I Have Your Wife / Live-Action TV

Times where a loved one is taken hostage in Live-Action TV series.

---

• 24 managed to carry one off, very successfully, for 8 episodes of season one, as Jack's wife and daughter were kidnapped. Among other things, Jack was forced to shoot his friend Nina (but set it up so she'd survive). Her later revelation as The Mole caused some rather rapid Retcon.
  • 24 also used this trope in season three with Tony's wife Michelle being kidnapped. And then in season four, they reversed it as Tony was kidnapped and Michelle was forced to work with the bad guy.
  • 24 loves this trope so much it was parodied by Derrick Comedy.
• The 100 has a rare case of the hero doing this: Clarke threatens to kill Cage's father unless he releases the captive Sky People. He doesn't, and she follows through on her threat.
• Agatha Raisin: In "Agatha Raisin and the Vicious Vet," the killer abducts Agatha's cat Podge and threatens to kill him if Agatha does not stop her nosing about.
• In the Season One finale for Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Cybertek manages to recruit several people to participate in their cyborg program with an "incentive" program, the incentive being, "Do as we say and your wife/husband/kids may survive." Garrett also has Mike Peterson's son hostage, forcing Peterson to serve HYDRA as Deathlok. When Skye reveals to Peterson that his son is safe, Peterson turns on Garrett.
• Alex Rider (2020): Alex's duplicate attacks Tom, breaking his arm, and threatens to kill him unless Alex comes to him for a showdown. He also plans to kill Ayisha and Jack.
• In Alias series 2, in order for Sark to give her an antidote to save Vaughn from a deadly illness, Sydney was forced to assassinate (or rather attempt, it turned out to be a ploy for the two to work together) Arvin Sloane. This is a slight variation on the scenario.
• All the Light We Cannot See:
  • Werner's boss Müller forces him to uncover Marie-Laure's location by reminding him that the Nazi Party knows where his sister Jutta lives and can have her die a painful death if they so choose.
  • Von Rumpel asks a museum curator for the locations of the jewels in the museum by telling his subordinate to shoot the curator's family if he doesn't return home in half an hour. He then asks the curator where the Sea of Flames is. The curator tells him about Daniel instantly, but is locked in the vault for his troubles.
• Arrow
  • After discovering his daughter Laurel is helping the Arrow, Detective Quentin Lance tries to arrest him during one of their meetings. He escapes, but the incident tips off a mobster that there's a connection between the Arrow and Laurel Lance, so he kidnaps her to force the Arrow into a trap. Quentin is then forced to team up with the Arrow to rescue her.
  • In Season 2, Count Vertigo catches Felicity Smoak snooping around, then calls Oliver Queen from her phone, guessing correctly that he's the Arrow and telling him to Come Alone for a confrontation. Even though Oliver has recently made a Thou Shalt Not Kill rule, he makes an exception in Vertigo's case.
  • In Season 3, Oliver Queen does this himself after becoming a brainwashed member of the League of Assassins by kidnapping Diggle's wife Lyla. He's actually Not Brainwashed, but it's a while before Diggle forgives him for this, even though Lyla accepts Oliver's action as a Necessarily Evil to fool the League.
• Babylon Berlin: Greta is coerced into changing her statement saying it wasn't Nazis who had her assassinate Benda, but Communists, by her infant son being held with the threat of death.
• Badger: Wilf is abducted in "The Price of a Daughter."
• In Battlestar Galactica (2003) Admiral Adama threatens to have Cally Tyrol put up against a bulkhead and shot, to force Chief Tyrol to end a refinery workers' strike. And this is the good guy to one of his own men.
• The M.O. of the Gravedigger in Bones. She'd kidnap someone with wealthy connections and bury them alive. If she got the money she demanded, she'd tell where the person was buried. Her second victims were actually a case of not doing the math because they only had half the supply of air she normally left. Brennan and Hodgins were both rich but she was targeting Hodgins' mega-wealth in that case, but they are too smart and MacGyver an escape method from the air bag explosives. Booth's kidnapping is an attempt to stop the trial she's facing, but again, he's found in time.
