History Main / HeartwarmingOrphan

* ''Manga/InuYasha'': Rin was orphaned when bandits killed her family in front of her, leaving her mute and suffering nightmares. She lived as outcast in the village, being beaten whenever she was caught stealing food to survive. Then [[KarmaHoudini Kouga]] and his [[{{youkai}} demon-wolves]] kill the entire village, including her. Then she's [[DeathIsCheap saved]] by [[BigBrotherBully Sesshoumaru]] who was testing his HealingShiv to see if it worked. And then she follows him everywhere, regaining her zest for life, her ability to talk, while becoming his MoralityPet and melting hearts along the way: [[CharacterDevelopment starting with his]].

* The ''WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda'' franchise has Tai Lung, Tigress and Po. All were adorable kids and while Tai Lung later betrayed his foster father in his adulthood, Tigress and Po have done theirs proud.

* ''Manga/{{Lady}}'': Lynn Russell, in spite of being an orphan, is a BlitheSpirit to everyone. Evan Sarah, who initially hated her, warms up to her.

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!!Examples

* Yotsuba from ''Manga/{{Yotsuba}}'' is exactly this kind of person - as the main character. However, the series barely touches on her orphaned status, instead focusing on her [[SliceOfLife daily life]] as a pre-school kid being raised by a (adoptive) single father.

* Hayate Yagami of ''Franchise/LyricalNanoha'', who turned four cold-blooded warriors into four kind-hearted [[AndroidsArePeopleToo people]] by being her cheerfully optimistic self. Though in a slight twist, they don't adopt her -- instead, [[WiseBeyondTheirYears she adopts them]].

* Played with (with rather [[TearJerker tragic]] results) in ''Manga/PandoraHearts''. Phillip is a very sweet little orphan kid whom everyone from the viewers to Oz seems to adore. [[spoiler: Too bad he's contracted to Humpty Dumpty...]]
* Suigintou before her StartOfDarkness (in ''Manga/RozenMaiden'': Ouverture).
* This, complete with HairOfGoldHeartOfGold, was inverted in ''{{Anime/Monster}}''.
** Not completely. Johan may be evil incarnate but [[SiblingYinYang his twin sister, Nina, is a very kind and compassionate person]] as is Dieter.
* HeartwarmingOrphan protagonists have been a staple of the ''Anime/WorldMasterpieceTheater'' series, which adapted most of the classic examples listed under Literature into anime series.
* Subverted big-time in ''Anime/YuGiOh''. Kaiba, the orphan with the horrible past (his parents die, ''none of his relatives want to take him in,'' he gets continually bullied during his time at the OrphanageOfFear, he finally gets adopted by [[spoiler:a megalomaniacal jackass who abuses him regularly and discarded his own son by blood for being too weak,]]) ends up being one of the series' biggest {{Jerk Ass}}es.
** AND played straight, in a way, in that it makes him the DracoInLeatherPants. Besides, can one really question why someone would be a jerk after all of that? Not that it makes it any better.
*** His little brother Mokuba plays it straight though.

* In ''Manga/WildRose'' there's Camille, who was taken in by his parents' friend after they died. Not only does he look like an angel, but he's also prone to TenderTears and just wants some love and attention from his [[EmotionlessBoy diffident]] father figure Mikhail.
* ''Manga/CandyCandy'':
* Manga/{{Naruto}} is an orphan who has the tendency to make friends out of his enemies. Normally by spilling his life story out while beating them up.
* ''Manga/InuYasha'': Rin was orphaned when bandits killed her family in front of her, leaving her mute and suffering nightmares. She lived as outcast in the village, being beaten whenever she was caught stealing food to survive. Then [[KarmaHoudini Kouga]] and his [[{{youkai}} demon-wolves]] kill the entire village, including her. Then she's [[DeathIsCheap saved]] by [[BigBrotherBully Sesshoumaru]] who was testing his HealingShiv to see if it worked. And then she follows him everywhere, regaining her zest for life, her ability to talk, while becoming his MoralityPet and melting hearts along the way: [[CharacterDevelopment starting with his]].
* Somewhat subverted in ''Manga/FullmetalAlchemist'', where orphan protagonist Edward Elric is a hot-tempered MeasuringTheMarigolds [[AlchemyIsMagic alchemist]] with a fiercely defensive nature and a wild talent for frustrating other people, being as stubborn as he is. Though Edward's [[TheFettered genuine care for other people]] and [[BigBrotherInstinct love for his little brother]] tend to win even the most cold-hearted characters over in the long run, it is his personality, not his orphaned state, that make people put up with his less-than-pleasant tendencies.
* Joshua Grant from ''Anime/MarginalPrince''. While he's not the only character in the series to have lost a parent, he is the only one to have his orphan status as a character (and plot) device. He's a genuinely NiceGuy and still hurts ''alot'' over his mother's death (his father died when he was still very young, but it had in turn big effects on Joshua's mother), even though he initially claims it never affected him much. It doesn't help that he is also [[spoiler: the heir to a kingdom he doesn't have much of a connection with, being only winded into this because the current king, his uncle, doesn't have any children himself]]. Joshua spends a great deal of the series angsting over all this, and as he's the main character, this trope is in full effect for both the audience and a bunch of other characters (especially Yuuta once he learns of Joshua's history).

