The Chosen One / Live-Action TV

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• Captain Dylan Hunt on Andromeda started out as a normal human (albeit genetically upgraded, which is standard for 90% of human characters in that series), but as seasons wore on he was retconned to be a half-human/half-Sufficiently Advanced Alien of the Master Race, then became the Paradine, spoken of in ancient prophecy, with his own prescient alien seeress by his side. (Trance Gemini, who started out as an (seemingly) innocent perky alien girl with hints of unusual powers, but in later seasons was fully transformed.) Hercules in Space, indeed.
• In Atlantis, Jason is the Chosen One. We know this because the Oracle makes sure to cryptically mention it Once an Episode. She is somewhat more vague what he is chosen for.
• In Babylon 5 there is not just 'One' Chosen One but three of them! Or, alternately (and significantly), one with three parts (as Zathras puts it, The-One-Who-Was, The-One-Who-Is, and The-One-Who-Will-Be).
  • The trio of Chosen Ones was probably (at least partially) a Retcon to explain how the Suspiciously Similar Substitute could replace the previous Chosen One.
    • Retcon doesn't even begin to describe B5. JM Straczynski practically deserves to be listed under the Crazy-Prepared trope for his contingency planning. From the very beginning, every single major character, in all five seasons had an "out" written into the story so that they could be removed without affecting the storyline, and indeed, could be reintroduced later if necessary.
    • And he specifically stated in interviews that it was intentional to remove Sinclair (a popular character on B5) during the height of the series. Straczynski designed the show to have a beginning, a middle, and an end (plus 20,000 contingency plans) unlike most shows. But Sinclair leaving at the end of the first season (rather than sometime in Season 2 or 3) and coming back in later seasons was not a contingency plan — it was forced by actor Michael O'Hare's mental health issues (he had schizophrenia; his paranoid delusions weren't helped by the fact that his character was having less-paranoid delusions, as well). This led to JMS bullshitting for several years about how he had "realized Sinclair's arc had played out too quickly" and the character needed to be written out for story reasons; in reality, he had promised O'Hare to keep the circumstances of his departure from the show a secret until O'Hare died (JMS revealed it in May 2013, O'Hare having passed the previous September).
  • The trope is also subverted in "Comes the Inquisitor." During this episode, the Inquisitor (on behalf of the Vorlons) tortures Delenn and Sheridan until they both proclaim that they're nothing special, that if they're killed others will just take their places, and that they most likely will die pointlessly and without glory.
    • That is revealed to be true. Sheridan ascends and leaves beyond the Rim, while Delenn dies of old age.
• The new Battlestar Galactica is swimming with them.
  • Dr. Gaius Baltar is 'chosen' by the hallucinatory vision of the Cylon Number Six (which vision is usually called "Head-Six") to serve the One True God, and she manipulates him to that end over the course of the entire run of the series, from scientist to political leader to champion of the downtrodden underclass to religious icon. She actually calls him 'the chosen one' on several occasions. Interestingly, no matter what happens, the things Baltar must do as the chosen one also get him laid — and even more interestingly, "Head-Six" is eventually shown to be an actual angel of God (although she doesn't especially care to be called an angel, and God isn't particularly enamored of that title, either), and it turns out that this whole time the physical Six model Baltar had had an affair with on Caprica has a "Head-Baltar" who is also an angel. We're not entirely sure what this reminds us of, but it seems like something.
  • In the second instance, President Laura Roslin comes to believe that she is the dying leader who will lead the people to Earth, based on her interpretation of ancient religious texts. Her role is questioned when she is cured of her supposedly terminal cancer, and reassessed when she suffers a relapse.
  • The third possibility is Kara 'Starbuck' Thrace, who is told early on by the Cylon Leoben that she is important and has a destiny. Unlike the other two, she actively denies it and works against it, before embracing it shortly before her 'death' in the atmosphere of a gas giant. Upon her return, she comes to passionately believe she is now the one destined to lead the human race to Earth, unaware of a Cylon prophecy that she will actually lead the human race to the apocalypse.