• Breakout Kings: In "Queen of Hearts," Lilah Tompkins escapes from prison by claiming to have had an accomplice kidnap a guard's son, and threatening to kill him unless the guard cooperates. She shows the guard a photo of his son on a mobile phone in order to convince him She was bluffing, but the guard had no way of knowing that.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer
  • In "Lover's Walk", the Scooby Gang is forced to help Spike after he kidnaps Willow and Xander.
  • After playing it straight multiple times, there is a spot of Lampshade Hanging in "Real Me". Harmony claims to have the perfect plan to defeat Buffy, but when Spike outlines the above plan as a guess, she steals the idea. It fails miserably.
• On Burn Notice, this is Brennen's M.O. He does it in every episode he appears in; in his first episode, he actually strapped a bomb to a child to prevent anyone from rescuing him before he'd gotten the MacGuffin he wanted.
  • In another episode, he has a henchman with Michael's brother. They manage to get him to back off by making him believe they have someone ready to kill - his daughter.
• In the Cade's County episode "Ragged Edge", the young daughter of an old friend of Cade's is kidnapped to be exchanged for a drug pusher in Cade's custody.
• Control Z: María is informed by one of the drug dealers that her sister Natalia has been kidnapped and demands that the owed money be paid by tonight, threatening to kill her should Maria say a word to the authorities.
• Criminal Minds: Evolution: In "True Conviction", Silvio falsely confessed to Maria's murder as a result of a persistent death threat against his boyfriend, and had maintained his guilt for years as a result.
• Criminologist Himura and Mystery Writer Arisugawa:
  • "Ransom of Associate Professor" deals with an actor being kidnapped and held for ransom. Things are more complicated than they seem, however. The actor's wife accidentally killed him before he was "kidnapped"; the culprit's reasoning for stringing her along with a hostage situation is because he's a control freak who loved having her under his spell.
  • Moroboshi is able to escape from prison by having her underlings kidnap her captor's wife and child, forcing him to disrupt her prison transfer so that they'll be returned safe and sound.
• CSI-verse:
  • CSI:
    • A particularly convoluted example is used in "Buzz Kill." A woman's brother is kidnapped and she is forced to deliver a message to the owner of a marijuana dispensary, showing that his wife and children have been kidnapped, and demanding he turn over all the cash in the shop.
    • The one with Catherine and her dad in the season 7 opener probably also counts. First, they kidnap Catherine and take embarrassing photos to use to threaten her father, then they kidnap Lindsey, Catherine's daughter. Luckily, the gang finds Lindsey in time.
  • Happens to Mac when his girlfriend Christine is kidnapped in CSI: NY's "Seth and Apep." It's actually a relief to Mac in one sense - hearing Christine's voice proved that the severed tongue Mac was sent earlier was not Christine's and that she was still okay.
  • Also happens in an episode of CSI: Miami. A man is forced into participating in the robbery of the bank truck he drives, which results in the death of his partner, because his younger sister is being held hostage. As it turns out, his sister is in on it and in fact came up with the plot because she knew this trope would work on her big brother.
• DCI Banks: In "Bad Boy," Banks' daughter Tracey is kidnapped in an attempt to get him to remove a gun being held in the evidence store.
• Delete: General Overson is coerced into helping the AI by its threat to kill his daughter, who has a heart implant which it can hack. After he gets it removed, Overson immediately stops helping the AI, which then kills him.
• The Doctor Blake Mysteries: In "Lucky Numbers," the wife of a lottery winner is kidnapped, with the kidnapper demanding 50,000 pounds.
• Doctor Who:
  • "Tooth and Claw": The werewolf-worshipping monks force Sir Robert MacLeish to go along with their Evil Plan against Queen Victoria by holding his wife Isabel hostage.
  • The series 3 finale:
    • The Master kidnaps Martha's entire family bar her brother. He never actually uses them as leverage against her, however, suggesting he's just doing it to be a dick.
    • Professor Docherty is The Mole for the Master because he's holding her son hostage.
  • In "Time Heist," the Teller is coerced into working for the bank because they have its mate chained up in the private vault.
