Artificial Family Member

"Who says I can't create life, huh? Just a bunch of proteins bumping together, anyone can do that. A true genius does it with code and electrons! And if I did create life, she would be brilliant and loyal and perfectly effective! And you know why? Because her dad is a genius, that's why!"

— Dr. Eggman on Sage, Sonic Frontiers

Artificial Family Member is when a creation is seen as family by its creator and vice versa. While the most standard portrayal of this is the creator being the parent and the creation being their child, other versions can occur.

While most often seen in the realm of science when creations are either robots, clones or other forms of Artificial Human, magic can also be used as a replacement.

There's a good chance that there will be actual blood ties as the creator might use their own DNA as a basic structure. Or better yet, they may have used someone else's DNA instead. The reluctant donor may not be too happy with the resulting offspring.

If the creation is actually a case of a Replacement Goldfish, expect plenty of drama. Maybe the creator isn't happy with the result as it isn't like the original. Or maybe the creation will resent the original and wants to be seen as its own person.

At a mundane level, this can apply to real life people like artists or writers and their creations as they may see them as family to some capacity.

A major difference between this and Robo Family is that the latter also covers examples of "families" consisting entirely of robots, whereas here the creator is almost always a human. Compare Pygmalion Plot, where the artificial being is treated as a Love Interest instead of a family member. Though, the two tropes can overlap. Compare Thank the Maker for when the creator of an artificial lifeform is treated more like a god. Can overlap with Secret Project Refugee Family.