  • The fourth example (is that a record?) is the Cylon Number Three (D'Anna Biers), who becomes obsessed with seeing the faces of the Final Five and what lies between life and death. She declares herself to be a chosen one who will lead the Cylons into a new age, but instead her hubris kills her and leads to her entire line being boxed. It turns out her experiences were actually more important to furthering Baltar and arguably Starbuck's positions as 'chosen ones' (by putting Baltar in a position where he found his way back to the fleet, and by enabling Starbuck to find Earth).
  • Really, when it comes right down to it, Battlestar Galactica: Reimagined doesn't really have a Chosen One — it has a Chosen Five-Man Band, each with a specific purpose in "God's" plan.
    • By comparison, the original Battlestar Galactica series is a bit more reserved. The Beings of Light, a mysterious race that go around the universe helping civilizations in distress developed an interest in Apollo. They think that the good captain has already done a fine job saving many innocent lives and will continue to do so in the future.
• In Being Human, Eve, the newborn daughter of George and Nina, is the Chosen One, who is going to save the world from the vampires.
  • Subverted: the prophecy is incomplete. Eve is actually responsible for the vampires' survival! It's implied that relying on Eve to save them undermined the humans' resistance and won the battle for the vampires.
  • It is also said that The Chosen One has a 'nemesis', marked by a burn on their arm. It's implied to be Hal but turns out to be Eve herself.
• A Bit of Fry and Laurie parodies this in the first sketch of Season 3, which features a father telling his son that he's the Chosen One just to get him out of the house.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer:
  • The title character Buffy Summers — at least until the end of Season 1 where it becomes subverted when Buffy was drowned and quickly resuscitated. She is replaced by Kendra Young, then Faith Lehane, but for all intents and purposes, Buffy is still the Slayer. All Slayers before Buffy (Nikki Wood, the First Slayer, etc) play this trope straight. They rarely live to see their 20s, and tend to be chosen when they're extremely young, at 15-17 if they're exceptionally lucky, and do not get discovered by the Watcher's Council particularly quickly (as appears to be the case with both Buffy and Faith and many of the Potential Slayers during Season 7, but not the case with Kendra, who gets an even shorter end of the stick: she is abandoned by her parents and raised by her Watcher). The "One" part of the Chosen One is very literal — "One girl in all the world." (At least until the end of Season 1)
    • It is indicated towards the end of the series that the replacement slayers are already lined up to take over when their predecessor dies, in significant numbers too. Apparently some get activated a little too early, maybe the Prophecy is incapable of distinguishing when a Slayer is going to be Back from the Dead. In the end of the series, the Good Guys do some magic to speed along the "Choosing" of the potential Slayers, essentially creating an army of girls with their Slayer activated.
    • Joss Whedon has hinted that despite activating all the potential Slayers, the "line of the Slayers" still runs through Faith Lehane and only through Faith Lehane, as she is the one-and-only Chosen One. He further has hinted that while the mass activation of the Slayers turned every potential alive at that point in time into a Slayer, no further Slayers will be activated until and unless Faith dies, at which point the Slayer line will continue with a Potential born after the mass activation.
  • The Anointed One was also an intended chosen one, but happened to be in the form of a child. He got killed by a bigger and older vampire who ran out of patience.
  • Funnily enough, despite being the one to stand alone against the forces of darkness, there are plenty of characters out there who make the Slayer look pathetic in comparison. Doesn't even have to be a villain, considering Willow is obviously so much more powerful than Buffy in the end. More often than not, Buffy has to rely on her team's help or some quick thinking to defeat any given villain. Like using an anti-tank rocket launcher (stolen by Xander) to take out The Judge, a demon who could kill her by touching her.
    • This is implied to be why Buffy has such a long lifespan compared to other Slayers-although individually quite powerful, Slayers who fight alone tend to die more quickly. Buffy's friends and their diverse skills often give the a Chosen One a much needed edge in the war of darkness.
  • Sineya could be considered the ultimate chosen one as Slayers go, since she was the First Slayer, the root of all those chosen ones.
