History PaperThinDisguise / AnimeAndManga

** James' disguises are usually good, especially when he crossdresses. The problem with Jessie's is that she almost always keeps her long red hair. But Meowth is easily the greatest user of this trope, all he needs is a baseball cap, t-shirt and shorts and suddenly he is a human student. What about the feet? The whiskers? The paws? THE TAIL?! The fact that he's ''less than two feet tall''?!? Ash must have some serious vision problems...[[http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/List_of_Team_Rocket%27s_disguises Here the list of all of them.]]

** In several episodes Meowth disguises himself as a Sunflora by taping his eyes shut and holding cardboard leaves.

** Subverted in ''Fire and Ice'' by [[LovableSexManiac Brock]] when Jessie pretends to be Nurse Joy. "My beloved Nurse Joy's lips actually move when she talks!" Brock is known to have the unique ability to tell all of [[InexplicablyIdenticalIndividuals the apparently identical Nurse Joys]] apart at a single glance, which is probably why he wasn't fooled.

** Possibly the most blatant disguise of all was when they dressed up as ''vikings'' in the ''Anime/PokemonTheFirstMovie''. The fact that A) vikings haven't been around for about 1,000 years and B) they never were in Japan never crosses their minds and barely crosses the protagonists' either.
--->'''Brock''':"I didn't know the Vikings were still around!\\
'''Ash''': Yeah, they mostly live in [[UsefulNotes/AmericanFootball Minnesota!]]"
** This is averted in the a few episodes of Best Wishes, as their black clothing, hats, glasses, and coats make good ways of disguising Team Rocket’s identity. This time, it would make sense for Ash & co to not recognize them.
** Played with to a bizarre degree in the penultimate episode of ''Best Wishes": While Jessie attacks, James disguises as a recurring character named Porter, in order to trick the twerps and take their Pokemon. His disguise is actually good. But in order to avoid suspicion in Jessie attacking them alone, she disguises the left half of her body as James. She'll turn her body one side to say her lines, hiding her James side from the twerps, and doing the reverse for James' lines. It's downright absurd.
** Played ridiculously straight in the episode "Crowning the Scalchop King" when Team rocket has Meowth dress up and painted up to look like a Dewott. '''Everybody''' buys the disguise and nobody sees that it's a sham until the blue painting came off.

** In ''[=XY029=]'', Team Rocket disguise themselves as Ash, Serena and Bonnie, with Meowth having a fake-looking Dedenne hand puppet to complete his Bonnie disguise, and James's Inkay is disguised as Pikachu...which floats in the air. They intentionally make trouble in public and announce the names and hometowns of the twerps, so that the twerps can be reported to Officer Jenny. Anyone who meets the actual group in person is quickly able to notice the difference. This is intentional on Team Rocket's part, since they ''want to be found out'', keeping the kids occupied with Officer Jenny who quickly figures out that they're impersonated, so that Clemont would be separated from his friends and sister in the meantime. And they ''want'' the twerps trying to find the fake ones to lure them into their trap.
* In one episode Serena disguises herself as Ash because a one shot character of the day is demanding a challenge when Ash is feverish and won't go away. The disguise consists entirely of wearing his clothes and attempting to hide Serena's hair under his hat (which works, but mostly because of her newer shorter hairstyle, the early season Serena could never have pulled this off). It still somehow fools the character of the day, even though he'd literally been talking to Serena a minute prior so he failed to recognize the same girl who left and came back a minute later in different clothing, and even Team Rocket is initially fooled, but they eventually figure it out. Clemont and Bonnie however, instantly can tell it's her, although she quickly gets them to keep up the ruse. To be fair though, a big part of the disguise is simply the demure Serena pulling off a pretty spot on impression of Ash's louder dynamic personality.
* Subverted in [=SM059=], after Ash, Lana, and Mallow find Drampa, who’s known for for being nice to kids. They are met by Team Rocket, who disguised themselves as preschoolers, a baby and its mother. Ash and and his friends don't buy it; instead, they're [[BlueWithShock too shocked to even respond]], and neither does Drampa, [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere who decides to flee rather than deal with their nonsense]].

