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Line 1: {{trope}} {{quote\|'''Fuuma (in Miharu's form):''' Even though you know I'm an imposter, you still can't hurt me, can you?!~~<br />~~ '''Fuuma (in Raimei's form):''' It's naive for you to be fooled by an illusion!~~<br />~~ '''Fuuma (in Aizawa's form):''' Come on! Try to punch me!~~<br />~~ '''Tobari:''' Sorry, Aizawa. I can punch him. punches Fuuma~~<br />~~ '''Fuuma:''' Huh?!~~\|''[[Nabari no Ou]]''}}~~ \|''[[Nabari no Ou]]''}} Our hero is in a duel with a crafty [[Shape Shifter]] villain. It looks like the shapeshifter is going to lose, until he busts out the most underhanded trick of ~~all -- suddenly~~all—suddenly impersonating one of the hero's loved ones or [[True Companions]], trying to cause him to lose his will to fight. Usually, the hero ends up struggling to find the willpower to continue beating up someone who looks just like his mom/girlfriend/little sister. Bonus points if the form the shape shifter takes on is that of a [[Dead Little Sister]], for extra guilt. Line 17 ⟶ 18: Also see [[Shapeshifter Swan Song]]. {{examples}}▼ ▲{{examples}} == Anime and Manga == * Envy of ''[[Fullmetal Alchemist (manga)\|Fullmetal Alchemist]]'' positively ''loves'' this. In a pivotal moment, he uses this to {{spoiler\|kill Hughes by transforming into a replica of the wife he adores, which makes poor old Hughes hesitate just long enough to get shot}}. And given Envy's regenerative powers, it wasn't really necessary either, it was just [[For the Evulz]]. Line 28 ⟶ 29: * In ''[[Bleach]]'', the hollow Grand Fisher has a lure on his head. By reading his target's psyche, he can transform that lure into the person the target cares about the most. He impersonates Ichigo's dead mother early on in the series. ** {{spoiler\|Later on, an Arrancar also impersonates Kaien Shiba, Rukia's mentor, to great effect. This particular one happened to be the 9th Espada, Aaroniero Arruruerie}}. In both cases, the impersonator had eaten the impersonate-ee. * The ''[[Sorcerer Hunters]]'' manga had a variation: We eventually learn that [[Body Surf~~\|Body Surfing~~]]ing demon Almond Rassel had been trapped in the body of Apricot, the [[Missing Mom]] of Carrot and Marron. In the final battle, Almond has to fight Onion Glace (Carrot's [[Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass\|Crouching Moron Hidden]] [[Retired Badass]] father), and plays his current body for all it's worth. Onion has no problem attacking [[Doppelganger Spin\|Almond's clones]], but can't bring himself to attack the real body of his wife. His solution: grab on to Almond and [[Taking You with Me\|stab them both]] with his [[Precision-Guided Boomerang\|boomeranging]] [[~~BFS~~Big Freaking Sword\|Big Freaking Axe]], which he aimed at ''himself''. * Parodied in ''[[Ranma ~~One Half~~½]]'', when the Cat Demon possessed {{spoiler\|Genma}}, thinking that Ranma wouldn't attack {{spoiler\|him}}. Ranma's response: IT'S EXORCISM TIME! ** To explain further, it really didn't help that {{spoiler\|Genma forced Ramna to fight [[Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?\|a giant cat]] since, no matter how weak a demon it was, Ranma is utterly ''terrified'' of cats. Right before booting his son towards said terror, Genma says that it's a martial artist's job to defeat demons, no matter what. Ranma repeats that right before beating up his old man.}} * ''[[Dance in the Vampire Bund]]'': One of the assassins sent after Akira in vol 4 pulled this. {{spoiler\|It worked perfectly when he took the form of Graham, a colleague whom Akira killed under as yet unknown circumstances, but then she(?) twisted the knife and tried to extract information by taking the form of Mina. Big. Mistake.}} Line 36 ⟶ 37: * ''[[Fairy Tail]]'': A variation of this is used by [[Dishing Out Dirt\|Monsieur Sol]] against [[Boisterous Bruiser\|Elfman]] in the anime. He used his earth powers to create clones of his [[Dead Little Sister]]. Borders with horror. * ''[[Nabari no Ou]]'': [[Played for Laughs]] in an omake where Tobari is unable to attack Fuuma when he takes Raimei and Miharu's forms. [[Crowning Moment of Funny\|It fails when Fuuma takes Kouichi's form, though]]. * Variation in ''[[ToA ~~Aru~~Certain ~~Majutsu no~~Magical Index]]'': [[No Name Given\|The girl in the dress]] can make people feel in their hearts that she is someone else, usually a loved one. Shiage Hamazura is unable to attack her when she makes him feel that she is Rikou Takitsubo, his girlfriend. The girl in the dress notes that some people will attack her ''harder'' if she tries this, because by perceiving