• In Carnivàle both Ben Hawkins and Brother Justin are chosen ones on opposing sides, following in a long line of both good and evil avatars. Also, Sofie is revealed to be the final avatar late in the series.
• Charmed:
  • The sisters are referred to as the Chosen Ones.
  • Wyatt Halliwell, Piper's firstborn son, is also known as the Chosen One, and is worthy of wielding Excalibur.
  • An early episode has a young boy who was the only being who could wield an evil witch's wand for the side of good, as well as kill her. He was recognized as such due to the fact that he was the seventh son of a seventh son.
• The Collector: Morgan was God's chosen instrument to discover the cure for Plague, centuries ahead of reality. The Devil successfully distracted him from this role.
  • One episode involves a great spirit periodically guided to an Amerindian tribe, the latest being their needed savior, whom the Devil also tries to distract from her role.
• Troy Barnes in Community, whose destiny is to be... the greatest air conditioner repairman ever. Yes, it is apparently Serious Business, for the Truest Repairman will repair Man.
• In The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, the Sancturary Tree chooses Deet to warn the surface Gelflings of the Darkening that ravages the Caves of Grot. Later, he gives her his ability to see visions and channel energy.
• Doctor Who:
  • In "The Masque Of Mandragora", Hieronymous grows certain that he is specially chosen.
• Dominion is the TV sequel to Legion (mentioned in the Film section above), and as such is all about Alex, the baby born at that movie's climax, coming into his destiny as humanity's savior. Whether he wants it or not.
• Firefly deconstructs this with River Tam. Her exceptional intellect and implied latent psychic ability got her "chosen" — to go straight to the Academy. She came out the other end a traumatized mental wreck who can't be treated and suffers from both schizophrenia and uncontrolled mind powers.
  • She does get better in Serenity, though at considerable cost, and plays the trope straighter by leading the gang to a secret of galactic importance... and then saving most of their lives.
• In the second First Wave episode, Cade finds out that he is predicted by Nostradamus to be the "twice-blessed man" who will either die with everyone else or save Earth from an Alien Invasion. Cade immediately calls himself "twice-cursed".
  "On the seventh dawn of the seventh day,
  A twice-blessed man will roam the fields.
  Doomed to shadows with his brethren,
  Or savior to all who walk the ground."
• Game of Thrones:
  • The faith of the Lord of Light believes in a prophesied champion who will stand against the darkness. Melisandre believes she has found him in Stannis Baratheon.
  • The dosh khaleen prophesied that Daenerys and Drogo's son would be "The Stallion Who Mounts the World," the legendary unifier of the Dothraki who will conquer the world.
  • Bran is destined to be the only person who can truly defeat the White Walkers and the Night's King. When he first meets the Three-Eyed-Raven the raven tells Bran that he has been waiting for him to arrive for a thousand years. By the halfway point of Season 6, Bran fully inherits the powers of the Three-Eyed-Raven and becomes his successor and his uncle Benjen tells Bran that when the Night's King finally invades Westeros, Bran will be the one to stand against him.
    • If the prophecies of the Prince That Was Promised are true and apply to his half-brother Jon Snow, then Bran may not face him alone. In a thematic parallel, Bran's visions of Jon's true origins (revealing Jon to be Bran's cousin as he is the son of Lyanna Stark and Rheagar Targaryen) and his power to oppose the Night's King may make Bran the Merlin to Jon's Arthur.
  • Melisandre's trying to sell this explanation to Gendry for why she abducted him. Then again, she was (ostensibly) instructed by R'hllor to find him and bring him back to Dragonstone.
  • While they all played a part, in the end it was Arya Stark who landed the killing blow on the Night King, ending the threat of the Army of the Dead and the Long Night.
• H₂O: Just Add Water and Mako Mermaids: An H₂O Adventure bring this up regarding who gets turned into a merperson. None of the characters truly understand it, but they suspect that Mako Island is a Genius Loci capable of ensuring someone falls into the Moon Pool.
