Follow TV Tropes

Following

Context Main / FosterKid

Go To

1%% Administrivia/ZeroContextExample entries are not allowed on wiki pages. All such entries have been commented out. Add context to the entries before uncommenting them.
2
3Foster care is a system in which children who have become orphaned or were removed from abusive homes are taken care of in a temporary capacity until they are adopted or their custody situation stabilizes.
4
5As the OrphanageOfFear has become a DeadHorseTrope, the foster care system has become the new bogeyman of AcceptableTargets. Very, very few characters (especially not main characters) are happily fostered. Their foster parents are always some variety of AbusiveParents, anywhere from "didn't care about the kid [[FosteringForProfit except for the money he brought in]]" to "treats the kid worse than the original abusive situation they escaped from in the first place". And don't expect the DepartmentOfChildDisservices to step in on their behalf, either; the kid just gets bounced to some new foster home, which will predictably turn out to be just as bad as the old one.
6
7In the rare case that the foster parents are kind and caring, they will almost inevitably end up adopting their foster kid, leading to HappilyAdopted.
8
9Any character who has this pop up in their BackStory will gain some amount of {{Woobie}} status, and have a constant struggle with [[ParentalAbandonment abandonment anxiety]]. Expect this to be a FreudianExcuse of many a villain as well, especially {{Serial Killer}}s.
10
11Not only is this sadly TruthInTelevision far too often, the inverse is true too; most foster parents can provide a very caring, safe environment for abused children, and it can be just as traumatizing for the children to be removed from them and sent back to their biological parents all over again. It can be even worse if those biological parents aren't ready to take care of them just yet. The experience of being removed from where you are and taken to a strange place by strange social workers is a lot like being kidnapped, and they have to deal with this repeatedly.
12
13Related to FosteringForProfit.
14
15----
16!!Examples:
17
18[[foldercontrol]]
19
20[[folder:Anime & Manga]]
21* The Shonan 14 Days arc of ''Manga/GreatTeacherOnizuka'' has Onizuka hiding and working inside the "White Swan" foster care center where it tries to whole-heartily raise several misbehaving but good-at-heart youths (especially some with experience with {{abusive parents}}) in a safe environment. A big later issue within the arc is the attempt of politicians and previously mentioned self-centered abusive parents trying to pull the children out of the foster care for their own selfish motivations.
22* Jessie from ''Anime/PokemonTheSeries'' was a foster child due to her mother Miyamoto[[note]]This is an extension of what "Musashi", Jessie's Japanese name, already refers to: the famous Japanese samurai "Musashi Miyamoto". "James" is known as "Kojiro" in the Japanese version, after Musashi's well known rival "Kojiro Sasaki".[[/note]][[GiveHimANormalLife wanting her to have a normal life]] while she made enough money in Team Rocket to support her. Jessie's life as a foster kid wasn't particularly remarkable but it wasn't bad either, [[HilariouslyAbusiveChildhood just pitiful like the rest of her life]].
23[[/folder]]
24
25[[folder:Comic Books]]
26* Following the ''Comicbook/{{Flashpoint}}'' reboot, [[ComicBook/{{Shazam}} Billy Batson]] became a KnightInSourArmor due to a series of failed fosterings (apparently worse than living on the streets in the previous continuity). This changed when he was fostered by the Vasquezes, and reluctantly began to see them and their other foster kids as his FamilyOfChoice.
27* ''ComicBook/JemAndTheHologramsIDW'':
28** It's never clarified if Aja and Shana were formally adopted or not, however they are presumably still the foster kids of the Benton parents. Unlike in [[WesternAnimation/{{Jem}} the cartoon]], they're the ''only'' foster kids. They were fostered at a younger age than in the cartoon and thus grew up with the Bentons from a young age. Jerrica, Kimber, Aja, and Shana are explicitly referred to as siblings in the comic (while the cartoon instead portrayed them as close friends).
29** The comic changes the backstories of the Starlight Girls. They're all DemotedToExtra and it's never specified if they're foster kids, or not. They are just a group of kids who hang around the local community service building.