her as a loved one, they believe they have been betrayed and become enraged. When faced against Accelerator, she retreats, reasoning that the [[Ax Crazy]] psycho would react that way. * Variation in ''[[Getter Robo]] Armageddon,'' where an Invader (who can infect humans and [[The Virus\|turn them into more Invaders]]) attempt to guilt-trip the Shin Getter team by coating itself in the reformed bodies of [[Body Horror\|not-quite-dead]] victims. This successfully prevents the Shin Getter team from attacking it - but its not quite so useful defending against [[Ax Crazy\|Ryoma and the Black Getter]], who simply do not give a fuck. == Comic Books == Line 51: == Fan ~~Fiction~~ Works == * In the ''[[Kingdom Hearts]]'' fanfic, ''A Match made in Hell'', the [[Big Bad]] tried this separately on Sora, Roxas, and Pete, transforming into everyone they knew, including Organization XIII. Line 74: * In Juliet Marillier's ''[[The Sevenwaters Trilogy\|Child of the Prophecy]]'', the [[Evil Matriarch]] Oonagh does this during the middle of the climactic showdown: {{spoiler\|while facing off her son and granddaughter, she takes on the appearance of the son's dead wife. Made worse by the fact that she killed the wife in the first place. This throws her son off-balance long enough that she would have killed him, had his half-brother not intervened.}} * ''[[Harry Potter]]'' A spell in ''[[Harry Potter and ~~The~~the Deathly Hallows (novel)\|Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows]]'' gives {{spoiler\|Ron Weasley}} a double-dosage of this trope - the ''two'' people closest and dearest to the victim manifest and give thorough counterpoint arguments for why [[You Suck]]. A Boggart does this to Mrs. Weasley in ''Order of the Phoenix'', tormenting her by transforming into an image of her children, dead. {{spoiler\|Comes true in ''Deathly Hallows.''}} * In ''[[The Space Trilogy\|Perelandra]]'', Ransom is fighting the Un-man (the demon-possessed undead corpse of Weston, the previous book's villain) when it suddenly reverts to Weston's actual personality and begs for mercy. Ransom ignores it, and the narration points out that Weston's actual soul had most likely been completely subsumed long before. Line 87: * Subverted in an episode of ''[[Angel]]'', when the [[Monster of the Week]] appears as {{spoiler\|Wesley's}} distant father {{spoiler\|[[Killed Mid-Sentence\|and is unceremoniously shot]]}}. Notably this only happens after he threatens {{spoiler\|Wesley's}} love interest, and since {{spoiler\|Wesley}} did ''think'' it was his real father at the time he spends the next episode absent, apparently dealing with the revelation that he would have been willing to kill his own father. Made more humorous with all the other characters saying how they killed "their" fathers or mothers and haven't looked back since. ** Although not done intentionally, the demon Illyria {{spoiler\|who has "hollowed out" and taken over the body of Fred}} notes that [[Blood Knight\|Spike]] has no problem punching her in the face. {{quote\| '''Illyria''': This shell... you had affection for it.~~<br />~~ '''Spike''': Tons. Loved the bird.~~<br />~~ '''Illyria''': Yet you strike at her form without sentiment.~~<br />~~ '''Spike''': You ain't her. I can see it. ''Lord'' knows I can smell it. And I got no problem hitting it. }} * Also done in the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' story "Planet of Fire". Line 97: ** It happens again in ''[[Kamen Rider Double]]'''s movie, ''[[The Movie\|Begins Night]]'', in which {{spoiler\|a dopant poses as Shotaro's mentor and in turn, Kamen Rider Skull. When it is revealed that it's the Dummy Dopant doing the imitating, this pisses off Shotaro.}} * On ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]],'' this was [[Big Bad\|The First]]'s main tactic. Creepily, its [[The Dragon\|Dragon]] [[Sinister Minister\|Caleb]] [[Inverted Trope\|inverted]] this---the First would turn into [[Straw Misogynist\|girls]] [[Serial Killer\|he had murdered]] so he could reenact killing them ''again.'' * The ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series]]'' episode "[[Star Trek/Recap/S1 E1/E01 The Man Trap\|The Man Trap]]" features an alien [[Shape Shifter]] who impersonates McCoy's old flame, causing him to hesitate to shoot it. * ''[[Lost]]'': The Smoke Monster {{spoiler\|aka The Man in Black}} did this a lot to the main characters, though he was usually impersonating their beloved ones: {{spoiler\|he appears to Jack as his late father, to Eko as his late brother, to Ben as his late daughter, to Richard as his late wife...