Kid Sidekick

"I don't know how the public accepted all these heroes' infant sidekicks. Besides the Catholic church, no other organization hires 10 year old assistants. Being a superhero is a lot like being a cop, and if we were watching COPS and one of the policemen was chasing a car thief with a kid dressed up as a little cop sitting next to him, we would think that was crazy."

— Seanbaby

A character, often an adult or sometimes teenager, has a considerably younger Sidekick. Traditionally the kid will often act as The Watson for the main character, and/or as someone for younger audiences to identify with.

Sometimes the kid acts as a Morality Pet or as a Wish-Fulfillment personification, which goes some way to explaining the implausibility of a responsible adult putting a young child in dangerous situations. Sometimes the sidekick will be a Teen Genius or Child Prodigy in an attempt to justify their presence, or even a Cute Bruiser.

Other times, they're The Load and a Damsel in Distress. May overlap with Junior Counterpart. Usually the result of Must Have Lots of Free Time.

Compare Tagalong Kid, Kid-Appeal Character, Bratty Half-Pint, and Baker Street Regular. Contrast Older Sidekick.

---

Examples:

Anime & Manga

• Jim Hawking in Outlaw Star is this to Gene Starwind being the Child Prodigy who is ironically the voice of maturity and reason compared to the impulsive and swashbuckling Gene.
• Isidro from Berserk in spite of the how dark the series is, plays this straight to Guts being very much the lighthearted Robin to his dark and brooding Batman. He’s the only character Guts has personally taught but the Black Swordsman still has to painfully explain to the kid (who’s desperate to be as badass as his idol) that it’ll take years for Isidro to become anywhere as formidable as he is in combat — something that stings Isidro but he keeps at it. Schierke can also be seen as this though to a less obvious extent.
• Playful Hacker Radical Edward aka Ed of Cowboy Bebop can be seen as this to Bebop crew especially to Faye whom she teams up with the most, though she aids Spike and Jet as well occasionally. Ed is unique example as she’s actually more competent than Spike, Jet and Faye combined being pretty much an unstoppable Invincible Hero as seen in “Mushroom Samba”.
• Dragon Ball:
  • Gohan did much of the series was this for Piccolo his mentor (to point of them wearing matching outfits), though he’s also played this straight with his own father Goku on occasion.
  • On the flip side Trunks from the Bad Future is the kid sidekick to Gohan himself in the Dragon Ball Z: The History of Trunks special while in the present Goten is this for his older brother Gohan early in the Buu Saga and in Broly the Second Coming.
  • Dende was this for Nail in the Namek Saga with their bond being reminiscent of Gohan and Piccolo’s.
  • In the original series technically Goku himself was this to Bulma being 11 while she was 16 although of course unlike other examples he was vastly more competent than her and soon set on his own adventure.
• Sailor Chibi Moon of Sailor Moon can be seen as this to the Senshi in general as The Baby of the Bunch but is really this to Usagi in particular.
• Doc Black Jack's sidekick, nurse, and surrogate daughter Pinoko.
