Line #50 Main/EnclosedExtraterrestrials


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9	[[quoteright:230:[[VideoGame/MassEffect3 https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/tali_form_png_2.png]]]]
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11	An Enclosed Extraterrestrial is a kind of alien whose entire race seems to cover their bodies from head to toe, whether by clothing, attire, armors or even especially designed artifacts. Sometimes this is done because they have some [[BizarreAlienBiology biological need]], others just don't want [[DontLookAtMe any stranger to see their real looks]] because of some sort of cultural taboo, or because they are EnergyBeings or StarfishAliens choosing AFormYouAreComfortableWith.
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13	Often done for budgetary reasons (as it [[ObscuredSpecialEffects saves you time and money from complex make-ups and/or body painting]]), when correctly used may create some truly creative design and give the creatures a truly alien look. Sometimes combined with UniformityException in order to save money on expensive makeup. Contrast with the exact opposite ExposedExtraterrestrials.
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15	May overlap with MobileFishbowl, which is when aquatic beings survive on land by wearing or carrying water with them. SuperTrope to LittleGreenManInACan.
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17	!!Examples:
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19	[[foldercontrol]]
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21	[[folder:Comic Books]]
22	* Inverted in ''ComicBook/JudgmentDayECComics'', in which a human astronaut visits a planet of robots to determine their fitness to join the Galactic Federation and keeps his helmet on for the entire visit. He eventually decides that the robots are not ready to join because some robots [[RobotsEnslavingRobots discriminate against others]] because of the color of their casings. In the final panel [[spoiler:he takes off his helmet, showing he is a black man]].
23	* ''ComicBook/Superboy1994'': While most of the slaves on the alien Kossak's ship are wearing very minimal clothing in addition to their slave collars a handful are in full body covering suits with helmets presumably because they couldn't survive the ship's atmosphere without them.
24	* ''ComicBook/TechJacket'' has the Geldarians, who are always wearing their Tech Jackets as TwentyFourHourArmor due to their weak bodies, but their helmets are retractable.
25	[[/folder]]
26
27	[[folder:Films -- Animation]]
28	* ''WesternAnimation/BattleForTerra'' has the peaceful inhabitants of planet Terra raided by an alien {{Generation Ship\|s}}. The invaders wear flight suits with full helmets, as they cannot breathe the heavy Terrian air. In fact, the Terrians actually swim around in their atmosphere. [[spoiler:The aliens are revealed to be humans who have become InvadingRefugees after a nuclear war left Venus, Earth, and Mars uninhabitable.]]
29	[[/folder]]
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31	[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]
32	* The Jawas and the Tusken in the ''Franchise/StarWars'' franchise cover all their bodies with heavy clothing, hoods and masks, among other things. In the expanded universe is explained that, at least in the case of the Tusken, showing any kind of skin is an absolute taboo.
33	[[/folder]]
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35	[[folder:Literature]]
36	* ''Literature/TheStarKings'': The H'harn from ''Return to the Stars'' are completely covered with cloaks whenever interacting with humans. The reason becomes obvious when one undresses to [[MentalFusion mind-meld]] with the protagonist.
37	[[/folder]]
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39	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
40	* ''Series/BabylonFive'':
41	** The Vorlons claim to use their strange-looking exo-suits to survive in other environments, although later it is revealed that the real reason is to hide their true EnergyBeings-meet-StarfishAliens look from outsiders.
42	** The Gaim are InsectoidAliens; their ambassadors are the only humanoid ones [[AllThereInTheManual according to background material]] (as they are all genetically designed by their queens), but still have insectoid features. They use a full body armor not so much to hide their look (other insectoid aliens walk without them) but because they can't breed in the environments that most races find comfortable. The name of the race is an homage from Creator/JMichaelStraczynski to Creator/NeilGaiman, as the Gaim's helmet looks like the one use by ''ComicBook/TheSandman1989''.
43	** In the LowerDeckEpisode "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS05E04AViewFromTheGallery A View from the Gallery]]", the station is attacked by alien FacelessMooks who look like [[https://neatnik2009.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/a-view-from-the-gallery-03.jpg?w=1000 Red Stormtroopers]].
44	* ''Series/DoctorWho'':
45	** The Daleks are actually OctopoidAliens inside their iconic metallic armour.
46	** The race of Ice Warriors, originally native to ancient Mars, consider it the ultimate disgrace to remove their armored body-suits. Thus, the Eleventh Doctor knows the situation has become ''really'' dire when one resorts to doing this in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS33E8ColdWar Cold War]]".
47	** The antagonist of "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E1TheWomanWhoFellToEarth The Woman Who Fell to Earth]]" is a Stenza, who come from a planet much colder than Earth, with a body temperature low enough to freeze humans on skin contact. As a result, he wears a suit of armour. However, downplaying the trope, he can expose his hands and face briefly with no ill effects.
48	* [[OurTrollsAreDifferent Trolls]] in ''Series/TheShannaraChronicles'' are fully covered in [[AfterTheEnd post-apocalyptic]] {{Steampunk}}[=-looking=] suits.