  • Upon learning of a prophecy showing a meteor destroying the world from the Moon Pool, Cleo becomes convinced that she, Rikki, and Bella were chosen to be mermaids for the sole task of stopping it. It's left ambiguous to whether or not she's right, as it was Emma, not Bella, who became a mermaid with Cleo and Rikki, but Bella was the one who had the information of how to use the Moon Pool to stop the meteor, which she could have done on her own if Ryan and Sophie hadn't blown up the Moon Pool.
  • Zac is a descendant of the merman who betrayed the rest of the merman pod and sealed away the Merman Chamber and the trident on Mako Island before they could be used to kill the mermaid pods. While any human man or merman could have retrieved the trident, the Merman Chamber only responds to a male descendant of the merman who sealed them. Zac's moonspells always lure him over to one of the merman artifacts and try to get him to use them despite his personal feelings on the matter. It's strongly implied that his merman ancestor never intended to have male heirs, so until Zac existed, the chamber would've remain inert despite all efforts.
• Despite him never being called this, Hiro of Heroes kind of becomes this when his destiny is to Save the World and "kill" Sylar.
• Duncan MacLeod in the Highlander TV series. First there's Cassandra's prophecy (not the mythological Cassandra) about a "Highland child born on the winter solstice, who has seen both darkness and light and who will defeat the voice of death" and then there's the whole Ahriman/immortal champion thing. A few fans think that might be what the prophecy meant, rather than referring to Kantos, but it was all still really bad anyway.
• Nina Martin in House of Anubis. Sarah Frobisher-Smythe, too, as she was the chosen one before Nina was born. Both are descendants of Amneris who were born at a special hour on a special day; July 7th at 7:00 AM, or January 1st at 1:00 AM, respectively. In this series, all it really means is being able to build the Cup, wear the Mask of Anubis, and communicate with ghosts. The first two abilities are what caused the drama in the first two seasons.
  • Joy was believed to be chosen due to her birthday, but was born at the wrong hour — 7:00 PM, rather than 7:00 AM.
  • Eddie Miller, too. He is not a chosen one, but is still important as the chosen one's destined protector — the Osirian. He gets his own powers in Season 3, specifically visions of the future. Rufus Zeno is one as well, despite being a villain. Actually, this power is what caused it.
• Referred to as the "Golden One" in Kröd Mändoon and the Flaming Sword of Fire because it's "slightly less cliche" than the Chosen One.
• The eponymous hero in Legend of the Seeker.
  • He's also a Seeker. There were others before him, whenever situation was grave enough to warrant one. Each one is implied to have had his own Confessor and a wizard (at least the one before did). Unfortunately, the one before ended up sleeping with his Confessor and going mad after the wizard convinced her to commit suicide. The wizard ended up killing the Seeker with the Sword of Truth and putting an enchantment on his body to keep his spirit out of the underworld. He then hid the truth (claiming that both the Seeker and the Confessor died in the final battle against the enemy) in order to keep the people's faith in the Seeker.
  • In the series of books the series is (very) loosely based on, Sword of Truth, it is suggested with hints spread out over the different books that the titular sword was actually made for the main character and the whole line of seekers was a tool just to get the function and authority to him.
• Locke on Lost appears to have been chosen for a special role. We just don't know what the role is or by whom he was chosen. Ben apparently used to be the chosen one. As he tells Locke, "Destiny is a fickle bitch."
  • In an incredibly cruel twist, it seems his special role, his destiny was to die off Island and return so that Jacob's currently unnamed rival could pose as him and kill Jacob... and despite being said to be chosen by Jacob, he never even met the real Jacob while alive, implying that maybe the whole "chosen one" thing was just crap thought up by Jacob's nemesis so that he could return to life.
  • It now turns out that he was already one of a number of people selected by Jacob as candidates to succeed him. Other candidates include Jack, Hurley, Sayid, Sawyer, and "Kwon" (either Sun or Jin).
• The title character of Merlin, who was chosen, we haven't a clue by who exactly, to help Arthur become the king he is destined to be and help him unify Albion.
