Like A Son To Me / Live-Action TV

• In American Horror Story: Coven, Myrtle Snow, head of the Witches' Council, views Cordelia Goode as a daughter. Cordelia has similar feelings toward her, especially since her birth mother is Fiona, a Rich Bitch who only cares about herself—to the point where Cordelia's personal version of Hell is her begging for Fiona's approval and being cruelly abused by her. Myrtle and Cordelia's relationship makes Myrtle's death all the sadder: Myrtle arranges for her own burning at the stake to allow Cordelia's reign as the Coven's new Supreme to go as smoothly as possible. Among Myrtle's last words: "Delia...my sweet daughter...I've never been more proud...
• Parodied in Arrested Development when GOB refers to his son as "the father I never had".
• Arrow. At the end of Season 3, Malcolm Merlyn says this to Oliver Queen only to be coldly rejected, given that Malcolm arranged the murder of Oliver's real father, and brainwashed his sister Thea (who is also Malcolm's daughter) into killing his ex-girlfriend Sara Lance. Malcolm takes back the statement in Season 4 after Oliver cuts off his hand to depose him as leader of the League of Assassins, and they become enemies instead.
• The A-Team. In "Lease With an Option to Die", the team meets B.A.'s mother. She loves Murdock and announces she wants to adopt him, to Murdock's utter delight and her son's (apparent) horror.
• The Barrier: Álvaro, whose marriage has never produced any children, views Luis' children as being like his own. In turn, Luis has the same sentiment towards the child Álvaro turns out to have produced with his mistress.
• In the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica, Admiral Adama has repeatedly told Kara "Starbuck" Thrace that she is like a daughter to him.
• Subverted in the last episode of Blackadder Goes Forth, where General Melchett tells Kevin Darling that he's "like a son to him" — not a favorite son, though.
  "Lord no, more a sort of illegitimate back-stair sort of sprog. Y'know, the sort of spotty squid that nobody really likes."
• In Brooklyn Nine-Nine, as the two grow closer, Captain Holt begins to view Jake as a surrogate son much as Jake views him as a Parental Substitute. On occasion, they've even slipped up and referred to one another as "Son" and "Dad." Amy also seems to develop this attitude, although her father is somewhat nicer to her than Jake's was to him.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode "Restless"
  Giles: Spike's like a son to me.
  • To clarify, that was a zany dream. Spike is not like a son to Giles. Xander, however, is, and Willow and Buffy are like daughters.
    • When everyone lost their memories in Tabula Rasa and started trying to reconstruct their relationships, Spike decided he was Giles' son while Giles seemed to think Spike must be his younger brother. It's only because they both speak with English accents, Giles looks a bit older (Spike is actually a century older than him!) and they feel an instinctive resentment toward each other.
  • Dickish Head of the Watchers Council Quentin Travers is the first person to say what Giles has been too shy to tell Buffy himself: "[Giles has] a father's love for the child". Quentin means it in a dismissive way, but it clearly means the world to Buffy to hear this when she's been dropping hints to Giles about wanting him to hang out with her socially now that she's realizing her real dad is no longer making an effort to see her, even on her birthday. Throughout the series, Buffy is more comfortable with telling Giles how she feels ("Giles, I love you]]", "I want you to give me away [at her spell-induced wedding...but the sentiment about Giles is genuine]") while Giles — in his British repressed way — is more likely to take a roundabout way ("You're everything a Watcher-everything I could have hoped for", "Wish I could play the father/And take you by the hand") or express his love through gestures like helping out when her mother gets sick, paying her bills, verbally and physically defending her from men she can't slay, culminating in his attempt to help her fly out of the nest by going back to England. It kind of works and it kind of doesn't, and they both have regrets about it, but reunite as a team and a family in time for the series finale.
  • While never explicitly said, the relationship between the Mayor and his Dragon Faith definitely has the same father/daughter connotations, including a Villainous Breakdown of Papa Wolf proportions after Buffy put her in a coma.
• Larry Sizemore calls Michael Westen this in Burn Notice. Subverting the usual associations of this trope, it is not a heartwarming moment- Larry is a former Evil Mentor and Michael has daddy issues.
• Cheers: Done darkly in one episode, when Esther Clavin tells Woody she's like the son she never had, right in front of Cliff, who she's on the outs with for standing up to her. When he objects, she retorts he's the son she did have.