• Lone Wolf and Cub is the epitome of this trope. Ogami Ittou's sidekick is three years young.
• Lirio from El Cazador de la Bruja is a loli sidekick to Badass Normal Ricardo.
• Hayate's partner, Reinforce Zwei in Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha StrikerS. Her non-Fun Size form looks around ten, with her actual age being younger.
• Lin and Bat in Fist of the North Star are this to Kenshiro (especially the latter who’s a Guile Hero) and they are also strongly implied to be ones who kept him going after he lost Yuria. One of the most heartwarming moments in the series is after the Time Skip Ken embraces the grown up and more competent Lin and Bat and giving them a So Proud of You speech.
• Wendy Garret of GUN×SWORD is a teenage example of this. She very rarely helps out in battle, but she's better at thinking than Van is. She functions as a manager, handling the money and making travel arrangements.
• Eve of Black Cat is one, but she hardly has trouble keeping up.
• One Piece:
  • Ninjin, Piiman and Tamanegi from Syrup Village were this for Usopp (their Trickster Mentor) and were willingly to give their lives on his orders to protect Kaya.
  • Luffy often has a knack for finding these: Coby in the first two arcs (before he Took a Level in Badass), Aisa in Skypeia, Chimney in Enies Lobby, Mommonosuke in Punk Hazard and Wano and Tama as well. That’s not even counting the various anime, movie TV special-only kids he teams up with like Apis or Mobambi.
  • Similarly Zoro and Sanji both in the anime and manga often find themselves with kid partners they have look after or in the case of Sanji and aspiring chef Tajio, mentor. More consistently the young Chopper plays this straight with them, especially with Zoro.
  • Shanks was once the Kid Sidekick to Gold. D Roger the Pirate King himself, he obviously Took a Level in Badass since then.
  • Toko from Wano is this for Hiyori aka Komurasaki serving as the kamuro to her courtesan. Hiyori even slaps Orochi to protect her.
  • Inuarashi, Nekomamushi and Kawamatsu as well Kiku and Izou were all once the kiddie allies of Oden before taking many levels in badassery thanks to a Time Skip.
• Subverted in Chrono Crusade with Chrono and Rosette. Chrono looks like (and sometimes acts like) a twelve-year-old, but it's soon revealed that he's really a demon that's probably at least a century old, making him actually Rosette's Older Sidekick. Also played somewhat straight with Azmaria, a 12-year-old apprentice in the Order who is assigned to work with Chrono and Rosette.
• In 1989 OVA two-parter Explorer Woman Ray, twin girls Mai and Mami are (according to some reviewers) to the titular heroine what Short Round was to Indiana Jones (see below).
• Nina is this for Dr. Theo and later on Nicolas in Gangsta., threatening or hurting her is the quickest way to set both of them off.
• My Hero Academia actually has a rather creative use of this. Sidekicks are actually interns for heroes who run organizations such as Best Jeanist or Nighteye. It's both used as training for upcoming superheroes as well as providing employment for some of them as well.
• Rooster Fighter: Impressed by Keiji's justice, a little chick decides to follow him, who is initially not happy for dragging a kid along, but changes his mind and gives her a name Piyoko without thinking (meaning Chick).