  • "The Ghost Monument": The scientists who worked in the Abandoned Laboratory the Doctor and company find left a message behind explaining that they were forced to create horrible weapons for their captors because their families were held hostage.
• The short-lived series Drive (2007) used this to force Alex Tully into the race, with the implication that they would release her only if he won.
• Neatly defied in the Due South episode "The Vault." Ray and Fraser are trapped in a vault with armed robbers outside. The robbers capture Ray's sister Francesca, and call a phone located inside the vault. They inform the heroes that they have Francesca, and Fraser immediately responds by disabling the phone before the robbers have a chance make any demands. Fraser correctly reasons that if the robbers cannot communicate with them, they have no way to threaten them and no reason to harm Francesca.
• The Dukes of Hazzard: A recurring trope, played most often with Boss Hogg and his wife, Lulu. As Lulu was overweight and homely, her being kidnapped averted the usual "damsel in distress" convention of a stark-raving beauty being kidnapped... often because the criminals knew that Boss held Lulu dear to his heart and that they could exploit this to get him to give in to their demands.
• Echo (2024): Maya's forced to surrender multiple times by Fisk's men when they take her family members hostage (though not for long).
• In Elementary, after Moran helps Holmes take down two of Moriarty's minions, Moriarty sends him a coded message reading "Moran, you never told me you had a sister. She dies or you do. Your choice. M." Moran bashes his own head in.
  • Sherlock's former drug dealer steals a lot of money from some very bad people and they kidnap his daughter to get it back. The man already spent the money so he goes to Sherlock for help.
  • Moriarty kidnaps the child of a Greek businessman and forces him to kill the son of a prominent Macedonian politician. The idea was to cause a major political rift between the two countries and then cash in through a currency manipulation scheme.
  • Some of Moriarty's former henchmen kidnap Moriarty's daughter to force the mother to transfer over valuable property to them. It ends up being a very bad idea and when a pissed off Moriarty catches up to them, one of the kidnappers willingly goes to his death because otherwise Moriarty would go after his family.
  • A group of French mobsters kidnap Joan Watson so that Sherlock and Mycroft obtain valuable information for them.
• The Enemy Within: This was how Tal got Erika working for him. His minions picked up her daughter and he then threatened her life. She's returned unharmed after she gives him the names of her operatives, but he clearly shows it could happen.
• In the Emerald City episode "Science and Magic", the Wizard forces a local rebel to denounce magic by threatening his pregnant daughter with death.
• The Flash (2014): For a part of Season 2, Zoom holds Harry's daughter Jesse hostage in order to force Harry to do his bidding and help him steal some of Barry's speed for himself. Eventually, however, Harry's conscience can't take it anymore and he confesses everything to Team Flash, who help him rescue Jesse.
• Flashpoint doesn't have as many of these as one might expect given that hostage negotiation is a major SRU skill,^note hostage situations in general happen on a fairly regular basis, but this particular scenario is uncommon but it does come up a few times.
  • In "Never Kissed A Girl," a wrongfully-convicted man holds Ed and a security guard hostage to demand the evidence that would exonerate him.
  • In both "Remote Control" and "No Promises," the apparent antagonist turns out to be acting under this type of duress.
  • "Grounded" has a group of airline passengers being held hostage by hijackers who want their leader released from prison. The only fatality, apart from the hijackers, is a guy who tried to play Badass Bystander; all the other hostages are rescued alive and mostly unharmed.
  • In "Blue On Blue," Sam's sister Natalie is held hostage to force Spike, who had been casually dating her, to help them break into a secure building. Luckily, they underestimate Spike's ability to engineer a rescue despite the circumstances.
  • This appears to be the issue at stake (and is to some degree) in "The Cost Of Doing Business," but it turns out to be more complicated than that. The hostage taker was also a victim of this.
• Father Brown:
  • In "The Jackdaw's Revenge," the murderer kidnaps Bunty and threatens to kill her if Father Brown does not resign from the priesthood.
  • In "The Menace of Mephistopheles", a pair of criminals abduct Inspector Mallory's wife and children to force to plant eveidence against the man they are framing for murder, and get him to imcriminate himself for the Frame-Up.
