History Main / InTheBlood

* Somewhat arguably, [[spoiler: Yusuke]] from ''Manga/YuYuHakusho''. Though it's not dwelt on much, partly because by the point in the series it comes up things have gotten to be semi-pure action, far far away from the series' roots as a chronicle of the reflective character-building experiences a delinquent can have while a ghost, probably because Togashi had [[Manga/HunterXHunter gone mad with power]] by this point, [[spoiler: a while after our hero has come back from the dead as a demon because of Mazoku ancestry, he has become relatively okay with the less uncivilized gradations of human-eating, and when Raizen is about to die due to self-imposed starvation offers insistently to go find him '''someone''' to eat right away. Earlier in the series he got ''incredibly'' angry about any cannibalistic tendencies, and drew huge lines between 'killing demons,' which he had done a good deal of, and 'killing humans,' which he really really did not want to have to do.]] Could just be an implicit redrawing of the FantasticRacism lines, with demons no longer suffering from WhatMeasureIsANonHuman because he wasn't human. So it might just be a really strange form of a perfectly reasonable Aesop, and/or Reverse GettingCrapPastTheRadar due to not treating it like it's important. Intended to cause FridgeLogic, probably. Altogether weird.
** Hiei, on the other hand, turns out to be the victim of the idea of this in his back story: being male shows he has outcross blood, which among the [[IceQueen Ice Maidens]] means (precedents apparently show) that if they keep him around he will grow up to kill everyone. So they throw him over the side of their Floating City, the woman doing the throwing whispering that she expects him to come back and please kill her first. They may or may not have been correct: yes, he is a psychopath from childhood, and actually mellows out the more grown-up he gets, and yes, judging by his facial expressions he was one evil baby, but that could be a combination of SelfFulfillingProphecy (though come to think of it, it doesn't), the trauma, and the fact that all babies are extremely selfish little creatures and if they were, like Hiei, sapient they probably would be kind of evil. He understood everything. (The 'source of evil' here is either 'every race except our own' or 'the male sex,' or both, because they don't have males. They clone themselves every hundred years.)
*** Jury is out on Yukina. She may or may not share Hiei's father's blood, and [[BewareTheNiceOnes has been known to express genocidal sentiments]] toward her own kind. Hiei told her that if she wanted them dead, she [[ValuesDissonance should do it herself]], not rely on some imaginary brother who might be dead. Since ''he'd'' decided it was crueler to let them live, and all. She considered that movingly positive advice and smiled adorably. She did not, as far as we know, ever go home and kill anyone.

* ''Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'': A recurring fear for [[ActionGirl Olivia]] [[BrokenBird Benson]] is that deep inside her is a violent, sadistic criminal spawned by her rapist father. John Munch has also voiced concern at least once that he may end up committing suicide like his father. There was also an episode where a man who was violently molested by his father worries about becoming just like him and his felon brother -- and does so.

** Also, Olivia went through a very complicated situation where it seemed her fears were coming true... [[spoiler: and not through ''her'', but through her half-brother Simon, who was accused of raping a handicapped woman who later killed herself. He was framed by the victim's sister, though.]]

* ''Series/ChouSeiShinGransazer'' has a lot of hand-wringing {{wangst}} near the end when it is revealed that [[spoiler:some of the heroes, and possibly all humans, are descended from the Bosquito, an evil race of [[OurVampiresAreDifferent monsters that feed on the life force of others]]. But in the end it turns out that they aren't related to the Bosquito at all; it was just evil propaganda. A rather nasty FamilyUnfriendlyAesop.]]
** [[spoiler:Also conveniently ignores the fact that humans ''are'' descended from creatures that feed on the "life force" of others, and still do. It's called "eating meat"...]]
** That's just chemistry. When it gets to the metaphysical, people take the moral implications a lot more seriously. Which makes sense, since the metaphysical is generally a moralistic construct, so if it's ''real''....

* ''ComicBook/WonderWoman1942'': While the Wonder Woman mythos is full of examples proving the idea that villainy runs in the blood false Kobra was a firm believer in the concept, which was rather unfortunate for Debbi Domaine when he decided he wanted his own ComicBook/{{Cheetah}}. As she was the niece of the original Cheetah he kidnapped her and tortured and drugged her until she went insane for his little pet project.