30* After the events of their miniseries, most of the ComicBook/{{Runaways}} ended up in foster care (except for Molly, who went to an ComicBook/XMen run [[OrphanageOfLove orphanage]] instead). While they were all treated well enough, they all decided that, after what they went through, they really couldn't go back to normal life. That, combined with the fact that [[FireForgedFriends they had all gotten]] [[TrueCompanions extremely close,]] inspired them to run away [[AndTheAdventureContinues all over again.]]
31* Franchise/{{Superman}}: Clark Kent and ComicBook/LoisLane had a foster son, Chris, who was HappilyAdopted. Arguably doesn't count, however, since he was actually a Kryptonian stranded on Earth and the legal work was actually forged by Franchise/{{Batman}}.
32* ''Comicbook/TeenTitansAcademy Yearbook 2021'' has a particularly horrific example in the Red X story. A couple is shown to have a dozen kids in their rundown apartment, have shaved all their heads because they're "lice factories", openly laugh when the apathetic DepartmentOfChildDisservices agent mentions a meal budget, and are actually raising the kids to be cannon fodder for Black Mask. The second Red X kills them [[spoiler: and it's strongly implied that one of the kids becomes the third Red X]].
33[[/folder]]
34
35[[folder:Fan Works]]
36* In ''Blog/AskTheFamous8'', Thomas and Percy are both foster children, but they ended up in the system under very different circumstances.
37** Thomas was orphaned at the age of six, when his parents were killed in a car accident. From there, he was taken in the care of his closest living relatives, his distant aunts Annie and Clarabel Clementine. Though they loved him deeply, they were ultimately unprepared to raise a child, so they put him in the Shining Time care center on Sodor.
38** Percy was abandoned on a doorstep by his mother, who did not feel ready to raise a child just yet. From there, he was taken to a hospital until he no longer needed constant care, and he was soon sent to the Shining Time care center.
39* In ''Fanfic/AsylumDaemonOfDecay'', [[spoiler:Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy]] are so close because they were foster sisters growing up.
40* ''Fanfic/ForbidenFruitTheTempationOfEdwardCullen'''s protagonist Atlantiana is a foster kid. Her new foster parents are 'very nice and hole some people' (sic) but completely oblivious to the situations she finds herself in.
41* In ''Fanfic/LostBoy'', Spitelout manages to convince Stoick to allow Hiccup into their home as a means of preventing scandal among the village. What follows is Spitelout, his wife Ava and Snotlout [[KickTheDog forcing him to work every waking hour, giving him half a meal for dinner and forcing him to sleep on the cold hard floor in Snotlout's room, all the while verbally abusing him every chance they get, becoming physically violent when he defends Stoick's honor by hitting Snotlout]].
42* In the ''Fanfic/MotionPractice'' series, which recasts various Marvel superheroes as lawyers, Bruce Banner's area of expertise is child protection law, so he deals with foster children several times. During the course of the series, he also takes on foster children himself. He's a good foster parent; some of the others we hear about, less so.
43* ''Franchise/MyHeroAcademia'': “Foster kid Shinso Hitoshi” is an entire Archive Of Our Own tag. The stories have him abused, muzzled and shuffled between foster homes before Aizawa finds out and takes him in with a pro hero emergncy foster license. Sometimes he’ll get Todoroki, Bakugo and even Midoriya too despite Midoriya having a decent canon mom. It’s common for Present Mic to reveal he was also a muzzled foster kid and bond with Hitoshi over it. A few examples include ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/series/2332319 The Aizawa-Yamada Family series]]'', ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/13768596/chapters/31644783 Better]]'' and ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/32971297 Home]]''
44* In ''Fanfic/TheOutside'', Ryuuko eventually ends up as a foster kid when she's subsequently removed from her sister's care and placed in a group home while social services look for her mother. The place isn't really bad and the kids there are taken care of but Ryuuko obviously doesn't like it there and would much prefer to be with her sister. There she meets two other foster kids, Shiro Iori and Nui, that former having been in the home since he eight and the latter being there for as a long as she can remember.
45** In different story by the same author, ''Secret Sunshine'', we know that Ryuuko was one of these (she mentions getting "moved from home to home") and, as we find out, Sukuyo was her foster mother, after the former ran away from a previous home. While we can see that Sukuyo provided a loving home to her, Ryuuko still has hang ups about being abandoned by her family.