** A flashback filler from Shippuden involved Naruto, Sakura, and Sasuke sneaking into a fortress run by cats by wearing cat-ear headbands.
** ''Another'' flashback filler from Shippuden featured Guy in the same wig & moustache. No one is fooled except for Naruto, but Sakura & Shikamaru go along with the gag all the same.
** Played straight during the Chunin exam arc, when Orochimaru is able to pass himself as a Jonin instructor from the Sound village (which he is actually in charge of!) by having a different hair do and slightly less snake-like appearance. He also passes as the Fourth Kazekage by hiding himself entirely in the Kage hat and cloak, which failed to arouse any suspicion. Beyond that, Orochimaru borders on LatexPerfection due to his unique and rather horrific habit of physically removing and wearing ''the faces of people he impersonates''. Orochimaru is a strange case where this trope applies even with LatexPerfection. From his expression, it is really clear to that he is Orochimaru at least for the audience. The Abridged Series inevitably poked fun at this.
** [[spoiler: Orochimaru, Sasuke, Juugo, and Suigetsu]] casually walk into Konoha and manage to avoid getting caught despite only wearing hooded cloaks. Somewhat excused by most of the ninja being out of the village.
** During the "Search for Tsunade" arc, Itachi (one of Konoha's most notorious missing-nin) and Kisame (a towering blue-haired man with distinctive gill-marks on his cheeks and sharp teeth) managed to stroll around Konoha and casual lunch without being noticed by anyone except for Kakashi, Kurenai, and Asuma. By wearing high-collared black cloaks with red clouds on them and straw hats. Said cloaks and hats actually obscure most of their features very effectively. Once they got past the guards by placing them under a genjutsu it was just a matter of not drawing attention to themselves, and they were still noticed fairly quickly.

** In the KC Grand Prix arc of the [[Anime/YuGiOh original series]] Yugi's grandfather disguised himself using his bandanna as a mask. Needless to say, only Joey -- his opponent -- fell for it. The rest simply didn't want to ruin Solomon's fun. (In the dub version, it was even more obvious; the name he used was "Apdnarg Otum" (which is just "Grandpa Muto" [[SdrawkcabName spelled backwards]]; he called himself "Mask the Rock" in the original version) and nearly gave himself away with what he said more than once.)

** [[BigBad Dr. Hell]] fabricated a cyborg seemed right like [[spoiler:[[TheProfessor Prof. Yumi]]]]... except his nails were black. The reason why Hell did not strive to create a perfect duplicate is a mystery, but if he thought nobody would notice, tough luck because [[spoiler:Sayaka, Prof. Yumi's daughter]] did. At least he did not make that mistake again when he fabricated cyborgs looked like [[spoiler:[[TheHero Kouji Kabuto]] or his mother.]]

** In ''[=XY029=]'', Team Rocket disguise themselves as Ash, Serena and Bonnie, with Meowth having a fake-looking Dedenne hand puppet to complete his Bonnie disguise, and James's Inkay is disguised as Pikachu...which floats in the air. They intentionally make trouble in public and announce the names and hometowns of the brats, so that the brats can be reported to Officer Jenny. Anyone who meets the actual group in person is quickly able to notice the difference. This is intentional on Team Rocket's part, since they ''want to be found out'', keeping the kids occupied with Officer Jenny who quickly figures out that they're impersonated, so that Clemont would be separated from his friends and sister in the meantime.

* This is averted in the a few episodes of Best Wishes, as their black clothing, hats, glasses, and coats make good ways of disguising Team Rocket’s identity. This time, it would make sense for Ash & co to not recognize them.

* Played with in [=XY012=] -- in an attempt to trick a Vivillon seller to leading the kids and Officer Jenny to his hideout, three characters try on a Spewpa disguise for bait. Ash is this trope and admits he wouldn't fit in the cage anyway. Dedenne fares a bit better, but is more Scatterbug-sized than Spewpa. Chespin is the most accurate aside from the pupil eyeholes and saying its name.

** ''Code Geass'' plays this trope to hell and back given the ridiculous variety of hairstyles in the characters. Kallen has spiky crimson hair, yet her classmates fail to recognize her until she takes off a pair of sunglasses. An even more egregious example is C.C, who has massively long green hair, was not recognized by Suzaku, who had been searching for her on and off for two years at this point, because she had a bag barely covering her face. Though since the whole cast [[YouGottaHaveBlueHair has got to have blue hair]], this is less weird than one would think. These hair colors could very well be common in the Geassverse. There's also the fact that Kallen the student uses very different body language, wears her hair differently, and the fact that Milly was the only one who knew she was half-Japanese. Not to mention the fact that Lelouch ''did'' figure out her disguise.

