Follow TV Tropes

Following

Strong Family Resemblance

Go To

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/familydragon0_9.png
Those Saiyan genes must be pretty damn strong... to give them all the same haircut.note 

"Hey, I think there's a little 'me' hiding behind your leg, Chi-Chi!"
Goku, when seeing Goten for the first time, Dragon Ball Z

This is an extremely common practice in animation where, to establish a familial relationship, a child looks more or less identical to one of their parents, or they just look a lot like their family. This frequently occurs when a show uses garish or outlandish designs, where subtlety and fine physical detail are already lost, and we need a quick visual aid that other characters may not seem to notice.

If a family is the stereotypical four-member "nuclear" one, the children will usually resemble the respective same-sex parents.

In an attempt to mix things up, however, there may be a family in which the children resemble the respective opposite-sex parents instead. Another common variant is to have the children look nearly identical to the respective same-sex parents, but with the hair or eye colors of the opposite-sex ones.

If there is a Tomboy and Girly Girl or a Sensitive Guy and Manly Man, the tomboy and the manly man will usually resemble the father, while the girly girl and the sensitive guy will look like the mother.

Apart from its usage in character design, this trope can also play a role in the plot; often, someone notices how similar two characters look and thus figures out they are related to each other.

A Super-Trope of Uncanny Family Resemblance (where the similarity is maintained further along the family tree), Hereditary Hairstyle and Family Eye Resemblance. Compare Identical Grandson (where the similarities allow for reuse of a character design or actor) and Generation Xerox (where not only the appearance but also the personality and experiences are repeated). See also Like Father, Like Son and Shared Family Quirks, when family members share similar behaviors and personality traits rather than physical traits. Contrast The Ugly Guy's Hot Daughter.

Though sometimes exaggerated in fiction, this trope is Truth in Television, thanks to the mechanics behind our genetics and the way they're expressed.


Example subpages:

Other examples:

    open/close all folders 

    Asian Animation 
  • In Happy Heroes, Doctor H. has a very similar hairstyle and physique to his father.
  • In Motu Patlu, the only major physical feature setting apart Inspector Chingum and his dad Bubblegum is that the latter has white facial hair due to his age; they look very much alike otherwise.

    Comic Books 
  • The artists for Archie Comics apparently strongly support this:
    • For example, whenever Betty fantasizes about her and Archie being married with children, their kids look like miniature clones of them. They don't even bother giving the son(s) Betty's hair color, or the daughter(s) Archie's.
    • In Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, Sabrina is basically a younger version of her mother. It's more obvious in flashbacks as her hair significantly lightened with age, from a deep blonde shade to near white.
    • Even the company's Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics) title bows to this. Sonia and Manik, Sonic and Sally's future children who appear in flashforward stories/scenes, look exactly like their mom and dad, even though their parents, being of different species, would be more likely to have "mutant hedge-squirrel babies".
  • Asterix: Obelix and Asterix look exactly like their fathers, right down to the hairstyle, as revealed in Asterix and the Actress. In a short comic in Asterix and the Class Act, Goscinny and Uderzo run into Obelisc'h, who shows them a family tree tracing all the way back to his famous Gaulish ancestor; excepting clothes and hairstyle, every branch looks the same.
  • The Avengers: Regardless of continuity, Pietro Maximoff/Quicksilver looks like an aged-down clone of his father Magneto. Pietro's twin, Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch, looks very much like the twins' mother Magda, ranging from 'really a lot alike' to 'her younger clone' in resemblance. Given the odd family dynamics through their 30+ years of history, this sometimes seems a little strange. This continues to the Scarlet Witch's 'children', Wiccan and Speed, who are (male) Expies of Wanda and Pietro respectively, down to powers and costumes.
  • Batman:
    • Thomas Wayne looks exactly like his son, except with a thick moustache. In Batman: The Dark Knight Returns Bruce grows a moustache and looks like an older version of his father, until he shaves it off.
    • Damian looks a lot like a younger version of Bruce, Depending on the Artist. Sometimes, he looks more like his mother Talia al Ghul, which also counts.
    • Bizarrely, Bruce's adopted sons also resemble him strongly. Dick Grayson, Jason Todd, and Tim Drake are all black-haired and blue-eyed (except when Jason's a redhead).
  • Dinah Drake and Dinah Lance have both been Black Canary. They're mother and daughter. Dinah Lance looks like a younger version of her mother, though her mom kept her hair black (she used a blonde wig as Black Canary) while she began dyeing it blonde in the 1990s. This is an Enforced Trope because, prior to Crisis, Dinah Lance was created to explain why Black Canary looks so young when she should have been in her forties. The reason was that her mind was in her daughter's body, which was later streamlined into Black Canary just being a Legacy Character.
  • The Boys: In one of the miniseries, Butcher, Baker and Candlestick Maker, which focuses on Billy Butcher's past, his dad resembled him during his childhood but was a bit fat.
  • Djinn: Kim Nelson looks just like her grandmother Jade; the key difference is that the former has straight hair while the former is curly.
  • In Firefly: Brand New 'Verse, Emma looks like a young Zoe. She is biracial but has Zoe’s dark skin, African-American hair and brown eyes. Her dad’s side is more In the Blood in many ways.
  • Immortal Hulk: When Joe Fixit takes over for a few days, he grows a mustache which makes Bruce look an awful lot like his abusive scumbag dad.
  • Invincible:
    • Mark greatly resembles his father Nolan (especially Alternate Universe Mark who has a moustache like his dad). Oliver also looks similar to his father and brother.
    • Terra closely resembles her father Mark, but her facial features are drawn similar to her mother Eve.
  • In Love and Rockets, Venus looks like a younger, less muscular version of her mother Petra, except with softer features. Also, as Fritzi ages, she looks increasingly like her mother Luba.
  • Lucky Luke: The Dalton brothers are identical except in height, and their resemblance to Ma Dalton is so strong that the shorter brothers can pass as her just by shaving and putting on a dress.
  • In Monica's Gang, most child characters share their appearance with their parent of the same gender... except for Monica herself, who looks nothing like her mother or father. This has been lampshaded a few times and has led to in-universe theories of her being adopted, but it's usually explained that she actually inherited her traits from other family members that aren't her parents, and at least one comic showed that Monica's mother looked like her when she was the former's age.
  • In Preacher, Jesse Custer strongly resembles his father John Custer, and not just physically. One of John's old war buddies during the Vietnam War briefly mistakes Jesse for his father when Jesse pays him a visit.
  • Raptors: The Molinas. The surviving twins, Drago and Camilla, are basically the spitting image of their late father and mother when they are shown in flashback.
  • Spider-Man:
    • In Sins Past'', Sarah Stacy was very much the spitting image of her mother, Gwen Stacy, and this—coupled with the fact that Peter was old enough to be her father (and that she'd previously believed him to be just that) made her brief Rescue Romance with him that much more controversial.
    • In most Elseworlds where he's a father, Peter's children end up looking a lot like MJ or Gwen. The notable exception is Spider-Girl, in which May looks like both of her parents (and has her Aunt May's eye color!). The trope's played straight with Ben Reilly's son, instead... although somehow, only MJ has noticed the resemblance. Then again, he's got a bit of the Uncanny Valley about him owing to the Deal with the Devil required to keep him from degenerating, so that tends to be more noticeable.
  • Superman:
    • Superman's birth father Jor-El also looks exactly like him (down to the curl, Depending on the Artist) and was a young man when he sent him to Earth.
    • In Smallville, this is reflected by having Clark's actor Tom Welling play him in flashbacks, though an older actor portrays him in later episodes.
    • Superman's Return to Krypton: As a time-displaced Superman attends his birth parents' wedding, another guest comments he looks right like Jor-El's father.
      Wedding Guest: Amazing, how strongly you resemble that statue! Coincidence, eh?
      Superman: (thinking) Coincidence, nothing! He's... my grandfather! Obviously, it's an old Kryptonian custom for statues of the parents of both the bride and groom to adorn weddings!
  • The Ultimates: Before Red Skull cut off his face, he was the spitting image of his father (Captain America.)
  • Ultimate X-Men: If Jimmy Hudson lets his hair grow out long enough, he starts to look like a blond, skinnier version of his father, Wolverine. However, during X-Men: Blue, Earth-616 Magneto notes that Jimmy also looks vaguely familiar for reasons he can't fathom — namely Jimmy's mother, Magda, who was Magneto's wife in the 616 universe.
  • In Warlord of Mars, Dejah Thoris and her mother Heru are nearly identical physically, with Dejah being confused with her mother by an old love from Heru's past. They had similar lives being Martian princesses who fell in love with Earthmen who saved them from danger.
  • Depending on the Artist, Wonder Woman looks exactly like her mother. Sometimes Hippolyta is a blonde but often times she shares her daughter's black hair. The main difference is that Hippolyta has curly hair but Diana's hair is straight, and even then it's inconsistent. Some artists also give them different noses. This is despite Diana not sharing her her mother's DNA due to being born from clay. Presumably she was fashioned completely after Hippolyta.
  • X-Men:
    • Rachel Summers, time-travelling daughter of Scott and Jean, often looks almost exactly like her mother, usually right down to the red hair and green eyes - though sometimes the hair is a slightly different shade of red, and her eyes are sometimes blue, like her father's really are - with only styles and her Facial Markings (which she can hide) to seriously distinguish them. The resemblance is so uncanny that in an alternate reality she successfully disguised herself as that world's version of Jean.
    • Less unnervingly, but still oddly, Nate Grey looks exactly like a young Cable as confirmed by deaging incidents, flashbacks, and Kid Cable, and alternate timelines have shown that he'll grow up to look exactly like Cable, with an elderly Sunfire thinking he is Cable. The sole differences are the metal arm/lack of it and the starburst scar over Cable's eye. More generally, Nate's looks and raw power mean he's initially assumed to be a young Stryfe, Cable's clone, on arriving in the 616 universe. He even notes when he picks up one of Cable's ridiculously sized guns that it feels balanced perfectly for him. What makes this even more baffling is that while they were initially positioned as counterparts, they're acknowledged as half-brothers - Nate was created whole from AoA Scott and Jean's DNA, engineered as a superweapon, whereas Cable was naturally conceived by Scott and Jean's clone, Maddy Pryor.
      • More generally, both Cable and Nate have their father's blue eyes, brown hair, and features (though maybe a slightly longer face from their mother). On the other hand, chessmaster tendencies aside, their personalities come straight from their mother.
    • Hope Summers looks exactly like a younger version of her grandmother, Jean Grey, to the point where when she meets Teen Jean they're drawn completely identical. No one knows why, especially since they're not biologically related, but it's strongly suspected that a) the Phoenix was involved and Jean is its favourite/was merged with it at the time, b) it was probably foreshadowing for her being Jean reincarnated until they established she wasn't.
    • This seems to be a thing in the Grey-Summers family - Cyclops, if he doesn't shave for long enough, starts to look like his dad, Corsair. Back when Cyclops had just met him, but hadn't learned the space pirate was his father, he even began to realize the resemblance, until his train of thought was interrupted.
    • Nightcrawler's blue colouring and yellow eyes being similar to Mystique is the In-Universe tip-off that he is related to her — to be specific, she's his mother. Later, Azazel shows up and is near identical to Kurt, but he's red skinned/furred instead, meaning Nightcrawler inherited the blue solely from Mystique. By the same token, in any alternate future/reality where Kurt has kids, they almost always inherit the elf's blue fur, pointy ears, solid yellow eyes and tail.
    • Laura Kinney, a.k.a. X-23, averts this when it comes to Wolverine, as aside from her height, claws, and temper, she doesn't resemble him at all. Especially jarring as she's supposed to be his Opposite-Sex Clone. However, it's also played completely straight in that every time Sarah Kinney appears Laura is drawn as her spitting image (some writers justify this by having Sarah use her own genetic material to stabilize the damaged samples taken from Logan, thus genetically making her Laura's mother). Additionally, in X-23: Innocence Lost and Target: X Sarah and her sister, Deborah, look very much alike (and in the former case, it would have been almost impossible to tell them apart in scenes they share with each other if not for Debbie's short-cropped hair). As a result, Laura also bears a very strong resemblance to her 'aunt' Debbie. Then they go and avert it with Debbie's daughter Megan, who looks nothing like her mother, aunt or 'cousin'.
    • Gambit and Rogue's kids Oliver and Rebecca from Earth-41001 are both identical to their parents. Both also got their mother's skunk stripe.
    • Ruby Summers, an Alternate Universe daughter of Cyclops, shares several traits with her mother; namely, blond hair and generous assets.
    • On first seeing Legion, Dani Moonstar quips that he does look a lot like Professor X. A year later, she's proven right when one of David's alters hijacks his body and goes on a pub crawl. With Legion's hair slicked down, he does actually look almost exactly like his old man, just with more hair.

