An index concerned with tropes about genes and biological heritage.
Tropes:
Useful Notes:
General tropes
Related indexes:
- All Genes Are Codominant: An interspecies hybrid baby ends up getting 50/50 genes.
- Artificial Hybrid: Someone who was born one species but was turned into a hybrid.
- Bioweapon Beast: An artificially created creature made to be a living weapon.
- Breeding Cult: A secret society that practices eugenics.
- Breeding Sim: A video game focused on breeding creatures for specific traits.
- Clone Angst: A clone angsts over the fact that they are a genetic duplicate of another person.
- Creature-Breeding Mechanic: In a game, the player breeds creatures until they have a necessary creature.
- Custom-Built Host: A body designed to serve as a host for possession, often through genetic engineering.
- Darwinist Desire: Someone will only have sex with a person with the "right" DNA.
- Designer Babies: Altering a fetus so the baby will be "perfect".
- Dominant Species Genes: When species X and Y have kids, the kid is always an X.
- Either/Or Offspring: When two species breed, you always get one or the other, never a hybrid.
- Extra Y, Extra Violent: Men with an extra Y chromosome are violent, even though real life men with XYY syndrome are simply taller and more susceptible to learning disabilities.
- Gender Equals Breed: When an interspecies couple have children, the male children look like their father and the female children look like their mother.
- Generational Magic Decline: Your magic is weaker than your father's, just as he is weaker than his father, who was weaker than his father, and so on and so on.
- Genetic Abomination: A horrifying monstrosity born of genetic engineering.
- Genetic Adaptation: Outsiders adapt to a hostile environment (such as that on other planets) by genetically modifying themselves.
- Genetic Engineering Is the New Nuke: Weird story aspects are explained as being the result of genetic engineering.
- Genetic Memory: An ability to record personal memories/skills into their genes and pass them onto their offspring.
- Genius Breeding Act: Breeding smart people with each other to create smart babies.
- Half-Human Hybrid: A being who is half-human and half-something that isn't human.
- Heinz Hybrid: A hybrid of an implausible number of different species.
- Hereditary Homosexuality: Homo- or bisexuality runs in families.
- Hereditary Suicide: Suicide and/or suicide attempts run in families.
- Hereditary Twinhood: Having twins occurs through family generations.
- Heroic Lineage: Heroism is passed down through the family.
- Hollywood Genetics: A biological family who doesn't look related.
- Hybridization Plot: A character's motive or the plot is dedicated to creating a hybrid.
- Hybrid-Overkill Avoidance: A hybrid can only inherit so many traits at once before it becomes mutated beyond recognition, or some traits cannot be inherited at all, to prevent severe mutation.
- Hybrid Power: An offspring always inherits the special abilities of their parents, and these often enhance each other.
- Hybrids Are a Crapshoot: The hybrid is defective in some way as a result of being a hybrid.
- Inbred and Evil: A villainous child of inbreeding.
- In the Blood: Personality traits, morality, and certain behaviors are passed down from generation to generation.
- It Runs in the Family: Family members tend to have similar personalities.
- Lamarck Was Right: A character inherits a non-genetic trait from their parents.
- LEGO Genetics: Mixing DNA can alter a person's body.
- Mage Species: The ability to use magic is inherent to a certain species.
- Magic Genetics: Genetic mutations can give you superpowers.
- Mix-and-Match Critters: Taking two different animals and combining them into one.
- Mix-and-Match Man: A clone created by combining DNA from two or more individuals.
- Mutagenic Goo: Applied Phlebotinum ooze that can instantly mutate whatever it touches.
- Mutants: Genetically abnormal organisms that look significantly different from normal members of their species.
- Non-Human Humanoid Hybrid: A being who is a mixture of two different non-human species.
- Not Blood, Not Family: A character insists that someone isn't family because of a lack of genetic relation.
- Patchwork Kids: Kids that have the combined physical features of their parents.
- Rapid DNA Test: A DNA test takes way less time in fiction than it does in reality.
- Recessive Super Genes: Superpowerful Genetics may skip generations.
- Royal Inbreeding: Only having sex with blood relatives to keep the bloodline pure
- Super Breeding Program: Breeding "better" people.
- Superior Successor: A younger generation proves to be more competent than the previous one.
- Superpowerful Genetics: A super-powered being will have children who inherit their powers.
- True-Breeding Hybrid: Hybrids capable of reproduction to the point of becoming a separate species.
- Two-Donor Clone: A clone made up of two or more genetic sources.
- Uneven Hybrid: Majority ancestry of one species, and minority ancestry of another.
- Unstable Genetic Code: A genetic defect that causes random Involuntary Shapeshifting.
- Villainous Lineage: When characters are born into an evil family, they run the risk of becoming evil themselves.
- Wrong Genetic Sex: A character's genetic sex doesn't match up with the gender that they appear to be.
- Xeno Nucleic Acid: Alien lifeforms have a very different genetic structure when compared with terrestrial DNA.
Genetics-related Twin Tropes
- Always Identical Twins: When twins of the same sex are mentioned in fiction, they are almost always identical, not fraternal.
- Conjoined Twins: Twins who are born fused to each other, sharing the same body.
- Half-Identical Twins: Brother-sister (i.e., fraternal) twins act identical in all ways other than sex.
- Hereditary Twinhood: "Being a twin" is treated like a genetic pre-disposition such that being a twin almost guarantees one's children or grandchildren will also be twins or that one has twin ancestors.
- Same-Sex Triplets: A set of triplets is more often than not all identical and of the same sex.
