter. He opened it. And opened it again. And kept on opening it and kept right on unfolding its sides and letting them down until the durn thing was the size of a small moving van and even more packed.
** In the short story "AndHeBuiltACrookedHouse", a [[MadArtist mad architect]] designs a house in the form of an unfolded tesseract (four-dimensional cube); it is constructed in Southern California; an earthquake causes it to fold up. ''[[AlienGeometries Into the fourth dimension]].''
* Planetron, star of two children's books about the solar system and the galaxy, unfolds from the size of a toy robot to a fully functional spaceship, and back.

[[AC: TabletopGames]]:
* ''TabletopGame/{{Paranoia}}'' adventure The Yellow Clearance Black Box Blues, Mission 4. In order to enter Troubleshooter Headquarters the {{PC}}s must enter a huge machine. If they do so (or if they refuse to do so), the machine folds in on itself repeatedly until it's the size of a suitcase.
* ''DungeonsAndDragons'' module I12 "Egg of the Phoenix". The title egg is an homage to the foldbox in the ''GloryRoad'' entry in the {{Literature}} section. It can be opened up multiple times, each time becoming larger.
** There is also a folding boat.

[[AC: VideoGames]]:
* The ''{{Pokemon}}'' games feature a bike that can be folded up small enough to fit into a backpack, although this may just be an example of BagOfHolding.
* Manny Calavera of ''GrimFandango'' can fold up his huge SinisterScythe to fit in his coat pocket.

[[AC: WesternAnimation]]:
* [[TheJetsons George Jetson's]] car could fold up into a briefcase, which he can easily carry into his workplace in the show's intro.
* ''PhineasAndFerb'' loves using this.
** As seen in the page image, Ferb once unfolded a map from a roughly two by two inch square into a world map larger than the house it was leaning on.
** Their "Plataposterior" robot is about 10 feet tall, but folds up into a square that fits in Ferb's front shirt pocket.
** The full-sized chemistry lab they carry around with them also qualifies.
** Also the "Wrapped up in a nice little boxinator" literally compacts his WHOLE BUILDING into a tiny box.
* A common gag on ''LooneyTunes'' is for a character to fold a large box, door or what have you, into a square the size of a matchbox.
* ''{{SpongeBob SquarePants}}'': Pushing the [[ContextSensitiveButton origami button]] on Mermaid Man's invisible boatmobile folds it and everyone inside into a paper crane.
* In an episode of ''TheSimpsons'', Homer folds a GiantNoveltyCheck into a small wad and stuffs it into his pocket. [[SubvertedTrope Then it expands.]]
* On one ''PinkPanther'' cartoon, Pink is hungry, so he folds up the background to the size of an index card, sprinkles salt on it and eats it. [[DinnerDeformation It then unfolds inside him.]]

[[AC: RealLife]]:
* The current world record for folding a piece of paper in half is 12 times. That's about 4,096 layers (2^12).

* One Norse god can fold up a ship and stick it into his pocket.

* RobertHeinlein's ''Literature/GloryRoad''. The foldbox which carries all of the team's equipment.
-->Rufo's baggage turned out to be a little black box about the size and shape of a portable typewriter. He opened it. And opened it again. And kept on opening it and kept right on unfolding its sides and letting them down until the durn thing was the size of a small moving van and even more packed.
** In Robert Heinlein's short story "AndHeBuiltACrookedHouse", a [[MadArtist mad architect]] designs a house in the form of an unfolded tesseract (four-dimensional cube); it is constructed in Southern California; an earthquake causes it to fold up. ''[[AlienGeometries Into the fourth dimension]].''

* ''{{Paranoia}}'' adventure The Yellow Clearance Black Box Blues, Mission 4. In order to enter Troubleshooter Headquarters the {{PC}}s must enter a huge machine. If they do so (or if they refuse to do so), the machine folds in on itself repeatedly until it's the size of a suitcase.

* ''{{paranoia}}'' adventure The Yellow Clearance Black Box Blues, Mission 4. In order to enter Troubleshooter Headquarters the {{PC}}s must enter a huge machine. If they do so (or if they refuse to do so), the machine folds in on itself repeatedly until it's the size of a suitcase.