• Firefly: "Objects in Space." The bounty hunter Jubal Early tries to force Simon at gun point to either reveal where River is or help him capture her. Simon would rather die than betray his sister, so Jubal points out that Simon's smart enough to play along with a view to taking advantage of any slip-up Jubal might make. Simon remains unimpressed so he then reveals that he has captured Kaylee (Simon's Unresolved Sexual Tension Love Interest) and will rape her to death if Simon doesn't comply. At this point, Simon takes the "seeking advantage" option.
• A French Village: Müller regularly detains people's relatives, then uses threats against them so they'll talk.
• Game of Thrones:
  • Theon is kept as a ward/hostage at Winterfell for a decade to prevent his father Balon from rebelling against the Iron Throne again. This is a completely acceptable part of Westerosi society.
  • After Ned's execution and Arya's escape, Sansa is essentially used as leverage by the Lannisters against Robb, and is physically and emotionally abused by Joffrey for her brother's victories. Meanwhile, Jaime has been captured by the Starks, who plan to use him as a hostage against Cersei. However, Sansa and Jaime counteract each other's value for this trope. Neither side will truly harm their prisoner for fear of the consequences to their loved one. In the books, this is also the reason why The Mad King kept Jaime in the capitol during Robert's Rebellion, even though all the other White Swords were sent out to fight — Ser Barristan Selmy, Ser Jonothor Darry, and Prince Lewyn Martell of Dorne to the ruby ford, where the latter two died alongside Rhaegar Targaryen; and Ser Oswell Whent, Ser Arthur Dayne, called "Sword of the Morning," and Lord Commander Gerold Hightower, the White Bull himself, to the Tower of Joy in Dorne, where Eddard Stark and his companions slew them whilst trying to rescue Lyanna. Aerys's plans were very straightforward: if House Lannister were to raise its banners in rebellion, Aerys could easily have Jaime killed. The Mad King had already made this threat to Prince Doran Martell — "I have your brother in the Kingsguard AND your sister as my daughter-in-law" — which is why Dorne fought for House Targaryen.
  • Cersei takes Ros (mistaking her for his mistress) as hostage in "The Prince of Winterfell" to mollify her fears that Tyrion is plotting a Uriah Gambit for Joffrey in the coming battle.
  • Averted with Martyn and Willem Lannister, because they are rather worthless hostages when compared to Sansa.
  • Rhaegar Targaryen's kidnapping of Robert Baratheon's betrothed, Lyanna Stark, is (probably in combination with his father's penchant for burning his vassals) what started Robert's Rebellion. He hid her in a tower in Dorne and appointed a retinue of Kingsguard knights to guard the tower and prevent anyone from entering. In reality, Lyanna fled to Dorne with Rhaegar willingly to get away from Robert, whom she never loved in the first place. Robert, meanwhile, was utterly oblivious to the fact that Lyanna preferred Rhaegar, going so far as to marry him and bear his child. When Rhaegar left to face Robert on the Trident, the Kingsguard were ordered to the Tower of Joy to protect Princess Lyanna Stark and their newborn son, the infant Aegon Targaryen (later Jon Snow). So it wasn't really a case of I Have Your Wife, but more like a secretive I Have My Wife, Please Leave Us Alone, Thank You.
• Gang Related:
  • Chapel coerced Lucho, a Los Angelico, to inform against his gang by threatening to have his incarcerated son placed in a cell along with a serial rapist who would surely assault him.
  • The Metas kidnap Daniel, Javier's son, after the cocaine that Los Angelicos (the crime family Javier heads) were supposed to distribute gets seized by the cops. He's given a day to get back the $120 million that it's worth or Daniel dies. They manage to steal back the seized cocaine, so the Metas return him Just in Time before their men were intent on murdering him.
  • Chapel later gets ahold of El Mozo's daughter, threatening her so he'll give up his daughter's murderer.
• Practically a weekly event on the Highlander TV show. Evil immortals really like to lure Mac in with this one.