    Comic Strips 
  • Arlo from Arlo And Janis and his son look nearly identical.
  • Baby Blues: Zoe and Wren have red hair like Darryl, while Hammie has black hair like Wanda. Going further, Darryl's dad Mac looks like an old version of his son, while Wanda and her sister Rhonda resemble their mother, Maggie.
  • Blondie (1930): Dagwood and his son Alexander look like identical twins. On the other hand, his daughter Cookie looks a lot like her mother Blondie, the only real difference being their hairstyles.
    • For many years the Bumsteads' dog, Daisy, had a litter of lookalike pups running around. They were phased out without explanation in the '70s, mainly because cartoonist Dean Young was sick of having to keep drawing them all.
  • In For Better or for Worse, Michael and April have brown hair like their father, while Elizabeth has blonde hair like her mother. Later on, when Michael and his wife Deanna start their own family, their daughter Meredith resembles Deanna, while their son Robin resembles Michael.
  • Jon Arbuckle from Garfield resembles both of his parents while his brother Doc Boy looks like his father.
  • Although the characters in Peanuts have Only Six Faces, only the Van Pelt family (Lucy, Linus and Rerun) have half-circles around their eyes all the time. Linus and Rerun especially; aside from height the only difference between them is that Rerun's hair is sort of flatter. It can be hard to tell them apart, at least in the later strips when their ages are fairly close.
  • Popeye bares a striking resemblance to his father, Poopdeck Pappy. Pappy even took advantage of this on a few occasions by shaving off his beard to play tricks on Olive. They both seem to get their looks from Popeye's grandmother.
  • Zippy the Pinhead and his two identical children, Fuelrod and Meltdown.
  • In the early Zits strips, Jeremy's older brother Chad was a constantly-smiling, barrel-chested man whose face was partially obscured. Later on, he was re-designed to look like an older and bearded version of Jeremy.

    Fan Works 
Ah! My Goddess
  • Ah! Archfall!: Lind's mother is basically a slightly taller, older and more muscular version of her daughter, with a scar and longer hair.

The Amazing World of Gumball

  • Kedabory's Elmore Chronicles: Upon arriving in Canada, Gumball is easily able to spot Mx. Small's relatives because they all have the same fluffy white fur and yellow-and-red-eyes.

Amphibia

  • Inverted in Medicated. Sasha (who's been turned into a toad) never suspected that she was adopted because she does genuinely look like her parents, having pink skin and blonde hair like Braddock, and a lighter hue like Percy.

Animorphs

  • Eleutherophobia: A Running Gag in the series is that people keep mistaking Tom for Jake. In A Straight Line Down Through the Heart, Cassie notes that Tom looks like Jake with the intensity turned all the way up.

Avatar The Last Firebender

  • The Last Firebender (sinistercinnamon): Zuko is essentially a younger version of Ozai. This leads to a very unsettling moment for Azula when she sees him in proper Fire Nation attire, from the unscarred side.

Bridge to Terabithia

  • Bridge to Terabithia 2: The Last Time: In the Distant Epilogue, Jess Aarons and Leslie Burke ends up happily married with two children, which seems like inverse copies to their parents; their daughter is an introvert who keeps all her secrets to herself and have a keen interest in arts, much like Jess back when he was younger in the original story, meanwhile their son is a hyperactive Manic Pixie Dream Boy who is often curious and a borderline keet towards his elder sister, not unlike Leslie when she first met Jess when they were children.

Carmen Sandiego

  • Parthenogenesis: With her dark brown hair, Icy Blue Eyes, and high intelligence, Maggie is definitely Carmen Sandiego's daughter. It causes an issue when she visits ACME behind her mom's back. Carmen's previous arch-enemies Ivy and Zack don't have any issue figuring out their relationship. Thankfully, they have long since decided to let Carmen be, as long as she stays away from crime.

Crossover

  • BlazBlue Alternative: Remnant: It's noted by Yang in Chapter 73 that Tsubaki's mother, Sumiye Yayoi, is pretty much an older version of her team leader in terms of physical appearance.
  • Child of the Storm:
    • Harry and his father, Thor, are initially all but identical — when Thor's using his James Potter form, anyway. Later, some of Lily's features emerge in Harry, but the resemblance is still striking, enough so that Clark Kent is stunned. For context, Thor's James Potter form was modeled off the general 'look' of the House of El by Odin as a tribute, since Kal-El I was and possibly still is his much loved foster-brother, meaning that Harry and Clark are initially nigh Identical Strangers allowing for Harry's initially stunted growth, different eyes, and glasses - and factors one and three are corrected. More than once, it's a plot point.
    • In the sequel, it's noted that Carol bears a striking resemblance to her mother.
    • In the second book, after a bit of growing, Hermione bears an increasing resemblance to her biological mother, Wanda Maximoff, with the only major difference being their eye colour. Even Hermione herself notices it in a vague sense a while before clocking on to their relationship. Though since she's used to being considered relatively plain, and Wanda is a famous beauty, she inwardly scoffs and deems it superficial. However, when Hermione gets all dressed up for the Yule Ball, Harry's jaw actually drops because she's basically Wanda in miniature.
  • The Lost Kingdom (Lost Girl & Merlin (2008)): When Morgana first meets the Blood King, she is attacked because she is mistaken for her mother Vivienne, before Merlin and Dyson manage to stop the conflict and make it clear that Morgana is Vivenne’s daughter. Even then, the Blood King has to spent a few moments looking closely at Morgana to determine that she is a different person from Vivienne, and only accepts the explanation as Vivienne would obviously look older after being away for forty years.
  • A Man of Iron (Marvel Cinematic Universe & A Song of Ice and Fire): The story claims Tony has the Stark looks, only more lean and slightly built. When he gets angry enough, his likeness to his cousin Ned becomes striking.
  • Oni Ga Shiku Series: Izuku looks like a carbon copy of his dad Hisashi with the green color palette of his mom Inko. Majima remarks that it's eerie how perfect of a blend between his parents Izuku is. Meanwhile Hisashi himself is a clone of his father Musashi. At another point, Yuya from Stardust at first mistakes Izuku for his mom, who he has not seen in almost twenty years.
  • A Song of Ice, Fire and Heart: People in Westeros believe Roxas is a case, because he's a carbon copy of Ventus so it's rather logical to think he's Ventus' son. Since Roxas is actually a Nobody, he doesn't have parents but nonetheless plays along as he doesn't want to explain his personal situation.
  • The Unrelenting Frozen Seas: The Trials (Harry Potter & Percy Jackson and the Olympians): Triton claims children of Poseidon all inherit his black hair, green ocean eyes and pout. Su and Lee agree with this after seeing him with his demigod sister Rhode.

Danganronpa

  • The Ultimate Hope: Celestia Yamada looks like a tiny version of her mother (the original Celestia, now again going by her original name Taeko).

The DCU

  • one day at a time (Nyame): This is how Jason Todd identified Helena Wayne, Terry McGinnis, and Matthew McGinnis as the biological children of Bruce Wayne. All of them closely resembled their older biological half-brother Damian Wayne, who in turn was just a miniature Bruce with green eyes and darker skin.

Disney Animated Canon

  • The Bolt Chronicles: In "The Seven" and "The Cameo," Bolt and his father Blaze are described as looking exactly alike.
  • The Royal Reunion: Even in disguise, Kristoff is able to tell that Malin and Gaspar are Elsa and Anna's parents just by staring at them.

Fusion Fic

  • Neither a Bird nor a Plane, it's Deku! (The DCU & My Hero Academia): Izuku looks enough like his adoptive parents that he never stopped to question if they were his biological parents until they were forced to tell him. He's also surprised at how little he resembles his father, Jor-El, but quickly notices that he got his dark, curly hair and freckles from his mother, Lara Lor-Van.

Game of Thrones / A Song of Ice and Fire

  • Dragonstone: A tapestry portraying Aegon the Dragon bears a very strong likeness to young Jon. When Arthur Dayne swears he didn't meddle with it, it's enough for Olenna Tyrell to understand the bastard's true origins.
  • Purple Days: For all the "the seed is strong" nonsense in canon, it's shown that the Lannister look is pretty prevalent in the family, Gerion Lannister being almost a duplicate of his brother Tywin, and Joff being the spitting image of Lann the Clever.

Godzilla / King Kong / MonsterVerse

  • Abraxas (Hrodvitnon): Vivienne's mother Susan Graham resembles her daughter (when the latter was still human) but with softer features. Susan would deny this and claim that Vivienne facially took more after her father.

Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation: Mo Dao Zu Shi / The Untamed

  • In An Acceptable Arrangement, Nie Huaisang is said to resemble his father and brother quite closely even as a small child.
  • For Both Of Us notes that Lan Wangji looks like a masculine version of his very beautiful mother. Given that Lan Xichen and Lan Wangji are noted in canon to look nigh identical, that means that Lan Xichen takes after her as well.
  • In And I Will Burn For You, now that Jin Ling's grown up, he looks even more like Jiang Cheng. Though he's gotten his height from his father and is consequently taller than his uncle!
    • Jiang Xi looks a great deal like his father even as a baby. As he is the result of a Mystical Pregnancy and thus has only one parent to look like, it's justified.
  • Second Bite of the Cherry:
    • Wei Ying very much looks like Cangse Sanren with Wei Changze's grey eyes, allowing Jiang Fengmian to correctly peg her identity when they meet.
    • A rather sad example happens when Lan Wangji's maternal grandmother and uncle accuse him from trying to kidnap Wei Ying because he inherited Qingheng-jun's looks, triggering bad memories of the Lan Sect Leader forcing Zhou Zhiruo into marriage.
  • A Troublesome Charge says that Jin Ling's mannerisms are even more like Jiang Cheng now that he's grown up.

Half-Life

Harry Potter

  • Eden, by Obsessmuch: Hermione notes that not only do Lucius and Draco have a lot in common with their looks, but her son from Lucius has inherited his looks, though he has her eyes.