• Cobra Kai:
  • History repeats itself, as the relationship between Miguel Diaz and Johnny Lawrence mirrors Daniel's relationship with Mr. Miyagi from The Karate Kid trilogy, as Daniel comes to realize once he finally gets a chance to know Miguel. For Johnny, it's a second chance at being a father figure after screwing up with his biological son Robby Keene, while Miguel gets a father figure he never had (his mother fled her abusive husband in Ecuador with her mother as a pregnant 18-year-old and subsequently raised Miguel on her own).
  • Daniel actually does attempt this with Robby, being a better father figure to him than Johnny ever was. Unfortunately, this later transitions to Kreese and Robby after Robby sees Daniel as the enemy for "betraying him" by turning him in to the police.
  • Kreese views Johnny as a surrogate son in a very twisted way. It becomes even more twisted in Season 3 when he extends those feelings down to Robby and gets him to join Cobra Kai, in the hopes it will bring Johnny back into the fold and they can rule as "three generations" of Cobra Kai.
• Daredevil (2015)
  • Karen Page feels guilty after Ben Urich is murdered by Wilson Fisk (due to Karen having tricked Ben into speaking to Fisk's mother), and tries to apologize to his widow at the funeral. Ben's wife isn't having it, saying that no one ever forced Ben to write a story, and he regarded Karen as the daughter they never had specifically because she never gave up.
  • Though never said out loud, it's pretty clear that Mitchell Ellison views Karen as one after he hires her to take Ben Urich's job at the Bulletin.
  • Despite trying to kill her on a few occasions when she goes rogue, Stick still has a soft spot for Elektra, more or less seeing her as his daughter. This ends up being his undoing in The Defenders (2017) as he hesitates when Elektra shows up to capture Danny Rand, giving her the opening to stab him to death.
  • Wilson Fisk views James Wesley as "like a son" to him, saying as much word-for-word when tasking Dex with killing Karen as revenge for Wesley's murder. However, while Wesley was indeed Fisk's close friend, it's implied Fisk is just using this trope to manipulate Dex (whose father abandoned him at a young age) by implying that Fisk will be a Parental Substitute for Dex if he takes on Wesley's role as The Dragon.
• Doctor Who:
  • "The End of Time Part 2" has a variation.
    The Master: (to the Doctor) Oh, your dad's still kicking up a fuss.
    Wilfred Mott: No, but I'd be proud if I was.
  • The Doctor, despite being Wilf's senior by several centuries, returns the sentiment.
    "I'd be proud...if you were my dad."
  • In The TV Movie, the Master claims Chang Lee is "the son I've always yearned for." The Doctor is not convinced ("Oh, please.") — and moments later, the Master snaps Lee's neck.
• In Drake & Josh, Josh's boss, Helen, is really affectionate towards Drake. She at one point says she feels this way towards him.
  Helen: Drake Parker, I love you like the son I never wanted.
• Echo (2024): Wilson tells Maya he's always considered her to be like his daughter. The flashbacks show he was a Papa Wolf against an ice cream vendor who had been rude when she tried speaking with him using ASL, beating the man severely. However, by now Maya knows he had her father killed, and so while she'd once seen him as a surrogate father now she rejects him.
• On Everybody Loves Raymond, Frank feels this way about Debra. In one episode, he tells her that he's always viewed his battles with Marie, Ray, and Robert as "me and you versus them." In another, upon discovering that his lodge brothers are treating Debra, who's been volunteering with them, as a piece of eye candy, he lets them have it: "This is Debra! She's not just some cheap floozy—she's like my own daughter!"
  • Marie and Debra largely avert this trope, especially because the former is extremely doting and controlling toward Ray. However, it's occasionally hinted that Marie sees Debra fondly; for instance, she's arranged to leave all of her recipes to Debra in her will. As Marie is a Supreme Chef, that's quite a compliment.
• Fellow Travelers: Leonard is jealous of Hawk because Leonard's father Senator Smith treats Hawk more like a son than his own flesh-and-blood. Smith acknowledges that this is true.
  Smith: This will be good for you, son.
  Leonard: Son? (scoffs) I stopped being your son the day [Hawk] showed up. The sad orphan, the tennis star. A goddamn war hero for Christ's sake. The son you thought you deserved. Your son. I never had a chance.
  Smith: He's right, Hawk. You took his place. And I let you do it.
• Several in The Flash (2014), all by Dr Wells.
  • He tells Cisco that, although he doesn't have children of his own, Cisco has shown him what it's like to have a son. Partly due to not being on the best of terms with his own family, Cisco shares the sentiment. Then Wells kills him, but does look genuinely distraught over it. Not like it sticks.
