Paper-Thin Disguise/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Basic Trope: A character manages to hide his identity with a disguise that shouldn't have fooled anyone.

  • Straight: Bob wants to spy on Dave, the Corrupt Corporate Executive. Although they know each other well, once Bob puts on a pair of sunglasses and a suit, Dave doesn't recognize him and tells Bob his plan.
  • Exaggerated: Dave doesn't recognize Bob because he's carrying a briefcase.
    • Bob puts on his sunglasses and suit and no-one recognizes him.
    • Dave can identify everyone else on the planet (including the people he never met) even if they had put on elaborate disguises. Of course, the only one he can't identify is Bob, even without a disguise himself.
  • Justified: Dave is blind, so Bob's disguising his voice is enough.
    • Alternatively: Dave has only met Bob in person once.
  • Inverted: Bob puts on a very elaborate disguise, involving plastic surgery, voice coaching, a wig and a whole new wardrobe. Dave still knows him immediately.
  • Subverted: Bob only thought he'd fooled Dave. Actually, Dave was feeding him false information and laughing at him behind his back.
  • Double Subverted: At first, Dave thought sure it was Bob. But now he's not so sure.
    • Alternatively: It was never Bob -- Bob was standing two feet away with a fake mustache and elevator shoes, pretending to laugh with him.
  • Parodied: Bob puts on a pair of bunny ears. Dave ignores him, thinking he's a rabbit.
    • Bob puts on a T-shirt reading "I am not Bob." Dave takes the T-shirt at its word.
    • Bob doesn't even wear a disguise, but Dave still doesn't even know who he is.
    • Bob walks in undisguised, and Dave recognizes him. Bob puts on a fake mustache right in front of Dave, and suddenly Dave doesn't recognize Bob at all.
    • Bob always wears a Hachimaki but after he takes it off nobody recognizes him.
  • Deconstructed: Bob comes from an extremely superficial society in which people recognize one another not by any fundamental traits but by surface physical appearance. The author uses the success of Bob's ridiculous "disguise" to comment on human superficiality.
  • Reconstructed: If someone were to over figure out his identity, or Bob were to tell someone his identity, it will inspire a new wave of free thought and creativity.
  • Zig Zagged: Bob is sometimes identified, sometimes not.
  • Averted: Bob puts on a convincing Wig, Dress, Accent disguise.
  • Enforced: "We want to make sure the audience knows it's still Bob, so let's just give him a pair of sunglasses."
  • Lampshaded: "I should have known! He looked just like Bob, only wearing a cowboy hat!"
  • Invoked: Bob puts on the sunglasses and expects Dave not to recognize him.
  • Defied: Dave knows he's easily fooled by pathetic disguises, so he has everyone fingerprinted before entering his presence.
  • Discussed: "Just because nobody recognized Clark Kent in glasses and a suit doesn't mean they won't recognize you, Bob."
  • Conversed: "These kids' shows are just shameless. Even my three-year-old, Alice, can see through that disguise."

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