Hetalia: Axis Powers

  • Kaitō Kokoro: Two of Kiku's and Feliciano's children pretty much inherit their hair colors and hairstyles.
    "...Sure." The elder sibling took two of them, emerald hues filling with wonder as he took in their sleeping forms. "They're...beautiful." Jade depths turned, glancing upon a boy who had locks styled like the father's, eyes revealing to be the same limpid brown of the mother's as they opened. "So this one's name is Nihon, right?" Those same jade depths switched to the second bundle, the other another boy who had brunet hair like his mother's and the same piercing ebon orbs as his father's. "And this one's name is Ren, right?"

Kim Possible

  • Kim Possible: Mirror, Mirror: Shego finds a younger version of herself in stasis. She initially thinks Drakken cloned her years ago, but it turns out that Shego is the original Shego's daughter, not a clone.
  • Basically analysed in "Spoiler Alert", when Kim and Ron's future son Max comes back in time to stop the future Monkey Fist changing history. Finding himself mid-Season Two, he is initially anxious about the possibility of Kim and Ron realising who he is to them, but assessing his appearance, he concludes that he can hide more distinctive features such as his big ears, and details like his red hair aren't that uncommon so people won't immediately assume he's a relative of Kim's, although he still takes care not to say too much that might give away who he is to them in the future.

My Hero Academia

  • Conversations with a Cryptid: Izuku is said to bear a serious resemblance to his father Hisashi, though he has his mother's hair color. Which seriously freaks out All Might, Kurogiri, and Shiragaki when he dresses up in a suit and they all notice how much he looks like All for One.
    • Besides her hair color, Inko looks almost identical to her mother once she loses weight. Said mother being Nana Shimura.
  • Custody Battle: The First One for All user suspected that Izuku was related to his older brother on sight.
  • Forgiveness is the Attribute of the Strong: Izuku looks very much like young All for One, but at first everyone assumes that Izuku is a distant descendant. He's actually All for One's son.

My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic

  • The Palaververse: From the first chapter of Treasures: Daring's similarity to her mom, is what Ivory clearly would've remarked upon if not interrupted:
    “My word, you really are growing up.” Ivory sighed. “You’ve got your dad’s eyes, but otherwise you’re the spitting image of—”
    “I was told by reliable authorities that you’ve got an ancient set of ruins in town?” Dad interrupted.
  • Why Am I Crying?: It is shown that Diamond Tiara looked very much like her mother Crystal Eyes, complete with the same purple mane with white streaks. It was for this reason that Filthy Rich tried to avoid his daughter after his wife's tragic death; Diamond looked so much like her mother, he couldn't stand looking at her lest be be reminded of Crystal.

Naruto

  • White Rain: Itachi Van Alstyne looks exactly like his deceased father Uchiha Itachi, something that makes his uncle Sasuke very uncomfortable. The younger Itachi's little sister Rina, on the other hand, is a dead ringer for her mother Lucia. In terms of personality and genius, she's exactly like her father Uchiha Itachi.

Nicktoons Unite!

  • Time Fixers: Nicktoons of the Future:
    • It has been lampshaded a few times that Darry looks like his father, Danny, especially when it comes to ghost fighting.
    • Aside from having her father's blue eyes, Yuki she looks a lot like her mother, Sam, and even like her father's Opposite-Sex Clone.
    • Tommy is basically Timmy, except with black hair.
    • Crash looks exactly like SpongeBob but is a daredevil like Sandy. Junior has blue eyes like his father (but bigger pupils) and an identical pore count, but has darker skin like his paternal grandmother. Twitchy looks a more scruffy male version of Sandy, but has SpongeBob's freckles and hyperness.
    • Jesse 13 is a miniature version of his father, but has red eyes like his mother.
    • Max looks just like Cindy (which Timmy lampshades is a relief), but has his father's blue eyes.

The Owl House

  • How To Tame Your Demon Beast: Caleb Wittebane first mistakes Eda for his wife Evelyn with longer hair when he first wakes up in her house, and Eda's sister Lilith points Caleb rather looks like their father Dell Clawthorne with blonde hair and a thinner build. That's because Caleb happens to be the Clawthorne family's Living Distant Ancestor.
    • It's also nastily subverted — Caleb is widely assumed to be Hunter's dad because the boy looks too much like him to not be related, only for the discrepancies in the timeline to torpedo this possibility. Hunter is actually a clone of Caleb, explicitely created as a Replacement Goldfish by Belos.

Ranma ½

Star vs. the Forces of Evil

  • The Queens of Mewni have such a strong tendency to look like female versions of their respective fathers that it'd be easier to list who doesn't: Solena (due to being a Decomposite Character with the character design of the canon Crescenta), Festivia (who, it should be noted, was born with her father's eyes until an incident changed their color to purple), Galaxia (an albino), Venus (latent magic gave her Kaleidoscope Hair and Kaleidoscope Eyes), Helia (because Venus had yellow hair and eyes at the moment of conception), and Sky (who still plays this trope straight, she's just the only one who resembles her mother). The fact that Swan's children looked a little too much like her and not enough like her husband is what led Venus to find out they're actually the product of Brother–Sister Incest between Swan and her brothers.

Superjail!

  • Extended Stay: Ethan, the younger of the Warden and the Mistress's twins, is described as being a miniature version of his father. His sister Matilda, on the other hand, is assumed by readers to look almost exactly like their mother. As if the fact that their parents look very similar to one another wasn't confusing and intriguing enough already.

Worm

  • Recoil: Taylor (having gone back twenty-two years in time) looks enough like her mother that it causes confusion in people who haven't seen her in a while, or are viewing her in dim light.

Yo Kai Watch

  • Strong and Steady: Eddie's cousin Maddie is said to have the same facial structure and hair colour as him. Roughraff quips that she could pass as his twin sister.

Dormant/Dead/Unsorted

  • The Twilight Child:
    • Twinkle is noted to be almost physically identical to her mother, aside from having different mane, eye, colouring, and being ever-so-slightly taller than she was at her respective age, as well as not sounding the same. Oh, and not having wings.
    • Noted to be a recurring trend with the future Pinkie Pie's children, all of whom have their mother's pink curls. Even the ones that are adopted.
  • Invoked and justified in the The Matrix fanfic Bringing Me To Life, where Cole as an A.I., and being unable to grow up like a human, must have his program upgraded to make him look older and chooses to look more like one of his two adopted dads — Neo, except with longer, black-hair and gray-eyes.
  • It actually works to Ichigo's advantage in Swinging Pendulum. Since Ichigo looks so much like Kaien, Kaien immediately adopts the amnesiac Ichigo into the clan, reasoning with his looks he had to be a Shiba.
  • Dracule Riskua from Tell it to the Marines shares her red hair, tanned complexion and facial structure with her father Shanks. However, her most striking feature — her yellow eyes — immediately let Garp identify her as Mihawk's niece.
    • Riskua worries about Ace being discovered by the Marines because he really looks like a young, clean-shaved Gold Roger. When Whitebeard meets the youth, he feels some familiarity about the features but is unable to put his finger on it while Shanks effortlessly guesses Ace's parentage due to his service as a cabin boy on Roger's ship.
  • In Ojos Que No Ven, even in death, Miguel still shares physical similarities to his great-great grandpa Hector in their skeletal features.
  • In All This Sh*t is Twice as Weird, Varric observes that Bethany looks more like her mother than her older sister does; Bethany replies that she and her twin brother always favored their mother, but her sister "is Father through and through."
  • The Guardian shows Martha Kent discussing the trope by insisting a child looks like their parents because they raised them, not because of blood, otherwise Clark wouldn't have her husband's smile. She also thinks Jason has Bruce's eyes.
  • In The Many Dates of Danny Fenton: Danny's kids with his match will show heavy similarities to their parents.
    • In his nightmare of marrying Katie Kaboom, their daughters all look like smaller versions of their mother.
    • The daughter he could have with Kim Possible, named Annie, resembles her mother but with her father's blue eyes. Although they turn green when her powers activate, unintentionally making her more of a mini-version of Kim.
  • In In Which Guzma Is Frustrated, Acerola is pretty much a younger version of her father.
  • Fate/Black Dawn: Half-sisters Arturia and Morgan could be twins, the main difference being that Morgan has long hair and enjoys being cruel, while Arturia is pretending to be a man and emotionless.
  • This is discussed in Batman's The Changeling Sequence by Martha Kent. She tells Jason that you don't have to actually look like your parents, biological or adopted, to have a resemblance, citing the fact that Clark smiles like Jonathan Kent. She also remarks that Jason has his father's eyes and suggests he sees Taila in Damian because of his mannerisms.
  • In After the Fall of Giants, Mousse's brother Wing resembles him so much that it only takes a wig and glasses for him to pretend to be Mousse. He uses this to his advantage while fighting his beloved Ling, in order to get her to fight at her full strength.
  • Played for Laughs in the Urusei Yatsura fanfic Sakura Seedling, where Sakura and Tsubame's first daughter Hanako looks exactly like Sakura's mother and uncle, both of whom are virtually identical and as ugly as Sakura is beautiful. That said, in the sequel, Sakura's infant son is not so cursed by genetics.