    • In the subsequent episode following said Cosmic Retcon, we get a more lighthearted reprisal of the above scene when Wells consoles Cisco over how he had been forced to reveal Barry's Secret Identity to Captain Cold.
  • He later tells Barry that he understands what Joe (Barry's foster dad) and Henry (Barry's actual dad) feel when they look at him with pride and love.
  • In a somewhat tragic example, he refers to his former protege Hartley Rathaway as 'the Prodigal Son', suggesting that they also had this sort of relationship. Until, that is, Wells fired him because he realised something was going to go wrong with the particle accelerator.
• In the Season 4 finale of Flashpoint, Greg Parker says pretty much exactly this to Spike, albeit in Italian. It's even more poignant when you take into account that Spike's father had recently died and his mother had moved back to Italy, leaving him without a readily-available parental presence for the first time in his life...or so he thought.
• From a deleted scene from Flight of the Conchords:
  Eddie: Bret, I like you. You're like a son to me. You remind me of my niece.
• Implied with Martin and Daphne on Frasier, especially when Martin becomes lonely when Daphne moves in with Niles and tries to get Daphne to promise to visit more often by using the fact that Eddie will miss her as a transparent excuse. Also given a Sibling Rivalry-like turn when Daphne gets jealous of Frasier's new girlfriend Claire, because Claire and Martin dote on each other and Martin clearly wants Frasier to marry her and make her Martin's daughter-in-law.
  Martin: Her laugh's just like music, isn't it?
  Daphne (wistfully): You used to think my laugh was musical... Remember, Marty?
  Martin: Yeah, but I'm used to it now.
• The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air: Uncle Phil sees Will this way. Phil is heartbroken and falls into a depression when Will pulls a You're Not My Father on him for trying to stop Will spending the summer with his deadbeat biological father, but still comforts Will when Lou (said deadbeat father) walks out on him again. In the series finale the family move out of the mansion and go their separate ways, Phil tells each of his kids to call him every Sunday and pointedly includes Will in that list.
  Phil: You are my son, Will. End of story.
• Game of Thrones:
  • Jon Snow to Jeor Mormont, whose own son Jorah disgraced their family.
  • Jon Snow is actually Ned Stark's nephew by his sister Lyanna, and Ned raised Jon as his own son.
  • Shireen Baratheon to Davos Seaworth, in the "like a daughter to me" version. Davos outright says this when he finds out that Melisandre killed Shireen by burning her alive, promising that he will kill Melisandre himself if he ever sees her again.
• The Golden Girls: When Rose is hospitalized for an esophageal spasm, Sophia cracks jokes as they wait for word. When Dorothy blasts her for this, Sophia admits that she's trying to hide her fear—"If something happened to Rose, it would be like losing one of my own children." She repeats the claim that she loves Rose like a daughter when Rose has a heart attack. Even though she doesn't say it, she clearly feels this way about Blanche too.
  • It culminates in the final episode when Sophia, who's planning to move away with a newly-married Dorothy, looks at a picture she's taken of Rose and Blanche and whispers "Good-bye, my girls..."
• Gotham has Alfred Pennyworth and Bruce Wayne, of course. In the penultimate episode of the series, Alfred even flat-out says Bruce is the only son he will ever have.
  • Fish Mooney claims this about Oswald Cobblepot...and then beats him half to death for snitching on her to the police. Later episodes imply she wasn't entirely making things up though, as part of the reason she seems to have taken his betrayal so bitterly personal is that she really did believe this. As he becomes more and more powerful, she's genuinely impressed by how much he's accomplished, which leads to a villainous So Proud of You moment where she confesses she could never kill him because she had a hand in creating him. He's so genuinely moved by this he spares her life in turn, and even after her death, he's pretty obviously taking cues from her in his dress and quotations.
• In the Haven episode "Speak No Evil", Vince Teagues tried to claim Dwight Hendrickson was the son he never had, but Dwight was not impressed, and was annoyed by Vince keeping him Locked Out of the Loop on several of the town's secrets.
• In Horatio Hornblower, the title character arrives on Captain Pellew's ship with a bad reputation, but Pellew is satisfied with the result after testing his actions. From there he treats Hornblower as his protege, and his regard for the young officer grows to barely-concealed affection. The final telefilm has Pellew spelling it out in nearly explicit terms by saying to the newly-promoted Captain Hornblower "You know, Hornblower, it is very hard for a father to see his children grow up." (Hornblower, however, is a little oblivious in personal matters and it sails right over his head.)