Comic Books

• Robin, sidekick of Batman, is the Ur-Example, and is retained in almost every incarnation of Batman, no matter how Darker and Edgier, simply because of tradition. These days the concept is subject to Reimagining the Artifact, justifying Robin's presence by saying that either the kid is so psychologically damaged that he'd become self-destructive (or just plain destructive) without Batman supervising his crimefighting (probably the case with Jason and definitely for Damian), or that Batman is the damaged one and needs a surrogate son to keep him grounded (all but said was the case for Tim).
  • In Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, when the new police commissioner tangles with Batman and spots the young Carrie Kelly as Robin with him, she adds Child Endangerment on the warrant for him.
  • Other kid sidekicks to Batman: Spoiler (sometimes), some Batgirls more than others. The original Bat-Girl (Betty Kane) was originally the kid sidekick of Batwoman (Kathy Kane), until Kathy was retconned away and Betty became Bette Kane, a Robin fangirl who called herself Flamebird. Then in Batman (Grant Morrison) Kathy was reintroduced, and so was Bette's time as Bat-Girl. She was last seen as the sidekick to her cousin, the Kate Kane Batwoman, as Hawkfire.
• Okay, Jimmy Olsen is more of a Teen Sidekick for most of his appearances, but he's still much younger than his hero.
  • In the Silver Age, Supergirl played it straight at the beginning, but she eventually subverted it. She was Superman's sidekick and emergency secret weapon while he was training her, but when he revealed her existence to the world, he made clear that she was his partner. Before that, in Action Comics #288, Kara becomes invulnerable to Kryptonite for a while, and Superman seriously regards her as superior to him, and wonders if he should become her sidekick. During the Silver and Bronze Ages both cousins interacted as equals, but in the Post-Crisis universe, teen Kara became his sidekick again. In Supergirl: Cosmic Adventures in the 8th Grade, she dislikes being called Superman’s sidekick because she is supposed to be his partner.
• The success of Messrs. Grayson and Olson have led DC to exaggerate this, if not Up To Cliché:
  • The two users of the Speedy identity (Roy Harper and Mia Dearden) and Red Arrow (Emiko Queen) to Green Arrow.
  • Black Canary: Roy and Mia have acted as this to her as much as they did to Oliver. Later Dinah took in Sin, though she wasn't really a sidekick so much as a girl Dinah planned to raise as her daughter.
  • Aqualad (Garth of Shayeris, Jackson Hyde), Aquagirl (Tula Marinus and Lorena Marquez) and Aqualass (Andy Curry) to Aquaman.
  • Kid Flash and Impulse (Wally West, Bart Allen, Wallace West, Irey West) to The Flash.
  • Wonder Girl only ended up being an example of this through retcon. She was originally introduced in the Wonder Woman Vol 1 comic as Diana herself as a teenager, in flashback stories set during her youth. Because of her popularity, there were then a few "Impossible Stories" written in which both versions of Diana teamed up. When the Teen Titans comic was created as a team book featuring the Kid Sidekicks of the main Justice League of America members, the original writers assumed that Wonder Girl was an ordinary kid sidekick to Diana, and treated her as such. The attempts to sort this out and give Wonder Girl a separate identity and backstory as "Donna Troy" ended up creating one of the most notorious Continuity Snarls in superhero comics history. Other than that, Cassie Sandsmark, the second Wonder Girl, has had the most tenure of being a sidekick to Diana.
  • Wing to the Crimson Avenger.
  • Stuff, the Chinatown Kid to the original Vigilante.
  • Atlee (the third? Terra) to Power Girl.
  • They even tried to give Catwoman a sidekick named Catgirl. It didn't take.
  • The original Red Tornado, Ma Hunkel, was accompanied by the Cyclone Kids, her own daughter and the neighbor's kid brother.
  • Darkly parodied with Kid Devil, whose adult counterpart and idol Blue Devil was barely aware of his existence, despite having made a Deal with the Devil to be a superhero with him.
  • Inverted with Golden Age teen hero the Star-Spangled Kid, and his adult sidekick Stripesy.
• Of course, Marvel has its share as well:
  • Bucky Barnes was this to Captain America in World War II, following Robin's debut less than a year earlier. He served with Cap in The Invaders as well; the latter also introduced the first Human Torch sidekick Toro, with near identical powers. The character, as depicted in that era, has become The Artifact for Cap as essentially a Child Soldier in modern eyes, which requires some convoluted justifications from the writers.
  • Step forward, Rick Jones. For decades Rick has been Marvel Comics' stock sidekick. He has been partners with The Hulk, Captain America, two Captain Marvel's, and Rom: Spaceknight. Must be some kind of record.