    Films — Animation 
  • Aladdin and his father Cassim look remarkably similar. The main difference is Cassim's graying hair and beard.
  • Marie from The Aristocats looks like a younger version of her mother, Duchess. The two boys are different colors, though.
  • Arlo the Alligator Boy: Arlo seems to inherit various features of his biological father Ansel. Besides both of them being half-animal, they have the same oval eyes, rosy cheeks, x-detailed earlobes, pointy fingers, and lower chin hairs; Arlo also got the Messy Hair and Youthful Freckles from Ansel's childhood. Arlo's pale red hair color, on the other hand, comes from his then unknown Missing Mom.
  • The Book of Life:
    • Maria got all her looks from her mother.
    • Carlos is essentially an older version of his son Manolo with a moustache, smaller eyes and graying hair.
    • The Rodriguez Brothers could all be triplets if there weren't some subtle ways to tell them apart: Pablo is the shortest, Pancho has the most pronounced beard, and Pepe has a "smile" moustache.
  • Brave: Merida's facial details look like her mother, except placed on a head shape more like her father's. She also has her father's wild red hair and bright blue eyes.
  • Disney Fairies: Tinker Bell and her long lost sister Periwinkle look almost alike in terms of the face, and they share the same wing design. However, their clothes and hair are different, and according to Gliss, Peri is a bit more paler than Tink.
  • In Frozen, the Queen of Arendelle's daughters look just like her; Elsa in particular, but with platinum-blonde hair instead of dark brown (Elsa's mother uses a slightly altered version of her model). Word of God is that Elsa has blonde hair due to her powers, so if she had been born "normal" she would essentially be a mini version of her mum. Concept art shows Elsa's mom originally had blonde hair which doubles the resemblance, though her design was slightly different in the art. In addition to her mother's features, Anna also inherits her father's hair and eye coloring.
  • In The Good Dinosaur Arlo's siblings Buck and Libby basically look like mini versions of their parents, with Buck looking just like his father and Libby who looks just like her mother. Averted somewhat with Arlo who seems to take his appearance from both his mother and father instead.
  • In the How to Train Your Dragon film series (and subsequent television shows and specials), Nuffink and Zephyr, the children of Hiccup and Astrid, look exactly like their parents, but with the other parent's hair color. So Nuffink looks exactly like Hiccup but with Blonde hair while Zephyr looks just like Astrid but with brown hair.
  • The Incredibles:
    • Dash is practically a spitting image of his dad while Jack-Jack resembles his mother more than his siblings.
    • In Incredibles 2, Winston Deavor looks just like his father, only younger and without the beard.
  • Greenie from Leafie, a Hen into the Wild greatly resembles his father Wanderer. The resemblance increases as he ages. He even grows feather on his head similar to his fathers.
  • Implied in Lightyear, where Buzz immediately thinks he's looking at his father on seeing his future self.
  • Adult Simba in The Lion King strongly resembles his father, Mufasa. There are a few differences; he's a little leaner and his mane is shaggier, but they're subtle enough that when he returns to Pride Rock, Sarabi and Scar initially think he is Mufasa.
  • The Lion King II: Simba's Pride:
    • Subverted with Kovu. Despite having a black mane and green eyes like you-know-who, Kovu is not the son of Scarnote . Otherwise, his eventual romance with Kiara would be beyond awkward. Initially he was Scar's son but that was changed partway through development when they noticed the implications.
    • Nuka is implied to be Scar's son and has his coloring.
    • Kiara resembles her father Simba quite a lot, having his golden-yellow coat and red eyes, while her body type comes from her mother Nala, in both cub and adult forms. Meanwhile, her head and face look a lot like her maternal grandmother Sarafina.
  • The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea:
    • Ariel and Eric's daughter Melody looks a lot like Ariel, having her same facemold and blue eyes, but has Eric's black hair and pale skin tone, as well as Eric's Big Ol' Eyebrows.
    • One of the sons of Flounder looks exactly like the younger Flounder. In fact, the boy looked so much like Flounder, that Ariel initially mistook him for Flounder.
  • Played straight in The Little Mermaid III: Ariel's Beginning. Queen Athena looks exactly like Ariel, albeith with green eyes, orange hair and a turquoise tail.
  • In the Disney film Meet the Robinsons, Wilbur is virtually a male clone of his mother, Franny. This helps to hide the fact that he's Lewis's Kid from the Future. Almost every (biological) member of the family sports the "family cowlick"... on both sides of the family. That's convenient.
  • According to Pixar, the redneck boy that attacks Randall Boggs in the trailer home at the end of Monsters, Inc. actually has the same model as the animatronic boy in the training room at the very beginning of the film. Also, said boy's mother is essentially another model of the boy, but with a bun placed on his/her head.
  • The Prophet: Almitra is a mini version of her mother, Kamila.
  • In Rise of the Guardians, when Jack Frost gets the memories of his former life back, we can see that his sister looked a lot like him before his death.
  • In Sleeping Beauty, Aurora looks remarkably like her mother.
  • In Song of the Sea, Ben and Saoirse resemble their father Connor and their mother Bronaugh, respectively. Saoirse even has the same curl in her hair that Bronaugh does. Ben inherited the lopsided smile Connor has.
  • Storks: There's no doubt in anyone's mind when Tulip finally meets her biological family.
  • The Super Mario Bros. Movie:
    • All the Mario Bros.' family's men have the same style of mustache.
    • The larger, rounded nose shape is a trait of all members of the family, even the ones who married in.
    • The two uncles look almost identical to Luigi aside from their hair and mustaches, with dad's resemblance to Mario not far behind. Not coincidentally, the three of them are brothers per an interview with the art directors and Papa Mario is heavily implied to be the oldest.
  • Queen Arianna from Tangled looks just like an older version of Rapunzel, but with brown hair. The resemblance is further highlighted once Rapunzel's hair turns brown; they look so alike that, when Rapunzel is reunited with her long-lost family, the King and Queen recognize her as their daughter instantly. A group hug follows.
  • In Disney's Tarzan, the titular character has his biological father's hair color, nose, and jawline, and his mother's eye color.
  • Toy Story:
    • Andy and Molly have their mother's blue eyes.
    • Mrs. Davis has brown hair like Andy in the first film, but in the sequels, she is blonde like Molly.
  • Ming from Turning Red looks just like a younger version of her mother, and wears a similar hairstyle, save for the fact that since she has longer hair, she wears it in a bun.
  • Mebh from Wolfwalkers is basically a miniature version of her mother Moll, right down to having the same Facial Markings under their eyes, distinct lack of eyebrows and going around barefoot. This extends to their wolf forms as well, where they're almost exactly alike aside from Moll being much bigger. Mebh herself even lampshades it:
    Robyn: Is that your mummy back in the cave?
    Mebh: Of course! Sure don't I look like her?

    Films — Live-Action 
  • Back to the Future:
  • Fredo, the weakest of Don Vito Corleone's sons in The Godfather ironically has the closest physical resemblance to him.
  • Bit: Laurel looks very much like her mom, with the same pale skin, dark hair and even similar facial structure.
  • The Butcher Boy: In the film adult Francie looks just like his father, but with red hair. Both are played by Stephen Rea.
  • Cinderella (2015): Ella shares her mother's beauty and the same luxurious blonde hair. Unfortunately, this resemblance, combined with the fact that her father always loves his dead wife's memory more than he loves his second wife, contributes to Lady Tremaine's dislike of Ella.
  • Class Of Nuke Em High Part III The Good The Bad And The Subhumanoid: Brick Bronsky plays Roger Smith in this movie, while also playing as Roger's son Adlai, and also Dick (albeit with dyed hair). As a result, the three look a whole LOT each other.
  • Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2: Played for laughs. Drax always thought that Yondu was Peter's biological father, since "they look exactly alike." Rocket points out that Peter is human, while Yondu is blue.
  • In Kagemusha, Takeda Shingen's brother Nobukado bears sufficient resemblance to the great warlord that he has impersonated him in the past. However, he manages to find a thief who looks even more similar to Shingen, who becomes the titular impersonator.
  • In The Little Rascals, Alfalfa and Spanky's dads look like adult versions of their kids.
  • Peter Jackson's Middle-earth universe has Thranduil and Glóin, who very much resemble the two Fellowship members Legolas and Gimli, respectively. In The Lord of the Rings itself, Boromir, Faramir, and their father, Denethor, strongly resemble one another.
  • Love Is Not Perfect: Elena's young daughter Claudia looks very much like her, with the same dark brown hair and a similar smile.
  • When King Stefan sees his grown daughter for the first time in Maleficent, the first thing he says is, "You're just like your mother."
  • My Animal: Heather, her mom and brothers all look quite similar, especially having the same red hair.
  • Prospect: Cee's dad comments that she looks just like her mom when they're in the ship early on now that she's grown into a young woman. Later we see a brief picture of her mom with Cee as a baby, which does appear to show her with similar looks.
  • A Simple Favor: Stephanie relates that her half-brother looked exactly like their dad when he was young. This makes it even weirder when they have sex.
  • In Snow White: A Tale of Terror, Lilli looks so much like her mother as to be a symbol for her continued lingering presence in Frederich's heart.
  • Star Trek:
  • In Stardust, Tristan and his father, Dustan. Especially when Dunstan Thorne is younger, played by Ben Barnes, they look almost identical (and mistakes of identity at the start are excused!) When Dunstan is older, and Tristan a young man, the casting definitely went out of their way on resemblance. It makes their relationship that much more satisfying. Lampshaded in the movie by the Wall Guard who mistakes Tristan for Dunstan.
  • In the Star Wars prequels, Anakin and Padme strongly resemble the Skywalker twins. Specifically: Anakin shares Luke's dark blonde hair, blue eyes, and pronounced chin, while Leia not only inherited her hair and eyes from Padme, but the two even sometimes dress alike and braid their hair in similar ways. Padme's older sister also looks a lot like her, and by extension also looks like Leia.
    • Subverted in The Force Awakens. Many audience members initially assumed that Rey was Han and Leia's child based on her looks, but instead of being a Skywalker or Solo, The Rise of Skywalker would reveal that she was Darth Sidious/Emperor Palpatine's granddaughter. Also, Kylo Ren (aka Ben Solo) doesn't look like any member of the Solo-Organa-Skywalker family besides his Episode III Anakin-style haircut.
  • Stuck in Love: Sam looks a lot like her mother Erica. Both have the same hair color, eye color, similar eye shape, facial structure and dark, prominent eyebrows.
  • Vox Lux: Celeste is a pop star who survived a school shooting as a teenager. Raffey Cassidy plays the teenaged Celeste and the adult Celeste's teenage daughter.
  • In Watch Your Stern, when Blissworth is disguised as Miss Potter, his first thought is that he looks like his Auntie Bessie.
  • Wild Child: Poppy remarks she looks like her mother after she gets her hair dyed brunette. A photo of her mom from her youth confirms this (it's the same actress in the image), with her dad also later astonished, saying they look just alike.