* [[ComicBook/{{Nightwing}} Dick Grayson]]. Both [[Franchise/{{Batman}} Bruce]] and Alfred have commented that he brought [[CheerfulChild joy]] and [[{{Pun}} color]] back into their lives after he moved into Wayne Manor. Even as an adult, he's still [[TheHeart universally]] [[TheCharmer loved]] by everyone who meets him, and still the best at [[MoralityPet softening Batman's heart]].

* Lewis from ''WesternAnimation/MeetTheRobinsons'' manages to win the hearts of the titular family, and gets invited to join them, over the course of the adventure and the invention fair.

* Flynn's BackStory in ''WesternAnimation/{{Tangled}}'', all the more effectively hinted at by his refusal to whine over it.
-->'''Flynn Rider''': ''Ahh. . . yeah, well. I'll spare you the sob story of poor orphan Eugene Fitzherbert. It's a little bit of a. . . it's a little bit of a downer.''
* Koda from ''WesternAnimation/BrotherBear''...especially after [[spoiler:Kenai kills Koda's mother.]]

* In ''WesternAnimation/OnceUponAForest'', [[spoiler: Michelle the badger becomes this after her parents are killed by the poison gas.]] And she's also a RidiculouslyCuteCritter to boot.

* Anne-Marie from ''WesternAnimation/AllDogsGoToHeaven'' though most of the main gangster dogs are too cold-hearted to be touched and actually find her irritating (including [[spoiler: Charlie and Itchy, at first)]] especially Carface. Most other animals do like her very much though, which is the first step into the excellent communication that makes her so valuable to the villains to begin with.
* The Inuit boy Kunac in ''WesternAnimation/BatmanAndMisterFreezeSubZero''.
* Heidi in ''WesternAnimation/HeidisSong'' just like she is in the novel.
* Jeffrey, the protagonist of ''WesternAnimation/TheNightBeforeChristmas''.
* Penny in ''WesternAnimation/TheRescuers'': a sweet little kidnapped orphan who needs the mice of the title to rescue her.

* Irena in ''Film/TheWayBack2010'' becomes something of a MoralityPet for the others in the group (seven escapees from a Siberian [[TheGulag gulag]]). They all wind up [[PapaWolf papa wolves]] to her, but especially Mister Smith, [[spoiler:whose teenage son had been shot]] before he himself was sent to the gulag. Unfortunately, [[spoiler:she doesn't get a happy ending: she dies of heat stroke and dehydration while trying to cross the Gobi desert.]]
* Brianna in ''Film/MysteryTeam''
* Creator/ShirleyTemple's parents often had a short life expectancy, allowing Shirley to play the Heartwarming Orphan and, usually, get adopted by new, ideal parents. Among the films in which Shirley played orphans are ''Film/BrightEyes'', ''Film/LittleMissMarker'', ''Film/Stowaway1936'', and ''Film/TheLittlePrincess1939'' (although in this one her presumed-dead father turns up alive).
* Denny in ''Film/TheRoom2003'' is an infamously botched case of this trope. An orphaned teenager who was taken in by the film's protagonist, he's supposed to establish Johnny as a good-hearted saint, and to provide an innocent contrast to Johnny and Lisa's turbulent relationship. The problem? Because of the movie's [[SoBadItsGood bizarrely inept writing and acting]], Denny unintentionally comes off as a budding voyeur and sex fiend, and he spends most of the movie [[NoSocialSkills creepily hitting on Johnny's fiancee in front of him]], even trying to convince the couple to let him have a ''threesome'' with them at one point. Contributing to the movie's general weirdness, Denny's actor, Phillip Haldiman, is actually one of the ''oldest'' actors in the cast.
* The wide-eyed, terrified, half-starved UsefulNotes/WorldWarII refugee boy that a GI (Montgomery Clift) unofficially adopts in ''Film/TheSearch''. Clift's character names the near-catatonic boy "Jim" and gets him to come out of his shell and learn English as they bond--but it turns out that "Jim" isn't an orphan after all, as a desperate mother is criss-crossing Germany searching for her lost son Karel.