  • The Hulk also had Jim Wilson, the nephew of The Falcon.
  • Wolverine's various sidekicks, usually of the young girl type (Kitty Pryde, Rogue, Jubilee).
  • Oddly enough, Moon Knight had an adult sidekick (or at least young adult) who was temporarily killed off and rebuilt as an evil cyborg named Midnight.
  • Spider-Man started as a deliberate subversion of this trope. Stan Lee had grown sick of teen sidekicks, so he decided to create a series that featured a teenager as the main star, rather than as support to an adult hero. Everyone thought that It Will Never Catch On... but it did. Marvel eventually gave him his own teen sidekick, "Alpha", for a Milestone Celebration storyline. It didn't last, as the powers went to the kid's head and Spidey had to depower him before he became a threat. Peter would get another kid sidekick, Spider-Boy, whom he really wishes would stay out of the heroing business.
  • On the other hand, Miles Morales serves as Peter's in Spider-Men, though this consists mostly of Peter watching his back and saving his life and Miles occasionally doing something awesome to make up for it.
  • Hawkeye: Played with in Hawkeye (2012), as Clint Barton's teen sidekick Kate Bishop is also Hawkeye. Aside from sharing the same superhero monicker, Kate is actually the better Hawkeye of the two.
  • Also played with in Morbius' Marvel NOW! series with the teenager Becky, who keeps saying she's his sidekick but Morbius insists she's not.
  • Young Avengers actually gives something of a justification as to why many heroes don't have sidekicks: back during World War II, every kid worth their salt dreamt of being Bucky, teaming up with Captain America and punching Nazis in the face. Then Cap disappeared and Bucky (supposedly) died and suddenly everyone took a step back and realized that being Bucky wasn't a good idea after all.
• The Clock, a very first Golden Age hero (last seen in 1944) and his kid sidekick Butch (a girl). Butch, incidentally, originally wanted to be the Clock's "moll", much to the hero's mortification. She eventually got over it.
• Johnny Bates, a.k.a. Kid Miracleman, from the comic Miracleman. (Originally known in the UK as Kid Marvelman and Marvelman.) Alan Moore's 1980s revival of the series not only aged the character to adulthood but gave him one of the most horrific Face Heel Turns in comic book history. There was also the Teen Sidekick Young Marvelman.
• German detective Nick Knatterton had Toni Knatter, in one story. The Meaningful Name was lampshaded by our hero.
• The Shield: In the 1940s, the Shield had a sidekick named Dusty. Joe adopted Dusty after his father was killed by foreign agents. Dusty later teamed up with the Wizard's sidekick, Roy, as the "Boy-Buddies".
• Viciously parodied in Rick Veitch's controversial miniseries Brat Pack, a deconstruction of superheroes and their Dysfunction Junction of teenage sidekicks. This featured transparent Captains Ersatz of various Justice League of America figures physically, mentally, and sexually abusing their sidekicks in various ways, including killing them off to get public sympathy. Of course, the adult heroes are contractually obligated to have kid sidekicks or else their sponsors won't pay them royalties. When — or, rather, if — a sidekick turns eighteen, they get a share in the royalties.
• The Adventures of Aero-Girl: Aero-Girl served this role for Battle Jack until his death.
  • A visiting superhero in issue #4 had one of these as well.
• Stray: In his youth, Rodney Weller was the Rottweiler, kid sidekick to The Doberman, his father. Sadly, he gave it up when they had a falling out.
• In Dr. Blink: Superhero Shrink, the Wonder Boys are this for Nocturne. He even has a rule for when they are replaced: "Once your voice breaks, so do you."
• Astro City has this fairly frequently, being a reconstruction of comic book tropes:
  • The original Honor Guard member Leopardman had Kitkat.
  • Altar Boy is this for the Confessor.
    • The second Confessor has the Choirboys, a small group of teens who do surveillance work.
  • The All-American had Slugger.
  • The Hispanic-themed El Hombre had his trusty partner Bravo.
  • The unnamed Master-Apprentice Chain of bird heroines adopt a new Kid Sidekick when the eldest retires. Known members have included Nightflyer, Sunshrike, Nightingale, and Sunbird.
  • In The '50s, the Gentleman often worked with the Young Gentleman.
  • For a while Starfight had Quark, until he proved unsuitable for the power.
  • The Jayhawks were a team composed entirely of Kid Sidekicks — Kid Corsair, Buster, Teen Genie, Beachboy, and Rally.
  • Bugleboy and Majorette were male- and female-sidekicks to Music Man.
• Katie the Catsitter has Katie, who babysits the cats of an eccentric woman who turns out to secretly be a superhero who fights crime with the help of her cats, and thinks this is so cool that Katie asks her to become her sidekick. She agrees.