Contrast That Thing Is Not My Child!, where the creator rejects their creations, and Guinea Pig Family, where a biological family member is reduced to a lab rat.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• The titular Astro Boy. He was created by Dr. Umataro Tenma as a Replacement Goldfish for his lost son. However, he abandoned Astro for not being close enough to Tobio. Astro was later adopted by Professor Ochanomizu. Astro also had a sister name Uran who is either created by Ochanomizu or by Tenma. There was also a brother name Cobalt. Astro even had robot parents created by Tenma in an attempt to atone for abandoning Astro.
• In Doctor Slump, Bungling Inventor Senbei Norimaki lives with his robot daughter Arale. He tells the other villagers that Arale is his little sister, despite being old enough to be her father.
• Dr. STONE reboot: Byakuya has an interesting take on the trope. Rei, despite being a robot, immediately identifies as part of the ISS crew. And much later, in chapter 8, after numberous brain upgrades, it brands itself a member of the Ishigami family.
• Fullmetal Alchemist:
  • The homunculi are the Anthropomorphic Personification of Father's Seven Deadly Sins, which he ripped out of his own soul to make himself a more perfect, god-like being. He addresses them as his children, and it's suggested (by another character pointing out why he made his creations call him "Father") that deep down his true desire was to have a family like humans do, although by the current day his soul is so stripped down that Father treats his children as minions, shows them little if any affection, and then we see how "fatherly" he is when Greed refuses to work for him. Apart from Greed, all the homunculus siblings are blindly loyal and devoted to him, even the most evil of them, and several of them show the same love for each other.
  • Father is also considered this to Slave 23 AKA Hohenheim and by extension, Ed and Al, having been created from 23's blood and in a sense making him 23's oldest "child" (as referenced in an omake). In the past, we're shown that Father reached out to 23 to help him better his life because he views 23 as his creator (not the one who actually performed the experiment using 23's blood, mind you, who is presumably among those Father sacrifices) and went out of his way to spare 23 from the destruction of Xerxes and grant him immortal life out of misguided affection. Now, of course, they're enemies, as is Father with Ed and Al.
  • Meanwhile, in Fullmetal Alchemist (2003), the homunculi were given a different origin story and were revealed to be the results of alchemists attempting to bring back their dead loved ones. By the end of the series, it's made deliberately unclear if the homunculi are twisted versions of the people they were meant to be truly Back from the Dead but Brainwashed and Crazy by Dante, or entirely new beings created by alchemy and reacting in different ways to the memories they inherited... but regardless, Izumi Curtis regards Wrath as her own son, fights to defend him even when he pulls a Face–Heel Turn, and adopts him after the TV show ends with him accepting her as his mommy in The Conqueror Of Shamballah. Sloth is vehement for most of her life that the Elrics are NOT her family and Ed and Al (Trisha's sons who created Sloth when trying to bring Trisha back) are NOT her sons, wanting to kill them to prove she's her own person, but whether that's true gets thrown into question in her last episode. Lastly, Envy is revealed to be the reincarnation of Dante's son with Hohenheim and has been the longest-serving Dragon to his "mother" for centuries (though we're shown a distinct absence of love on both sides). Envy is directly equated by the Big Bad to Ed and Al's (much older) half-brother due to sharing a father, and his torment of the Elric brothers is done out of bitter spite towards Hohenheim for abandoning him when he Came Back Wrong.
  • Which means that in both continuities, Envy and Sloth are technically related to the heroes, either as their nephews/niece and nephew in Brotherhood or as their undead evil older half-brother and undead evil mom in the first anime. They also have an evil older half-brother by Hohenheim in both continuities.
• In HeartCatch Pretty Cure!, Professor Sabaaku created Dark Pretty Cure and treated her like an actual daughter. Then it was revealed that Sabaaku was actually Yuri Tsukikage's father, making Dark Pretty Cure her sister.
• Kill la Kill Nui Harime is a Life Fiber Artificial Human created by Ragyo Kiryuin, who Nui considers her mother. With everything it entitles. She also sees Ryuko as a "blood sister" because they both have Life Fibers in them.
• Lyrical Nanoha:
  • In Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, Fate Testarosssa is actually a clone created by Precia Testarossa based on her deceased daughter Alicia. However, because Fate ended up being entirely different from Alicia, Precia becomes an Abusive Parent. Despite that, Fate still loved her mother and considers Alicia her older sister.
  • Reinforce Zwei from Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's. She was created by Hayate Yagami by using the left over Unison Device of Reinforce Eins. She's often treated as the baby of the Yagami family even if she says she is an adult.
  • Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha StrikerS:
    • The Numbers, 12 cyborgs created by Doctor Jail Scaglieti. He regards all of them as his own daughters which some do share his DNA and they in turn see him as a loving father. Even the ones who turned face. There's also a small example of Parental Incest since he implanted clone embryos of himself in the sisters in case his plans were to fail.
    • Subaru and Ginga Nakajima, the adopted daughters of Genya and Quint, are revealed to be cyborgs themselves whose DNA are base on Quint. This also meant that they were sisters to The Numbers even before some of them were adopted into the Nakajima family.
    • Subverted with Vivio Takamachi, the adopted daughter of both Nanoha and Fate. At first glance, she would seem to be their biological kid since she looks very similar to them. She's really just a clone of a long ago ruler and has zero blood relation to Nanoha and Fate.
  • Amitie and Kyrie Florian from The Gears of Destiny are Robot Girls who were raised as their creator's daughters after he accidentally granted them sentience. Amitie also refers his other non-sentient creations as her brothers and sisters.
  • Iris from the Reflection/Detonation duology refers to her late creator Phil Maxwell as her father and her primary motivation in the movies is getting revenge for his murder. This affection does not run both ways, as he's a sociopath who only pretended to love her because it would make her develop her potential as a Super-Soldier faster.
• In Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic, Scheherazade creates Titus as a sort of magical Opposite-Sex Clone; dialogue seems to indicate that she's done this before. They do seem to think of each other as a mother and son, though part of Scheherazade's Heel Realization is realizing that she hasn't been treating him as his own person.
• The Aerial in Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury boasts a highly sophisticated AI by mech standards, enough that she functionally raised the protagonist, Suletta Mercury. For this reason, she tends to refer to her as "little sister", which is ironic given that the Aerial is eighteen meters tall. Her often-absent mother Prospera is no less fond of the mobile suit, and refers to Aerial and Suletta as "my daughters." Most people just think this is weird, Companion Cube-esque affection. It's not—Aerial's AI is Ericht Samaya, a child who was drawn into the Aerial at a young age, and who is Prospera's real daughter, with Suletta being a clone of her.
• My-HiME has Miyu Greer, who refers to Joseph Greer, the man who created her, as "father". Not that this stops her from running him through with her built-in sword when he shoots Alyssa Searrs to clean up loose ends.
• Rei Ayanami from Neon Genesis Evangelion is a clone created by Gendo Ikari via combining the DNA of Lilith and his late wife Yui. Gendo is shown to have some affection for her. Though, it might be because she looks just like his wife; on the other hand, he did choose the name he and Yui were planning to give their son Shinji if he had been born a girl. There's been debates on whether Shinji's attraction to her can be consider incestual since she shares his mother's DNA.
• Re:CREATORS deals with fictional creations of entertainment entering the real world and meeting their creators. Most of the interaction between the creator and their creation are akin to parent and child.
  • Takashi Matsubara (Creator) and Celesia Upitiria (Creation). The two started out rough as they often argue with each other. Others who see this compare it to a father arguing with their daughter. Later on they do developed a much deeper and caring relationship.
  • Military Uniform Princess aka Altair (Creation) and Yuna Shimazaki (Creator). Altair hates the real world and wants to destroy it because she blames it for causing Yuna to commit suicide.
  • Humorously done with Nishio Onishi (Creator) and Hikayu Hoshikawa (Creation). Others are creep out that Nishio wants to marry Hikayu even though she is basically his daughter. He doesn't really care.
• The main Universe of Tenchi Muyo! has Mad Scientist Washu being the mother of Space Pirate Ryoko. She did that by combining her egg cells with a sentient material called Masu which Mihoshi actually referred to as Ryoko's dad. Theres also the cabbit Ryo-Ohki who was also made out of Masu and is thus Ryoko's sister.
• Touta Konoe of UQ Holder! is repeatedly called the grandson of Negi Springfield, the protagonist of the previous series, Negima! Magister Negi Magi, however it's revealed later on that Touta is a clone of Negi and Asuna, as the former was unable to reproduce. And not only that, Touta was the only successful clone out of dozens of experiments.