  • Actually, it's Arthur who's the Chosen One. He's just such a Chosen One that fate gave him his own Chosen One to keep him alive and sane throughout being a Chosen One. His wife Guinevere is a Chosen One too, with a destiny so sure that the most powerful healing artifact in the Five Kingdoms could not stop a dream of her becoming queen, because fate had decreed it. In other words, he's such a powerful Chosen One that all the people in his life become Chosen Ones just by being around him.
• Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers definitely starts like this, with several (apparently) normal teenagers being selected to be defenders of Earth.
  • Used to somewhat nebulous effect in Power Rangers Lost Galaxy. That season's rangers are "chosen" because they were the only ones able to pull five legendary swords free from the ground, though by what or what exactly being "chosen" rates is unclear. In one episode villain Furio is unable to enter a cave to claim a legendary power source because he isn't "chosen" so they have to trick the rangers to go in and get it for them. But then you have the guy who pulled the sword meant for the red ranger never even getting to use it and passing it on to his younger brother, who has no problem becoming the red ranger in his place. It seems to be a very fluid condition.
  • Fast forward about 13 years, and we have the prophecy of The Light: a person born from the most powerful sorceress and the most skilled swordsman who is destined to defeat the forces of darkness. Power Rangers Mystic Force played this trope completely straight. The Light is revealed to be Nick, the series's red ranger, who is the long-lost son of The Mentor Udonna and her, though unknown at the time, Brainwashed and Crazy husband Leanbow a.k.a. Koragg.
• Mortified: After listening to a lecture on Buddhism, Taylor becomes convinced that she is the chosen one. However, this turns out to be just another manifestation of her I Just Want to Be Special tendencies.
• In The Nine Lives of Chloe King, the title character was a prophesied 'Chosen One' destined to unite the prides of the cat beings called the Mai, of which she is one.
• Nirvana in Fire: Mei Changsu, formerly known as Lin Shu, AKA the Divine Talent. In Lin Chen's word, "To have the Divine Talent is to have the World." Played with because Lin Chen is Mei Changsu's best friend and likely gave out this "prophecy" as part of his master plan. Add to that Langya Hall's "prophecies" are actually just statements of fact derived from carefully compiled information, and essentially Lin Shu chose himself.
• In Once Upon a Time, Emma Swan, the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming is prophesied to one day save all of the fairy tale characters trapped by the Evil Queen's curse which has them living out mundane lives in our world with no memory of who they really are, and no chance to reclaim their happy endings on their own. Played with in that the only one in-universe who actually believes this is Henry, Emma's son (at least, on the surface).
  • Oddly enough for the idea, is that Emma fulfills her destiny at the end of Season 1, but still has a ton of work to do protecting the town now. Justified by Season 6, which reveals that breaking the curse was just part of Emma's destiny. She's also fated to face down with the curse's original creator, the Black Fairy.
  • Also in Season 6, it is revealed that Rumple was supposed to be the Savior. However,his mother intervened when she read up on the whole prophecy because she didn't want him to die. In the end, she stole his destiny from him, and ironically turned herself into the villain that he was supposed to fight. Even more ironically, Rumple himself turned into one of the show's biggest villains.
  • In the third season it's implied that Henry is also a chosen one, although given his pedigree it shouldn't come as a surprise. Fulfilled at the end of Season 4, when he becomes the new Author.
  • A central plot point in Season 7 is the search for the Guardian, a person with a totally pure heart, who can take the powers of the Dark One without being consumed by them, thus putting an end to its evil permanently.
• In Person of Interest Root becomes this, as she gains direct access to The Machine as its analog interface.
• Sleepy Hollow: Ichabod realizes pretty quickly that he and Abbie are the two Witnesses of the Apocalypse foretold in the Book of Revelation, and as such are the only ones who can stop Moloch from bringing about The End of the World as We Know It.
• Smallville:
  • Clark Kent in is referred to as a sort of 'chosen one' by the local Indian tribe, who call him 'Naman', the prophesied warrior who would destroy his worst enemy, Sagith. In fact this prophecy was implanted in the tribe (along with metahuman werewolf powers) by a Kryptonian visitor centuries ago.