*** ''Gundam 00'' also has a {{Meta}} example with BigBad Ribbons Almarck, who's played by "Noboru Sogetsu"...AKA Creator/TohruFuruya, [[Anime/MobileSuitGundam Amuro Ray]]'s voice actor. The pseudonym was ostensibly done to keep Furuya's return to the franchise from overshadowing the show's actual stars, but because his voice is so distinctive it was obvious from Day 1 and fans even [[FanNickname nicknamed]] the character "Bad Amuro". Sunrise even drew special attention to it: [[spoiler:in TheMovie we learn that Ribbons was cloned from a man named "E.A. Ray"]], and one of the ''Anime/GundamBuildFighters Battlogue'' shorts has Ribbons battle Char (who gets annoyed by his voice) before Ribbons is abruptly transformed into Amuro, who dismisses any similarities between them as a coincidence.

** Euphemia tries to sneak through Ashford Academy's school festival by donning a hat and a pair of glasses. It doesn't help that she has ''waist-length pink hair''. (Not that it doesn't work...)

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[[quoteright:350:[[Anime/PokemonTheSeries https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/bush_disguise.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:350:[-And yet, Ash and friends are tricked every single time.-]]]

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* Anime/AikatsuFriends: In episode 22, Kaguya disguises herself as her twin sister Sakuya yet the only thing she did was cover the lower half of her face with a veil and it completely fools Aine and Mio.

* Subverted in ''Manga/CastleTownDandelion''. In Chapter 21/Episode 8A, Kanade gave Akane a pair of normal glasses and ''claimed'' those can disguise the user's identity in front of others. Akane, which is [[ShrinkingViolet phobic of being in the center of attention]], took the chance to apply her RoyaltySuperpower--GravityMaster to be exact--to become "Scarlet Bloom," a MagicalGirl-sorts of superhero. This of course does not fool the populace, but the ''entire country'' decided to play along. Understandably, everyone calls her... "A...Scarlet Bloom."

* ''[[Anime/TheIdolmaster THE iDOLM@STER]]'' - [[{{Tomboy}} Makoto]] dressing up as a boy so she wouldn't be recognized by her fans. [[spoiler:It doesn't always work that well.]] Haruka also wears glasses and a beret to avoid detection.

** Completely blown through in the last episode, when her {{Mentor}} shows up in her classroom and addresses her as "Pretty Sammy" in front of everyone. It turns out that the ''entire class'' knew her secret identity but they didn't say anything because it was traditional for {{Magical Girl}}s to have secret identities - they didn't want to embarrass her by mentioning it.

** After the TimeSkip, when, [[spoiler:upon the real crew's two-year disappearance, a group of impostors pretend to be the Straw Hats. Despite their bad disguises and ridiculously different looks and body shapes, absolutely everybody is fooled - even some members of the real crew!]] Though given the fact that [[spoiler:the Straw Hats were presumed dead after vanishing for two years, and would be expected to have changed appearance in that time]], this trope may be [[JustifiedTrope Justified]].

*** [[spoiler:Luffy]] takes part in a tournament wearing some different clothes, a helmet, and a fake beard. It could be considered to be an adequate disguise - although several people see through it from the start - but not when he starts to [[spoiler: use his Gum Gum powers in the ring]], which should be a dead giveaway of who he really is... yet most people still do not recognize him!
*** In the same arc, [[spoiler:Jesus Burgess]], even with his ridiculously identifiable body structure, is able to hide his identity from the others with nothing but a paper bag - a ''literal'' paper-thin disguise! - over his head. Then again, competitors that bulky in that tournament were a dime a dozen.

** The Straw Hats' attempt to sneak into a Navy base during the anime-only Marine Supernova arc features a lot of this. Of the four infiltrators, Nami's the only one who wears a thorough disguise, and even that fails because she does nothing to hide her face. Chopper's disguise as a burly marine gunner would be convincing if it weren't for the fact that he's still clearly an animal person, Carrot doesn't do anything to hide her rabbit ears or tail, but Luffy's by far the worst of the bunch; he wears the Marine's CoatCape and that's it.