Comic Books

• In Astro City, the Gentleman is actually a Dream Person created by his "daughter," based on idealized memories of her real, deceased father. She later imagined the Young Gentleman as a sort of perfect older brother.
• The DCU
  • Kon-El's Superboy is a clone combining the DNA of Superman and Lex Luthor. While Supes never treated Kon as a son, he does see him as part of his family along with his adopted parents and his cousin. Lex, however, is treated as Kon's Archnemesis Dad as he tries to persuade the Boy of Steel to his side.
  • Wonder Woman has Princess Diana whose original origin story has her being sculptured from clay by Queen Hippolyta and given life by the Greek Gods. There's also Donna Troy who in one of her many origin stories has her being the magical mirror clone of Diana to act as a friend. In the Silver Age, Nubia was Diana's black twin sister who was sculpted from clay as well.
• Marvel Universe:
  • Spider-Man considers Ben Reilly and Kaine, clones of his created by the Jackal, his brothers. In the case of the latter, following his Heroic Sacrifice during the "Grim Hunt" arc, he's buried under the name Kaine Parker.
  • In Avengers: The Initiative, the Scarlet Spiders are all clones of Michael Van Patrick mixed with DNA from Baron von Blitzschlaug. He frequently refers to them as his boys.
  • The ever Tangled Family Tree that started with Hank Pym and his rebellious robot son, Ultron who has an oedipus complex on Pym. He once attempted to create a wife by using the brainwaves base on Hank's wife Janet and naming her Jocasta. Then there is Ultron's sons The Vision and Victor Mancha. Vision himself marries Scarlet Witch and with the use of her Chaos Magic, created two sons for themselves. And later on, Vision creates a Robo Family consisting of a wife, a son, a daughter, and a dog. And the wife's brainwaves are base on Scarlet Witch's. And then there was the time Hank Pym was in a relationship with Jocasta which squicked others out since he is technically her grandfather. Though, she sees it as being with God.
  • Laura Kinney a.k.a. X23 is the Opposite-Sex Clone of Wolverine, created by The Facility. How their relationship was seen actually change from that of a brother-sister dynamic to a much more father-daughter one once Logan decided to adopt her and Daken saw her as a sister. There's also Dr. Sarah Kinney who was forced by Dr. Zander Rice to give birth to X-23. While sympathetic, Sarah was emotionally abusive to X even if she did try to help her as much as she could. Eventually she did pull a Heel–Face Turn and tried to save Laura from the Facility. Laura also saw Sarah's sister and niece as her aunt and cousin even if there was no true blood ties. Rice himself can be seen as the "father" to X-23 as he was the head scientist to the project. He was portrayed as the true abusive parent since he focus all his hate on Wolverine to her. It is theoretically possible that Laura may have actual Kinney DNA, given her slight resemblance to her mother and the fact that the DNA sample used to create her was damaged, which may have required the splicing of Sarah's DNA to repair it.

Fan Works

• In the fanfic series that starts with Descent into Darkness, the artificial hedgehog Shadow sees the human scientist who created him, Gerald, as his father. In turn, Gerald sees Shadow as his youngest son. Shadow is also treated as the brother of Gerald's granddaughter Maria.
• Human After All:
  • Professor Moshimo created Robotboy because he could not have kids of his own. The two see each other as father and son (with Robotgirl being Robotboy's sister).
  • Robyn lives with Lola, so the two have grown to see each other as sisters. Robyn's been accepted into the family, but the others don't know she's a robot.
• About half of the Invader Zim fandom has adopted the idea that Dib fits this trope (see below). In particular, many stories depict him as a clone of his father (due to their Strong Family Resemblance), with Gaz sometimes explained as a clone of his presumably-existent wife.
• In the Five Nights at Freddy's Alternate Universe Fic Something Always Remains, the Puppet is this to its creator, Bonnie Wickes. In the end, it becomes this to her niece, Vanna, Mike Schmidt, and her uncle-in-law, Will Wickes.
• In The Myamoto Project, Myamoto's clone sees Giovanni as her father. He only sees her as an Expendable Clone. Myamoto finally disowns Giovanni after he kills Tracey and Jennifer, right before she stabs him and commits a Heroic Sacrifice.
• TRON fandom has a tendency to play around with this trope in regards to User (human) characters and their Programs. It's usually Averted or Defied for good reason when it comes to the Flynns and Clu 2.0. And it's more often played entirely straight when it comes to the Bradleys and Tron or Yori.
• Kingdom Hearts fandom also tends to treat the Literal Split Personality characters (the Nobodies who developed their own personalities, living personification of darkness, and Replicas) this way with the original human characters, at least when they're not shipping them. In canon, all the Artificial Humans are around the same age as their originals, so most fanworks tend to default to treating them as sibling-like relationships. Alternate Universe fanfiction can play more with the ages to make certain characters the biological parents, siblings, etc of the Artificial Humans.
  • "Receipts" from MugetsuPipefox's Sea-Salt Family series touches on this trope applied to the canon universe, with "Leftovers" exploring it more in detail. Roxas and Xion need birth certificates and ultimately decide on the inelegant solution of claiming Sora and Kairi are their birth parents, since it's the closest thing to true... despite their "parents" looking the exact same age as them (in fairness, it's unlikely anyone's actually going to check since they're literally on different worlds). Nice Guy that he is, Sora worries that Roxas and Xion actually feel abandoned by him letting Lea and Isa raise them and tries in his own awkward way to bond with his new "kids," but...
    Roxas: Sora, we're kind of the same person. You're stuck with me whether you like it or not. I'm not your son, no matter what some form says. I'm you.
    Sora: We're not the same person, Roxas, but I think I get what you mean. And I'd prefer to be your brother than your dad, anyway.
    Roxas: I think technically you'd be my mom.
• Tealove's Steamy Adventure reveals that Applejack's "younger sister" Apple Bloom is actually "a failed science experiment", though her exact nature (robot? golem? something else?) is never explained.
• Luna creates a second Tantabus to make good dreams in Tantabus Mark II. When it unexpectedly develops sapience, the first thing it does is call Luna "Mom". Once Luna manages to work out her own issues in accidentally creating life and establishes the Tantabus as a Benevolent A.I., she begins treating it as her daughter.
• Much like the canon Kill la Kill series, Nui is this in Natural Selection, but it's much more pronounced as, despite being an Artificial Human, she was adopted and raised within the Kiryuin family and grew up alongside Satsuki and Ryuko as their little sister. Even despite her nature, Soichiro considers her his daughter as much as he does Ryuko and Satsuki.
• Penny Polendina, in a similar but different case from canon, is Pietro's daughter in BlazBlue Alternative: Remnant, but instead of being an android created by him, she's a Murakumo Unit cloned from Saya. Despite this, she still regards him as her father and he regards her as his daughter.
  • Subverted regarding Penny and Noel. Despite both of them being Murakumo Units, making them genetically related, and Penny regarding Noel as her sister, Noel admits in Chapter 47 that she doesn't quite feel comfortable with being Penny's sister just yet. The two decide to acknowledge each other as friends rather than family.
• In the last chapter of Weight Off Your Shoulder, the Dupain-Cheng family does not has much problem adopting the Sentimonster Ladybug (and thus technically clone of Marinette) created by Mayura, once Marinette explains (off-screen) the (even more) complicated mechanics of her origin, giving her the name of "Bridgette".