  • A look into the past reveals that Jor-El was once aided by Jonathan Kent's father Hiram. Before Jor-El left, Hiram assured him that the Kents would always be there for him if he needed them. Clark tells his parents that he doesn't believe him being sent to Smallville was a coincidence. Jor-El chose the Kents.
• Daniel Jackson of Stargate SG-1 appears to have been considered this by the ascended Ancient Oma. But the others kicked him out of the 'Ascended Fan Club' for being too much of an All-Loving Hero and wanting to actually help people when they needed it instead of ignoring them. This aspect seems to have diminished somewhat around Season 7.
• In Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Captain Sisko is the Emissary to the Prophets, the Wormhole entities that the Bajorans worship as gods. It takes a little while for the science-loving Sisko to embrace his role as the messiah of another race, but he manages. Sisko later learns that he is actually a Prophet's son: his bio-mom was possessed by one of the Prophets for months if not years, in order to make sure Benjamin would be born and able to fulfill his destiny (when the energy being left her, Sara was not happy to have had her life taken over and ran off, leaving Ben to be raised by his father). Over the course of the series Sisko, in his dual roles as Starfleet officer and Bajoran Emissary, saves Bajor from military and spiritual threats.
  • In the final season, Sisko's nemesis Gul Dukat appropriately enough becomes the Emissary of the Pah-wraiths. Sisko ultimately sacrifices himself to defeat Dukat and apparently end the threat of the Pah-wraiths, fulfilling his destiny as the chosen one of Bajor.
• Supernatural:
  • Sam Winchester is essentially the chosen one of the series. He was chosen to be the vessel for Lucifer. Everything that has happened, including the death of his mother, to Azazel/YED bleeding in his mouth, to the development of Sam's special abilities has led up to the fact that Sam was the one that would eventually destroy the world.
  • Dean Winchester as of Season 4. Unfortunately, the guy's gone through so much Break the Cutie trauma by this point, that it's doubtful if he can actually fulfill this role. In Season 5, it's revealed that he's the intended vessel of the Archangel Michael, which he doesn't agree to.
  • Season 7 introduces Kevin Tran, a bright teenager who is not at all happy that he has been chosen as a prophet. Dean briefly commiserates with the boy, making it clear that being The Chosen One sucks and is going to ruin Kevin's life, just as it did Dean's.
  • Season 15 showed that Sam and Dean Winchester were chosen by Chuck/God to be Protagonists in his story. The result of the relationship between them breaking down causes the Chosen Ones to experience the frailties of being normal. Both are more clumsy and find fighting/hunting to be more difficult. Sam gets a cold for the first in his life. Dean's unhealthy eating happens catchup to him as he has at least 17 cavities and discovers he is lactose intolerant. The effects are short lived however as they track down the Greek Goddess of Luck to give them back the benefits of being Chosen Ones.
• Subverted in the series finale of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. John Connor travels to the future, where not only has no one ever heard of him, but the resistance is still alive and well without his leadership. Although an alternate interpretation of the finale is that the original John Connor was erased by all the time travel, and John's leap forward in the finale cemented his future role as leader of the resistance. They hadn't heard of him yet, but on his arrival they learn much more about the machines and how to stop them, from John.
• The Wheel of Time: The Dragon Reborn, the prophesied reincarnated hero destined to save the world from the Dark One... or destroy it.
• Vlad Dracula from Young Dracula is the Chosen One, prophesized to bring the vampires out of hiding.
• Yellowjackets: Lottie has ends up leading her fellow flight crash survivors into worshipping "the Wilderness". In the Season 2 finale, Lottie tells them that she cannot hear the Wilderness anymore, and that "It" has chosen someone else as leader so they can survive: Natalie, who earlier on had escaped her fate when she lost a Lottery of Doom.
• Wonderfully skewered on Z Nation as Murphy is clearly the Chosen One who is the only man to survive a zombie bite and could be the man to save humanity from the plague of the undead. He also happens to be an ex-con, arrogant, self-serving and a total jackass who could care less about the rest of humanity. He just wants a decent meal, often causes even more disasters, and does not seem to care about the people who are dying to keep him alive.

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