}} you get the idea. ~~== Roleplay ==~~ * [[Mnemosyne\|Apos]] creates a doppelganger of Bit during one of his battle with the [[We Are Our Avatars (Roleplay)\|Group]]. Line 114 ⟶ 110: == Video Games == * In the [[Final Boss]] fight of ''[[Beyond Good & Evil (video game)\|Beyond Good and Evil]],'' the [[Big Bad]]'s shape shifting [[Mooks]] mimic the forms of Jade's [[~~Sidekick\|sidekicks~~sidekick]]s. They accuse her in a [[Creepy Monotone]] of causing their suffering, and beg her to join the villain to take the pain away. Considering their [[Large Ham\|natural tendencies,]] this is especially unnerving. ** Worse, they do this right after the [[Big Bad]] apparently absorbs them both, leaving you to wonder just how fake it is. * Used a few times in a section of the first boss battle in ''[[Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots]]'', with Laughing Octopus, who uses her OctoCamo and FaceCamo to disguise herself as Naomi, then as Metal Gear Mk. II, with Otacon's voice. When you approach it, it attacks you, with Otacon's voice (although obviously not him speaking) making fun of you. Of course you can spot the flaws easily (she never changes out of her suit when in the face cameo and MK II is much bigger then its normal size. Plus Otacan doesn't flag you down with it in regular play.) ** You can briefly pull this off in ''[[Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater]]'' thanks to [[Latex Perfection]]. Put on the Raikov mask and uniform when fighting his gay lover to distract him for a moment. "Ivan is that you?" * In ''[[Star Fox (series)\|Star Fox]] Assault'', the final boss tries to pull this, although only with voices from the various people that died (or are presumed dead) during the storyline. ** Including James. Which is the clincher, since Fox knows that "[[Something They Would Never Say\|my father would ''never'' tell me to give up!]]" * You can attempt one in ''[[Majoras Mask]]'' against Igos Du Ikana with his knight captain's mask. Then fail completely. {{quote\| "Ohhh! Keeta! Is it not Captain Keeta?!?... But you're so... T-Tiny!!!"}} ** Also done with the Gorman brothers of the same game while wearing their brother's mask, they get so upset looking at it they can't fight. * The ''~[[Baldur's Gate~]]'' series features dopplegangers and other shapeshifters who like to impersonate other characters, but all of them shift into their normal forms when attacking, thus disqualifying some interesting scenes from quite exemplifying this trope. The closest to actually qualifying are the random dopplegangers that attack you in the Candlekeep catacombs that appear in the form of familiar minor characters and speak lines that don't actually make sense for those characters but are still related to what they might actually say; the greater dopplegangers near the end of the level try to convince you that it's all been an illusion and you've actually been killing the people that the dopplegangers looked like, but they stop pretending immediately if you choose to fight them. ''Throne of Bhaal'' also has a similar scene where some wraiths have a go at [[Break Them by Talking\|Breaking You by Talking]] in the form of lost loved ones, but they too do it only ''before'' the battle is joined, not during it. * Not quite an exact use, but referenced: In ''~~<nowiki>~~~[[Paper Mario: The Thousand -Year Door~~~</nowiki>~~]]'', when {{spoiler\|the Shadow Queen takes over Peach's body}} Goombella tells you that no matter how much it looks like your friend, you can't think of it that way and just have to fight it. * The Holoprojection droid PROXY in ''[[Star Wars]] [[The Force Unleashed]]'' uses it to his advantage several times. Going against Vader as Obi-Wan Kenobi or against Boba Fett as his father Jango does not guarantee him victory, but ''does'' confuse his opponent for a few precious seconds. In the Wii/[[~~Play Station~~PlayStation 2]]/PSP version of the first game, Darth Phobos briefly adopts the appearance of Juno Eclipse to lure Galen into letting his guard down at the start of the fight. After you defeat her, she tries it again to stop you from killing her. It doesn't work. In the beginning of the sequel, Darth Vader orders Starkiller to destroy a droid that looks like Juno Eclipse, but he can't. The game's novelization includes a scene where Starkiller is confronted by a Juno droid again, as well as droids of his friends and father, but this time he declares that dreams and memories have no power over him anymore and destroys them all. {{spoiler\|[[Evil Knockoff\|The Dark Apprentice]] destroyed his Juno droid and declared that he felt ''nothing.''