Films — Animation

• Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio: Takes a darker/sadder twist with Geppetto creating Pinocchio in a depressive and drunken state, attempting to bring back his dead son Carlo who died from an aerial bombing. When Pinocchio is given life, he instantly sees Geppetto as a father, but Geppetto takes much longer to see Pinocchio as his son. Pinocchio falls in the "failed Replacement Goldfish" when Geppetto tries to force him to be more like Carlo.
• Like in the book, Pinocchio is a wooden marionette created by Gepetto and who he treats like his own son. The Blue Fairy can also be seen as Pinocchio's mother since she brought him to life.

Films — Live-Action

• Played with in A.I.: Artificial Intelligence. Henry and Monica Swinton are employees of Cybertronics, the company that manufactured Robot Kid David. David was intended as a Replacement Goldfish for the couple's comatose son Martin, but after some initial tension Monica grows to care for him. Tensions arise when Martin wakes up from his coma.
• In Attack of the Clones, Jango Fett's DNA was use for the basis of the Clone Army. He asked for one unaltered clone (i.e. no accelerated aging) that he raised as his own son. That son being Boba Fett.
• The title character of The Electric Grandmother is exactly this, a replacement for the dead mother. It takes a while for one of the kids to warm up to her.
• Godzilla: Biollante started life as just a simple rose crossed with the DNA of Genshiro Shiragami's deceased daughter in an attempt to resurrect her. Later on, Biollente was dosed with Godzilla's mutated cells, transforming her into a kaiju that's part plant, part human, and part Godzilla. While the relationship was never clearified, most labelled Biollante as a "sister" to Godzilla.
• Logan:
  • Like in the comics, Laura a.k.a. X-23 is created by using Wolverine's DNA. Even if others refer to her as his daughter, Logan doesn't want to have anything to do with her. However, he has a change of heart doing the course of the movie and Laura does call him dad as he lays dying and feels pride in those words.
  • Even though the moments are brief, there's the relationship between Zander Rice and X-24, a clone of Logan. Rice actually comforts X-24 as he injects the healing serum like a father would to their child. Then there's X-24 mad reaction of seeing Rice dead.
• Saving Mr. Banks: P.L. Travers is very reluctant to give Walt Disney the movie rights to her Mary Poppins books, as she has a personal connection to her characters. Disney understands this, as he feels the same way about his most famous creation.
• Subverted in Splice, where Clive and Elsa increasingly strive to dehumanize Dren even as it becomes clear that she is sapient.
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze has Tohka and Razor, a mutated snapping turtle and wolf. They were created by Shredder who wanted his own mutant army and they hilariously call him "mama" instead of master.
• In Toys, the youngest member of the Zevo family, Alsatia, is a Cloud Cuckoo Lander who works in the family toy company's dolls division. She's revealed to be a robot after being accidentally shot by one of the older brother's experimental weapons.

