Basic Trope: Twins who look identical except for their sex.
- Straight: Twins Alice and Bob look exactly alike save for a few Tertiary Sexual Characteristics.
- Exaggerated: Alice and Bob are both very androgynous, and so sex doesn't differentiate them much. Only their parents can tell them apart.
- Downplayed: Alice and Bob share many physical similarities, yet Alice has freckles while Bob wears glasses, and the two have very different clothing styles.
- Justified:
- Alice and Bob simply bear a strong family resemblance.
- Alice and Bob are still babies. They look very much like one another—as well as half the kids at their preschool.
- Alice and Bob are genetically identical, but one is transgender.
- Alice and Bob belong to a species where sex is determined by the environment (as in some Real Life animals) rather than genetics.
- Alice is an Opposite-Sex Clone of Bob.
- Alice and Bob are the products of genetic engineering, so they have almost identical genes even with different chromosomes.
- Alice and Bob are the same person but from different universes. Both are transgender, but one is still in the closet while the one from the other universe has been out for a while and has transitioned.
- Inverted: Alice and Carol are twins of the same gender who look nothing like each other. They may differ in hair, eye, or skin color, or not appear to be the same age or even species.
- Subverted: It turns out Alice was just wearing a wig and make-up that made her look more like her brother.
- Double Subverted: …and so was Bob. Even without the make-up and wigs the two are near indistinguishable.
- Parodied:
- The twins are mistaken for each other so often that they wear shirts with their names on them in giant, bold print. Even so, people still mistake them for each other.
- The girl has short hair and wears pants, while the boy has a ponytail and wears skirts and dresses.
- Zig Zagged:
- Depending on the Artist, Alice and Bob look either near identical or no more similar than any two non-twin siblings would.
- Alice and Bob are individuals of a species with no biological sex or only one sex, but Alice presents in a feminine way while Bob presents in a masculine way.
- Averted: Alice and Bob share just enough similarities to look like they're related but otherwise have many differences.
- Enforced: The executives order the creators to give Alice and Bob similar designs to make it obvious that the two are twins.
- Lampshaded: "So, how exactly am I supposed to distinguish between Alice and Bob?"
"It's not easy. I guess you could ask them which is which?" - Invoked: Either Alice or Bob gets cosmetic surgery, resulting in the two looking more alike.
- Exploited: To disguise herself as Bob, Alice simply wears some of her brother's clothes.
- Defied: Bob, sick of being mistaken for his sister, shaves his head.
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: "I have to ask, which one is Alice and which is Bob?"
"Watch for a while longer. When they start talking, their voices will give them away." - Implied: Alice and Bob are mentioned but unseen. Charles tells Diane that he couldn't tell Alice from Bob.
Back to Half-Identical Twins