* In ''AfterTheGoldenAge'' [[spoiler:supervillainy seems to be hereditary, since, though Mayor Paulson never met his father (Dr. Simon Sito, a.k.a. [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast The Destructor]]) or knew of their relationship, he still ends up emulating many of his megalomaniacal tendencies. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] since Simon Sito became evil after some radiation messed up the wiring in his brain, and the condition appears to extend to the genetic level.]]

* The ComicBook/{{New 52}} version of ''Comicbook/{{Superboy}}'''s instinctual affection for farms in rural Kansas.

* Being connected to a criminal by blood seems to be quite a stigma in the ''Manga/OnePiece'' world, mainly from the World Government who are afraid that it really is InTheBlood. Nico Olvia separated herself as much as she could from her daughter Robin when she set off to be an illegal AdventurerArchaeologist to try and keep Robin from being the "child of a criminal." When the Franky Family are trying to convince the Straw Hats to take Franky with them, one of the reasons used is "he's the son of a pirate, anyway." Most recently, when Vice-Admiral Garp tells Ace that he'd wanted him and his brother Luffy to become great Marines, Ace tells Garp that their fathers' blood assured they could ''never'' be Marines. [[spoiler:Ace himself was hunted by the Marines even before his birth because they wanted to nip the potential danger of his father's continuing bloodline in the bud. Only an extreme MamaBear act by his mother prevented him from being found.]]

** The offspring of a [[AlwaysLawfulGood Generally]] ChaoticGood Nymph and a [[AlwaysChaoticEvil Always]] LawfulEvil Devil is a NeutralEvil, misshapen, goat legged midget called a Forlarren. They typically befriend the party with tales of their tragic past but the evil inherited from their [[TurnOutLikeHisFather Devil father]]([[TheWomenAreSafeWithUs It's all but stated that]] [[ChildOfRape they're a result of rape]]) causes them to murder a member of the party.

** There is an in-universe procedure for breeding ''actual'' half-demon children. The one who turns up in season five is apparently the Antichrist, a decent little kid named Jesse with enough power to hypothetically threaten the Heavenly Host. The Winchesters talk to him a bit, borrowing help from Spiderman, and the kid becomes an AntiAntiChrist by running away from home and vanishing so he couldn't be used in any war, despite the fact that he could have saved the world from many of its major threats since and might be a major resource against the Leviathan in the current storyline. InTheBlood apparently defied here.

* [[GenderFlip Jen Black]] in ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/9937462/1/Black-Princess-Ascendant Black Princess Ascendant]]'' might have this problem after she uses a magic ritual to make Bellatrix into her mother. When she starts acting differently than normal, she worries that her new mother's insanity really is hereditary.
* This is one of Yang's main worries in ''Webcomic/RWBYCherish''. She went looking for her [[MissingMom deadbeat biological mother]] and found out that Raven is the most-wanted woman on the entire planet. Her younger half-sister Ruby has a HeroicLineage through her mother, so Yang worries that she'll take after her own mother. This trope is [[LikeFatherUnlikeSon subverted]] as Yang's heroic and nice, unlike Raven.

* ''Disney/TheLionKingIISimbasPride'' used this with Nuka, the only son of Scar. He is evil, [[BeautyEqualsGoodness very]] [[WhatMeasureIsANonCute ugly]], and receives a DisneyVillainDeath. Ironic, as the film was supposed to be subverting this trope. The film was supposed to have Scar's son as a protagonist, but that wasn't possible for American social standards because it would've made its Romeo and Juliet [[KissingCousins cousins]]. Though Nuka is a lot more sympathetic than Scar, since he just wants his mother to be proud of him. A last crazed attempt to earn her pride even gets him killed.

** The Targaryen dynasty has always walked a fine line between brilliance and madness, a trait they cannot shake because of their three-hundred year old tradition of incest to keep the "blood of the dragon" pure, which is also believed to be important to their RoyaltySuperpower of connecting with dragons. Aerys Targaryen was insane and he passed this on to Viserys.