• In an episode of Hogan's Heroes, a French scientist is brought to the prison camp to conduct research to develop a weapon for the German war effort. Lebeau, a representative of the French Resistance, is assigned to help the scientists. When they are together, Lebeau chastises the scientist for helping the Nazis, but the scientists confesses that he hates the idea of helping their nation's conquerors, and outright refused the first time they asked, but prior to being brought to the prison camp, Gestapo agents arrested his daughter and told him he will conduct research for the Nazi war machine or else.
• InSecurity: The Dutch kidnap Burt's parents and force him to steal N.I.S.A. technology to ensure their safety.
• In Kamen Rider Double, this was done in the Accel movie. Akiko is kidnapped by the Commander Dopant, who believes that killing her will cause Ryu to become consumed by vengeance and "cleanse" the city of evil. The plan fails due to Ryu being changed by Akiko's love, and he instead takes down Commander Dopant as Kamen Rider Accel.
• Intergalactic: Rebecca gets Wendell to cooperate by taking his son into custody, threatening that the boy will get sent offplanet into a penal colony as a terrorist if he doesn't give up all he knows on ARC.
• At the end of the miniseries The Kill Point, Worthy Opponent Mr. Wolf takes negotiator Horst Cali's wife hostage to force him to slip Wolf and his team out of the police standoff. To his credit, Wolf doesn't seem happy to do it and, when one of his men decides not to let her go, he gives Cali a gun and covering fire to go to her rescue.
• L.A.'s Finest: Carlene kidnaps Izzy in order to get leverage over Nancy.
• Leverage: In "The Bank Shot Job," Nate and Sophie are caught in the middle of the bank robbery being staged by a military vet. He is doing so because meth dealers have kidnapped his wife and are threatening to kill her if he doesn't pay his son's debts.
• In Lost one of Widmore's psycho's for hire Keamy tries to get Ben by holding his daughter at gunpoint. Ben then tries to double bluff Keamy by pulling a Break His Heart to Save Him bluff, claiming she means nothing to him and is therefore a pointless hostage to try to get to him... It doesn't work
  • Also in the episode "The Hunting Party," after Jack tells Kate to stay behind while he, Sawyer and Locke search for Michael, she follows them and gets captured by the Others. Jack was not too happy.
• In the MacGyver (1985) episode "Hearts of Steel," disgruntled steel mill workers attempt to kidnap the daughter of the industrialist who put them out of work, but end up abducting his housekeeper's daughter instead.
• Madam Secretary: Russian Foreign Minister Anton Gorev and the McCords make this a Defied Trope in season 2. When Russian President Ostrov dies in "The Doability Doctrine," Gorev tells them to look after his daughter Olga, who was one of Henry's students at Georgetown. In "The Long Shot," Maria Ostrova tries to have her abducted by Russian Intelligence as leverage during her power grab, but Henry, having been warned by his mole Captain Petrov, gets there first.
• Spoofed in a MADtv skit where the bad guys keep doing this to the hero, ending with "I have your goldfish!"
• The Magician: In "The Vanishing Lady," a singer is kidnapped and a million dollar ransom demanded from her agent/boyfriend.
• Midnight Sun (2016): The killer kidnaps Kahina and Anders' children to blackmail them into not stopping his final plot, putting them in harm's way as extortion.
• Midsomer Murders: In "Faithful Unto Death," the wife of a local businessman is kidnapped. Her husband is sent photographs of her bound to a chair and looking bruised and battered along with ransom demands (and the usual exhortation not to contact the police). The wife is actually the mastermind of the scheme, and is using it to extract cash from her husband before he is murdered.
• Mission: Impossible: A recurring aspect of many episodes, where the villain uses a loved one to coerce a victim into doing his bidding.
  • In "The Wall," the villain kidnaps the daughter of a key negotiator in order to sabotage a set of diplomatic talks.
  • In "The Bunker," a missile scientist works for an enemy state because they have captured his wife.