* OlderThanRadio: Poor little Literature/JaneEyre is tormented by her cruel Aunt Reed and her three nasty children. Then she grows up and meets [[ByronicHero Mr. Rochester]]...
* Literature/{{Heidi}} teaches Peter to read, makes the old grandmother more comfortable, helps Clara learn to walk, and makes her grandfather's life worth living.

* Literature/OliverTwist, who just wants a little more gruel.
* ''Literature/HarryPotter'' starts out as an orphan living in a closet under the stairs and ends up not only making Hermione's, Ron's and Hagrid's lives a little brighter, but also saving the world from [[BigBad You-Know-Who]], [[spoiler:who is himself a total inversion of this trope, as told in his backstory in ''Half-Blood Prince''. Though ironically, Tom Riddle is more classically this, being raised in his orphanage and going in a quest to discover his parents and all, his charm at Hogwarts even plays on this appeal for sympathy. It's just that a HeartwarmingOrphan can easily be TheSociopath]].
* ''Literature/{{Pollyanna}}'', who is so unrelentingly cheerful that she earned [[{{Pollyanna}} a place in the dictionary]].
* All the primary characters in ''Literature/LesMiserables'' are orphans. Or else raised by the Thenardiers, which probably counts anyway.
%% * Cat of the Canals, aka Arya Stark, from ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire''. She ends up joining [[spoiler:an assassin's guild/death cult]] at the age of nine.

* In ''The Little White Horse'', the orphaned heroine transforms her uncle, and reconciles him with his true love.
* Subverted in the ''VideoGame/MechWarrior Dark Age'' novels where the resident OmnicidalManiac "adopts" (read: found while strolling through a city that was recently razed by her instructions) a young girl. And she's changed! Now instead of wanting to just burn the known universe to the ground, she's going to burn the universe down for her!
* Flute, in the Creator/DavidEddings' ''Literature/TheElenium'' trilogy, is not ''really'' an example of this trope, but the band of knights who informally 'adopt' her think she is. [[spoiler:Bit of a shock when they find out she's actually the Child-Goddess Aphrael.]]
* There are a handful of these to be found among the many orphans in ''Dear Enemy'', the sequel to ''Literature/DaddyLongLegs''. Sadie Kate and baby Allegra are perhaps the most direct examples of the trope. Sallie, the administrator of the orphanage where they live, admits she sometimes uses their heartwarming characteristics to charm donations of toys or clothing out of the wealthy and powerful.
* A few of Jo's pupils at Plumfield, in ''[[Literature/LittleWomen Little Men]]'', qualify for this trope.
* By Louisa May Alcott ''Literature/EightCousins'' and its sequel ''Rose in Bloom.'' Protagonist Rose Campbell, in the first, is orphaned and comes to brighten the life of her adoring guardian, lifelong bachelor Uncle Alec, as well as her seven male cousins and various other relations. In the second, adult Rose opens an orphanage called the Rose Garden, and personally adopts an orphaned toddler whom she names Dulcinea (after Literature/DonQuixote's lady).
* Mark Herron, from ''Then There Were Five'' by Elizabeth Enright. He's extremely knowledgeable about the natural world, and teaches others about it.
* Nello from ''Literature/ADogOfFlanders.''
* Freckles is older than normal in Creator/GeneStrattonPorter's ''{{Literature/Freckles}}'' but manages to pull off the role becoming [=McLean=]'s son substitute.
* [[ParodiedTrope Parodied]], along with many common RomanceNovelTropes, in Creator/PGWodehouse's short story "Honeysuckle Cottage".
* The title character of ''Literature/JamesAndTheGiantPeach'', abused and neglected by his creepy aunts, is something of an IronWoobie, nicely adapted in the movie version with the "My Name is James" song. Though miserable in his circumstances, he maintains inner strength, and acts as the leader of all his giant bug friends during their emigration to America.
* Joe from the ''Literature/BetsyTacy'' series is a somewhat older version of this.