*** In ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'', the trope is played straight with [[spoiler:Rey, who discovers that she is the granddaughter of Emperor Palpatine. While retrieving the Sith Wayfinder from the second Death Star's vault, she's attacked by a Sith version of herself in a vision, who urges her to embrace her heritage. In her final confrontation with Palpatine, she is tempted by the prospect of taking the Sith throne and ordering the fleet to spare the Resistance, but she ends up refusing him and calls on the spirits of all past Jedi to defeat him for good. Going one step further, she ultimately [[FamilyOfChoice adopts the name Skywalker]] as the spirits of Luke and Leia look on approvingly.]]

* Orion, son of ComicBook/{{Darkseid}}. Orion's a good guy, but he inherited Darkseid's inherent rage and bloodlust, and requires a Mother Box to keep his temper in check.

** To summarize, many members of the Britannian royal family are this, one way or another. [[spoiler: Not only do Lelouch and Charles have plans that they believe are for the good of the world, and yet (by the end of the series, for Lelouch) have a remarkable disregard for human life, Schneizel, too, believes that what he is doing will stop war, despite that he wants to kill all world leaders and destroy every capital city, and Nunnally goes along with it, intending to use Schneizel's nukes to the two of them, and believing ''that'' will stop war, is mostly willing to throw nukes around to do it.]]

*** In ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'', the trope is played straight with [[spoiler:Rey, who discovers that she is the granddaughter of Emperor Palpatine. She's confronted by a Sith version of herself in a vision, who urges her to embrace her heritage. In her final confrontation with Palpatine, she is tempted by the prospect of taking the Sith throne and ordering the fleet to spare the Resistance, but she ends up refusing him and calls on the spirits of all past Jedi to defeat him for good. Going one step further, she ultimately [[FamilyOfChoice adopts the name Skywalker]] as the spirits of Luke and Leia look on approvingly.]]

** Very subtle in ''[[VideoGame/FireEmblemTellius Radiant Dawn]]'', but present nonetheless: One of the most amoral members of the Greil Mercenaries turned out to be [[spoiler: the son of the BigBad from the previous game.]] Possibly averted in that despite being amoral, he is also fiercely loyal ([[HoYay ahem]]) to Ike, and for lack of a conscience of his own, he often follows Ike's.

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]

-->'''Professor Zoom''': Your mother may be a Thawne, but your father was an Allen. Your blood is polluted.\\
'''Bart''': Look on the bright side, Professor Plum. We're only half related!
** However, other than Bart and Meloni, the Thawne line plays this entirely straight. "Chain Lightning" showed that, for centuries, the Thawnes would be villains to the West and Allen families of Flashes.

* In fics set in the universe of ''FanFic/KingdomHearts3FinalStand'', several characters in Radiant Garden believe that bloodlines carry traits such as cruelty. The [[TheRevolutionWillNotBeCivilized Insurgos]] were determined to wipe out the royal family of Radiant Garden because they believed that somewhere along the line, Ansem's descendants would become just as cruel and despotic as his [[GodSaveUsFromTheQueen tyrannical parents]]. On the flip side, which proves that the Insurgos are NotSoDifferent from his parents, Ansem's {{Jerkass}} mother Hanako lambasted Ansem for allowing Rimi, his niece [[spoiler: and Kairi's birth mother]], for allowing her to become engaged to Kaname, explicitly stating that Kaname should be locked up [[SinsOfOurFathers simply for being the son of an Insurgo]]. As a whole, it's largely subverted, as it's repeatedly shown that Kaname and Ansem are ''nothing'' like their parents.
* ''FanFic/MegaManReawakened'' plays this straight with Quentin Emerald, whose father was a terrorist, but subverts it with Dr. Regal, who isn't evil despite his father being Dr. Wily.

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[[folder:Film — Live-Action]]

--> ''There's a sentence on my father,''\\
''On my sister, on my brother''\\
''There's a terror in the corner''\\
''That will make your blood run cold''\\
''And it goes back in my bloodline''\\
''And we tried to walk away...''
* The [[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Music/Mothy?from=Main.Mothy Marlon]] family generally play antagonists, with two exceptions, and even then, one of them was possessed by a demon. [[EvilMatriarch As]] [[DarkActionGirl for]] [[HangingJudge the]] [[WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds others]]...