Literature

• In The Adventures of Pinocchio (as well as the adaptation Pinocchio by Disney), the elderly woodsmith Gepetto creates a sentient puppet named Pinocchio which he treats as his son.
• Aeon 14: Under the Phobos Accords, new sentient Artificial Intelligence are traditionally created via a blending of minds (which for human partners is usually represented as cybersex followed by virtual birth), and are regarded by their "parents" as little different from biological children. In Orion Rising, protagonist Tanis Richards, her flesh-and-blood husband Joe Evans, and her AI partner Angela blend minds to birth an AI daughter, Faleena, to keep their biological and adopted daughters Cary and Saanvi out of trouble.
• In Alien in a Small Town, Indira's ex-boyfriend Aleksie was genetically engineered by his "mother." He doesn't actually share any of her DNA and born from a Uterine Replicator. She gave him every genetic enhancement the law allowed and wanted him to be an Übermensch. For his part, Aleksie finds her to be controlling and unsatisfiable, and has no particular ambition in life, living as a bohemian. The two do not get along.
• In the Animorphs prequel The Ellimist Chronicles, the title character (pre-Sufficient Advancement) is trapped for eons in a sort of mental world, during which he imagines his dead wife being around and thinks up three children for them. He notes that, being inexperienced with kids, they didn't come out as well, sort of disappearing whenever he's not actively thinking about them.
• In Captain Vorpatril's Alliance the Jewels were both the creation and the children of Udine. Her husband Shiv treats them as his children too, and their (more or less) natural children consider them siblings. Although they all do make a distinction between the "odd sibs" and the "even sibs."
• The Sisters from A Certain Magical Index are all clones of the Level-5 Esper Mikoto Misaka created from her DNA sample. While Mikoto originally went through a phase of denial, she now happily sees them all as her little "sisters", a sentiment which they return.
• In Dark Lord of Derkholm, the wizard Derk's specialty is creating magical hybrids, like pigs with wings. His masterworks are the griffins, built from combinations of avian and feline DNA with a bit of human DNA for intelligence — they have human-level minds, and he regards them as just as much his children as the ones he fathered by more traditional means.
• Fate/Apocrypha:
  • Saber of Red is Mordred, the "son" of King Arthur and Morgan le Fay. However, instead of being born naturally she's really a homunculus born from Morgan's womb when Morgan stole sperm from Artoria, who was transformed into a male by Merlin.
  • Berserker of Black is actually a genderflipped Frankenstein's Monster. Her backstory is more or less the same with one major difference being that Victor Frankenstein is much more of a Abusive Parent than in the book.
• Inverted in Frankenstein—immediately after giving the Monster life, Victor has a What Have I Done moment and essentially abandons it. It's the Monster who comes to see Victor as his "father," and is understandably upset about the way he's been treated. His response is to do everything he can to destroy Victor's life, though at the end he still winds up mourning his "father's" death.
• October Daye: On paper, May Daye is Toby's twin. May is a personified death omen who didn't wink out of existence when Toby's death was averted. This is a played with example, as Faerie itself created May, not Toby.
• In The Marvelous Land of Oz, Jack Pumpkinhead, a Pumpkin Person created by young protagonist Tip and brought to life by Applied Phlebotinum, refers to Tip as his "father" throughout the book. Tip isn't quite comfortable with this arrangement and is relieved when, after it's discovered that "he" is actually the kidnapped Princess Ozma who was transformed into a boy to hide her true identity, Jack realizes she can't be his father anymore and drops it.

Live-Action TV

• The Aquabats! Super Show!: While Jimmy the Robot's creator resents his decision to leave the family farm to pursue music and crime fighting, he and his wife love their super-powered robot son immensely. Jimmy's friends express great confusion in finding out he has parents.
  Crash: Are you guys robots?
• Eve (2015): Shortly after being brought home by the Clarkes, Eve is identified as "Will's American cousin", although her role is more like that of a sister/daughter.
• Astronaut Molly Woods of Extant is married to inventor John Woods, who has created a Robot Kid called Ethan to be their son because Molly is infertile. John cares for Ethan deeply, and gets distressed when people question Ethan's "humanity" or "lack of a soul."
• I Am Frankie: Frankie is seen as a daughter by Gaines. Frankie in turn sees her family as her own.
• K.C. Undercover: KC refers to Judy as her younger sister, identifying herself as the big sister.
• Kamen Rider Ex-Aid:
  • Burgermon, the Bugster from Ju Ju Burger, was created by Tsukuru Kobashi. Instead of being frighten by the Bugster, he was happy that Burgermon was real and treated him like a son.
  • Poppy, another Bugster, actually sees Dan Kuroto as her birth father since he created her and named her. The feeling is surprisingly mutual as Kuroto also sees her as family. Might also be because Poppy is the Busgster of his mother.
  • Downplayed with Parado and Emu. While no true family connection was made, since Parado did came out of Emu's body and wanted to play with him and the two ending up as Bash Brothers, the two can be seen as brothers.
• Kamen Rider Zero-One:
  • Aruto lost his father when he was young. His grandfather built a HumaGear to act as a substitute parent to act as a emotional support. Aruto and the HumaGear did see each other as family to the point Aruto called him father and he was willing to sacrifice himself for Aruto. Not only that, he was actually buried in Aruto's family plot.
  • Jin is a HumaGear created by Horobi, and the two explicitly refer to each other as father and son.
  • An aspiring voice actress HumaGear in Episode 6 was this to her talent manager and the latter treats her as though she was the manager's deceased daughter. While it was technically illegal, Aruto sympathized with the manager due to him being raised by a HumaGear.
  • Wazu Nazotoku was a prototype of Izu and considered himself her older brother. Izu returned the sentiment shortly before his death.
  • The astronaut brothers Uchuuyarou Raiden and Uchuuyarou Subaru.
• The Outer Limits (1995):
  • In "I, Robot", Mina Link testifies that the robot Adam is like a brother to her.
  • In "Simon Says", Gideon Banks considers the robot with his late son Simon's memories to be his actual son.
  • In "Family Values", the Millers (with the exception of Jerry) come to view their household robot Gideon as a member of the family after less than a month.
• Small Wonder: This was the central premise of the series. Ted Lawson built a robot girl named Vicki and he, his wife and their son all had to pretend she was a member of their family and not a robot.
• Star Trek: The Next Generation:
  • Data (an android) calls his creator "Father" and his creator's wife "Mother".^note She's kind of an odd example, as the version of her Data encounters in "Inheritance" is an android duplicate her husband built after the death of her human original. The latter expressly tells Data that she loved the androids they created like children. Data also considers the other androids created by the same couple, Lore and B-4 (from the films), his brothers, and in "The Offspring", Data creates an android girl named Lal, who he calls his "daughter".
  • In "The Schizoid Man", Data encounters his creator's (non-biologically-related) mentor, who encourages him to call him "Grandpa". Data immediately agrees to do so. Pity the guy is planning to kill Data, steal his body and achieve immortality through Brain Uploading.
• The Twilight Zone (1959):
  • In "The Lateness of the Hour", a scientist's daughter discovers that she is actually a robot he built. This knowledge drives her mad and he ends up reprogramming her as a maid.
  • "I Sing the Body Electric" is about a widower purchasing a robot Grandma from a company as caretaker for his children. One of his daughters is very slow to warm up to her, still being bitter over her mother's death, before seeing that the gynoid is nigh-invulnerable and thus never at risk of dying on her.
• In Ultraman Geed, Riku is the son of Ultraman Belial. However, he was created in a lab by Alien Sturm who used genetic materials taken from Belial.
• Westworld. Arnold created a host recreation of a happy childhood time as a gift to Ford, but he changed the program so his father is a violent drunk like he apparently was in real life.