Fan Works

• Subverted in Power Girl story A Force of Four. Fury wants to fight crime alongside her mother, the Golden Age Wonder Woman, but Diana makes clear she's NOT taking a sidekick.

Films — Animation

• In The Incredibles, a little kid named Buddy really wants to be Mr. Incredible's sidekick. When Mr. Incredible declines the offer due to his lack of formal training and refusal to take "no" for answer and just listen, Buddy does not take it well. In fact, he takes it so badly that he eventually becomes the Supervillain known as Syndrome just to try and become a Fake Ultimate Hero.

Films — Live-Action

• Last Action Hero even has the Kid Sidekick refer to himself as the 'Comedy Sidekick', which should be a sub-trope of sidekick.
• The Jedi in Star Wars pair up young padawans with older Jedi to teach them the way of the force. The difference here is that they often remain padawans into their twenties, making them former Kid Sidekicks by that age. They are usually Knighted after that, and soon begin the cycle again by choosing their own padawan. Generally padawans and their masters are sent on diplomatic missions, but with the way the Star Wars universe works, and with the advent of the Clone Wars, it's almost a given that the padawan will be forced to fight.
• Lex and Tim Murphy from Jurassic Park for Dr. Alan Grant who initially found children insufferable but grows to deeply care for Lex and Tim.
• Mindy Macready/Hit-Girl from Kick-Ass. Subverted by the fact that she is much more competent than the protagonist.
• Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Short Round is Indiana Jones's partner, friend and nag. Indiana met him when he was a street orphan trying to pick Indy's pocket. His parents were killed during the Japanese bombing of Shanghai in 1932. He even gets to wear Indy’s hat.
• In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man becomes Iron Man's sidekick, with him assisting the seasoned hero and being mentored by him on many occasions. After Tony’s death, Spidey becomes independent though he has go through a Trauma Conga Line to get there.
• In the Disney pre-Marvel buy-out superhero film, Sky High (2005), the students are divided abitrarily between trainee super-hero and trainee hero support (the preferred term for which "sidekick" is a derogatory nickname). As such, half the student body are technically child sidekicks, or at least student hero support. The villain's original motivation was actually anger at being assigned to hero support, despite her potent ability to spontaneously create and control super-powered gadgets.

Literature

• Barbarian Hero Naoh is joined on the titular quest by two adolescent warriors Nam and Gaw in Quest for Fire.
• The Red Lama and Kim in Rudyard Kipling's Kim. Interestingly Kim is The Sidekick to several different characters including the Red Lama, Mahbub Ali, and so on as well as being The Hero.
• Doc Wilde, a Doc Savage parody, has his two kids who he's been raising to be badasses like himself come up with him on his adventures.
• Wearing the Cape:
  • Hope (18 years old) becomes Atlas' sidekick in order to learn the butt-kicking ways of Atlas-type heroes. The whole mentor/sidekick angle is played up for the media (her costume is even color-coordinated to match his), but it's clearly understood to be a temporary arrangement, more like an apprenticeship.
  • The Sentinels end up with a team of pre-eighteen heroes called the Young Sentinels (led by Astra), which delves into the concept more. In particular, it is illegal to intentionally send a minor into any combat situation, so they are exclusively used for disaster relief—though since supervillains sometimes decide to take advantage of disasters, they do have to fight more than a little. Astra also had problems with this law in early books, because she's a tiny little waif of a girl and a lot of people refused to believe that she was of legal age. The government knew her true identity and age of course, so she didn't actually get in trouble, but there was a media storm over it.
• Discussed extensively for laughs in the How to Be a Superhero chapter "The Problem With Boy Wonders". Not that Girl Wonders aren't without their own problems...
• In Please Don't Tell My Parents I'm a Supervillain, Miss A is sidekick to the Original, who is probably her father. She's also a complete Jerkass, with the Original apparently being just as bad, and Penny's parents don't think most other heroes with sidekicks are much better. Not that there's something wrong with sidekicks, it's just that for some reason it attracts all the jackasses.
  • In the prequel novel, I Did NOT Give That Spider Superhuman Intelligence!, several younger sidekicks appear in the book, all of whom are fairly competent.
    • Psychopomp (who is immortal but has a ten-year-old body) and mortal teenagers Bluejay (although she only heals people and doesn't fight in the field) and Mish-Mosh assist Goodnight and Spider in their quest to protect the innocent.
    • Corporate-Sponsored Superhero Palooka Joe (an implied relative of the Original and Miss A)’s new sidekick is a teenager named Accessorizer who mentions that she only does hero work on weekends or after school and shows some discomfort at Joe's Escalating War with Bismuth. She is presumably a senior in high school or a college freshman, though, as Goodnight is shocked when an unnamed magic-using hero who backs up Palooka Joe and Accessorizer in one fight is clearly younger than eighteen.
• In Jeramey Kraatz's The Cloak Society, Amp was Lone Star's sidekick when younger.