[[folder:Professional Wrestling]]

* In Roleplay/DinoAttackRPG, this was the primary reason behind Rev Raptor's HeroicSuicide just after defeating his MadScientist father, Dr. Jecht "Landro" Raptor, in battle. Landro told Rev that it was in his destiny to [[FaceHeelTurn follow in his footsteps]], and Rev was so afraid of the possibility that, rather than risk letting it come true, he was willing to die to prevent it from happening.

[[folder:Stand-Up Comedy]]
* Creator/ChristopherTitus has made a career of 50% DysfunctionJunction and 50% this trope. A lot of his material comes from the fact that he can't escape the habits that he seems to have learned, or genetically inherited from his parents, including the nervous breakdown he had when he read so much as the ''title'' of a Life magazine article titled: "Mental Illness: Genetic?" His father had an extremely promiscuous and addictive personality and his mother was crazy.
--> '''Titus''': "And when I say crazy, I don't mean, '[[CampGay My mom is]] ''[[CampGay insane!]]'' ' I mean, '[[DeadpanSnarker We, the people, find the defendant]]....'
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[[folder:Webcomics]]

** Sometimes she's just as crazy, even though in more benign way:
---> '''Agatha''': I believe another [[LudicrousPrecision forty-five point three seconds]], and I would have ''exploded'' or something.\\
'''[[spoiler:Castle Heterodyne]]''': ...or something. Under the [[DramaticStutter circir/circumstances]] I/I am forced to admit that yo/you are most most likely oneoneone of the family... \\
'''Agatha''': Oh, ''yeah''... I have ''got'' to try [[PsychoSerum that]] ''again!''\\
'''[[spoiler:Castle Heterodyne]]''': yesss... ''most'' likely, in/in/in''deed''.

* In ''Roleplay/TheGamersAlliance'', every demon is essentially faced with this choice because their very nature compels them to act in destructive and manipulative ways. Half-demons suffer from this even more so as their demonic side often tries to goad them to act on impulse and self-gratification. The descendants of the infamous warlord Sydney Losstarot also have to live under the shadow of their ancestor, and every Losstarot is feared more or less.
* In the Literature/WhateleyUniverse Whateley Academy has an official 'club' known commonly as The Bad Seeds. Admission? One or both of your parents must be a supervillain. Some kids take to this like ducks to water, some resist, some don't know what to do, some are pretty clueless even for teenagers. Nacht has a supervillain mother who is constantly trying to get Nacht to use her powers to help mommy commit crimes; Nacht doesn't mind the crime part, but she really doesn't want to spend time with her mother. Jobe is a ruthless, amoral genius bio-devisor who even looks like his supervillain dad; his dad hates that junior doesn't have a flair for mechanical devises instead. Carmilla has Deep Ones in her mother's ancestry, and is the grandchild of Shub-Niggurath on her father's side; she's taking the ScrewDestiny approach right now. And so on...
** It's worth noting that membership in the Bad Seeds does not in itself infer an intention to become a supervillain (some do, some don't, and the setting makes plain that either is no more likely than any other high school career ambition) they're just more-or-less stuck together for mutual protection because everyone else fears that evil ''is'' in their blood.
* ''WebAnimation/{{Dreamscape}}'': It turns out the [[EvilOverlord Overlord]] [[DemBones of Evil]] is [[OurZombiesAreDifferent Curien and]] [[AxCrazy Ethan's]] ''father''! He even refers to them as his daughter and son.

-->'''Beatrice Horseman''': You were born broken, it's your birthright.

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/rsz_inherit.png]]

[[quoteright:334:[[ComicBook/DarkEmpire https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/darth_luke_2.png]]]]
[[caption-width-right:334: He's got [[TurnOutLikeHisFather too much of his father]] in him.]]

* ''GIJoe'''s Serpentor, made with the DNA of Julius Caesar, Napoleon Bonaparte, Attila the Hun, Philip II of Macedon, Alexander the Great, Ivan the Terrible, Vlad the Impaler, Hannibal, Genghis Khan, and Grigori Rasputin to be the world's most evil and effective military leader. So naturally, his plans fail.