• Murdoch Mysteries: In the finale of Season 16, Murdoch and his family are kidnapped. In the opener of Season 17, Murdoch and Julia are told that they're expected to exonerate a woman found guilty of murder (and who almost certainly is). Since they have to conduct an investigation, they're free to leave, but their daughter is being kept somewhere else, and their told that if they go against their "employer"'s wishes, Susannah will pay the price.
• NCIS does this in "See No Evil," until it turns out the officer pulled it on himself to get $2m from the Pentagon.
  • Also, the Mexican drug cartel's have Gibbs' heterosexual life partner, Franks.
• This trope is the reason why the human rights commission agent in NCIS: Los Angeles uncharacteristically attempted to kill the defected sister of the Sudanese dictator in transit before she could testify against her brother: A French CEO kidnapped his wife and daughter, and he threatened to have them killed if he didn't assassinate her.
• The New Avengers: In "Hostage," a gang of villains abduct Purdey and hold her hostage to ensure Steed's compliance.
• Noughts & Crosses: The Liberation Militia kidnap Sephy in the season one finale, and coerce Kamal then into resigning as Prime Minister using threats to her.
• This happens at least once per season in NUMB3RS. The FBI usually intervenes before anyone can be seriously hurt.
  • "Prime Suspect": A mathematician's daughter is kidnapped because the kidnappers want him to give them a formula to break internet encryption.
  • "Better Or Worse": A jewelry store owner's wife and daughter are kidnapped to use as collateral in a robbery. Subverted when it turns out the owner arranged the kidnap and robbery to cover a gambling debt.
  • "Rampage" has a variation: the bad guy forces another guy to attack the FBI by threatening his family, but rather than kidnap them outright (which might draw attention), he uses photos and other information to show the guy how easy it would be to find them and hurt them. The same guy appears to be pulling a straight version of this when he kidnaps another family, but it turns out it's a trap; he never had any intention of releasing them, but rather was using them to lure the target to his location (on the pretext of letting him see the hostages to ensure they're okay) in order to kill him, and planned to kill the hostages as well so they couldn't lead anyone back to him.
  • "Backscatter": Two bank employees are kidnapped to force their Team Dad boss to give a crime syndicate access to the bank to carry out a scheme.
  • "Spree": Crystal Hoyle takes the cake on this one; she kidnaps a federal agent to extort the FBI. It does turn out there was a little more to it than that; in addition to a hostage, she also swiped the agent's credentials to look up some classified information.
  • "One Hour": A child is kidnapped to extort a ransom from his multi-millionaire father.
  • "Tabu" appears to be another case of a rich parent's child kidnapped for ransom, but it turns out the "victim" was actually the mastermind.
  • "End Game": A disgraced former Marine captain wants information from one of his subordinates, so he kidnaps the man's father and sister to force him to give it up.
  • "Jacked" has the stranger-as-hostage variation. It turns out to be mostly illusion.
  • The bad guy in "Shadow Markets" threatens his rival's elderly aunt to force the rival to meet him so he can take his revenge.
• Once Upon a Time in Wonderland: Jafar kidnaps Alice's dad to force her to make her second wish.
  • The Red Queen captured the Rabbit's wife and children in order to make him be her mole.
• The Outpost: Naya spies on Gwynn for the Prime Order because they had threatened to kill her mother and sister, who were living in the Capitol.
• Person of Interest:
  • A surgeon's spouse who's working in a public area is covered by a sniper to force the surgeon to 'accidentally' kill a high-profile patient while he's on the operating table. What makes this invocation so noteworthy is that it is one of the first examples (possibly the first on network television) of this trope being used on a same-sex couple.
  • Also, Finch faked his death to his fiancee, Grace, specifically so she wouldn't be endangered by this trope. It turns out not to matter for Root, who cheerfully informs him that Grace thinks she's a children's book author, and he can either help her with her scheme or... she can go get coffee with Grace.
  • Used against Elias, of all people, by Dominic. In chasing him down, Dominic's gang manage to shoot and capture Scarface. The rest of the episode is a conflict between Reese, who is trying to get Elias out alive because he is a more palatable candidate than Dominic for leader of New York's organized crime, and Elias, who is willing to turn himself over to Dominic for the chance they'll let Scarface go free.