    Literature 
  • 2666: Klaus looks just like his uncle, Archimboldi.
  • In Animorphs, Tom is described as looking a lot like his younger brother Jake, just with darker hair and eyes.
  • Paul Belikov from Blood Promise, is the nephew of Dimitri and looks like a ten-year-old version of his uncle.
  • In The Bridge Kingdom Archives the royal family of Maridrina, including the current king Silas, has signature azure eyes. And while 12 princesses trained in the compound have different mothers and therefore different complexion and hair color, all of them have the same azure eyes.
  • In A Brother's Price most families we get to see are this. Jerin is anxious about possibly having to marry the Brindle sisters all thirty of whom he considers ugly. His own family has a strong tendency towards blue eyes and black hair.
  • Casteel Series: Heaven looks identical to her late mother Leigh, aside from her dark hair.
  • The Chronicles of Dorsa: Akella can tell quickly on going into their quarters that the Order of Taghren children were sired by her men. With them being Adessian like her (black people, going by their descriptions) and they have white mothers, this results in the girls having darker skin plus kinky hair, as Akella notes, closer to their fathers. Additionally, some also have particular facial features in common too with her men.
  • It's mentioned several times throughout the The Chronicles of Prydain that Princess Eilonwy has red-gold hair and large blue eyes. Reading the supplemental volume The Foundling and Other Tales of Prydain shows the reader that it's because of this trope; she looks exactly like her mother, except that she has her father's eyes.
  • This causes Nettie trouble in The Color Purple. Her niece and nephew both look a lot like their biological mother Celie. Nettie also resembles Celie. The sibling's adopted mother believes that Nettie is the mother of her children and that she cheated with her husband. Even on her death bed Corrine refuses to believe that Nettie is their aunt, not their mother.
  • Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick in the book is Greg with thicker eyebrows and hair, so it's hinted Greg sees the resemblance between him and Rodrick, but considers Rodrick a nastier version of him.
  • In Doctrine of Labyrinths Felix looks so much like a male version of his mother that he half doubts he had a father at all. The resemblance is so strong that a straight man who never got over the mother ends up hitting on him, which Felix finds insulting and creepy. Before that, there is also a very strong resemblance between Felix and Mildmay. The red hair — very rare in Melusine — is a huge clue that they're related.
    • Shannon Teverius is also stated to look uncannily like his mother — a double-edged sword, as she was a ravishing beauty but also a notorious traitor to the realm. This leads to an awful lot of people distrusting him, and even his own siblings quietly expecting him to do something treasonous, which is a little unfair — he's not the nicest person in the world but he's never disloyal to his family or realm.
  • Dresden Files:
    • Once Thomas reveals to Harry that they're related, Harry frequently compares and contrasts their looks. Nobody else seems to notice, not even Harry before he found out.
    • Harry notes that all of the Raiths are impossibly beautiful, and at least somewhat similar. That subconscious awareness saves Murphy from being Fed on at one point. Recurring examples: contrasting Thomas and the reigning Lord Raith, and comparing the Raith sisters.
    • Maggie Dresden looks a lot like her mom, Susan Rodriguez.
    • Molly Carpenter takes after Charity a lot. In more than just looks.
    • Murphy's sister looks a lot like her.
    • Harry notes that under their different outfits, the Queen of Summer (Titania) and the Queen of Winter (Mab) look virtually identical, so much that they might be twins. He comes to the same realization later, with Maeve and Sarissa.
  • In the epilogue of Fifty Shades Freed, it's revealed that Ana and Christian have a two-year-old son with red hair — who looks exactly like the toddler version of Christian that Ana has been imagining and daydreaming about post-coitus for the past three books.
  • In the Gemma Doyle Trilogy, Gemma has enough of a resemblance to her mother to really freak out multiple characters.
  • In Anne McCaffrey's short story "The Greatest Love," a new implantation technique makes it possible for Pat Kellogg to carry children for her brother Peter and his wife Cecily, who has a defective uterus. (The story was written and published before surrogacy became possible.) However, Cecily's mother, refusing to believe the children are her biological grandchildren, has Pat and Peter charged with incestuous fornication and reproducing within the limits of consanguinity. When the case comes to trial, the doctors involved produce all of their records of the procedure. What really makes their case, though, is a little detail not revealed until the very end of the story: the infant twins have an uncanny resemblance to Cecily's mother, thus demonstrating decisively that she is their biological grandmother, and therefore Cecily is their biological mother.
  • Harry Potter:
    • Harry Potter is frequently — make that at least once every book — described as looking like a miniature copy of his dad James, only with his mother Lily's green eyes. When Harry encounters the young James inside a memory, he finds the experience uncanny, comparing it to looking into a mirror, but finds some that details are just a bit off, most notably in how James has a slightly longer nose and hazel eyes.
    • The Weasley family can be counted on to have bright red hair and freckles.
    • Ladies of Fleur Delacour's family, thanks to a veela grandmother, are all blonde, willowy, and gorgeous (readers assume that Fleur and Bill's daughters and son take after her).
    • The Black family (Sirius, Regulus, Bellatrix, Andromeda, and Narcissa) are all very attractive with grey eyes and black hair, though Andromeda's hair is brown and Narcissa's is blonde. Harry almost attacks Andromeda the first time they meet because she looks so much like Bellatrix at first glance.
    • The Malfoys are remarkable. They are all pale and blonde — even Narcissa Malfoy née Black, who is actually related to her husband since pureblood wizards are all interrelated.
    • Tom Riddle resembles his father.
    • Dumbledore and his brother look alike.
    • Though the Epilogue doesn't go into detail, it is implied Harry's middle son Albus Severus and Malfoy's son Scorpius look exactly like their fathers. All we know about Harry's other kids is that they do not have his green eyes.
    • When Harry sees a photo of Luna with her dead mother he immediately notes how much they look alike.
  • The Ashkevron family in the Heralds of Valdemar series. Starting in the Last Herald-Mage Trilogy, it seems their sons tend to be solid, axe faced warrior men and their women tend to be lovely and meek. It's said of them that once every generation one girl is born who takes after her dad instead and often becomes an Action Girl, even inheriting the "Ashkevron nose". (The opposite is rather rarer, but Vanyel is a good example.) On their consistency, one character even comments, "The Ashkevron look usually breeds true, and when it doesn't, the poor child generally runs off to Haven!" (the capital city)
  • The Everdeen family seems to have this in The Hunger Games: Prim has blond hair and blue eyes like her mother, while Katniss looks like her father. When Katniss and Peeta have children, one has Katniss' hair and Peeta's eyes, while the other has Peeta's hair and Katniss' eyes.
  • Hurog: The Hurog family seems to have this. Most of the children have a distinct eye colour that Ward calls "Hurog blue", he himself lacks it and the aristocratic facial features to go with it, but is remarkably tall and strong, which also runs in the family. This goes back a long time, even the ghost that haunts castle Hurog as those blue eyes, and bears a close enough resemblance to the family members that they can get away with claiming that he's a bastard half-brother. Justified, as they're all part dragon, which probably makes for very dominant genes, which would normally not be the case with blue eyes. Of course, with all those bastard children, and the strong attachment the family has to the land, there's probably lots of inbreeding.
  • Incarnations of Immortality: It is noted at several points that Niobe, her daughter Orb, and her granddaughters Luna and Orlene greatly resemble each other. Orb and Luna were born at the same time (Niobe bore Luna's father Cedric Jr. first, then several years later, she and her son had children at the same time) and were often mistaken for twins.
  • Edgar Rice Burroughs' John Carter of Mars: In The Gods of Mars, John Carter is haunted by the familiar look of a fellow prisoner. Perhaps he should have looked in the mirror more often.
    The youth's face had haunted me. Where had I seen him before. There was something strangely familiar in every line of him; in his carriage, his manner of speaking, his gestures. I could have sworn that I knew him, and yet I knew too that I had never seen him before.
  • In the Kane Series story "Raven's Eyrie" Kane's daughter Klesst shares his characteristic looks — red hair, blue eyes and very long fingers — as well as his uncanny ability to see in the dark. Also appears in "Misericorde", when Kane encounters Puriali, who has red hair, and acknowledges that he may be his descendant.
  • In Kushiel's Legacy books, innumerable instances: the entire House Shahrizai has unusually dominant genetics, coined the "unmistakable stamp", House L'Envers has violet eyes that show up with alarming frequency, and the two princesses look like their parents, but with the eye colors swapped.
  • In The Land of Stories has brothers that are a striking image of their father. They look so much alike that even one of the two’s children thought they were the same person.
  • In The Lion King: Six New Adventures, Kopa looks nearly identical to his father Simba.
  • In Jane Austen's Love and Freindship, Laura's grandfather comments on it.
    He started, and after having attentively examined my features, raised me from the Ground, and throwing his Grand-fatherly arms around my Neck, exclaimed, "Acknowledge thee! Yes, dear resemblance of my Laurina and Laurina's Daughter, sweet image of my Claudia and my Claudia's Mother, I do acknowledge thee as the Daughter of the one and the Granddaughter of the other."
  • The M Universe has the Donovans, who all bear a downright unnerving resemblance to one another. One character privately thinks it's like looking at some olive-skinned, black-haired version of Village Of The Damned.
  • Old Kingdom:
    • Meet the Abhorsens! Notice their unnaturally pale skin that tends to burn in the sun and their black hair. And also meet their cousins in the Charter bloodline, the Clayr, who are all dark-skinned blondes, and almost exclusively female.
      • In the first book, it is all but stated that the Abhorsens have the colour drained out of them by walking in Death, with the changes noted in Sabriel by the midwife. Of course, that doesn't explain Lirael.
    • Half-brothers Touchstone and Kerrigor are said to look very similar. When Sabriel sees Kerrigor's real body in a vision, she's rather sickened by the resemblance, and later on tries not to look when she has to destroy said body.
  • Oliver Twist has the titular character as a gender flipped version of Agnes, his mother who fell victim to Death by Childbirth. In fact, this VERY important in-story: when Mr. Brownlow sees Oliver next to a portrait of Agnes that he keeps in his Big Fancy House, it's one of the first clues on Oliver's true identity as the long-lost son of Agnes and of Brownlow's dead best friend, Edwin Leeford, the one who painted said portrait in the first place.
  • Percy Jackson and the Olympians: Demigod children can often take after their godly parents in appearance, particularly their eyes. Multiple times Percy is compared to his father Poseidon (apparently, his eyes and general looks make him look like a young, beardless version of him) especially by some of Poseidon's former lovers, and Percy himself has drawn comparisons between Annabeth and Athena, Thalia and Zeus, and Nico and Hades.
  • Presidential: Zach is described as looking like a little clone of his father Robert more than once, which his mother Connie finds painful somewhat since Robert's dead.
  • In L. Jagi Lamplighter's Prospero's Daughter trilogy, Theo is in fact taken for his father by his own sister. He had after all stop using magic to keep himself from aging. Caurus realizes he's not Prospero only by his aura — whereupon he deduces that it's a seeming and an imposter, and Mab has to throw himself between them to keep him from attacking.
  • Quarters: Vree and her younger brother Bannon appear much alike, so that no one is surprised to learn they're related.
  • Interesting example: in Rainbow Magic, Rachel and Kirsty look like miniature versions of each other's mothers (i.e Rachel's mother has straight brown hair like Kirsty, and Kirsty's mother has curly blonde hair like Rachel). This was rectified in the Animated Adaptation Return to Rainspell Island, where Mrs. Walker was redesigned and looks much more like Rachel.
  • Re:Zero has several examples:
    • Subaru clearly got different traits from his parents: he got his father's hairstyle and hair color, and his mother's "devil eyes."
    • Emilia herself looks like her mother, who was a witch just like her.
    • Subaru is able to tell right away that both Frederica and Garfiel are related because of their Scary Teeth and blond looks, though Frederica looks more like their human mother.
    • Otto inherited his father's messy hair and his mother's gray hair. His siblings only got the hairstyles, though.
  • The Scholomance: Anyone who met Arjun Sharma (before the Seer from the outskirts of Mumbai got eaten by a Maw-Mouth getting his three-months pregnant girlfriend out of the Scholomance's graduation hall) swears Galadriel 'El' Higgins is is spitting image. Conversely (and resultantly), the Marathi-looking Huge Schoolgirl is marked by her profound lack of resemblance to the petite Welsh healer Gwen Higgins.
  • Lilly from The Secret Life of Bees is stated repeatedly to resemble her deceased mother. In the final chapter her father even mistakes her for her mother in a crazed state.
  • Serge Storms: Sharon from the first and fourth books and Rachael from Atomic Lobster turn out to be sisters and are described almost exactly the same way. Both are six feet tall and have large breasts, long blonde curls, full lips, shapely legs, and freckles. Furthermore, there is a ten-year age gap between them and Serge and Coleman meet them ten years apart, causing them to comment on the resemblance (and the two women's similar temperaments and circumstances in life) long before the relationship is revealed.
  • The Shadowhunter Chronicles:
    • Jocelyn Fray greatly resembles her daughter Clary, only with sharper features.
    • Clary's brother, Jonathan Morgenstern, is basically a teenage version of their father, Valentine, right down to having the same Black Eyes of Evil.
    • Isabelle Lightwood greatly resembles her mother Maryse.
    • Amatis Graymark tells Jace Herondale that he looks exactly like his father, Stephen, did, save for his mother, Celine's eyes.
    • Will and Cecily Herondale inherited their mundane mother's black hair and beautiful blue eyes. Will's son, James, looks exactly like his father except for his demonic golden eyes.
    • Cyril Tanner resembles his brother Thomas very much, both in appearance and demeanor, although Tessa Gray says he's more indifferent.
    • Most Blackthorns share the same dark brown hair and blue-green eyes. There are a few exceptions, however, such as the black-haired gray-eyed Tiberius, and black-haired green-eyed Jesse. Jesse still fits this trope since his black hair is inherited from his father (another Blackthorn with black hair), his green eyes are inherited from his mother, and he is stated to be a spitting image of his father.
  • In The Shamer Chronicles, Davin and Melli have the same pretty faces and auburn hair as their mother, Melussina, and Davin is said to share her elfin build as well. Dina, however, is the splitting image of her father Sezuan with her black hair and green eyes.
  • A Song of Ice and Fire:
    • A member of any given noble family is immediately identifiable by various distinct features. The Targaryens all have violet eyes and silver hair; the Lannisters are all blonde with green eyes; the Tullys all have auburn hair; the Baratheons all have thick black hair; the Manderlys all resemble walruses; the Mormonts and the Umbers have bear-like features; the Florents have huge ears, etc. This becomes a massive plot point early on, since Ned wonders why none of the royal children resemble Robert. When he goes digging, he discovers that whenever a Baratheon has a child with a Lannister, the child always inherits the Baratheon black hair. The Baratheon king's illegitimate children all have his black hair. However, the children that the king's Lannister wife has given birth to? They're all blonde. Guess why.
    • The Targaryens' silver hair and violet eyes are so characteristic in-universe that the occasional Targaryens born without them are singled out:
      • Rhaenyra's three sons with Laenor Velaryon did not inherit their parents' silver hair, violet eyes, and Valyrian good looks, and instead were brown-haired, brown-eyed, and pug-faced, sparking off rumors that they were actually fathered by Rhaenyra's paramour Harwin Strong. This was further supported by the fact that when Rhaenyra had two more sons with her uncle Daemon, they were silver-haired, violet-eyed, classically Valyrian specimen.
      • Rhaenys, the eldest grandchild of Jaehaerys the Conciliator, was another Targaryen with non-silver hair, as she had her Baratheon mother's black hair. In the original texts of Archmaester Gyldayn's Histories, she had silver hair, but this was retconned to black when they were republished as part of Fire & Blood.
      • Baelor Breakspear, the eldest son and heir apparent of Daeron II, had his Martell mother's black hair and brown eyes. Despite the Martells being a prestigious noble house, they are still Dornish, who are looked down upon in the rest of the Seven Kingdoms, and to top it off, had just been integrated to the realm after two centuries of conflict (in fact, Baelor's mother was given in marriage to Daeron to seal the peace). It was this fear of being potentially ruled by a "mongrel" Targaryen, coupled with attacks against Daeron II's questionable parentage and scholarly pursuits, that contributed to the outbreak of the First Blackfyre Rebellion.
      • Among Aegon V's sons, the only one to inherit their mother's brown hair was the eldest and one-time heir, Duncan. Fittingly, he was also the only one with a non-Valyrian name, as he was named after his father's best friend, the lowborn Duncan the Tall.
      • Rhaegar's daughter with Elia Martell, Rhaenys, was stated to look like a Martell, instead of a Targaryen. Her grandfather Aerys II even commented that she "smelled Dornish". Her younger brother, Aegon, on the other hand, had their father's Targaryen looks. In A Dance with Dragons, Young Griff, who is supposedly the long-dead Aegon, dyed his hair blue so nobody would notice that he is a Targaryen.
    • Straighter examples exist with specific characters — there is an astounding number of the younger generation who resemble older ones. Sansa Stark is said to be the spitting image of her mother Catelyn while her sister Arya resembles their paternal aunt Lyanna Stark. Joffrey Baratheon is stated to look a lot like his uncle and father Jaime Lannister and Joffrey's little sister Myrcella is also said to look like their mother Cersei. Robert's little brother Renly and illegitimate son Gendry both strongly resemble him. Ned's illegitimate son Jon Snow and daughter Arya Stark are both said to have the "classic Stark look" like him. One of the reasons Catelyn resented Jon was because he looked more like Ned's son than any of the sons she bore him since Robb, Bran, and Rickon inherited more of her features.
  • Survivor Dogs: Bella and Lucky were separated as pups. When they meet years later, Lucky immediately feels connected to Bella even before recognizing her. They're so similar he compares it to looking in a mirror. The two do have some differences, however, such as Lucky being much scruffier than Bella.
  • Henry from The Time Traveler's Wife is noted to look a hell of a lot like his mother. Despite her status as a mom, this doesn't work as well for him as one might think as it's very difficult living with a father trying desperately to forget his wife's death when you constantly remind him of her. And then there's Alba, who looks exactly like Henry. Which, this being Niffennegger, is history repeating itself; Alba reminds Clare painfully of Henry after his death.
  • Unbelievably Boring Bart: Bartholomew Bean's dad, Bill Bean, looks like Bart with a five o'clock shadow.
  • Cats often look similar or identical to their parents. Despite this, only really noticeable examples are pointed out in Warrior Cats:
    • The first sign that Mistyfoot and Stonefur are Bluestar's kits are that they all share similarly blue-grey coats and lean bodies. Their adopted mother, Graypool, was a different shade of grey.
    • Fireheart and many other cats in his clan have a hard time separating Bramblekit from his traitorous father Tigerstar. He looked like a tiny clone of his dad. He eventually shows that Like Father, Unlike Son, as unlike his father Brambleclaw is a loyal ThunderClan cat. They share similar ambition, and Brambleclaw even becomes a Clan leader like his father, however the way they followed their ambitions was completely different from each other.

