History Main / TwinSwitch

** ''Anime/TurnAGundam'' had Queen Dianna Soriel of the Moonrace and Kihel Heim of Inglessa switch places shortly into their first meeting with each other. Dianna originally did it as a practical joke on her attendants (being Queen doesn't give you too many chances to have fun), but it ends up going too far when they are separated by a war, and Kihel ends up spending the bulk of the series making major political decisions as the leader of the Moonrace while Dianna is put in mortal peril numerous times traveling with Loran Cehack and his Gundam. [[spoiler:At the end of the series, they switch for one final time, with Kihel ruling the Moonrace while Dianna settles down with Loran, realizing her dream of living out her remaining years peacefully on the beautiful Earth.]]
** ''Manga/MobileSuitGundamTheOrigin'' has a much darker take, with Casval Rem Deikun and [[TheRealRemingtonSteele the real Char Aznable]], who look identical except for their eye color. Casval, knowing the Zabi family is planning to assassinate him and correctly guessing they'll plant a bomb on the commercial space flight the boys are taking to military school, plants a gun on Char so spaceport security will detain him, then "generously" offers to switch places, thus becoming the Char we all know and love while the real one's remains are scattered through outer space.

* Pulled off nicely in ''VideoGame/NancyDrew Warnings At Waverly Academy'' with [[spoiler:Kim and Rachel Hubbard]]. When Nancy finds out, they explain that mother was dead and their father was clueless about taking care of them, so they applied at various schools to avoid being separated. Waverly Academy was the only school that accepted, but for only one of them, so they pulled this on the faculty. And they actually did a ''very'' good job at this, since even some of the ''players'' were fooled when TheReveal came. [[spoiler:Side by side, it's pretty easy to tell Rachel from Kim -- Kim tucks a lock of hair behind her ear while Rachel doesn’t -- you actually ''do'' see and interact with Kim during the game, and if one looks closely when she doesn't seem to recognize you, you can see that you're talking to Kim. Also when they stand side-by-side, you can see that one of the twins is taller than the other]] It also turned out well for them because despite that they were expelled, the alumnae said that their scheme was so they could get a good education and should be rewarded, so the faculty paid for their tuition and room and board.

* A variant on this happens in the French comic, ''Les Passagers du Vent'' (''The Passengers of the Wind''), though it's played entirely for drama. The two girls, Agnes and Isabeau, aren't related; Agnes is the daughter of a nobleman widower and Isabeau is an orphan girl brought into the household to be Agnes's playmate. Agnes and Isa aren't ''completely'' identical, but they are the same age and they resemble each other enough that when Agnes's father returns after having been away at court for years, they correctly guess he won't be able to tell which one is his actual daughter. In order to play a prank on him, they swap clothes and pretend to be one another... and the prank ends up working too well, as Agnes's father, to "take care of their further education," sends "Isa" (really Agnes) off to a convent while keeping "Agnes" (really Isa) with him. Scared of being sent to the convent herself, "Agnes" keeps the bluff going, and hence nobody listens to "Isa's" attempt at telling the truth. The girls end up permanently living each other's lives, leading to a very complicated love/hate relationship between them as adults.

** Before being exposed in the third issue Diabolik used the identity of Walter Dorian, who was later revealed being [[InexplicablyIdenticalIndividuals a man that just looks like him]] that Diabolik had assaulted and pushed into a river before stealing his identity believing he had killed him, even confessing his murder on his first arrest. Years later Walter Dorian, who in the meantime had been captured by rogue soldiers and imprisoned as a spy, managed to come back to Clerville, and was ''not'' amused at finding out who the man who nearly killed him was... Or that the government, believing him dead without relatives, had seized all his assets.

* A variant on this happens in the French comic, ''Les Passagers du Vent'' (''The Passengers of the Wind''), though it's played for drama and not comedy. The two girls, Agnes and Isabeau, aren't related (Isabeau, nicknamed "Isa", is an orphan brought in as Agnes's playmate), and while they resemble one another, they aren't completely identical. However, Agnes's father is away a lot, and when he returns home he hasn't seen eithet girl for six years. They suspect he won't be able to tell which one of them is his daughter, and so they decide to play a prank on him, swap clothes and pretend to be one another. The prank ends up working too well when Agnes's father, to take care of their further education, sends "Isa" (really Agnes) off to a convent while keeping "Agnes" (really Isa) with him in the belief that she's his real daughter. Scared of being sent to the convent herself, "Agnes" keeps the bluff going, and hence nobody listens to "Isa's" attempt at telling the truth. The girls end up permanently living each other's lives, leading to a very complicated love/hate relationship between them as adults.

* A variant on this happens in the French comic, ''Les Passagers du Vent'' (''The Passengers of the Wind''), though it's played for drama and not comedy. The two girls, Agnes and Isabeau, aren't related (Isabeau, nicknamed "Isa", is an orphan brought in as Agnes's playmate), and while they resemble one another, they aren't completely identical. In order to play a prank on Agnes's father, who hasn't seen either of them for years, they swap clothes and pretend to be one another -- and the prank works so well that he, to take care of their further education, sends "Isa" (really Agnes) off to a convent while keeping "Agnes" (really Isa) with him in the belief that she's his real daughter. Scared of being sent to the convent herself, "Agnes" keeps the bluff going, and hence nobody listens to "Isa's" attempt at telling the truth. The girls end up permanently living each other's lives, leading to a very complicated love/hate relationship between them as adults.

* ''VideoGame/{{Siren}}'': [[spoiler: Late in the game, Shiro kills his twin Kei, and takes his place, though the cutscene in which it happens is deliberately ambiguous, making it look like Shiro has killed himself. You can still play as 'Kei', but he has Shiro's items and voice actor.]]

* In ''Anime/{{Pokemon}}'', May and Jesse would wind up accidentally getting their Wurmple swapped, and the twerps have to track down Team Rocket to return the Wurmple to their rightful trainers.

* Roderick Kingsley, AKA the Hobgoblin and enemy of Franchise/SpiderMan, frequently used his twin brother Daniel Kingsley in his criminal schemes. Since Daniel was a whiny, sniveling DirtyCoward, Roderick exploited this to make people think that he too was a pathetic weakling rather than the MagnificentBastard he really was.
** ''ComicBoook/SpiderMan'' has done this himself with his clone Kaine. [[spoiler: During the Grim Hunt arc, Kaine pretends to be Peter to trick the Kravinoff family into hunting him for their ritual to resurrect the original Kraven, which resulted in Kraven coming back unable to be killed except by a Spider. [[DeathSeeker He's not happy]].]]

* In ''ComicBook/XMen Noir'', [[spoiler:Thomas and Robert Halloway]] made a game of making people think there was only one of them when they were kids. After their father died, they were adopted by different families -- but when they met up as adults, [[spoiler:Robert]] insisted on keeping up the game. If anything you could probably consider this an ''in''version; they used this trick so their singular identity could be in two places at once.
* ''Franchise/WonderWoman'':

See also TagTeamTwins for a [[ProfessionalWrestling different]] type of Twin Switch and TwinTest, which may involve a Twin Switch if you're dealing with some TricksterTwins. Compare with PrinceAndPauper. Contrast FakeTwinGambit, where a character claims to be their own twin, who doesn't really exist. A SubTrope to IdenticalTwinMistake.

See also TagTeamTwins for a [[ProfessionalWrestling different]] type of Twin Switch and TwinTest, which may involve a Twin Switch if you're dealing with some TricksterTwins. Compare with PrinceAndPauper. Contrast FakeTwinGambit. A SubTrope to IdenticalTwinMistake.