History Main / ImaginaryFriend

* [[MontyPythonsFlyingCircus Dinsdale Pirahna]] is convinced that he was being watched by a gigantic hedgehog named Spiny Norman. Normally, Norman was wont to be about eight to ten feet from nose to snout, but when Dinsdale was really depressed, Norman could anywhere up to eight hundred yards.

** UminekoNoNakuKoroNi has a few different cases of this, [[MindScrew depending on which explanations you go with]]. Most evident is Maria's relationship with Sakutaro, [[LivingToys a plushie of hers]]. [[{{Yangire}} Lord help you when he breaks]]. More spoileriffic is an example from the seventh arc - [[spoiler:Yasu's relationship with both Shannon and Kanon, though at this point, Yasu and Shannon have virtually switched places, and ''Yasu'' has become the imaginary friend]]. This series really knocks around the line between Imaginary Friend and NotSoImaginaryFriend.

* ''HigurashiNoNakuKoroNi'': Rika Furude, who is regarded by some as a prophet, had a childhood imaginary friend named "Oyashiro-sama", which is coincidentally the name of Hinamizawa's guardian god. (This is only briefly referenced in the anime, in ''Meakashi-hen'', but is more explicitly spelled out [[AllThereInTheManual in other material]]). [[spoiler:Oyashiro a.k.a. Hanyu is real, though no one else can see or hear her until ''Matsuribayashi-hen''.]]

* In John Varley's ''TheGoldenGlobe'' protagonist Kenneth "Sparky" Valentine's imaginary friend turns out to be a symptom of a disassociative personality disorder caused by years of suffering at the hands of his abusive father, Kenneth Sr.

* In {{Call of Duty Black Ops}}, Mason have [[spoiler: Viktor Reznov]] as an imaginary friend, as a result of Dr steiner's experiments on him. It is heavily hinted so when no one else could see or interact with [[spoiler:Reznov]]. The player could even shoot through him during the mission.

In darker stories, sometimes the ImaginaryFriend is a ghost or extradimensional entity who may not have good and kind intentions toward the child. These can be a variation on OurGhostsAreDifferent. Sometimes it's just a manipulative or JerkAss adult preying on the child's imagination and innocence and pretending to be imaginary, counting on adults not believing the child if the child does happen to speak on it.

** Earlier, in ''Small Gods'', desert-dwelling religious hermit S.T. ("Saint") Ungulant has an imaginary friend called Angus. [[spoiler: Because the small gods of the desert don't miss an opportunity to latch onto anyone's belief, even a crackpot's, Angus is "real" enough to hit a lion over the head with a rock.]]

* In ''TheGhostWhisperer'' the title character is aware some children can see ghosts. The child of a storekeeper on the same square as her antique store, Dylan, appears to have the full-fledged medium gift, and his mother reacts poorly to her son talking to people who aren't there.

* The 1979-80 series ''Kujira no Josephina'' (''Josephina the Whale'') is about a boy in Spain who went on adventures with his imaginary whale. In the last episode, the boy eventually grew up and said goodbye to Josephina...[[DownerEnding yeah]].

* ''The Savage Dragon'' features She-Dragon, who, in a parody of She-Hulk's NoFourthWall tendencies, had five or so imaginary friends, who many issues later turned out to be real people trapped in another dimension with a psychic link to her.

* In ''Un Sussurro nel buio'' (aka ''A Whisper in the Dark''), the boy's imaginary friend is [[spoiler: the ghost of his brother who died as an infant before he was born.]]
* In the DisneyChannel Original Movie ''Don't Look Under the Bed'', imaginary friends become boogeymen if the child stops believing in them too soon.

* Brazilian movie ''A Mulher Invísivel'' features an imaginary ''lover'', the "invisible woman" of the title.
* Reyeb for Malik in ''Un prophète'' by Jacques Audiard. Remarkably friendly (if mysterious) considering Malik murdered him.
* The TV Movie 'Invisible Child'.

* In ''Paper Man'', Ryan Reynolds plays the superhero imaginary friend of the main character, a middle-aged failed writer.