46* In ''Franchise/SonicTheHedgehog'' fanfic ''FanFic/PrisonIslandBreak,'' Shadow is revealed to have been a Foster child, having gone through multiple care homes, the final Foster home resulting in him being sexually abused.
47* In ''Fanfic/SonOfTheSannin'', Haku is placed in the custody of Hayate and Yugao following Zabuza's arrest. They're told that they'll be free to leave once Zabuza's incarceration and parole have finished, though Jiraya is banking on Haku becoming attached enough to the village in the intervening years to stay and start a family ([[SuperBreedingProgram thus bolstering the village's ranks with the Yuki clan's Ice Release]]). [[spoiler:Zabuza "[[JerkWithAHeartOfGold disowned]]" him at the end of the Kirigaguke Civil War arc so he wouldn't be forced to abandon his friends and it's implied that Hayate and Yugao officially adopted him during the TimeSkip.]]
48* In ''Fanfic/SpeedAndPurpose'', Sonic was a foster kid growing up. He arrived in his hometown, parentless and amnesiac, at age five. Because there weren't any hedgehog families to home him with, he's become a "pass the parcel" child in his village. He stays with a family for several months before he switches families again. At age fourteen he is finally allowed [[MinorLivingAlone to get his own house and take care of himself]] (though the village council gives him an allowance until he's eighteen).
49* The ''Film/XMenFirstClass'' series'' [[http://archiveofourown.org/series/82162 Stars from Home]]'' has Ororo in this situation, while Scott is HappilyAdopted, both with [[GoodParents Charles and Ruth]]. They're treated the same and refer to each other as [[LikeBrotherAndSister brother and sister]].
50* ''Fanfic/TodayTomorrowAndForever'' revolves around Derpy Hooves' daughter Dinky being put in foster care after Foal Services finds Derpy unable to take care of her due to former's disability.
51* In the third chapter of ''Fanfic/WhatAStrangeLittleColt'', Rainbow Dash decides to start fostering Gabriel.
52* Nora and Ren were both orphaned at five in ''Fanfic/YouAndMeAndEveryoneInBetween''. Glynda began fostering them soon afterwards. She adopted them a few years later.
53[[/folder]]
54
55[[folder:Films -- Animation]]
56* The Teen Titans from ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeagueVsTeenTitans'' are portrayed as being super-powered children at a foster home, each of the members being portrayed like troubled teens who are unable to be with their families due to either being orphaned (like with Raven and Beast Boy) or their super-powered situations making their presence too dangerous for their families (like with Blue Beetle), with the young-adult Starfire acting as [[TeamMom their caretaker]] at Titans Tower.
57[[/folder]]
58
59[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]
60* ''Film/Annie2014'', as part of its SettingUpdate, changes the title character's circumstances from an orphanage to a foster home. People occasionally [[MythologyGag refer to her as "little orphan Annie"]], which she {{insistent|Terminology}}ly corrects to "foster kid" each time.
61* ''Film/BigDaddy'' has a young child left at the front door, with the social worker claiming that Sonny is responsible for raising Julian, and not being given much warning otherwise.
62* ''Film/BlueBayou'': Antonio mentions that his 'adoptive' parents gave him up after six months, and he bounced from foster home to foster home before eventually ending up at one that was abusive.
63* ''Film/TheChristmasBunny'': Julia was taken away by Child Services from her biological mother, an abusive (implied) drug addicted sex worker. When the film starts, she’s at her third foster home. [[spoiler:She’s adopted by them after her mother surrenders her parental rights.]]
64* ''Film/{{Foster}}'' is a 2019 HBO documentary about foster children, foster parents, and parents whose kids are in foster care.
65* Ashburn from ''Film/TheHeat'', who is a BrokenAce at the FBI with a FriendlessBackground apparently as a result of growing up in foster care, and when Mullins finds out she refers to her as "Foster Kid" in a teasing manner, only at the end of the film to give her a card saying "Foster kid - now you have a sister."
66* ''Film/JemAndTheHolograms2015'' de-ages the titular characters to teenagers. Jerrica and Kimber live with their aunt Bailey, who has fostered Shana and Aja. Aja is mentioned to have spent time in juvenile hall.
67* Cassie Webb from ''Film/MadameWeb2024'', was one of these after her mother's death, and it's all but said her miserable experience contributed massively to her spiky and antisocial personality in the present. When she tries to tell a scared Anya that foster care isn't that bad, Mattie calls her out on that being bullshit, something Cassie doesn't even try to deny.