}} * Completely averted in ''[[Prototype (video game)\|Prototype]]''. If Alex is discovered by the military, while shape shifted, the military will not hesitate to fire on ~~him -- even~~him—even if you're in the guise of a respected commander, unarmed woman, or someone they wouldn't dare think about hurting otherwise. [[Hilarity Ensues\|Hilariously]], if you use the Patsy ability to accuse someone of being Alex, the poor sod gets gunned down with an equal lack of restraint. * In ''[[Metroid]]'' {{spoiler\|Gandrayda}} pulls one of these once you [[Shapeshifter Swan Song\|defeat]] {{spoiler\|her}}. First, {{spoiler\|she changes into Ghor, then into Rundas, then into Samus. The whole thing takes less than a minute, and the only sound that comes out of her mouth is a scream, but the message to Samus is clear: You couldn't save them from [[The Corruption]], you couldn't save me from it, and you're not going to be able to save yourself. [[Your Days Are Numbered]], Samus.}} * ''[[Dante's Inferno (video game)\|Dantes Inferno]]'': Lucifer takes the shape of Dante, along with his form massacring innocent people in his grand illusions, to break the will of Dante's wife's soul, Beatrice. * In ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics Advance]]'', the final totema attempts this in a cut scene. It changes from Ritz, to Doned, to Mewt (all characters with a close relation to the main character), and then finally to the main character himself, each one trying a different tactic to try to get him to {{spoiler\|stay in the world and not destroy the final crystal}}. None of it works, though it does succeed in briefly mind fucking the main character. ** Similar to the above, in ''[[Tactics Ogre]] The Knight of Lodis'', when you enter the [[Very Definitely Final Dungeon]], the first battle has [[Big Bad\|Shaher]] attempt this on Alphonse and Eleanor, and who he takes the illusion of depends on the route you take. If you take Path A, he becomes {{spoiler\|Rictor, Alphonse's commander who was possessed by Shaher and subsequently killed by Alphonse.}} If you take Path B, {{spoiler\|he takes the form of Cybil, who felt she could no longer trust Alphonse and was later possessed by Shaher in a similar manner of Rictor in Path A}}. However, Alphonse doesn't buy it one bit, and simply lashes out at them and causes the illusion to break. Then again though, [[Genre Blind\|Shaher did actually say he would take their form to their face]], but to be fair, even before he said this, Alphonse wasn't buying it. * In ''[[Fable III]]'', after having to leave behind your mentor Walter in the deserts of Aurora, the demonic Crawler taunts you with illusions of Walter begging for help and being brutally killed by the Crawler's shadow monster minions. * In the [[Full Motion Video]] game, ''[[Dracula Unleashed]]'' Alexander, Helsing and Harker confront a friend turned vampire Juliet. They chase her back to her crypt where in a last ditch effort to save herself, changes into Harker and Alexander's wife and fiancee respectively. Harker sees through the guise but Alexander, apparently forgetting that that they're dealing with a supernatural force, nearly falls for it before Helsing stops him. == Web Comics == * In ''[[Drowtales]]'' [[Eldritch Abomination\|Khaless]] does this to Lulianne [https://web.archive.org/web/20100315185709/http://www.drowtales.com/mainarchive.php?order=chapters&id=1286 using the face of her niece Sael], who Khaless may have killed and/or absorbed. * A half-example appeared in everybody's favorite [[Trope Overdosed]] work, ''[[Order of the Stick]]'', when [[Spoony Bard\|Elan]]'s [[Evil Twin]], [[Sdrawkcab Name\|Nale]], faces off against [[The Leader\|Roy]]. If he was hoping that Roy would be reluctant to attack someone who looks identical to one of his party-members, he was [[Berserk Button\|DEAD WRONG]]. {{quote\| '''Roy''': I've been suppressing the urge to beat the crap out of someone who looks EXACTLY like you for a long, long time.}} == Web Original == * Mocked in [[Seanbaby]]'s [http://www.seanbaby.com/stupcom/superquiz.htm Super Quiz]. {{quote\| ''Question 13: Shape Changers You're in a fight against a group of super villains, and one of them is a shape-changer. Suddenly, your dead girlfriend shows up in her underwear. Do you: A: Ignore her. It's possible that your girlfriend climbed out of her grave, changed into her panties, and got on a plane to see you during a fight, but it's probably the shape-changer, genius.''}} == Western Animation == Line 168 ⟶ 164: [[Category:Shapeshifting]] [[Category:Shapeshifter Guilt Trip]] [[Category:Index of Shame]]