** One of the more infamous examples, the girls essentially wear uniforms similar to actual [[SailorFuku school girl uniforms]] and not one of them wears even a simple mask. Yup, no masks, no hair color changes, pretty much nothing concealing their identities. Despite this, no one seems to recognize Usagi and her pals. This is particularly worse for Sailor Moon herself, whose Sailor outfit and school uniform not only share the same color scheme, but she wears her transformation brooch on ''both'' - not to mention that rather distinctive hairdo. A few of the characters are occasionally recognized not by appearance or voice, but by performing actions or behaviors unique to them. For example, Minako is id'd by an old school friend because he recognizes the way Sailor Venus plays volleyball to be the same as Minako's.

** In the KC Grand Prix arc of the [[Anime/YuGiOh original series]] Yugi's grandfather disguised himself using his bandanna as a mask. Needless to say, only Joey - his opponent - fell for it. The rest simply didn't want to ruin Solomon's fun. (In the dub version, it was even more obvious; the name he used was "Apdnarg Otum" (which is just "Grandpa Muto" [[SdrawkcabName spelled backwards]]; he called himself "Mask the Rock" in the original version) and nearly gave himself away with what he said more than once.)

* Nearly ''every'' disguise in ''Anime/GalaxyAngel'', like Vanilla wearing a handlebar mustache without hiding her ringlets or Millefeuille wearing an enormous bow-tie with a CoatHatMask.
* Played for laughs in ''Anime/{{Punchline}}''. The fact Mikatan is the superhero "Strange Juice" is incredibly obvious however her neighbors don't realize it until they see Strange Juice without her mask.
* In ''Anime/SDGundamForce'' episode "Undercover Mission! Learn the Gundam Force's Secrets", a pair of Zako Soldier's slap on visors over their [[CyberCyclops mono-eyes]] and approach the Gundam Force claiming to be Neotopia reporters wanting an interview. With the exception of [[IdiotHero Bakunetsumaru]], the heroes aren't fooled, but play along to get intel on the Dark Axis by goading the Zakos.

[[quoteright:350:[[Anime/{{Pokemon}} https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/bush_disguise.jpg]]]]

* In ''Franchise/{{Anpanman}}'', any of Baikinman's disguises qualify as this. No one seems to notice that characters have shrunk (or grown in the case of the very tiny characters), feminine characters suddenly gain a more masculine voice, and no one notices Baikinman's sharp teeth and pink eyes, which are never covered by his outfit. This is made even more obvious on some disguises, where he even puts tape on his face (very obviously) to get a slightly chubbier appearance.

** In ''Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventureStardustCrusaders'', [[MonsterOfTheWeek villain of the week]] Rubber Soul can use his [[FightingSpirit Stand]] Yellow Temperance to perfectly imitate the appearance of another person, which he does to infiltrate the Joestar group by imitating Kakyoin. However, he makes absolutely no effort to ''act'' like Kakyoin (it's implied that he enjoys making the people he imitates look stupid), including violently assaulting a pickpocket while [[SirSwearsalot swearing like a sailor]], randomly eating a beetle off of a tree, and creepily rolling a cherry around in his mouth. Needless to say, Jotaro doesn't buy it for a second. Of course, the episode ends with the real Kakyoin [[SugarWiki/FunnyMoments rolling a cherry with his tongue in exactly the same manner]] after he's reunited with the group.

!!Pokemon

''Anime/{{Pokemon}}'' makes such frequent use of this that it merits a section to itself.

* In one episode of ''Anime/ShimaShimaToraNoShimajiro'', Torippi tries to trick Shimajiro into thinking that he is Torippi's robot alien friend. The costume in question is literally made out of some cardboard boxes, a pair of cardboard tubes, and a pair of tin cans. It's also not perfect in that part of Torippi's wings and feet are exposed. But for some reason, Shimajiro still buys it.

* In one episode of ''Anime/ShimaShimaToraNoShimajiro'', Torippi tries to trick Shimajiro into thinking that he is Torippi's robot alien friend. The costume in question is literally made out of some cardboard boxes, a pair of cardboard tubes, and a pair of tin cans. For some reason, Shimajiro still buys it.