68--> '''Cassie:''' I was the perfect foster kid. [[SarcasmMode Peed outside and everything]].
69* ''Film/{{Meadowland}}'': Adam's foster parents assumed they would be getting a neurotypical child, and were not pleased to learn about his Asperger's. His mother yells insults at him when he forgets his lunch, which is often. His father doesn't seem to pay much attention to him.
70* ''Film/TheRageCarrie2'''s Rachel was put into the foster system after her crazily religious mother was taken away. Her foster parents are white trash, who occasionally hit her, and are after the extra allowance.
71* In ''Film/ReformSchoolGirls'', Lisa is a foster kid who has repeatedly run away from her foster homes. She is being sent to reform school till she turns eighteen.
72* ''Film/Shazam2019'': As in the comics, Billy Batson, as well as his five foster siblings. Initially, Billy resists this, since he's been searching for years for his birth mom and is standoffish to his foster families, making it clear that he doesn't really see them as his actual family. However, once he [[spoiler:finds his biological mother and learns that she abandoned him on purpose as a child and doesn't want to be part of his life]], he fully accepts and embraces the Vasquez household as his true home, becoming HappilyAdopted.
73* ''Film/ShortTerm12'': Mason is a positive example, having been fostered by a loving couple along with many other children, and turned out well because of it.
74[[/folder]]
75
76[[folder:Literature]]
77* In ''Literature/TheBabySittersClub'', the Papadakises foster Lou [=McNally=], and her older brother is with another foster family. When they go to live with their aunt and uncle, Lou receives ''The Great Gilly Hopkins'' as one of her going-away presents.
78* ''Literature/BudNotBuddy'': Since his mother's death four years ago, Bud has mostly lived in an orphanage, but has had three very temporary foster placements, all of which were terrible. The third involves a SpoiledBrat BigBrotherBully who gets his parents to lock Bud in a shed overnight. Bud breaks out of the shed and runs away.
79* In ''Film/TheCheetahGirls'' books and movies, Dorinda is a foster kid, although she keeps this secret from her friends. One book has a plot where her foster parents try to adopt her, but since her foster mother was illiterate she couldn't fill out the paperwork.
80* April, the title character of ''Literature/DustbinBaby'', has been in several foster homes. The novel might briefly refer to Tracy, and also shows Tanya, a foster kid from ''Bad Girls''.
81* In the German novel ''Gottes Bodenpersonal: Eine Unwahrscheinliche Liebesgeschichte'', the two male protagonists foster a teen boy who has been living on the streets for most of his life. He originally lived on the streets because he didn't want a foster family, suspecting that he would be sexually abused there. [[spoiler: He decided that if he was to be sexually abused by adult men, he might as well take money for it, and lived as street prostitute. He met his future foster father by propositioning him, and the polite rejection of this offer and subsequent attempt to help him get out of prostitution was what made him trust the man.]] No adoption takes place in the course of the novel, which is explained as being due to the stricter regulations on adoption, and the problems a homosexual couple would face.
82* The titular character in Creator/KatherinePaterson's novel ''Literature/TheGreatGillyHopkins'' is currently in the system.
83* Dee's love interest, James, in ''Literature/TheHeartsWeSold'', entered foster care at a young age, and aged out without being adopted. He's relatively well-adjusted, all things considered, but his lack of a real support system lays the groundwork for his role in the plot.
84* Austin, the protagonist of ''Literature/HollowPlaces'', was a foster kid. Lucky for him, they ended up being much better than his real parents.
85* Marcus from ''Literature/IfIFallIfIDie'' was on his sixth foster home at the time of his disappearance. The second home was the worst - his parents kept him in chicken-wire shackles at night and abused him with various household tools, leaving him covered in scars. The sixth home made him stay out of the house from nine to five even when he was sick because they thought he was a bad influence on the other kids.
86* In ''Literature/TheIllustratedMum'', [[spoiler:Dolphin and later Star end up in a foster home.]]
87* ''Lily Alone'' ends with [[spoiler:Lily and her siblings split up in different foster homes, and their mother arrested for child neglect and credit card fraud.]]