-->-- '''SpongebobSquarepants'''

!! [[AC: {{Advertising}}]]:

!! [[AC: ComicBooks]]:

!! [[AC: {{Film}}]]:

!! [[AC: {{Literature}}]]:

!! [[AC: TabletopGames]]:

!! [[AC: VideoGames]]:

!! [[AC: WesternAnimation]]:

!! [[AC: RealLife]]:

* A commercial for the SciFiChannel featured a car folding into a briefcase. May be a ShoutOut to TheJetsons (see WesternAnimation entry below).

* {{Iznogoud}} features an example of this. In "Iznogoud's nightmarish birthday", he opens a very small box and extracts a small piece of paper and proceeds to unfold it (it's so small that he needs a magnifying glass to start to unfold it). When completely unfold, the paper is several metres large. Of course, the box had been given to him by the guild of mages...
* At one point in the original comic-book version of TheTick, the Tick and Arthur take a road trip; the Tick insists that he knows how to fold up their (standard US-style) road map, but every time he tries, he produces an even larger wad of paper, until he's filled up the entire backseat of the car with it.

* In SorcerersApprentice when Dalthazar gives Dave the book he unfolds it from tinyness.
* In {{Transformers}} the allspark cube-thing goes from the size of a house to the size of a basketball.
* In TheSimpsonsMovie, Homer has a small-billboard-sized poster of Alaska folded up to the size of a business card.

* One Norse god can fold up a ship and stick it in his pocket.

** In RobertHeinlein's short story "AndHeBuiltACrookedHouse", a [[MadArtist mad architect]] designs a house in the form of an unfolded tesseract (four-dimensional cube); it is constructed in Southern California; an earthquake causes it to fold up. ''[[AlienGeometries Into the fourth dimension]].''

* {{paranoia}} adventure The Yellow Clearance Black Box Blues, Mission 4. In order to enter Troubleshooter Headquarters the {{PC}}s must enter a huge machine. If they do so (or if they refuse to do so), the machine folds in on itself repeatedly until it's the size of a suitcase.
* DungeonsAndDragons module I12 Egg of the Phoenix. The title egg is an homage to the foldbox in the GloryRoad entry in the {{Literature}} section. It can be opened up multiple times, each time becoming larger.

* The {{Pokemon}} games feature a bike that can be folded up small enough to fit into a backpack, although this may just be an example of BagOfHolding.

* On one ''PinkPanther'' cartoon, Pink is hungry, so he folds up the background to the size of an index card and eats it. [[DinnerDeformation It then unfolds inside him.]]

* In ''TheFlintstones'' episode ''The Hit Song Writers,'' the celebrity songwriter Hoagy performs Fred's and Barney's song on piano, then immediately folds the piano into a briefcase and exits the stage.

* The current world record for folding a piece of paper in half is 12 times. That's about 4096 layers (2^12).

!! [[AC: {{RealLife}}]]:
* The current world record for folding a piece of paper in half is 12 times. That's about 4096 layers (2^12).

->Rufo's baggage turned out to be a little black box about the size and shape of a portable typewriter. He opened it. And opened it again. And kept on opening it and kept right on unfolding its sides and letting them down until the durn thing was the size of a small moving van and even more packed.

* The current world record for folding a piece of paper in half is 12 times. It's got over 8,000 layers at that point.

->'''Barnacle Boy:''' Drive? What do you know about driving the Invisible Boatmobile?\
->'''Spongebob:''' Tons. Like the windshield wipers are right here. (pushes a button) \

* [[TheJetsons George Jetson's]] car could fold up into a briefcase which can easily be carried into his workplace in the show's intro.
* PhineasAndFerb loves using this.

** Their "Plataposterior" robot is about ten feat tall, but folds up into a square that fits in Ferbs front pocket.
** The full sized chemistry lab they carry around with them also qualifies.
** Also the Wrapped up in a nice little boxinator literally compacts his WHOLE BUILDING into a tiny box.

* In an episode of ''TheSimpsons'' Homer folds a GiantNoveltyCheck into a small wad and stuffs it into his pocket. [[SubvertedTrope Then it expands.]]

* Lampshaded with the credits of ''WesternAnimation/RockyAndBullwinkle'', which Bullwinkle claims "are all here on this itty-bitty card"; the card then folds out to list the cast and crew.

A subtrope of {{Hammerspace}} and ToonPhysics, and a supertrope of TelescopingRobot. May overlap with TransformingMecha, BagOfHolding, or SwissArmyWeapon.