* In the ''Bagthorpe'' series of children's books by Helen Cresswell, the youngest cousin, Daisy, has an imaginary friend called Arry Awk (the name comes from a folksong). Daisy is a strange child who has fads, such as setting things on fire and burying sausages in the garden, and she blames Arry Awk for all her misdeeds.
* The short story "Thus I Refute Beelzy" by John Collier, in which it's strongly implied the child has summoned up a demon.
* In Andrew M. Greeley's ''God Game'', a man's computer affects a {{fantasy}} [[TheKingdom kingdom]] (and the people around him) and characters from the game start appearing to him to ask for plot changes.
* One of the only Kevin Henkes books populated by humans is ''Jessica'', a picture book about a girl whose best friend is imaginary. The girl is initially reluctant to start kindergarten due to fears of leaving Jessica, but eventually befriends a classmate who happens to share the name.

* In Anne Tyler's ''Earthly Possessions'', the narrator's daughter has an imaginary friend "Selinda" for whom a place must be set at the table; after a while, the daughter sits in Selinda's place and insists that she is Selinda, and that the daughter is the imaginary friend. She is always referred to as Selinda from then on.
* In ''Chocky'' by John Wyndham, Matthew's "imaginary friend" turns out to be actually an alien.

* The novel ''The Other''. The narrator and his twin brother deal with a host of calamities. [[spoiler: The narrator has no brother, and he's a murdering sociopathic monster.]] This book is NightmareFuelUnleaded.

* In John Varley's ''The Golden Globe'' protagonist Kenneth "Sparky" Valentine's imaginary friend turns out to be a symptom of a disassociative personality disorder caused by years of suffering at the hands of his abusive father, Kenneth Sr.

* A ''Sketch Show'' sketch took this to an over-the-top degree. The sketch concerned a psychiatrist running a group therapy session to persuade people that their imaginary friends weren't real; her patients were a guy who used his imaginary friend as a cover for alcoholism, a lonely and lovesick woman, and a guy who thought he himself was the imaginary one. At the very end of the sketch, it turns out the psychiatrist was actually addressing an empty room.

* The play ''The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of'' is about an adult who never outgrew his imaginary friend.

* Manhunt 2 does this with Daniel and [[spoiler: Leo]] which didn't surprise this troper too much actually as [[spoiler: Leo, who is somewhere between imaginary friend and alternate personality, always seemed to be the one talking Daniel into dangerous decisions as opposed to really doing anything.]]

* Mr. Pingoo of ''Star Bored'' is ''strongly'' hinted to be Ham Luca's ImaginaryFriend.
* ''The Imanginaries'' is about new residents of the extradimensional limbo that imaginary friends go to when their creators don't need imaginary friends anymore.

* ''TeenTitans'': One girl had an imaginary friend who was invisible to those she didn't trust. It was the expression of her telekinesis.
** Expression of telekinesis in this case being [[spoiler: a gigantic teddy bear with razor sharp claws and fangs that beats the shit out of a French gorilla]].

* Ninja Ninja Afro's foul mouthed, perverted, jive talking imaginary friend from {{AfroSamurai}} he was thought up because Afro's entire adoptive family was murdered by a band of thieves and he created him so he wouldn't be completely lonely, no one else can see or hear him but he can get hurt and once he accepted responsibility for their deaths he let go of Ninja Ninja allowing him to be killed in his place and letting vanish from his life, although he returns in the movie.

* ''{{The Gone-Away World}}'' is ''weird'' about this. [[spoiler:The main character was the imaginary friend of TheAce, serving as the inspiration and motivator for all his deeds, and became real as the result of AppliedPhlebotinum. His memories are a hybrid of what really happened and what TheAce visualized as happening, along with a few things that never happened (for instance, he thinks he's married to the woman who the original actually married.)]]

* In one episode, the ''PowerPuffGirls'' had to fight an ImaginaryFriend who was causing trouble at school. They defeat him by imagining a friend of their own to beat the snot out of him.

Children in their formative years have a lot of imagination. They also need guidance, support, love, and companionship. And stimulation for their imaginations.

In cases when the parent is physically present but emotionally and mentally a MissingMom or DisappearedDad; or when the child is abused or orphaned or otherwise put through upheaval -- they cope by creating a friend from their imagination to keep them company.