History Main / ReplicantSnatching

* In ''[[JohnCWright The War of the Dreaming]]'', selkies refer to the skins as "jackets," and they can be made from any species' flesh. Weirdly enough, this is also played for comedy: high-ranking selkie switch skins so often the lower ranks are perpetually confused about their identities.

* There is a reversal of this trope in Asimov's ''Evidence'', where it is implied that a man who was crippled in an accident created a replicant for himself, who replaced him by his own consent, [[spoiler: and who eventually came to rule Earth, in a very beneficial manner.]]

* How the Akuma of ''DGrayman'' gain their human forms. To add to the horror of it, though, the body they use is always the one who called the soul powering the Akuma back from the dead -- which only works if they are someone the deceased cared strongly for. So the traumatised soul ends up in a robot body wearing their beloved's skin and with no free will of their own. NightmareFuel much?

* The [[TroperWorks Troper Work]] ''TheToymakersWorkshop,'' being based on the ''TabletopGame/ChangelingTheLost'' example, is about the construction of a fetch.

* It's implied in the ''Film/{{Transformers}}'' films that the Decepticons made a point of destroying the vehicles they mimic, partially for infiltration reasons (Blackout caused a great deal of confusion by being a helicopter that was previously destroyed) and partially because they have no regard for human life. The Autobots are, unsurprisingly, more descret about acquiring their vehicle modes.

* This is at least OlderThanPrint; [[TheFairFolk fairies]] were said to operate this way in English folklore, kidnapping babies and replacing them with lookalikes of their own kind known as "changelings".
** The roleplaying game ''[[TabletopGame/ChangelingTheLost Changeling: the Lost]]'' plays on this. The changelings of the title are actually the humans who were abducted (at any age, not just as babies) and taken away to Faerie; fetches, beings crafted from random detritus and animated by TheFairFolk, take their place, believing themselves to be the person who was replaced.
* Foxes do this too--particularly in Korean mythology, but the neighbors have picked up some of it. Accounts vary, but typically the fox finds someone with the right skull dimensions, kills them, eats them, and then puts on their skull and assumes their identity. For different periods depending on the purpose; maybe just long enough to get into the house and eat your baby, maybe longer.

* ''CaptainScarlet and the Mysterons''' titular Mysterons fit this trope to a T. ''"Possessing the ability to re-create an exact likeness of an object or person -- but first, they must destroy."''

* The trope picture comes from the Sega CD game ''{{Snatcher}}'', despite its oversimplification of the titular robots' preferred method of impersonating humans: grafting the replica skin and muscle tissue of their quarry over an exoskeleton in a [[PeopleJars People Jar]].

* This is the purpose of the titular conspiracy in ''TheZetaProject''. Its purpose is to allow the government to assassinate anyone it wants; they then send a holographic robot duplicate to prevent suspicion among the target's acquaintances.

* [[QuirkyMinibossSquad Quirky Miniboss]] Cobalt Claw does this to an OfficeLady [[TheLibby Libby]] in the ''CuteyHoney'' [[TheMovie live-action movie]]. She then proceeds to wear the "suit" backwards while [[CeilingCling crawling on the ceiling]], so apparently it was just ForTheEvulz.

* The [[TroperWorks Troper Work]] ''TheToymakersWorkshop,'' being based on the ''ChangelingTheLost'' example, is about the construction of a fetch.

** The roleplaying game ''[[ChangelingTheLost Changeling: the Lost]]'' plays on this. The changelings of the title are actually the humans who were abducted (at any age, not just as babies) and taken away to Faerie; fetches, beings crafted from random detritus and animated by TheFairFolk, take their place, believing themselves to be the person who was replaced.

http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/TSP.gif

* The Soultaker from ''Limbo of the Lost'' stole [[spoiler:the Mayor of Darkmere]]'s skin to hide itself from the populace.

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* The Edgar-Bug in the first ''MenInBlack'' movie skinned and wore an "Edgar Suit" that rapidly decomposed throughout the movie.

* The Slitheen from ''DoctorWho'' kill ministers, skin them and wear the 'suits' using gas compression technology.

The InnocentBystander's family [[GlamourFailure doesn't notice anything.]] Why should they? He's [[AntagonistsAssimilate the same as he always was.]] As long as they don't check the one dumpster where you left his skinless corpse and his removed, [[ExpositionBeam scanned-for-memories brain]], you're safe. In all your plucky advanced [[HollywoodCyborg cyborg]] glory.

* Inverted in {{Philip K Dick}}'s short story ''The Father-thing''. When an alien takes the place of the protagonist's father, he eats his insides, leaving only a dry, dead skin behind.

* In ''[[JohnCWright The War of the Dreaming]]'', selkies refer to the skins as "jackets."

* This is the central concept of [[http://storiesyouplay.com/44/ 44]], in which the PCs are people who've had a close relative or friend replaced by a robot, and the GM controls the Section 44 conspiracy. Brilliantly, player characters can be replaced during the game, and join the GM on the bad guy side.