    Live-Action TV 
  • In The Amanda Show Penelope's younger brother Preston is a male version of her with slightly shorter hair.
  • Crash McLarson and his mother from The Aquabats! Super Show! are played by the same actor.
  • In El Chavo del ocho Ñoño is very similar to his father Señor Barriga (both played by Edgar Vivar), and we also learn in a flashback that Quico is also identical to his father (again, played both by Carlos Villagrán). Of course, if we consider that also Doña Florinda is identical to her niece Popis and Doña Nieves to her great-granddaughter Chilindrina (again same actresses respectively), this seems to be not uncommon in El Chavo’s Universe.
  • The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance: Brea looks similar to her mother and wears her hair similarly to her sisters.
  • Dinosaurs did this with the daughter resembling and acting like the father and the son resembling and acting like the mother. The third child didn't act or look like anyone in the family; in one episode, it was revealed that he was Switched at Birth, ending up in a "Family is the people you love" Aesop and a parody of the Reset Button, with the doctor who confirmed the switch jumping out of a cloud and proclaiming "Science was wrong!"
  • In The Drew Carey Show, Oswald learns that he had a son (now grown) with his ex-girlfriend. The guy shows up...and he looks ridiculously like Lewis, who admits that he had a fling with the mom while she and Oswald were broken up. Oswald, however, objects that the son actually looks just like the mom.
    Drew: Creepy — Oswald had sex with someone who looks like Lewis.
    Kate: CreepierLewis had sex with someone who looks like himself.
  • Echo (2024): Maya resembles her deceased mother strongly, so after her mother's death her grandmother had found it hard seeing her and pushed her away, which Maya is deeply hurt by and resents to this day.
  • Along similar lines, it's been openly stated that the role of Niles Crane in Frasier was created specifically because a casting director noticed that David Hyde Pierce looked and sounded like he could be Kelsey Grammer's brother.
  • Friends: Joey has seven sisters who all look extremely similar with bushy, dark '90s Hair and a tendency to all dress in similar colors. This becomes a plot point when Chandler makes out with one of them at a party, but he's so drunk he doesn't know which sister he kissed.
  • Game of Thrones:
    • Like her brothers Ned and Benjen, Lyanna has the classic Stark look of dark hair and eyes, and general austere features. When we see Lyanna's childhood in flashback in Episode 6.2, she's introduced wearing a boy's clothing and skillfully riding a horse around the courtyard. She's a tomboy just like her niece Arya will be (though Arya was born years after she died). In the books themselves, Ned outright states that Arya greatly resembles Lyanna at her age. The actress (Aisling Franciosi) also looks a fair bit like Maisie Williams (Arya).
    • It is also clear Jon Snow inherited most of his looks from his mother Lyanna, especially his dark hair, eyes, and striking looks, which certainly made it easier for Lyanna's brother Ned (Jon's uncle) to pass him off as his illegitimate son, as opposed to if Jon had taken after his father Rhaegar Targaryen with the trademark Targaryen silver hair.
    • Sansa looks increasingly like Catelyn as she gets older, even after she dyes her hair black.
    • Bran looks a great deal like Ned and Benjen did as kids.
    • Young Cersei looks strikingly similar to her daughter, Myrcella. The fact that Myrcella's father is Cersei's own twin brother might have something to do with this, considering they have the exact same genes, give or take a few.
    • With her hair cut off by the Faith Militant, Cersei bears an unsettling resemblance to her son Joffrey. (Ditto with the incest thing.)
    • In the one flashback we finally see him, Rhaegar Targaryen is remarkably identical to his younger brother Viserys, give or take him being more muscular and having a more dignified air. In the books, Daenerys almost confuses Rhaegar with Viserys in the House of the Undying.
    • Though Jon Snow takes after his Stark mother, he is a brooding Pretty Boy like his Targaryen father.
    • The History and Lore videos show that Princess Rhaenys inherited her mother's Dornish look, with black hair and brown eyes.
    • Almost everybody who knew Robert Baratheon comments that his illegitimate son Gendry resembles how he looked when he was young. Gendry is Tall, Dark, and Handsome, like a true Baratheon. Ned Stark immediately realizes upon seeing him for the first time that he is Robert's son. So does Stannis, when they meet in "Second Sons". In the books, it is said that Gendry resembles a young Robert so closely that it is blatantly obvious to anyone who meets him that also knows Robert (Eddard, Stannis) that Gendry is Robert's son. Given that Renly also resembles his older brother in his youth, people also remark on how much Gendry looks like Renly.
  • Occurs on Glee. Thanks to actresses Lea Michele and Idina Menzel looking near-identical, no one bought that Shelby was just the director of Vocal Adrenaline and not Rachel's birth mother. "Dream On" finally confirmed it.
  • In The Good Place Eleanor bears a very strong resemblance to her neglectful mother, Donna, despite their respective actresses having no relation in real life.
  • On Heroes, Claire Bennet has a strong resemblance to not only her adoptive parents, but also to her biological parents, which made the plot point of her parentage all the more effective.
  • On Highlander, if an Immortal meets someone he knew in a previous identity, he'll at least imply that he's the son or grandson of the person s/he knew.
  • It's possible that the only reason Jonathan Taylor Thomas was hired for Home Improvement is that he looks so similar to Tim Allen.
  • How I Met Your Mother:
    • The hypothetical daughter Marshall imagines looks so much like Lily that the actress could pass for Alyson Hannigan's younger sister.
    • Also invoked and subverted with Barney and his brother James. Barney thinks that they look exactly alike, seemingly oblivious to the fact that James is black and, in fact, Barney's half brother. When James eventually is reunited with his father, Sam Gibbs, Barney doesn't seem to understand that he and James are half brothers, and briefly believes that he is African American (this is initially Played for Laughs, until Barney admits that he was just jealous of James for having a father when he doesn't). However, James and Barney have very similar personalities (being close friends while growing up) and tastes in clothing; the only major differences are that James is gay, monogamous, and happily married (and because of the last two, doesn't share Barney's sleazy love of having sex with women, or, in James's case, men).
  • In Lucifer the trope is Played for Laughs: therapist Linda Martin sees family resemblance between Lucifer and his mother Goddess (in the body of Charlotte Richards) in how they both make completely unconnected conclusions from her advices and immediately storm out to try that out.
  • On M*A*S*H, Radar received a home movie from home. In the film, his mother is played by Gary Burghoff.
  • Modern Family: Phil and his father bear a remarkable resemblance to each other.
  • Once Upon a Time:
    • Emma is the daughter of Prince Charming/David and Mary Margaret/Snow White. Emma's actress, Jennifer Morrison, looks like a perfect combination of her parent's actors, especially her mother's. The two actresses have also been mistaken for each other in real life. Emma's son Henry also looks a lot like Snow.
    • Furthermore, Emma's son Henry bears little resemblance to his mother, but does look a lot like his maternal grandmother, Mary Margaret.
    • Red has a pretty good resemblance to her mother, Anita.
  • ''Outlander: Jonathan Wolverton Randall and his descendant Frank Randall are played by the same actor.
  • Actress Andrea Parker on The Pretender played both Miss Parker in real-time and her mother Catherine Parker in flashbacks.
  • Princess Silver: The resemblance between Rong Le and Hen Xiang allows the latter to impersonate Rong Le.
  • One episode of Quantum Leap has Sam leaping into himself as a teenager. Scott Bakula played Sam AND his father in the episode.
  • Roseanne:
    • It's been stated that Michael Fishman was cast as DJ specifically because he looked eerily like the title actress.
    • Similarly with the casting of Ned Beatty as Dan's father. If someone told you he was John Goodman's real-life father, you'd believe it in a heartbeat. He isn't.
  • Parodied in Saved by the Bell when Mr. Belding forcibly sets Zack up with his niece, Penny Belding. Zack imagines Mr. Belding in full drag. Screech ends up posing as Zack (in a bad blond wig) to take Penny out, and she's fairly cute.
    Stuart Millard: Again, I'm bummed that they didn't outright have Mr. Belding in drag, waddling around with his shoes on his knees, but instead cast an actual teenage girl for the role. She doesn't do so much as a “Hey hey hey hey hey!” or the trademark Belding laugh. It's an open flouting of the rules of sitcom.
  • The Spencer Sisters: Darby and Victoria, her mother, look pretty similar. Both are redheads, have similar facial structure and even sound much alike.
  • Star Trek:
    • Star Trek: The Original Series: Captain Kirk's brother Sam looks just like him, only with a mustache. (And dead, Jim.)
    • Star Trek: The Next Generation: When Tasha Yar was captured by the Romulans, she was forced to become the wife of a Romulan and had a daughter by him. That daughter, Sela, is the spitting image of her mother because she is played by the same actress. It's lampshaded on the show. Sela deliberately uses her resemblance to Tasha to manipulate Tasha's friends on the Enterprise.
    • Star Trek: Voyager: The character of Shannon O'Donnel strongly resembled her descendant Katherine Janeway.
  • Occurs in The Vampire Diaries with Katherine and Elena. Elena is the Doppelgänger of Katherine.
  • That '70s Show: The flashbacks to Red's youth show that he looked a lot like his son Eric, and in one instance, when he was remembering how he handled his first breakup, young Red sounded like Eric, too.
  • Willow: After the reveal of Jade and Scorpia being sisters, it's not surprising as the two have similar looks (e.g. their features, hair, skin color etc).
  • The Witcher (2019): Ciri looks very similar to her mother, enough so both of them could be mistaken as each other, with several people noting the fact.
  • On The X-Files, the younger CGB Spender is played by the same actor who plays his son, Jeffery Spender. CDB Spender is also Mulder's biological father, and oddly, the two could plausibly pass for father and son.