• From In Plain Sight as Rafael is moving in with the Shannons before marrying Mary
  Brandi: So I guess I'm like the little sister you never had, huh?
  Rafael: I have three sisters. All little.
  • Later deconstructed, impressively. One of the witnesses flips on his criminal buddies after they kill the "son he never had" . . . except the witness had a son, who he couldn't connect with or accept, and who was rightfully jealous of the son substitute. Their relationship is . . . messy.
• Iron Fist (2017): Harold Meachum acts at first like Danny is a better son to him than his actual son Ward, but it soon becomes clear that this is just an act.
• JAG:
  • Harm's stepfather Frank Burnett tells him this when he visits his mother in "To Russia with Love":
    Frank Burnett: I figured out early on that I could never live up to your father in your eyes. I wasn't a Blue Angel. Hell, I never even wore a uniform.
    Harmon Rabb, Jr.: Frank.
    Frank Burnett: But although you never thought about me as your father, you're the only son I ever had.
  • From "Desert Son": General Williams to Lt. Boone, the only friend of the careless Lt. Williams that he approves of.
• In Law & Order: UK, this is clearly how DS Ronnie Brooks feels about his partner Matt Devlin (no wonder, given that he royally screwed up raising his actual daughters, thanks to being a drunk). He outright says this while talking with the mother of the man who killed him. "The police officer who died? His name was Matthew Devlin and he was like MY son."
• Exploited in Lost, when Mr. Paik tells Jin this in order to manipulate him into killing Jae Lee. However it's pretty obvious he doesn't really care about Jin.
• During the intro to the 1991 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, when Katie Couric entered the scene aided by a magician's box, her cohost Willard Scott jokingly referred to her as "the son [he] always wanted." See it here.
• Gaius and Merlin (2008):
  Gaius: Merlin, you're like a son to me. I never expected such a blessing so late in life.
  Merlin: And you are more than a father to me.
• Married... with Children: On several occasions, Al Bundy spoke to/of someone as "the son [he] never had" -at least once in front of Bud.
• In Colonel Blake's farewell episode of M*A*S*H, he exchanges gifts with Radar and tells him, "You're like a son to me." What makes this even more adorable is that at the exact same time, Radar says, "Sometimes I felt like you were my father." It makes Radar's devastation in the final scene, where he informs the rest of the cast of Colonel Blake's death, that much more gut-wrenching.
• Mimpi Metropolitan: To Mami Bibir, everyone who lives in her dorm are her children.
• Monarch: Legacy of Monsters: Hiroshi Randa to his Honorary Uncle Lee Shaw, as revealed in the third episode.
• Shows up very early in The Nanny. Fran is calling Maggie, Brighton, and Grace "her kids" by the fifth episode, and her love for them is clearly more maternal than professional.
  • It's later inverted with Mr. Sheffield and Sylvia, Fran's mother, later in the series, after Fran has finally married Maxwell. When Fran is briefly hospitalized, Max and Sylvia rush to the hospital together, and he does his best to calm her down, calling her "Mom." Sylvia notes that he's never done that before, and he explains that she's been a better, dearer mother to him than his birth mother ever was. It's especially surprising because Sylvia's behavior borders on invasive and annoying at times, particularly when she shows up to eat the Sheffields out of house and home.
• NCIS has two examples:
  • Ducky doesn't say it outright, but is very fatherly towards his assistant Palmer.
  • Gibbs seems to almost view Abby as a daughter: he's by far the nicest to her, and even gives her a kiss on the head a few times.
• Hook from Neverland is a unique example. He starts the series displaying this trope towards Peter. He took him in after his mother died and he did everything he could to protect him. However, he subverts this in the end and ends up wanting to put an end to the boy he used to care about.
• NUMB3RS: When Larry leaves on his sabbatical in Season 6, he leaves a large amount of his work scribbled on a wall with a note that translates to "All to son". Everyone immediately knows he's referring to Charlie.
• The Punisher (2017): Frank Castle's friendship with Karen Page stems from the fact that she reminds him heavily of his late daughter Lisa. He thinks of Karen as what Lisa would've been like if she'd grown to see adulthood rather than be cut down by a hit squad in the midst of an attempt to assassinate Frank.
• When Rizzoli & Isles have a seemingly-insurmountable split, Jane's mother Angela tells Maura "You're like a daughter to me too."