Unfortunately, there's a problem. Because you're a physical being, you can't [[BodySnatcher flat-out possess someone]]. Even if you can [[VoluntaryShapeShifting shape-shift]] into a perfect replica of a human, you can't just integrate yourself into normal human society, [[UndeadTaxExemption without any form of identity.]] Sooner or later you'll get the cops on your tail, and all ''they'' need to do is put you through a metal detector and it's Game Over. Even perfectly imitating a real individual will cause problems [[SpotTheImposter if the original]] [[BecauseImJonesy shows up]].

The InnocentBystander's family [[GlamourFailure doesn't notice anything.]] Why should they? He's [[AntagonistsAssimilate the same as he always was.]] As long as they don't check the one dumpster where you left his skinless corpse and his removed, scanned-for-memories brain, you're safe. In all your plucky advanced [[HollywoodCyborg cyborg]] glory.

See also DeadPersonImpersonation.

[[AC:{{Literature}}]]

** Also happened with the Terminatrix of the third movie.

* In ''[[http://www.johndiesattheend.com John Dies At The End]]'', Korrok's clones kill/replace the originals and proceed to go about their lives with all the memories of the original. For added authenticity, although the clones can be remote-controlled in emergencies, the replacements themselves lack alien memories and have no idea they're not the originals. This eventually leads [[spoiler:to a TomatoInTheMirror situation.]]

* The Tchokar in the ''Lords of Madness'' supplement for ''DungeonsAndDragons'' are tentacle monsters that can insert themselves into a humanoid host and either tag along harmlessly or violently usurp the original person.

* The Soultaker from ''Limbo of the Lost'' stole [[spoiler:the Mayor of Darkmere]]'s skin to hide itself from the populance.

* The trope picture comes from the Sega CD game ''{{Snatcher}}'', despite its oversimplification of the titular robots' preferred method of impersonating humans: grafting the replica skin and muscle tissue of their quarry over an exoskeleton in a [[PeopleJars People Jar]].

* In [[JohnCWright The War of the Dreaming]], selkies refer to the skins as "jackets."
* This is at least OlderThanPrint; [[TheFairFolk fairies]] were said to operate this way in English folklore, kidnapping babies and replacing them with lookalikes of their own kind known as "changelings".
** The roleplaying game ''[[ChangelingTheLost Changeling: the Lost]]'' plays on this. The changelings of the title are actually the humans who were abducted (at any age, not just as babies) and taken away to Faerie; fetches, beings crafted from random detritus and animated by TheFairFolk, take their place, believing themselves to be the person who was replaced.
* In ''[[http://www.johndiesattheend.com John Dies At The End]]'', Korrok's clones kill/replace the originals and proceed to go about their lives with all the memories of the original. For added authenticity, although the clones can be remote-controlled in emergencies, the replacements themselves lack alien memories and have no idea they're not the originals. This eventually leads [[spoiler:to a TomatoInTheMirror situation.]]

* The premise of ''Imposter'' is that look-alike copies of key people can be sent after targets, exploding violently once contact is made. The hero is accused of being one such imposter.
* The Slitheen from ''DoctorWho'' kill ministers, skin them and wear the 'suits' using gas compression technology.

* It was recently revealed in the webcomic ''[[http://starfire.poecatcomix.com/2007/01/31/01312007/ Starfire Agency]]'' [[spoiler: that one of the characters is a replicant unaware of his status]] when he's abducted by aliens (again) and has the situation explained to him. [[spoiler: Then they repair his damaged sleeper personality and erase his memories. Perhaps the aliens were just explaining to the readers?]]
* The Tchokar in the ''Lords of Madness'' supplement for ''DungeonsAndDragons'' are tentacle monsters that can insert themselves into a humanoid host and either tag along harmlessly or violently usurp the original person.
* How the Akuma of ''DGrayman'' gain their human forms. To add to the horror of it, though, the body they use is always the one who called the soul powering the Akuma back from the dead -- which only works if they are someone the deceased cared strongly for. So the traumatised soul ends up in a robot body wearing their beloved's skin and with no free will of their own. NightmareFuel much?

* The Soultaker from ''Limbo of the Lost'' stole [[spoiler:the Mayor of Darkmere]]'s skin to hide itself from the populance.
* ''CaptainScarlet and the Mysterons''' titular Mysterons fit this trope to a T. ''"Possessing the ability to re-create an exact likeness of an object or person -- but first, they must destroy."''

* The Archaeologists in RequiemChevalierVampire are resurrected with no skin and have to spend most of their time floating in tanks; when one of them needs to venture outside their servants promptly flay some poor schmuck alive (with lots of screaming and thankfully some discretion shots) so the master can wear their skin.
* The [[TroperWorks Troper Work]] ''TheToymakersWorkshop,'' being based on the ChangelingTheLost example, Is about the construction of a fetch.

* In DS9 Episode "Homefront", Sisko convinces the president that security measures are needed to prevent just that. [[spoiler: It all was actually orchestrated by an evil admiral, though changelings do disguise themselves as people]]