49	* The Breen in ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' are entirely hidden behind suits and long-snouted helmets. Worf mentions that no one has ever seen a Breen without their suit and lived to speak of it. The suits are known to be refrigerated, regulating a cold environment for the wearer, and the Breen are known to have no blood. The most common belief among the races of the Alpha Quadrant is that the Breen homeworld is a frozen wasteland, which is why they need to wear refrigeration suits. However, Weyoun once refers to the Breen homeland as being quite comfortable, maintaining the mystery of the Breen and their suits. An ExpandedUniverse novel, ''Literature/StarTrekTyphonPact: Zero Sum Game'', claims that the Breen wear the suits to promote equality between the different species of their Confederacy by forcing them all to have the same external appearance.
50	* ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'': In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZone1959S2E15TheInvaders The Invaders]]", a woman living alone on a farm is menaced by two small aliens in form-concealing armor. [[spoiler:At the end of the episode, we learn that the 'aliens' are actually human astronauts, and the woman is a giant alien.]]
51	[[/folder]]
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53	[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
54	* The Suspended from ''TabletopGame/TheyCameFromBeneathTheSea'' are a weird mixture of this trope and MobileFishbowl. They get their name because they are always encased in enormous masses of psychoreactive slime, which they can control with their thoughts to make it function like a cross between a BlobMonster and exoarmor. They need this slimy shell because in their natural state they have no prehensile limbs and they can't breathe oxygen, so the slime-bubble keeps them alive and lets them use its pseudopods to interact with the world.
55	* ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000'': The Tau's body armor tends to be a lot more enclosing than those of other factions (they still indulge in HelmetsAreHardlyHeroic, just not to the extent of the others), including their basic troops. Their helmets' CyberCyclops appearance can also unnerve some of the humans they deal with.
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58	[[folder:Video Games]]
59	* In ''VideoGame/AgeOfWondersPlanetfall'', the ancestors of the Dvar were forced to constantly wear their extreme environment exo-suits to survive the DeathWorld they were stranded on. About fifty thousand years later, their descendants cannot survive without them outside of Dvar dwellings.
60	* In ''VideoGame/DawnOfWar'', the only Tau unit without a face-concealing helmet is the Ethereal, who wears robes anyway.
61	* ''VideoGame/{{Destiny}}'':
62	** The Cabal are rhino-like humanoids with SpaceMarine troops, covered completely in armor, and with a few exceptions (headshots cause their helmets to fly off and reveal their face for normal troops, Dominus Ghaul, the Consul, Calus, and Caiatl), none of them show their faces.
63	** The Fallen are SpacePirates who have a lot of their units wear helmets or other headgear that only show their eyes, and at first glance, you'd be forgiven for thinking said eyes are just eyeholes or optics. The Dregs of House of Dusk are an exception, showing their face and hair in full, revealing the ScaryTeeth they have.
64	** Averted for the Hive, who, while looking like they wear chitinous armor at first glance, are actually effectively nude, given that the armor is actually part of their bodies.
65	* ''VideoGame/MassEffect'':
66	** The volus live in a high-pressure greenhouse atmosphere, forcing them to use full-body suits when dealing with other species.
67	** The quarians are SpaceNomads, and after centuries of living in sterilized environments, they have lost most of their immune system. Thus, they [[BubbleBoy always use enviro-suits to protect themselves from disease or infection]] when dealing with other races.
68	* ''VideoGame/NoMansSky'' has the Anomaly race that the player starts every standard game as, who are the only race in the game who exclusively have helmets for their head options. All the other race options abide by this save for the head, as no below-the-neck options reveal the wearer underneath.
69	* The Terraniux Mercenaries of ''VideoGame/UnrealI'' are enclosed inside their combat environment suits probably since they can't survive in the Earth-like environment.
70	* ''Videogame/XCom2'':
71	** The Andromedons are unable to breathe oxygen and the atmosphere of their own planet is toxic to humans. As a result, the ones encountered during the game all wear PoweredArmor with samples of the gases they breathe sealed inside them. Depleting an Andromedon's health results in the suit's glass-like "helmet" shattering, with the alien inside briefly spasming as they quickly suffocate... leaving the player with [[AnimatedArmor the suit itself now operating autonomously]].
72	** The Gatekeepers are largely shapeless tentacled blobs that always keep themselves within spherical metallic shells. That being said, while they spend most of their time in the closed-up state, they do open their shells and "expose" their bodies to the environment whenever they exercise their psionic powers, only to immediately close it up as a free reaction the moment they're struck with enemy fire.
73	[[/folder]]
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75	[[folder:Western Animation]]
76	* ''Franchise/Ben10'': In ''[[WesternAnimation/Ben10UltimateAlien Ultimate Alien]]'', P'andor's body is completely covered by armored ContainmentClothing to contain his unstable {{Energy Being\|s}} body. It's unknown if this is the norm for his species, as he was [[ClingyCostume sealed in the suit]] as punishment for previous crimes. However, in ''[[WesternAnimation/Ben10Omniverse Omniverse]]'', an artificial HalfHumanHybrid of this species wears something similar that also covers him from head to toe. Ben's NRG [[VoluntaryShapeshifting form]], taken from scanning P'andor's DNA, keeps the suit and wears it most of the time, but (starting from ''Omniverse'') is capable of exiting it at will and displaying his true form more often.
77	* Trollans in ''WesternAnimation/HeManAndTheMastersOfTheUniverse1983'', of which Orko is the most famous one, are all cover in heavy clothes except for their ears, eyes and hands, and in their culture showing their faces is so intimate that is the equivalent of kissing.
78	[[/folder]]

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