    Puppet Shows 
  • In Fraggle Rock, flashbacks in "Born to Wander" and "The Riddle of Rhyming Rock" show that, as a young Fraggle, Travelling Matt looked exactly like his nephew Gobo, only beige with yellow hair. And his Uncle Gobo looked exactly like Matt does now, only orange with (faded) purple hair — the same colours as his namesake great-nephew.
  • Sesame Street:
    • Elmo got his fur, nose, and eyeshadow colors from his father Louie, while his body and nose shapes came from his mother Mae.
    • Big Bird's Granny Bird looks like her grandson dead-on, apart from her grey forehead feathers, and her eyeshadow is purple instead of pink.
    • Rosita's mother Rosa bears an uncanny striking resemblance to her daughter.
    • Abby Cadabby resembles a young version of her mother Maggie, while her stepbrother Rudy looks a lot like his father Freddy.
    • For Julia's family, Julia resembles her mother Elena, while her brother Samuel looks a lot like their father Daniel.

     Stand-Up Comedy 
  • In his show So... Where Were We?, Dara Ó Briain talks about his adoption and the process of finding his birth mother, leading to his meeting the family she subsequently had. At a drinks they had together, one of his step-brothers told a story in which, months before Dara made contact with their mother, he had shaved his hair for charity... and had subsequently been told by everyone he met that he "really looked like that man off the telly".

    Sports 
  • Because the Major League Baseball season overlaps with both Mother's Day and Father's Day, many teams who have games on these holidays will have the mom or dad of the team's Mascot "come to visit" and cheer on the crowd alongside their son. Typically, they'll be identical in body shape, color, and facial structure to their children (likely to save on costume costs), but will have some sign of old age (glasses, graying hair/fur, a cane, etc.) and/or Tertiary Sexual Characteristic (for dads this could be in the form of Furry Baldness or facial hair, while for moms, this includes eyelashes, lipstick, head hair, or in more recent examples, lacking male-specific traits like manes or antlers) to set them apart from their child. They’ll also be distinguished by wearing a more formal and vintage-style outfit. Here are some examples.

    Theatre 

    Toys 
  • Ever After High: Ramona Badwolf is daughter of the Big Bad Wolf while Cerise Hood is daughter of Little Red Riding Hood. The two are enemies and are destined to be at odds... So they put on. They're actually sisters, but it's a secret that the Big Bad Wolf married Red. The two look quite similar. They have similar skin colours, similar eye colours, and similar hair colours (including white highlights). No one realizes their relationship because Cerise keeps her ears covered, while her sister does not.

    Visual Novels 
  • The Ace Attorney:
    • Kristoph and Klavier Gavin are brothers who are eight years apart but look almost identical, save a slight difference in hairstyles. When Apollo first meets Klavier, it takes a few moments before he realizes he's not looking at Kristoph. It's also a plot point, as Vera Misham seems to recognize Klavier because she's seen Kristoph before, when he commissioned the forged diary page that got Phoenix disbarred.
    • Barok van Zieks resembles his late brother Klint enough that both Ryunosuke and Iris mistake a prominently displayed portrait of Klint as Barok's own, presuming he commissioned a painting without the Rugged Scar and perpetual Death Glare out of vanity.
  • CLANNAD has Nagisa Furukawa and her mother Sanae. Later on, there's Nagisa and her daughter with Tomoya, Ushio.
  • Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc: The Bad Ending shows the students trapped in the academy years later, after they've already had several children there. The children are practically clones of their fathers, to the point that Hagakure's child (the youngest of the lot) has his father's massive dreads while sucking on a pacifier.
  • Happens a lot in the Fate Series:
    • Illya from Fate/stay night is basically a miniature of her mother, Irisviel, from Fate/Zero.
    • Ditto Shinji from stay night and his father, Byakuya, from Zero.
    • And Caren from Fate/hollow ataraxia and her mother, Claudia, who is illustrated in Fate/complete material II.
    • Morgan le Fay from Fate/Grand Order is a white-haired version of her sister, Saber from stay night. When she was younger, she was identical to her sister.
    • Mordred from Fate/Apocrypha is a subversion, as she is literally a clone of stay night's Saber.
  • Higurashi: When They Cry:
    • Mion and Shion are younger versions of their mother, Akane. It's likely their grandmother Oryuu looked similar in her youth as well.
    • Satoshi and his little sister Satoko both have blonde hair and red eyes.
    • Rena looks like a teenage version of her mother, made more noticeable in the anime when in one episode Rena appears "modern day" as an adult.
  • Kanon has Nayuki Minase and her mother Akiko.
  • Katawa Shoujo:
    • Emi looks like a younger and shorter version of her mother, Meiko. Hisao ends up lampshading it in Emi's route.
    • Shizune and her younger brother Hideaki look a lot alike. Hisao even mistook for Shizune's sister at first glance.
  • Minami and Yukari from Liar Liar are sisters who could pass for identical twins at first glance. There are slight physical differences however they mostly look different due to their hairstyles, and that Minami is a Perpetual Frowner.
  • Shall We Date?: Ninja Shadow:
    • A given between Kaname Shishido and his twin younger sister Saori, aka the Player Character. If not for them closely resembling one another, Saori wouldn't be able become a Sweet Polly Oliver to take on the dead Kaname's spot and avenge his murder.
    • The Nakagawa brothers look noticeably alike, especially in regards to their jawlines and their eyes. It's so strong that the eldest brother Toru's sprites include a set where he conceals his identity with his Cool Mask, and whenever Saori sees the man's bare face for the first time in each route, she tend to immediately point out how the brothers look terrifyingly similar.
    • Yuzuki Hirano's brothers aren't seen on screen, but according to Saori's narration, they closely resemble one another and look a lot like their father. The fact that Yuzuki is said to NOT physically resemble any of them turns out to be extremely important: he resembles his courtesan mother instead.
  • Shining Song Starnova:
    • Nemu Akimoto is repeatedly stated to look almost identical to her late birth mother Sena Ueda, though the game’s artwork doesn’t bear this resemblance out. The resemblance becomes a plot point later on, when the still-living but mentally-ill Sena sees Nemu performing on TV and concludes that Nemu is impersonating her, leading Sena to try and kill her.
    • Natsuki Tanabe looks nearly identical to her older sister and mother, with all three of them sporting the same face, Cat Smile, Idiot Hair, and bright orange hair colour. The only differences between them are their choice of clothing and the length of their hair.
  • Umineko: When They Cry:
    • Played for Drama with Beatrice II, the illegitimate daughter of Kinzo and Beatrice "Bice" Castiglioni. Her mother died in childbirth, causing Kinzo to fall into despair, and as she grew older Beatrice began to look more and more like her to the point that Kinzo deluded himself into believing she was her mother's reincarnation. This eventually led to him forcing himself on his own daughter, and the birth of Sayo "Yasu" Yasuda.
    • Played somewhat less dramatically between Kinzo and his grandson Battler: it's said that Kinzo looked a lot like Battler when he was younger, and some flashbacks explaining Kinzo's past and how he met "Bice" prove it true.
  • Downplayed in Your Turn to Die: Shin Tsukimi and Kanna Kizuchi are eventually revealed to be estranged blood siblings, and while they do share similar eye and hair color, they're not an exact match; one's hair is a much lighter shade than the other's.