Radio

• Dimension X: Dr. Cornelius from "Dwellers in Silence" is the only survivor on Earth. To help against his loneliness , he created robot copies of his deceased wife and children: Alice, Susan, Marguerite, and John.

Video Games

• Fate/Grand Order:
  • Downplayed with Mash Kyrielight who is a designer baby created to host the Heroic Spirit Galahad, the son of Lancelot. Even though Lancelot had zero involvement in Mash creation, he still sees her as his daughter.
  • Jeanne d'Arc Alter is an interesting case. She was created by Gilles de Rais with the use of the Holy Grail and molded as a twisted vision of the regular Jeanne d'Arc. When made into a playable Servant, the event has her trying to make a harem with Gilles playing the father archetype. Regular Jeanne also sees her as a little sister and thinks her retaliation on her to be cute.
  • The ninja Assassin Kato Danzo is a robotic karakuri doll created by the Mage Koji Kashin and empowered by the first Kotarou Fuuma. She view both of them as her parents. Danzo also acted as the "mother" for the other Fuuma. Kotarou Fuuma the Fifth, the one that the protagonist can summon, outright calls her "Haha-ue (Honored Mother)".
  • Downplayed with Sieg, a Homonculus that Siegfried implanted with his own heart to help him survive. Siegfried's wife, Kriemhild, recognizes the scent of her husband on Sieg and develops maternal instincts for him... through wanting Sieg to change his name to not match Siegfried and making sure he doesn't die a horrible death like her husband.
• Hephaestus in the God of War series created Pandora as an Artificial Human to serve as the key to Pandora's Box, but eventually comes to see her as his daughter, a fact which earns him much mockery and scorn from the other Olympian Gods, who refuse to see her as anything more than a pale imitation of real humans. Kratos similarly becomes obsessed with Pandora as a Replacement Goldfish for his dead daughter Calliope, and, like Hephaestus, is mocked by Zeus for this.
• In the "Distant Future" episode of Live A Live, the protagonist Cube is an adorable robot whose creator Yoshiyuki Kato treats with paternal affection, often addressing it as "Little One".
• Using Astro Boy as one of their inspirations, the main story of Mega Man is about Dr. Light creating the first sentient robots to help humanity, where his first models (Blues/Proto Man, Rock/Mega Man and Roll) are considered as his own family and helping him in home labours, especially Rock, being treated almost like it was his son. It helps that both Mega Man and Roll are designed to resemble preteen children.
• Metal Gear: Solid Snake and his brothers, Liquid and Solidus, are all clones of Big Boss, but are repeatedly referred to as his sons. While Big Boss himself doesn't acknowledge him as such until the very end of his own life, he nonetheless respects Snake as a man and fellow soldier.
• Downplayed with Samus Aran from Metroid. She was born naturally by human parents but was genetically altered by her adopted family the Chozo who also gave her their DNA. In the Manga, Mother Brain, who was created by the Chozo, called herself Samus' "mother" since not only did she help in Samus' upbringing, she was the one who injected Samus of the Chozo DNA. Though, her jealousy over Samus being the true legacy of the Chozo race can be compare to sibling's rivalry.
• Mortal Kombat: Kitana's "sister" Mileena is actually a clone of hers created by Shang Tsung under orders from Shao Kahn who feared that Kitana would one day learn that he wasn't her father and turn against him. Which is exactly what happens.
• Sonic Frontiers: Sage is an AI created by Eggman for the purpose of discovering the secrets of the Ancients and how it can be used in his quest for world domination. Over the course of the game Sage begins to learn more about love and friendship from watching Sonic and begins to yearn for the same from Eggman. Eggman, for his part, thinks of her as nothing more than a minion no different from Orbot and Cubot at first, but by the end comes to consider her as his daughter.

Visual Novels

• Doctor Klim from Virtue's Last Reward clones himself to create a successor to finish his work if he dies before it's finished, and raises the clone (very poorly) as his son. When the clone asked for a mother, he built a Ridiculously Human Robot to fulfill the role, but the clone refused to see her as anything more than Just a Machine and latched on to Klim's female colleague as a mother figure instead. Klim also saw the "robot mom" as his daughter, while she secretly harbored romantic feelings for him.