88* In ''Literature/MaggieNow'' by Betty Smith, the titular character and her husband are unable to have kids, so she becomes a foster mom for orphans taken in by the church. She can only care for them for a set period of time before they are taken away. [[spoiler: Eventually, he husband catches a horrible illness and she is no longer allowed to take in any foster children]].
89* Sam from ''Literature/TheManyHalfLivedLivesOfSamSylvester'' spent their early life in foster care. Before they were adopted, they were a mute, self-injurious child who had been diagnosed with reactive attachment disorder. They finally started talking after being adopted.
90* ''Literature/LostVoices'': When Luce was eight, she was taken from her father, a petty criminal. She spent months in foster care before her father picked her up again when she was nine. After that, they had to stay out of Texas so her father wouldn't be arrested for kidnapping her.
91* Maya from ''Literature/TheMermaidChronicles'' lives in foster care and doesn't know who her biological parents are. Her placement actually seems pretty good - she loves her foster siblings even though they annoy her. [[spoiler:It turns out that she comes from a long line of prophecy interpreters. Her parents were killed at sea while protecting the mermaids.]]
92* Nickel from ''Literature/NickelPlated'' was removed from his biological mother at a young age and lived between the ages of four and eight with a detective who was the only good parental figure he ever had. After the detective was murdered, he lived with a series of abusive foster families, the last of which turned out to be child pornographers. Nickel escaped and, it's implied, murdered them, and is now a MinorLivingAlone who considers going back into foster care to be a FateWorseThanDeath.
93* ''Literature/PilgrennonsChildren'' has autistic twins Dana and Cale, who lived in an institution before they were placed with foster parents Pauline and Graeme. The parents genuinely care about them, but Dana is still miserable with them because of severe bullying at her school.
94* ''Literature/RainReign'': When Wesley Howard was ten, he and his younger brother Weldon were removed from their abusive single father's home and placed in foster care. They lived in a total of seven foster homes before they turned eighteen. The longest they ever stayed with a family was 21 months. The shortest was 78 days.
95* Bo from ''Literature/{{Run}}'' has been this before, but was eventually returned to her mama's custody. She had it so bad that she doesn't want to call social services on her again, even if things get bad, which is why she opts to run away instead at the beginning of the book. [[spoiler: At the end of the book she is put into the system, but is lucky enough to end up with a very kind family]].
96* ''Literature/TheSomedayBirds'': After Ludmila and her brother Amar arrived in the United States, they were split up. Amar was sent to a military school for boys, while Ludmila went through a series of foster homes. Some were good, and some were terrible. Her favorite was the astrophysicist Dr. Joan, with whom she is still in contact.
97* Tracy in ''Literature/TheStoryOfTracyBeaker'' has been in two foster homes.
98* ''Literature/TheyCageTheAnimalsAtNight'' is an autobiographical novel about a boy's experiences at an OrphanageOfFear and later various foster homes in the 1940s and 1950s. His first foster home is so bad that he's brought back to the orphanage within a couple of days because his foster dad couldn't handle his wife abusing another one of their foster kids (which they only keep around for money).
99* In ''The Unicorn Club'' (a spin-off of ''Literature/SweetValleyHigh''), Mary Wallace used to be in foster care, [[spoiler:and Ellie is temporarily there]].
100* Cats in ''Literature/WarriorCats'' rarely adopt kits. Most kits are treated as foster children (usually [[ObliviousAdoption unknowingly]]). Examples includes Cloudtail, Mistystar, Stonefur, [[spoiler:Hollyleaf, Lionblaze, and Jayfeather]].
101* Alvie from ''Literature/WhenMyHeartJoinsTheThousand'' became a foster kid at age eleven after her mother's death and a stay in a psychiatric hospital. She lived in several homes, but none of them worked out - she was a difficult kid, and the parents didn't understand her boundaries. Eventually she was placed in a group home for emotionally troubled teenagers, which turned out to be the worst place of all, due to the severe bullying that went on. Eventually she persuaded a judge to let her become a MinorLivingAlone as long as a social worker checks up on her twice a month.
102* ''Literature/WildflowerRanch'': After Alyssa and Ethan's mom leaves them, they're briefly placed with a foster couple called the Woodards before Alyssa is sent to the titular ranch and Ethan is sent to live with his grandparents.