• Funnily enough inverted on Roseanne. After a rather uncomfortable discussion involving sexual dreams, David finally comes out and admits that he sees Roseanne, who adopted him, as more of a mother than his biological one. It's been clear for a while the feeling's mutual, and she's very touched by the affection.
  David: Do... do you want me to start calling you Mom?
  Roseanne: No. (grins) I want me other kids to start calling me Mrs. Conner.
• Sarah and Maria in The Sarah Jane Adventures. At the end of "The Last Sontaran", Maria is leaving. Sarah Jane tells her she's losing the daughter she had always wanted. *sob*
• Shadowhunters Magnus has raised many downworlders in his long lifetime. He says this to Raphael, whom he has always taken care of, calling him son.
• In Stargate SG-1 Bra'tac has been a mentor and close friend to Teal'c for decades. In "Talion", Bra'tac explains to Teal'c that he is like a son to him and that he is so proud of him.
• Supernatural: Even though he doesn't say it out loud, it's obvious that Bobby loves Dean and Sam like they were his sons. He even tells Dean in the season 3 finale that, "Family don't end with blood."
  • In a seventh-season episode, as he lies dying, Bobby tells the memory of his abusive father that he adopted two sons, referring to Sam and Dean.
    Bobby: I adopted two boys, and they grew up great. They grew up heroes.
  • Bobby also seems to think of Castiel as a son as well as Sam and Dean, despite the fact that Cas is millennia older than he is.
  • Mary also apparently regards Cas as one of "her boys", along with Sam and Dean.
• Spin City: Mike and the Mayor gradually develop a relationship like this. In this case, the Mayor sees Mike as the father figure.
• The Suite Life of Zack & Cody: Mr. Moseby at first seems only to be playing Parental Substitute to London because her dad is his boss, but it quickly becomes clear that, having done this since she was a baby, he does care very deeply for the girl. He doesn't have kids of his own, but he's the one who taught London to walk, he's the one to discipline her when she goes too far, and more than once, he risks his boss' wrath to do what would be best for her. Her actual parents are never around, and she's gone through more nannies and stepmothers than she can recall, so Mr. Moseby is really the only consistently caring adult in her life.
• In Teen Wolf, Melissa McCall is a substitute mother to her son Scott's best friend Stiles, whose mother passed away when he was very young. This is especially exemplified in season three when Stiles begins to show the same symptoms as his mother did just before her death. Melissa takes care of him, leading to the following:
  Stiles: Thanks, Mom.
  • She seems to have become this to Isaac, as well. When Isaac ends up in the hospital after being electrocuted, Allison is not allowed in to see him, despite her telling the staff that he doesn't have any family.
    Melissa: He's got us.
• On That '70s Show, Kelso wants to buy a great car from Leo. As they're about to make the final deal, however, Leo recalls that he had originally planned to give that car to his long-lost son and said that he couldn't bear to sell it, which Kelso can understand. Leo then immediately gives the car to Hyde, calling him the son he never had (as opposed to that long-lost son that he did have). Needless to say, Kelso was annoyed.
• Neal and Peter on White Collar. Oddly, Mozzie is the first person to point out the father-son relationship between Peter and Neal. In the third season episode Upper West Side Story, Peter is posing as a man enrolling his son in a prep school as part of an undercover assignment. Someone at the school asks Peter about his son. Peter doesn't have a biological son, so he describes Neal instead.
  "He's very intelligent but impulsive. His moves tend to land him in trouble... Well, I wanna give him the best shot at life. I know it's gonna cost me."
  • Peter's wife even makes comments about Neal being their kid.
  • Further emphasized in the series finale, where, after Neal apparently dies, Peter and Elizabeth name their newborn son "Neal" in his honor.
• Voyagers!: After a little while of time-traveling together, Phineas Bogg comes to see Jeff as being like his son (he actually says to another character during "Bully and Billy" that Jeff isn't his son, but he wishes he could say he was). While they don't quite have an average father/son relationship, he does try to teach and protect him.
• All but actually said in The West Wing with President Bartlet and Charlie, especially when President Bartlet passes on to Charlie his family knife that has been given from father to son.
  • He also refers to Josh as his son in "Two Cathedrals".
  • Josh tells CJ that Bartlet thinks of her as a daughter.
  • Josh also has this kind of relationship with Leo, who is an old friend of his father's.
    President Bartlet: He loved you like a son. You know that, right?
• In one episode of Wizards of Waverly Place between Max's conscience and his mom.
  Theresa: "You're like the son I don't regret having!"
  Max: "Oh, she means Justin."

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