Web Animation

• RWBY: Penny Polendina is a robot created by Atlesian scientist Pietro Polendina. She addresses him as her father, and he in turn views her as his daughter.

Webcomics

• Devil's Candy: After making Pandora for his school science project, Kazu is fully willing to raise her like a younger sister or daughter. By Chapter 3 he's even enrolled her as a student in the same school. This is in contrast to the rest of his class, who mostly built themselves (poorly assembled) girlfriends.
• In El Goonish Shive, a magical mishap creates Ellen, an Opposite-Sex Clone of Elliot. Elliot and his parents adopt her into the household almost immediately and she quickly comes to be seen as his de facto twin sister.
  Ellen: Really. The spontaneous creation of a female clone with all your memories. That was simple.
  Elliot: "She's family. Help her." Not that complicated.
• Molly the Peanut Butter Monster in The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob! considers Bob and Jean her parents (which they are to a certain extent), even calling them Mommy and Daddy even though she was fully grown in body and mind long ago.
  • There are now plenty of examples. Molly's robot Roofus calls her "Mom." Her clone Galatea calls Molly her "sister," calls Jean "Mom," calls Bob "Uncle," and calls the scientist who made her "father" even though she hates him. Molly's other clone Djali calls Jean "Mom," Molly "Sister," and can't seem to decide if Galatea also counts as Mom or as Sister. And Galatea's own creation Gosh calls her "Mom." Oh, and Jean's engagement ring has become part of a Hive Mind of sentient crystals, and once called her "Mom," to which she responded "Oh, don't you start!"
    Voluptua: (to Jean) "And your family has too many kids. But you know that."
• The eponymous character of Trader Lydia unknowingly drinks a multiplication potion that creates several dozen clones of her, who all deviate from the original and develop styles and personalities of their own. She treats the clones as her sisters and her parents likewise don't seem to have a problem having a lot more daughters out in the world.