  • In "Sotto Voce," a locksmith's wife is kidnapped so that he will assist in a crime. Subverted when the 'locksmith' turns out to be the Villain of the Week — the wife is just an actress he's hired to fool our heroes.
  • Finch, of all people, does this having crossed his own Moral Event Horizon in Season 5. He forces a soldier to let him escape by using information gathered by the Machine. The soldier's daughter is waiting for a heart transplant and a compatible donor has just died... or the Machine can put her at the back of the queue and she'll die in a few weeks.
• The Plot Against America: Evelyn claims Lindbergh only enacted antisemitic policies and keeping America neutral because his son was really kidnapped by the Nazis rather than killed, and used to coerce him into doing so. Like in the book, it's left unknown if that's true or simply an excuse she cooked up herself.
• In the finale of Power Rangers S.P.D., Emperor Gruumm reveals that he has Doggie Kruger's long-thought-dead wife Isinnia in his possession (although the trope itself technically doesn't apply as Grumm never revealed Isinnia's presence until the very end of the series, at which point Kruger is in no position to do anything for Grumm even if he believed Grumm would let him go afterwards)..
• In the third season of Prison Break, the Company blackmails the brothers into working for them by kidnapping the remaining people they care about. When the seemingly impossible task set by the villains forces the brothers to make a desperate attempt at a rescue, one of the captives is executed as an object lesson.
• Pure: The cartel leader coerces Anna into running operations for him in Canada, holding Isaak prisoner to insure she'll obey.
• On Rabbit Hole (2023), using people's loved ones against them is a favorite tactic of Crowley's. John Weir knows this, hence using his supposed ex-wife against Crowley because he knows that he will kidnap her, only for him to reveal that the woman Crowley kidnapped is actually the "pro, a real bad-ass" that he hired to rescue his ex-wife when she was kidnapped previously, and who has been playing the role of his ex-wife ever since.
• Done by the villain in the Rizzoli & Isles episode "My Own Worst Enemy" is order to ensure the cooperation of an importer.
• In RoboCop: The Series, a villain kidnaps Robo's wife from his old life, i.e. Mrs. Alex Murphy. The item he is to steal is a ray gun that causes heart attacks, called the Heartbreaker. Initially, his built-in Restraining Bolt stops him, using Obstructive Code of Conduct three, "uphold the law." As soon as Robo pictures his wife in danger, directive two — "protect the innocent" — overrides this.
• Shakespeare & Hathaway - Private Investigators: In "This Promised End," Mr. R and Mr. G uses threats against Peter Quintus' wife to prevent him from going to the police. It is actually an elaborate scheme engineered by the wife.
• This is subverted in an episode of Sharpe, when a villainous Frenchman tells his more noble countryman he won't plead for the release of his English wife. Sharpe promptly walks over and helps the English wife mount a horse behind her husband.
• Sherlock:
  • An inversion in "The Great Game," Moriarty strapped bombs to people Sherlock had never met and gave him a time limit to solve several mysterious crimes. Sherlock was mostly dispassionate towards the hostages and only cooperated because he found the mysteries amusing. When the final victim was John Watson, however, Sherlock no longer found the game fun and attempted to appease Moriarty with valuable government information. This turned out not to be Moriarty's object after all!
  • In the final episode of series two, John, Mrs. Hudson, and Lestrade are all threatened, but especially John. Sherlock has to fake his death for all of them.
  • And John gets captured and thrown in a bonfire in Season 3 episode 1.
  • And both Mary and John are being screwed with by Magnussen.
• In the first season finale of Los Simuladores, their leader Santos is kidnapped in exchange for helping a mob boss being set free.
• Spartacus: Blood and Sand plays with this. Sura isn't exactly kidnapped, she's captured and sold as a slave, but Batiatus promises Spartacus to search for her, buy her and reunite them in exchange for Spartacus behaving well. When Spartacus, after some minor hiccups, behaves and is victorious in the arena, Batiatus is true to his word, buys Sura and brings her to the ludus. Then he orders her killed right before they reunite, so she dies in Spartacus' arms.