Live-Action TV

• Our Miss Brooks: Walter Denton usually drives Miss Brooks to school. He often sees her at lunch in the cafeteria, and will play a major part or even instigate the Zany Scheme of the week.
• Mark Hollander to the titular Ace Lightning (albeit sometimes reluctantly).
• Rather bizarrely on Heroes, Sylar temporarily gained one of these in the form of Luke, a troubled teen with the inexplicable desire to go on a road trip with a super-powered serial killer. And keep annoying him. His survival is something of a miracle. The series implied that Luke could potentially be Sylar's brother, but this was never confirmed.
• In Nickelodeon's U-Pick Live segment, they held a contest where the winner would be added to the show as Pick Boy's new sidekick. Something must have gone wrong backstage though, because no kid was ever brought in.
• On Doctor Who, Adric filled this role. Susan and Vickie were likewise younger and less mature than most. Of course, given the Doctor's full age, almost every companion is a kid to him, unless they're Timelords too. Word of God has it that they deliberately went out of their way to avoid straight examples of this trope because "children don't want to watch any child character who's younger than themselves", so companions are almost never any younger than their mid-teens and most often in their late 20s or early 30s.
• Wonder Woman: Princess Drusilla, a.k.a. Wonder Girl played by Debra Winger.
• The title character of Henry Danger gets a job as the sidekick to the superhero Captain Man under the identity of Kid Danger.
• Deconstructed in Titans (2018) where Bruce Wayne's training of his various Robins is suggested to be manipulative and abusive.

Radio

• In Welcome to Our Village, Please Invade Carefully, The Resistance consists of 34-year-old Katrina and her 17-year-old sidekick Lucy (who turns 18 in the penultimate episode). At various times their relationship can be catgeorized as being either a (very small) Ragtag Bunch of Misfits, Big Sister Mentor and her mentee, or Odd Couple.

Tabletop Games

• Mutants & Masterminds has rules for a variety of minions/henchmen/sidekicks, and a popular supplement: "Hero High" gives you rules for playing a whole team of youngsters studying to transition from hero support into actual hero work. There are also a few in the Freedom City setting, most notably Arrow (Speedy to the Bowman's Green Arrow, in several incarnations).

Theatre

• Some stagings of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street depict Tobias Ragg as this to Pirelli and subsequently to Mrs. Lovett, though Toby can also be played as an intellectually disabled adult.

Video Games

• Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure: Cole, for Henry Hatsworth. He's later revealed to be a "Well Done, Son" Guy and in actuality the Big Bad in disguise.
• Street Fighter has multiple of these. Most prominently there’s Sakura for Ryu followed by Sean for Ken, Li-Fen for Chun-Li, Ed for Balrog (before Ed leaves him) and Menat for Rose. Luke appears to have been this for Guile his Colonel before setting out on his own, though Luke still shows Guile a great amount of respect something everyone else doesn’t get from him.
• Maya Fey, the main assistant in the Phoenix Wright Trilogy may or may not count, as she starts 17 but becomes 19 by Trials and Tribulations, although she tends to act like a little kid sometimes. Phoenix also had Ema Skye in one case when she was 16, and Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney has Trucy, who is 15.
  • 8-years-old Pearl Fey may also count in the missions where she plays a sidekick to Phoenix.
  • It's tradition for the protagonist of the Ace Attorney games to have a cute young girl for a sidekick. Or Gumshoe. Even Edgeworth teams up with Kay Faraday... and then it gets sent up when he's helped by Franziska von Karma. (who also briefly and hilariously becomes Phoenix's sidekick in the third game).
• Miles 'Tails' Prower, sidekick of Sonic the Hedgehog, is of the Gadgeteer Genius variety and has abilities that complement Sonic's. Later games introduced Cream the Rabbit (who has her own Sidekick, the Chao named Cheese), who serves as more or less the female counterpart to Tails (hence why they are often shipped together, despite almost never interacting). She started as a sidekick to Amy, but in Sonic Rush she acted in this capacity to Blaze. In Sonic Rush Adventure, Blaze gets her own sidekick in Marine the Raccoon.
• In Metal Gear Sunny in Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is this for both old Snake and Raiden, she’s joined by George in Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance who is also a kid sidekick to Raiden. Not to mention Chico from Peace Walker and Phantom Pain who is Big Boss’s kid sidekick.
• Professor Layton has Luke his ward, surrogate son and self-proclaimed apprentice. Though a Actual Pacifist Layton won’t tolerate Luke getting hurt. To a lesser extent there’s Flora who the localisation says is a “protégé and devoted follower", though this is a pragmatic change as in the original Japanese version she’s the self-proclaimed “bride candidate” of the older Layton.
• Sherry in Resident Evil 2 manages to play this straight with Claire and Leon to a smaller degree, though she certainly becomes a badass Action Girl in her own right by the sixth mainline game. There’s also little Natalie who aids Barry in Resident Evil: Revelations.
• The Silver Age-inspired Freedom Force computer games give us Liberty Lad, sidekick to The Minuteman. Young Nick Craft, founder and president of the Freedom Force Fan Club, tags along after the team as they try to bring down mobster-turned-supervillain Pinstripe. Naturally, he gets shot.
  Pinstripe: Now youse gotsta choose, heroes. Come afta me, or save da brat! Mentor reports that he needs an immediate transfusion... or he'll die! Minuteman, feeling responsible for the plucky youngster, valiantly volunteers to give his own blood to the boy. Mentor warns him that they have no idea what will happen, because Minuteman's blood is infused with... Energy X.
  Minuteman: By the Constitution, Mentor, there's no time!' The Energy X in Minuteman's blood gives Liberty Lad super strength and agililty and a penchant for red, white and blue tights. He's one of the more fun and effective characters in the game.
  • And from the same game, we have Man-O-War and his preteen sidekick, The Sea Urchin.