* This was a main component of memorable ''{{Series/Hoarders}}'' participant "[[http://beginning.anitawirawan.com/2010/09/the-troubling-history-of-sir-patrick-oshannahan-epic-hoarder-and-convicted-felon.html Sir Patrick]]"'s [[BlatantLies alleged]] backstory.

* In ''Theatre/TheGoldenTicket'', the opera adaptation of ''Literature/CharlieAndTheChocolateFactory'', Charlie Bucket's parents are never seen or mentioned -- his kindly but mostly-bedridden grandparents, whom he tends to, seem to be the only relatives he has -- implying that he's this. As if the poverty he lives in isn't enough...

* Cheryl, of the original ''VideoGame/SilentHill1'', is the HappilyAdopted and much-beloved daughter of DotingParent Harry Mason, who loves her more than anything... [[spoiler: ''both'' of the times she's his daughter.]]
* ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim'': The ''Hearthfire'' [=DLC=] offers the player the chance to adopt orphaned children found throughout the game and give them warm, loving homes. You can buy them gifts, play tag and hide-and-seek and even allow them to keep pets!

* ''Webcomic/GoblinHollow'': How evil are these people? [[http://www.rhjunior.com/GH/00238.html They had an orphanage condemned.]]
* ''Webcomic/{{Strays}}'' has Meela. Uncommonly mouthy for it, but still awfully pitiful.

* In ''Webcomic/DocRat'', [[http://www.docrat.com.au/default.asp?thisItem=734 Pippie lost her family to the fires, and is now living with her uncle.]]
** [[http://www.docrat.com.au/default.asp?thisItem=743 She feels haunted.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/CaptainPlanetAndThePlaneteers'': Ma-Ti lost his parents when people who didn't like their stance on clear-cutting the Amazon burned down their village, and in consequence was raised by his grandfather. He's an incredibly NiceGuy in spite of his tragic backstory, and [[LovedByAll no one besides the villains dislikes him.]]

* The unnamed little girl mistakenly named "Cancer" thanks to her medical bracelet by the inmates of ''WesternAnimation/{{Superjail}}''. Naturally, this being Superjail, things turn out horrifically wrong. Also there's a subplot regarding her saccharine childhood innocence driving the warden mad because he's lost his. Then his inner child breaks out of his body and tries to kill her throughout the episode.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons '': Patches and Poor Violet, who appear to have been transferred to Springfield from Dickensian London.

* ''WesternAnimation/AroundTheWorldWithWillyFog'': Princess Romy is a very young woman who lost both her parents in a typhoid epidemic when she studied in England. Then she was forced to marry an old Rajah and almost died with him as a sacrifice to goddess Kali. She hopes to be reunited with her uncle and aunt who she thinks will take care of her. Unfortunately, they also passed away and she's all alone in the world. This tragic backstory makes her even more adorable and sympathetic to the viewers. She's warm and kind, and almost always smiling and happy. She's very grateful to Mr Fog and his companions for rescuing her, taking care of her and allowing her to travel with them. They all adore her and she makes their world lovelier.

* Denny in ''Film/TheRoom'' is an infamously botched case of this trope. An orphaned teenager who was taken in by the film's protagonist, he's supposed to establish Johnny as a good-hearted saint, and to provide an innocent contrast to Johnny and Lisa's turbulent relationship. The problem? Because of the movie's [[SoBadItsGood bizarrely inept writing and acting]], Denny unintentionally comes off as a budding voyeur and sex fiend, and he spends most of the movie [[NoSocialSkills creepily hitting on Johnny's fiancee in front of him]], even trying to convince the couple to let him have a ''threesome'' with them at one point. Contributing to the movie's general weirdness, Denny's actor, Phillip Haldiman, is actually one of the ''oldest'' actors in the cast.