Western Animation

• Ricky and Lucy Blank in 3Below started out as "blanks", a type of mass-produced robot. These particular two were programmed to look and act like human parents as part of a cover story for their alien programmers. They started developing emotions after one was electrocuted, and the aliens named them and kept them active.
• In The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius, the title character decides that he wants a little brother, so he creates Brobot. Eventually, Jimmy gets sick of him and makes him a Mombot and a Popbot, and the new family goes to live on the moon.
• Adventure Time:
  • The entire Candy Kingdom was created by Princess Bubblegum and she sees them as her children who she cares about. Even people like Lemongrab who is an annoyance is still loved by her.
  • Goliad and Stormo were created by Princess Bubblegum with the former created by standard candy parts and Bubblegum's baby teeth and the latter created with Finn's DNA. Goliad refers to Stormo as her brother and Finn himself refers to Stormo as his son.
  • "Bonnibel Bubblegum" reveals the first three Candy People were explicitly meant to be Princess Bubblegum's family. She was still (physically) a child then, so she made them older than she was—specifically an uncle, aunt, and older cousin modeled on a family she found a photograph of.
  • NEPTR is a machine created by Finn to act as a pie thrower, which came to life when he was hit by some of the Ice King's frozen lightning. NEPTR considers them both his fathers, but of course, the Ice King ("Papi") cannot remember that he exists, and Finn ("Creator") isn't much better.
• In Buzz Lightyear of Star Command, both XR and XL consider Commander Nebula to be their father, because he commissioned their creation. He finds this endlessly annoying, particularly since it was the LGMs who actually made them.
• There's Dani Phantom from Danny Phantom, the Opposite-Sex Clone of Danny created by Vlad Plasmus. She did refer to Plasmus as her father but stopped after finding out he was just using her. And while she refers to herself as Danny's cousin, it would be more accurate to see them as genetic brother and sister. Had the series continued, Dani would have been adopted into the Fenton family.
• DuckTales (2017):
  • Magica De Spell's "niece" Lena is actually her Living Shadow brought to life (and thus more like her daughter). After Lena has a Heel–Face Turn and is disowned by Magica, she is Happily Adopted by Violet's fathers.
  • In "Happy Birthday, Doofus Drake!", Louie discovers that Mark Beaks' son Boyd is actually a robot (a Beaks Optimistic Youth Droid). Once exposed, Beaks basically abandons Boyd, who ends up adopted into Doofus' family. It's later revealed that Boyd isn't actually Beaks' creation at all, but Gyro's. Gyro abandoned Boyd for seemingly turning evil, but changes his mind once he learned that was his partner's doing, though Gyro doesn't quite refer to Boyd as family.
  • The Grand Finale reveals Webby is an artificial daughter (possibly an Opposite-Sex Clone) of Scrooge made by FOWL before Mrs. Beakley rescued her as an infant. Later on, FOWL cloned May and June from her. They treat FOWL Directors Buzzard and Black Heron like parents (they even once call the latter "mom"), but aren't treated as much besides minions. After the girls' Heel–Face Turn, they are taken in by Donald and Daisy.
• Gargoyles
  • The clone gargoyle Thailog had three "fathers." Goliath is his DNA template, Dr. Anton Sevarius is the one who created him, and David Xanatos gave him his education. While Goliath was enraged at him, Elisa points out he is more or less his son. Though, Thailog attempted to kill him and his other fathers after finding them a disappointment. He also has an oedipus complex with Goliath as he hit on Elisa Maza, Goliath's Love Interest, enter a relationship with Goliath's ex, Demona and created Delilah, a clone combining the DNA of both Demona and Elisa.
  • Anton Sevarius creates a new giant gargoyle by using the DNA of the entire Manhatten Clan. He actually saw it as his own son as he named him Little Anton and was sadden when he permanently turned to stone.
• Invader Zim: According to Word of Saint Paul, one possible story that they might have eventually made would have Dib learn that he was actually an Artificial Human created by his father, Professor Membrane; how Gaz fits into this is anyone's guess. Has become quite popular in Fanon (see above).
• Justice League's Galatea was a clone of Supergirl created by Dr. Emil Hamilton for Cadmus. Despite Emil joining Cadmus because he did not trust supers, he actually loves Galatea like a daughter and she loves him like a father.
• Lilo & Stitch: Technically an extended family example due to the whole theme of the franchise, but by the end of the original film, Jumba joins his creation's X-626/Stitch's new family and becomes his father figure. In Lilo & Stitch 2: Stitch Has a Glitch, he worries about Stitch's glitches and builds a machine to save his life, and in Stitch! The Movie, Stitch goes to see Jumba to talk about how he doesn't have "cousins" (this is before Stitch meets the other experiments, who also count towards this trope). Also, in The Origin of Stitch short (set between Lilo & Stitch 2 and Stitch! The Movie), Jumba comforts a distressed Stitch by reminding him about what he has become and is proud of him for that.
• Miraculous Ladybug: It is eventually revealed that Adrien Agreste, his cousin Félix and Kagami Tsurugi are all Sentimonsters created by the Peacock Miraculous which was broken and thus their parents Cast from Lifespan to create them. While Adrien and Kagami were completely unaware of this revelation, Félix was not so lucky, with his father using this fact as the centerpoint of his abuse of him as the former was dying.^note In a bizarre twist of events, the moment the Sentimonsters first appeared, the fandom jumped on the theory these three were Sentis and it was a heavily argued idea until the reveal.
• My Life as a Teenage Robot has XJ-9 a.k.a. Jenny Wakeman created by Dr. Nora Wakeman. While the latter expects the former to act as a defender of the Earth, she still sees her as her own daughter and loves her just as much. There's also XJ-1 through 8 who Jenny sees as her younger sisters but who Nora doesn't have that close of a relationship with.
• The Owl House: Hunter is a Grimwalker clone of Caleb Wittebane, created by and raised as the nephew of Caleb's brother Philip, AKA Emperor Belos. Unfortunately the reasons behind his creation are extremely dark — Caleb was murdered by Philip for falling in love with a witch, and Hunter is merely the latest in a very long line of Grimwalkers, all created as Belos's attempts at making a "better" version of Caleb that would obey him without question, and killed when they failed to live up to that expectation. While he acts as Hunter's father figure, Belos is an extremely abusive one, keeping Hunter isolated from the outside world, forcing him to do the job of an adult at age 16, verbally abusing him when he fails, and it's implied Hunter was being regularly beaten by Belos as well. After Hunter figures out the truth, Belos gives up every pretense of caring about him, and nearly all of their interactions in subsequent episodes consist of Belos either actively tormenting or trying to kill him, or trying to hurt his friends through him.
• The Powerpuff Girls (1998)
  • Professor Utonium created the Powerpuff Girls and acts like their father in every way. And while the Girls always refer to him as the Professor, they love him like a father.
  • There's Bunny, the temporary fourth sister of the PPGs. She was created by the girls after feeling so exhausted from saving the day.
  • There's Mojo Jojo and Rowdyruff Boys who were created very similarly to the Girls. The four villains are shown to have some family affection. The Boys would be later resurrected by Him with the use of magic, making him their other father. Once Mojo found out, he wasn't too happy and battle Him in a literal Custody Battle for the Boys.
• In Samurai Jack, the Daughters of Aku are literally the Daughters of Aku. They were conceived when The High Priestess of the Cult of Aku drank some of Aku's dark essence.
• W.I.T.C.H. (2004)
  • In "H is for Haunted", Will creates an Astral Drop, magical clones with no personality, to do her laundry. Big Bad Nerissa then turns it into an altermere, an artificial being with actual feelings and emotions, and convince her to take over real Will's life. After the two Wills battle, the original one realized the other was an actual being and the two made peace. The two then referred to each other as sisters.
  • Nerissa creates a altermere of Yan Lin since she knew she be unable to convince the real one to join her. After defeating Nerissa, the altermere Yan Lin is introduce as Mira, Yan Lin's long lost sister.
• X-Men: Evolution was the first appearance of Wolverine's Opposite-Sex Clone, X-23. During the two's battle, Wolverine commented on that the two were the only family they had. What kind of family relationship was never established but many fans assume it would evolve into a father/daughter one.
• Young Justice (2010)
  • Red Tornado considers his creator, T.O. Morrow, to be his "father" (even if he's a villain), and Morrow's other robots his siblings.
  • Superboy is also in this show. Unlike in the comics, he does want Superman to be a father-figure to him, but Superman has a hard time dealing with this issue. They still eventually get the familial relationship, however, with Supes calling him "little brother" in Season 2 and beyond.
  • The New God Metron, creator of the Mother Box and Father Box technology, eventually comes to think of Violet and Victor as his grandchildren because both of them are the result of his creations merging with humans.
  • A very twisted example comes from Helga Jace. She believes that any metahumans created under her care are her children. So someone like Halo whose powers are alien in origin, she is willingly to abandon them because she didn't create them.

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