103[[/folder]]
104
105[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
106* ''Series/AlmasNotNormal'': Alma was moved around the care system a bit after her mother became incapable of caring for her.
107* ''Series/{{Bones}}'': Played straight with Brennan's foster parents who locked her in a trunk for two days for breaking a plate. Averted with Sweets who was abused, only to be adopted by a lovely older couple. Brennan also gets very defensive when people talk about foster kids in a negative light.
108* Part of Sara Sidle's backstory in ''Series/{{CSI}}''. Her mother killed her father, who was abusive to both her and her mother. Sara ended up in foster care.
109* ''Series/CSIMiami'': [[spoiler:Horatio]] finds out he has a kid who's been bouncing around the Foster system.
110* ''Series/{{CSINY}}'': Stella Bonasera. Her foster sister was a suspect in the crossover episode with ''Series/ColdCase,'' "Cold Reveal."
111* ''Series/DiagnosisMurder'': In later episodes, Dr. Amanda Bentley adopted a child named Dion, who had been abused by his previous foster parents. Dr. Bentley herself was a foster child who was HappilyAdopted. A bit of ActorSharedBackground, as actress Creator/VictoriaRowell was also a foster child.
112* ''Series/DiffrentStrokes'': One of the last episodes of the series, Season 8's "Lifestyles of the Poor and Unknown," sees Sam get into a fight with another kid who is a foster child, the fight borne out of the boy's extreme envy and jealousy of Sam's posh life. Willis reminds Sam that he and Arnold could easily have ended up in foster care (either temporarily staying with families or living in group homes), but it was averted when Mr. Drummond took them in and adopted them. By episode's end, Mr. D � who is being featured on a TV series � uses his opportunity to encourage the adoption of older children.
113* Growing up, Cassie from ''Series/{{Elementary}}'' spent time in orphanages and then in foster care. A season nine episode has her asking Joan and Sherlock to help with a case involving one of her foster mom's who was murdered.
114* Four of the five kids from ''Series/TheFosters'', with Jesus and Mariana having been subsequently adopted [[spoiler: and Stef and Lena planning on adopting Jude and Callie]]
115* A recurring character type in ''Series/HomeAndAway'', mainly with members of Sally's family. The inverse also occurred fairly early on, when original character Lynn Davenport left to rejoin her biological parents.
116* ''Series/{{Leverage}}'':
117** Parker, the ClassyCatBurglar, is implied to have grown up in the system, and this becomes something of a sore issue for her when they foil an adoption scam.
118** Hardison, on the other hand, is one of the few happily fostered examples--his foster mom, who he calls Nana, was apparently an extremely positive influence on his life. He's also mentioned learning social skills when he was fostered by door-to-door missionaries.
119* In ''Series/MajorCrimes'', Rusty Beck is put in the custody of the protagonist herself after threatening to run away from his latest set of foster parents.
120-->'''Rusty''': They were telling me what to do all day long, like, even what I could eat! And they would turn off the television at nine o'clock. Every night.\
121'''Sharon''': So...you were tortured.
122* ''Series/NCISLosAngeles'' has Callen who had been to no less than 37 foster homes over the course of his life.
123* ''Series/TheOfficeUS'': This is part of Erin's backstory and she does have some angst over it. She does [[spoiler:get reunited with her birth parents in the series finale]].
124* ''Series/OnceUponATime'':
125** Emma Swan, due to being found on the side of the road. She was taken in by a couple who gave her up after they had a baby of their own, and she grew up a ward of the state. Her experience was very negative, and as an adult she starts out prickly and unwilling to form attachments to anyone. She [[DefrostingIceQueen defrosts]] as the series goes on. It's later revealed that she was nearly HappilyAdopted by [[spoiler: Ingrid the Snow Queen]], but her memories of that were erased. [[note]]It's worth pointing out that Emma's situation requires a great deal of ArtisticLicense. In the real world, a healthy white baby with no listed family is the Holy Grail of the adoption system. Baby Emma would have had infertile couples across Massachusetts fighting to adopt her by proving to the courts that they could provide the best home for her. She would have grown up wanting for nothing.[[/note]]
126** Later episodes reveal that [[spoiler: Pinnocchio aka August]] was in the system too, and abandoned baby Emma in order to escape their house.