Webcomics

• Gordito Delgado from The Adventures of Dr. McNinja. The Doctor even compares himself to Batman when he decides to take Gordito in. Of course, the Doctor compares himself to Batman regardless. Note that Gordito's origins — a child of a family of circus performers who was orphaned mid-show — is a tribute to Dick Grayson's.
• Nip and Tuck has an arc that shows a Serenity-inspired movie featuring a kid sidekick.
• In The Adventures of Gyno-Star, Gyno-Star's sidekick is a teenager named Little Sappho.
• Tween superheroine Sparky of Lady Spectra & Sparky.
• The titular protagonist of Miss Melee has a kid sidekick who happens to be her own kid.
• In Poison Ivy Gulch, Professional Gambler Lotta Doler has Ace, a child who is both her sidekick and good luck charm.

Web Original

• In the Backstory of the Whateley Universe, the pre-World War II superhero Champion had two: Miss Champion and Champion Junior. In a Shout-Out to the way heroes age in Comic Books, Miss Champion only aged (from then on) at about one-fourth normal, which really messed up her social life. Miss Champion is still around, and one of the important side characters of the universe. Subverted in the present, where kid sidekicks are specifically banned by a law that the former Miss Champion was instrumental in getting enacted.
  • According to Unreliable Narrator Mephisto, many of the other early Kid Sidekicks during World War II were actually adult, but youthful-looking, OSS operatives wearing costumes designed to make them seem even younger. These 'sidekicks' were actually acting as handlers for these 'flag heroes', who were actually Super-Soldier candidates sent on home front missions to test their combat effectiveness.
  • The laws against kid sidekicks after the mid-1950s don't stop some superheroes - or thugs calling themselves 'heroes', such as Jack Rabbit - from trying to have a Kid Sidekick anyway. Jack Rabbit in particular has this ugly habit picking up recently-manifested mutant teens and using his mind control powers (from a Power Gem he possesses) to brainwash them into what is essentially an audience for his 'heroism'. The fact that at least two of these have been killed due to this, and a third permanently crippled, only seems to feed Jack's psychotic delusions of grandeur.
• In the words of How to Hero "a child is the worst thing you can bring to a gun fight, even worse than a knife!" the guide in general is very against the concept of bringing children with you to fight supervillains.
  • Despite that there's an entry on them here.
• Unwanted Houseguest: Melody fills the role for the Houseguest in the Comic-Book Adaptation. She's eager to investigate the villains, but as a small child doesn't have the physical strength to overpower them and has to rely on the Houseguest.