• Done to Miles O'Brien in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "The Assignment". The twist: the villain was actually a Pah Wraith (a noncorporeal being) possessing his wife, and can kill her instantaneously. The only solution is to figure out a way to kill the Wraith even more instantaneously, without letting it catch on to the plan.
• Strangers From Hell: Moon-jo captures Jong-woo's girlfriend to entice him to come back to Eden, setting up for the finale.
• Seems to happen a few times in Supernatural, though it's more like "I have your brother." This is discussed a few times, with others saying that Sam and Dean are each others' Achilles' Heel, since they would do almost anything to save each other.
• Teen Wolf has the villain going for Scott's best friend Stiles instead of his girlfriend, when Gerard takes Stiles because he knows that's the best way to hurt Scott. Playing with the trope, Gerard doesn't give Scott a chance to bargain for Stiles's safety or the opportunity to rescue him, just beats Stiles within an inch of his life and then releases him as a warning for Scott to back down before he hurts him again.
  Gerard: You have a knack for creating a vivid picture, Mr. Stilinski. Let me paint one of my own. Scott McCall finds his best friend bloodied and beaten to a pulp. How does that sound now?
• Tehran: Faraz frequently threatens people's relatives who he has in custody or can get to for cooperation from them. Later he suffers this himself when his wife is kidnapped by Mossad, and then inflicts it on Tamar to get her back by kidnapping her father.
• Gwen's mother, husband and daughter are held hostage by Olivia Colasanto in Torchwood: Miracle Day to blackmail Gwen into kidnapping Jack for her.
• This is a favourite tactic of The Network in Utopia for blackmailing people by reminding them they can get to their loved ones at any time. "Jen's great, really great. It'd be such a shame to see her raped."
• V (1983): Robert is coerced into giving up the site of the rebel camp to the Visitors with a threat of harm against his daughter Robin, who they're holding prisoner. The V commander who makes the deal promises his wife and their second younger daughter (who are still there in the camp) will have a chance to leave before they attack (naturally, he lied).
• Vikings: Erlendur tries to coerce Torvi into killing Bjorn by threatening her son, who is in the custody of his people. She kills Erlendur instead though.
• White Collar: In the cliffhanger ending of the third series mid season finale, Keller has kidnapped Peter's wife, El.
  • Keller likes this one; in "Payback" he kidnaps Peter to force money out of Neal.
• Toyed with on The Wire: Brother Mouzone kidnapped and tortured Omar's boyfriend Dante for information, and then held him hostage, agreeing to release him to Omar on the condition that Omar work with him to take out Stringer Bell. Omar and Dante were on the outs anyway, Omar was unimpressed by the fact that Dante had given up information on him, and Omar had been looking for a chance ever since Stringer had his previous boyfriend tortured and killed two years prior; Dante is released to Omar, but they then part ways.
• World on Fire: Kasia is tasked with spying on another Polish woman in England by MI 5. It turns out the woman is spying for the Germans, and says it's due to them having her son in prison with the threat of death hanging over him if she doesn't.
• The X-Files:
  • Mulder makes it very clear very early on in the series that the only way to hurt him is to hurt Scully, and that he'll go to great lengths to get her back. So, Scully falls victim to this quite a lot. But as the bad guys quickly figure out, this never has the desired effect. If anything, it makes Mulder even more resistant to dealing with them and he gets her back in his own way, plus the Roaring Rampage of Revenge that goes along with this. This trope makes up about half of the 1998 movie Fight the Future.
  • It works the other way around, too. And if anything, Scully is even more frightening when Mulder is taken. In season 8, Mulder is missing and she unleashes hell on whoever gets in her way. Never mind that she's pregnant. It takes Skinner pointing out that Mulder wouldn't want her to risk her life and the baby's to get her to even take a breath.
• Zero Zero Zero: Stefano tries to stage a coup against his grandfather Don Minu, leader of their 'Ndrangheta clan, but when push comes to shove, he secretly spares his grandfather. When Stefano's men learn of Stefano's conflicted loyalties, they kidnap his wife and daughter to force him to kill Don Minu.

---