127** The episode "True North" revolves around Emma trying to track down the birth father of two orphaned children to prevent them from becoming this. From her past experiences, she is determined not to let them enter the system. [[DontSplitUsUp As they're two different sexes, they also risk being sent to different homes]].
128* ''Series/OrphanBlack'': Sarah and Felix were raised by Mrs. S., Sarah after being an [[TitleDrop orphan brought in from... "the black."]]
129* Just as ''Series/PunkyBrewster'' centered upon a 7-year-old foster child, the short-lived reboot ''Series/PunkyBrewster2021'' featured the adult Punky taking in a 7-year-old foster child of her own.
130* Hunter on ''Series/QueerAsFolkUS'': played straight before Hunter ever appears on the show; apparently he ran away from a foster home because he was abused there. He's eventually taken in by Michael and Ben and seems to be happy there, but then this trope is inverted when his mother (who originally lost custody of him because she used drugs and forced him into prostitution) shows up and wants him back, and actually gets custody. Then she screws it up before they've even left the courtroom, by freaking out when she learns that Hunter is HIV-positive, and promptly loses custody again, to Michael and Ben who officially become Hunter's foster parents. From then on, this trope is averted and at the very end of the series, they offer to adopt him when they notice that he's been using their last names on his school books.
131* Ricky from ''Series/TheSecretLifeOfTheAmericanTeenager'' is a foster kid, but he has very loving and supportive foster parents and he even refers to them as his [[ParentalSubstitute mom and dad]].
132* In ''Series/ShamelessUS'', Kevin was one when he was younger, which causes him to be eager to subsequently foster a 13 year old girl named Ethel who had been removed from [[{{Squick}} a polygamous cult whose leader had married her at 11 and had sex with her enough times to give her a son]].
133* ''Series/StargateSG1'': Daniel Jackson has this as a part of his backstory. Specifically, his parents were killed in a freak accident (which he witnessed) when he was about eight years old, and his only living relative was his maternal grandfather, who refused to take him in because he felt he was too busy to raise a child. Beyond this, the details are unclear � we don't know how his relationships with his foster families were � but based on his relationships later in life he never considered himself to have a family until his team stepped in and filled that role.
134* ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'': When Claire Novak resurfaces in Season 10, this is her backstory. After her father abandons her to become Castiel's vessel and then her mother abandons her to look for Castiel/Jimmy, Claire winds up bouncing from foster home to foster home. Eventually, however, she's taken in by Jody Mills, who offers her a stable and loving home.
135* ''Series/WynonnaEarp'' includes Wynonna bouncing around the foster care system as part of her backstory. Especially notable since her younger sister Waverly was decidedly ''not'' this trope--Waverly was raised by loving [[HonoraryUncle family friends]] after Ward Earp's death. Presumably they couldn't handle Wynonna's troublemaking ways.
136[[/folder]]
137
138[[folder:Puppet Shows]]
139* Karli from ''Series/SesameStreet'' is a young muppet monster who is in foster care because her mother struggles with addiction. (Although this is only explicitly stated in special community outreach videos - in the regular show, we’re just told her mom needs to “get better”.)
140[[/folder]]
141
142[[folder:Video Games]]
143* Adam Bentley, a recurring Maple Heights suspect from ''VideoGame/CriminalCaseGrimsborough'', is revealed to have come from the foster system before becoming a socialite, and knew the victim from Case 50 from his old foster home.
144* In the backstory of the Seed brothers of ''VideoGame/FarCry5'', they were removed from the house of their {{abusive parents}} as children, with John being adopted (by another [[HolierThanThou abusive]] family), Jacob going to juvie and ending up in the military, and [[BigBad Joseph]] spending the rest of his childhood shuffled around from foster home to foster home. No one ever kept him for long when he brought up the Voice he could [[HearingVoices hear in his head]].
145* ''VideoGame/DeusExInvisibleWar'': The protagonist, Alex, mentions that [[CrossPlayer he/she]] lived with his/her foster parents in Chicago. That's about as much as we know about them, since Alex displays [[AngstWhatAngst no real emotion]] about their death following the terrorist attack in the game's opening. Their existence also serves to foreshadow the reveal that Alex is [[spoiler: actually a clone of JC Denton and does not have biological parents]].