Western Animation

• In The Fairly OddParents!, The Crimson Chin's sidekick, Cleft the Boy Chin Wonder, is a ten-year old. Makes sense, because his alter ego is actually none other than Timmy Turner himself.
• Played with by Jade from Jackie Chan Adventures. Jackie doesn't even want to go on adventures, much less let his young niece accompany him. But he can't keep himself or Jade out of trouble — often times she's the one who drags them into it.
• Spoofed with Barnacle Boy, Mermaid Man's sidekick on SpongeBob SquarePants, who is still treated as a child even though both of them are now old men. One episode has him doing a Face–Heel Turn because of it.
• The Transformers have a bad habit of dragging young humans into their battles — young humans who tend to have no powers or skills that make letting them within a mile of Decepticons anything less than criminal negligence. Giving them a reason to be around at all is relatively new to the franchise.
• Young Justice (2010) has the main characters being sidekicks to members of the Justice League (Robin to Batman, Aqualad to Aquaman, Kid Flash to The Flash and Speedy/Red Arrow to Green Arrow). Other characters who aren't sidekicks in the comics canon are reimagined as such here, such as Miss Martian being Martian Manhunter's niece and Bumblebee being the Atom's student, while Beast Boy is linked to Miss Martian. The only character who doesn't have a mentor is Blue Beetle... because the previous Blue Beetle was killed.
• The Cadets in Voltron Force are a fairly good example. They bring considerable talents to the team - Vince's Technopathy, Larmina's martial arts talent and Daniel's piloting skills and agility (both physical and mental) complement, rather than overshadowing, the rest of the Voltron Force.
• On Sidekick, the four main characters are all children attending a school for superhero sidekicks. Protagonist Eric is himself already the sidekick of the superhero, Maxum Man.
• Played with on Atomic Puppet. Joey seems like one at first to AP, and is treated by the egotistical superhero-turned-Hand Puppet as one, despite Joey being the key to unlocking AP's former superpowers. As the series progresses though, AP starts to treat Joey as more of a partner-in-crimefighting than a kid sidekick.
• Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker: Timothy Drake deconstructs the Kid Sidekick as a "Well Done, Son" Guy pathetically trying to please The Hero because He Just Want to Be Him. When that doesn't happen, there comes the Fan Disillusionment:
  Me and the others gave everything, but it just wasn't enough for the old man. I used to think, if I went on long enough, someday he'd retire and I'd... ah, the heck with it. Capes, costumes, bad guys — it was kid's stuff! Bruce probably did me a favor. By the end, I was so sick of it I never wanted to see that stupid Robin suit again!
• Initially averted in Batman: The Animated Series, which is only notable because Batman and Robin are, as noted above, the Ur-Example of this trope. The series implies that Robin was a Kid Sidekick for some time, but the series begins with him already college-aged and away at school for most of the week. Later played straight after the series was uncancelled, with Tim Drake brought in as a Kid Sidekick to shake things up and let them explore that aspect.
• In the Justice League episode "Patriot Act" when Speedy shows up, Green Arrow refers to him as "my ex-sidekick" prompting Speedy to immediately retort, "Ex-partner."
• The Batman has Barbara Gordon (a highschool girl in this continuity), and then later Dick Grayson. Joker gets his own in one episode, although this being Joker it doesn't take long before he's trying to throw said sidekick into a vat of acid.
• TaleSpin has Kit Cloudkicker, with whom Baloo often brings along on his missions, some of which are very dangerous.
• The The Venture Bros. themselves are to some extent a deconstruction of this trope, Dean being intelligent and eager-to-please but timid, Hank energetic but rebellious and invincibly stupid. Their father, an ex-sidekick, blames his seemingly inexhaustible supply of character flaws on the experience. His participation in a support group for "ex-Boy-Adventurers" doesn't seem to have helped him much, but it has introduced us to the likes of an ex-Wonderboy (one of Captain Sunshine's multiple such dropped at eighteen years of age) who memorably claims that it left him unable to get an erection unless he were 'tied to a chair with a bomb strapped to [his] chest'.
• In The Simpsons, Bart Simpson frequently serves as this to his father Homer by helping him with his Get Rich Quick Schemes.
• Morty is this to Rick in Rick and Morty although he's often there unwillingly.
• In Animaniacs, Slappy Squirrel is often accompanied by her young nephew Skippy, who's not afraid to help with her usual mischief on occasion.
• Played with in Darkwing Duck. Darkwing would rather his adopted daughter Gosalyn stay at home (mostly for her safety, but also because it ruins the "cool loner" shtick he's going for). But she always tags along and gets involved anyway, and has occasionally created her own superhero identity to complement his.

---