* In one episode of ''Anime/ShimaShimaToraNoShimajiro'', Torippi tries to trick Shimajiro into thinking that he is Torippi's robot alien friend. The costume in question is literally made out of some cardboard boxes, a pair of cardboard tubes, and a pair of tin cans. For some reason, Shimajiro still buys it.

* One of Anime/{{Doraemon}}'s gadgets takes this to the extreme. It's literally just a board that you write someone's name on. Then you hang the board around your neck and anyone who sees it thinks you're the name you wrote. You can even write something generic like "servant" and have it work.

* During the physical exam episode of ''Manga/OuranHighSchoolHostClub'', Tamaki disguises himself as Haruhi, so nobody finds out he's really a she. His disguise consists of...putting on a wig. Everyone sees through it immediately.

*** Chiharu actively convinces Sakuya to allow her to play this one straight in [[http://www.mangareader.net/hayate-the-combat-butler/309/7 Chapter 309]] of the manga.
* ''Manga/HetaliaAxisPowers'':

** In one arc, Shampoo and Kodachi [[http://www.anymanga.com/ranma/025/007/005/ wear glasses]] in order to fool Hinako.

* ''Manga/AxisPowersHetalia'':
** Averted and possibly parodied. When Japan visited Greece's land, Turkey attempts to spy on them donning a hooded green coat. It doesn't work.
** In the anime, Italy uses the disguise of the 'tomato box fairy' upon meeting Germany. It doesn't work.
** Also averted with England's fail attempts to escape from Italy. First time he tries to blend into the Italian crowd, his "disguise" consisted of his civilian clothing. He really wasn't trying to blend in all that much, especially considering how different the styles in Britain and Italy are. So of course he got caught. Admittedly his second attempt at dressing as an Italian improved but... you just can't hide those eyebrows.
** It was less about the eyebrows and more about his behavior. He didn't chase skirts around like Italians were supposed to do.
** In one episode of the anime, Germany tries to go around France's house, in disguise...by wearing a pair of glasses. France falls for this, at first, until he sees Germany mash his potatoes before eating them, as opposed to just eating them cut.
** Germany and Prussia did a similar feat by taking American uniforms, in order to spy on America. Prussia plays this straight but, once again, Germany (wearing the glasses again) is nearly caught but, recovers by flashing an "American smile" and proclaiming that he "loves hamburgers!"

* Subverted in ''Manga/KamikazeKaitouJeanne'' where her hair color and style changes and her eye color. (And people STILL think she looks similar to Maron.
* This is the primary running gag in the earlier arcs of ''Manga/KatekyoHitmanReborn''. The titular character is (at first) the only toddler that the main cast knows who's capable of intelligent speech and simply manhandling the strongest of adults with ease. Yet every time he puts on a different pair of glasses or a fake mustache he seemingly becomes unrecognizable despite his distinctive size, hairstyle and baby face. Protagonist Tsuna is usually the only one who sees through the disguises, but the tables turn in a later chapter when [[spoiler:he's the only one who ''doesn't'' recognize Reborn's adult self]].

* ''Manga/MahouSenseiNegima'':
** Negi and his students in the Magical World, being wanted criminals [[ClearMyName for a crime the villains committed]], often disguise themselves in public by using pills to make them look five years older or [[TokenMiniMoe younger than they really are]] and wearing [[CatGirl Neko themed]] adornments such as ears and tails. They've yet to be caught. Of course, few RealLife people would look at a child when searching for a teenager. Later, they even get magical Clark Kent glasses.
** Subverted by Natsumi, who is able to identify Kotaro right off the bat simply by his personality and hairstyle.

* ''Anime/DemashitaPowerpuffGirlsZ'':
** Similar to the Sailor Moon example below, nobody ever seems to figure out that the three middle school girls are actually the Powerpuff Girls, who unlike the [[WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls original series]] actually have secret identities and change into [[MagicalGirl Magical Girls]] (made even more jarring in the dub since they even have the same names in their super hero and civilian form).
** Although it's implied in one episode that their costumes have some sort of power that keep people from recognizing them since when the Professor was trying on Bubbles's outfit, his son, Ken, walks in on him and asks "Bubbles" if "she's" seen the Professor.