146* Ivan from ''VideoGame/GoldenSun'' is fostered by Lord Hammet and Lady Layana of Kalay, but [[HappilyAdopted he's very happy with them]] and [[BewareTheNiceOnes will destroy anyone who endangers them]]. [[spoiler: It's later revealed that Ivan's birth family were not harmful or dead; they're Jupiter Adepts from Contigo who predicted his need to be living in Kalay at a certain time, and [[ThePlan arranged things so he would be where he needed to be]].]] In ''[[VideoGame/GoldenSunDarkDawn Dark Dawn]]'', it's noted that he remained in Kalay and helped the refugees from Vale settle there.
147[[/folder]]
148
149[[folder:Web Animation]]
150* ''WebAnimation/ActuallyHappened'': ''I've Had 3 Foster Families, And I've Seen Things'' is about a teenage girl named Chloe who was put into foster care because of her [[MissingMom mother's death]] when she was fourteen. Her first foster family were her neglectful aunt and uncle, her second foster family was an abusive couple who [[FosteringForProfit only fostered for money]], and her second foster mother was a caring mother whose son died a few years prior. The last one, Susan, later formally adopted Chloe.
151[[/folder]]
152
153[[folder:Webcomics]]
154* Steven in ''Webcomic/AskWhitePearlAndStevenAlmostAnything'' has been passed across different foster homes before landing with an abusive foster family before he runs away when White Pearl finds him.
155* Red in ''Webcomic/RedsPlanet''. The foster home is not bad, she's just adamant that she doesn't need to be adopted, because she's not an orphan. She also thinks that she has unlimited license to run away. The sheriff breaks it to her that after the third time, they won't just dump her in another home.
156[[/folder]]
157
158[[folder:Web Original]]
159* ''Literature/CanYouSpareAQuarter'': Graham gets legal guardianship of Jamie, so that he can get help for the boy's nightmares and so that he can be kept away from his AbusiveParents.
160* Hannah Johnson, from ''Literature/HeroesSaveTheWorld''. She's been moved to a new home more than once by the time that the story starts.
161[[/folder]]
162
163[[folder:Western Animation]]
164* The 1980s cartoon ''WesternAnimation/{{Jem}}'' has Starlight House as a rare positive example of a foster home. The Benton parents decided to foster girls after having two biological children of their own because Jacqui had been a foster child herself. Aja and Shana, the first two foster kids, grew up alongside Jerrica and Kimber and as a result they're all very close. After both parents died, the Benton sisters decided to take over the foster home. The seldom seen Ms. Bailey apparently takes care of the girls while the band is out touring.
165* ''WesternAnimation/TheLastKidsOnEarth'': The main character, Jack Sullivan, grew up in the foster care system. The foster family he was living with when the monster apocalypse hit left town without him.
166* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'': Bart, Lisa, and Maggie were once placed in a loving, if extremely weird (to them), family: The Flanderses. [[StatusQuoIsGod They were back with Homer and Marge by the end]], once the Simpson parents took a parenting class that was [[BumblingDad tough for Homer]] and humiliating for Marge.
167* On ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark,'' Kenny and his sister are removed from their drunken, drug-dealing parents and sent to a foster home with about a dozen other children, headed by a pair of abusive, fundamentalist agnostics (no, that's not a typo). Cartman later frames his mom for dealing drugs, under the false impression that he'll be taken in by some rich family, and winds up in the same place. The DepartmentOfChildDisservices is actually semi-competent here, with their case worker [[WhatHaveIDone horrified when he realizes how bad the place is]].
168* Toyman's first appearance in ''WesternAnimation/SupermanTheAnimatedSeries'' gives this as his backstory -- Toyman's father took a loan from gangster Bruno Mannheim, was forced to allow his toy factory to be used as a front for Mannheim's criminal enterprises, and took the fall when the police closed in. Toyman's criminal motif is a twisted way of reclaiming his lost childhood.
169* ''WesternAnimation/VoltronLegendaryDefender'': After [[spoiler: his mother left shortly after his birth in order to protect him and his father died when he was a child]], [[spoiler: Keith]] entered the foster system. Several years later, he was recruited to the Galaxy Garrison by [[spoiler: Shiro]].
170[[/folder]]

Top