    Webcomics 
  • Sparrow and her mother Sharon in But I'm a Cat Person. Justified in that Sparrow was conceived via a sperm donor, whom Sharon chose to look as much like her as possible.
  • Gravity Falls fan-comic Deal: Gwen is a dead ringer for her mother, Pacifica. Gwen's model is almost identical to her mothers' at the same age, save for her outfit and darker, messier hair.
  • In Drowtales Ariel Val'Sarghress (top) strongly resembles a teenaged Quain'tana as a young adult, a fact noted by several characters, and also her sister Mel'arnach who is actually her mother via Family Relationship Switcheroo. Then there's her father, Zhor whose resemblance to her becomes really apparent after he is restored to his original body.
  • In Educomix, this is completely averted for Dave, whose Parental Control, his only parent, appears to be a TV remote.
  • In El Goonish Shive, Tedd with shorter hair looks very similar to short haired Nanase.
  • In General Protection Fault, Nick looks like almost exactly his father, but doesn't have a mustache and his hair is not yet gray.
  • Girl Genius:
    • Agatha inherited much of her mother's appearance, to the point that without her glasses and with her signature Einstein Hair put down a little, she looks almost exactly like Lucrezia. It's implied that she was specifically modified to be as much like Lucrezia as possible, since Lucrezia was planning to steal her body. In personality and abilities, however, Agatha is much more similar to her father, which Lucrezia finds annoying beyond words.
    • According to Lucrezia, Tarvek is a dead ringer for his father Prince Aaronev back when they were an item.
    • Zeetha and Gil resemble each other quite a bit, especially when grinning or angry. According to Word of God they're siblings but haven't realised it yet.
    • Several people have claimed that the last female Heterodyne, Euphrosynia, looked quite a bit like her ten-times-great-niece Agatha. Andronicus Valois mistakes Agatha for her in his last moments. That being said, many other people have not noticed any undue similarities. None of the Jägers mention it, not even Euphrosynia's personal guard Jenka. Prende and Andronicus Valois initially don't even realize Agatha is a Heterodyne, instead thinking she's a random servant.
  • Gunnerkrigg Court: Antimony is nearly identical to her mother, Surma; apparently the only traits she inherited from her father are her small nose and straight hair. Kat resembles her parents as well, especially her mother when her hair gets longer. It's just normally cut too short for the curls to show. This is plot-relevant. Antimony and her mother are descended from fire spirits, whose very life essence is passed down from one generation to the next.
  • Homestuck loves playing this with clone and Timey-Wimey Ball shenanigans.
    • After John creates the paradox clone babies, it's pretty easy to see the resemblance between the player/guardian pairs, especially John/Grandpa and Jade/Nanna. Similarly, in the flashbacks to Grandpa and Nanna as thirteen-year-olds in 1923, they look nearly identical to modern-day John and Jade, the only real difference being Nanna's hair compared to Jade's. In Act 6, sprite-mode depictions of the B2 players showcase their resemblance to their B1 counterparts. Roxy in particular is indistinguishable from Rose save for her t-shirt and hair curl.
    • Becquerel was created partially using Halley's DNA, and so looks almost exactly like Halley except without a visible face.
    • According to Word of God, had all twelve A2 trolls grown to adulthood, they would have looked identical to their Famous Ancestors, barring a few differences due to life circumstances (i.e., Tavros' paralysis). The Ancestors are also a glimpse at possible adult personalities for the A2 trolls.
    • Played with in Dad's case. Both versions of Dad look like a younger version of their grandfather Colonel Sassacre, but their relevant parents (Nanna in B1, Poppop in B2) were adopted and we never see who they married.
  • Kell and Sheila from Kevin & Kell are cousins, but look enough like each other that they can pass themselves off as each other well enough to fool their own families.
  • Both Ayzee and Pandora from MoringMark - TOH Comics look incredibly similar to Luz and Willow respectively with only minor superficial resesemblance to their other parents to the point that the Collector actually mistakes them as such when meeting them for the first time. They both seem to be somewhat self conscious about it and take steps to mitigate it by either using hair dye or changing up their hairstyles.
    Collector: No offense, but those are some lazy designs.
  • In MYth, Athena has Metis' face, Persephone is a mirror image of Demeter, Hades is a younger version of Cronus and Zeus is a male, younger Rhea. Even Rhea and her sister, the Titaness Phoebe look alike.
  • In The Order of the Stick, General Tarquin, the father of the identical twins Nale and Elan, is drawn as looking the same as his sons except with white hair (brown in flashbacks), and other characters note that he looks much like Elan and Nale.
  • In Platinum Grit, siblings Kate and Andre Provocski have faces that are drawn almost identically. Several members of the MacConnor family share a recognisable "blonde and bland" look. And the lead character Jeremy MacConnor looks so uncannily like his uncle that it just has to be relevant.
  • In Precocious there's an in-universe rumor that Autumn's family reproduces by cloning. And actually there's one strip where her parents come to realize that it was narcissism that brought them together.
  • In Roommates Jareth (even more so in his Dark form) and his father. They look alike, dress alike (Painted-On Pants rule), have similar modus operandi and even share a catchphrase or two... but for some reason no Hereditary Hairstyle in sight (Jareth has '80s Hair his dad is a Long-Haired Pretty Boy).
  • In Stand Still, Stay Silent, the main characters greatly resemble their ancestors from the Just Before the End prologue. Among their family members, Reynir's older siblings are a deliberate aversion due to being born from a sperm and egg donor program meant to enable non-immune parents to have immune children (Reynir's own theory is that he wasn't exactly planned for).
  • Til Debt Do Us Part: Subverted. Of the Ji children, Subin looks the most like the patriarch, Mr. Ji (and they are drawn similarly as well, with strong features and dark purple hair). However, the resemblance is coincidental: he's his stepson rather than biological son. In one of the side stories, Mrs. Ji explains that she had found it shocking how strongly her second husband resembled Yejun's father.

    Web Original 
  • The animated online epic Broken Saints: Take a look at Gabriel Dunn. Now take a look at the young man from the West in Chapter 14 Act 1.
  • Played for laughs in Chad Vader, where at least two characters have relatives played by the same actors. The first was Champion J. Pepper, who's a lot more loveable (if a bit crazy) than his son Clint (who was the Big Bad of the first season). Lampshaded later when Chad encounters Weird Jimmy's brother Johnny and mistakes him for the former. Weird Jimmy's ghost then possesses Johnny, essentially bringing the character back to life.
  • Bunny looks an awful lot like her mother, Esmeynelda. The only difference is that Esmeynelda has dark pink eyes, whereas Bunny's are red.
  • FreedomToons: In "Thanksgiving with Ben Shapiro", Ben Shapiro's family members all look exactly like him and talk with the same nasal high-speed voice.
  • The eponymous family in "Metal Family" consists of father Glam (thin and blonde), mother Vicky (broad and red-haired), and their two sons Heavy and Dee. Dee resembles Glam in both looks and intelligence, while the younger, scrappier Heavy takes after his mother's appearance and personality.
  • In Mommy Sleeps in the Basement, Paisley looks a lot like her mother Claire, which Mrs June realizes is why she finds Paisley so familiar after seeing a picture of Claire; she recognizes her as a teenager who went missing twelve years ago and was on the news a lot.
  • RWBY:
    • Yang has inherited her father's hair colour (blonde) instead of her mother's (black) and her eyes are purple, which is mid-way between her father's blue eyes and mother's red eyes. Despite this, Yang and her mother are the spitting image of each other, right down to having the same cowlick at the top of their heads. When Yang gets angry, her eyes turn as red as her mother's, emphasising the similarities.
    • Her half-sister Ruby looks even closer to her own mother Summer, with their age, hair length, and wardrobe color being the only real differences.

    Real Life 
  • Henry Fonda and daughter Jane.
  • English chess players James M. and Chantelle Foster look very similar to each other and to both parents.
  • Angelina Jolie and her mother, Marcheline Bertrand. Hell, Angelina and her father Jon Voight.
  • Tim Buckley and his son Jeff Buckley looked very similar, the main difference being that Jeff's hair was straighter than Tim's. They resemble each other so much that comparisons are always made between them, even though their music was vastly different.
  • Scott Eastwood has been called a carbon copy of his father, Clint Eastwood.
  • Take a look at the picture of Joe Hill on his page. Now look up his father Stephen King at around the same age.
  • Looking at King George V of Britain and Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, you might come off noting they look a lot alike, to the point that when in the same photo it's hard to tell who's who. Maybe, just maybe Tsar Nicholas had a slightly deeper chin than King George, but that's debatable. This is not a coincidence - they're cousins! In fact, nearly all of the World War I-era European monarchs were related to each other as descendants of Queen Victoria. George V and Nicholas II were also related to Wilhelm II of Germany — their enemy. Nicholas II and Wilhelm II were both first cousins of George V, and Wilhelm also closely resembled his cousins (though it's less striking since he had no beard and wore a different style of mustache).note 
  • Martin Sheen and his sons Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez. Not to mention his other son Ramon, though he's not as famous. Actually, make that all the male members of the Sheen family. Martin's brother Joe could very reasonably be mistaken for his twin, and even seamlessly doubled him during the hell on Earth that was the filming of Apocalypse Now. When The West Wing needed to show a home movie of a younger Jed Bartlet, played by Martin, they used a home video of Emilio playing with his daughter.
  • Kirk Douglas and his son Michael Douglas.
  • New Yorker journalist Ronan Farrow, son of Woody Allen and Mia Farrow, has been called a male clone of his mother when she was young — they have the same big eyes and smile. He doesn't look much like his father, however, and has been noted for his strong resemblance — *ahem* — to Frank Sinatra.
  • Mark Hamill and his son Nathan.
  • Tom Hanks' son Colin Hanks is essentially a taller, lankier version of himself. More than one viewer has done a double take the first time we see Colin in Fargo because of the resemblance. They not only look alike, they sound alike, too.
  • Every Beatles child resembles their father very strongly.
  • Steven Tyler and his daughter Liv Tyler.
  • Judy Garland and her daughter Liza Minnelli, who also sound very similar.
  • Sean Pertwee is a dead ringer for his father, Jon Pertwee, although without the glorious white hair.
  • Joe Biden and his sons Hunter (left) and Beau (right).
  • Harrison Ford's son Ben resembles him so much that Ridley Scott used him to fill in for his father for a few new shots in the Final Cut version of Blade Runner.
  • Ice Cube and his son O'Shea Jackson Jr. look so similar that Junior was able to play his father in the biopic Straight Outta Compton.
  • Miguel Ferrer bore quite a bit of a resemblance to his father, José Ferrer.
  • Gordon Ramsay's son Jack looks so much like him they're practically twins.
  • Susan Sarandon and her daughter Eva Amurri
  • Mitt Romney and his son Tagg.
  • Softball legend Rick Scherr and his son Adam, best known as professional wrestling monster Braun Strowman.
  • Speaking of wrestling...
    • Brian Christopher, best known in WWF/WWE as Grandmaster Sexay, was a dead ringer for his dad, Jerry Lawler. So much so that Brian's parentage was pretty much impossible to hide, no matter how much his dad's promotions tried to keep it under wraps.
    • Ric Flair and his daughter Ashley, better known as Charlotte Flair, also have a pretty strong resemblance.
    • Chris Benoit and his elder son David Benoit.
    • Rey Mysterio Jr. and his son Dominik. The latter has twice worn his father's mask, and both times people thought he was Rey. This despite Dominik being several inches taller than his notoriously short father. See here.
      • This actually played a factor during Rey's feud with Eddie Guerrero back in 2005, where (in-storyline) Eddie was declared to be Dominik's biological father. Dominik was only eight at the time, but even at that age anyone who had seen Rey unmasked (thanks to his brief unmasked period in WCW that officially never happened) could see the strong resemblance between them, making the idea of Eddie being his real father ridiculous. Not even dying Dominik's hair blond and giving him frosted tips helped.
  • Daisy Ridley bears a strong resemblance to her two older sisters , leading to a number of Star Wars-related jokes ("This is getting out of hand — now there are three of them", "Attack of the Ridleys", etc.)
  • Amanda de Wolf basically looks like a female version of her father, Keith Moon.
  • Michael Jackson's youngest son Prince Michael II (better known by his nickname Blanket) has a similar resemblance to his father, most notably post-Bad.
  • Madonna and her daughter Lourdes.
  • As Robert Irwin has grown, he's started to resemble his father Steve more and more, from looks to mannerisms to speaking styles both on and off-camera, which is all the more remarkable considering that Robert was only three when he lost his dad, and would mostly know him from his film work and secondhand stories. As early as toddlerhood, he was imitating his dad's croc capture commands as though he'd been catching crocs himself his whole life; by age four, he could stalk small reptiles just like Steve did; and by age thirteen, he was carrying interviews with a similar charisma and enthusiasm to his father. As shown on Robert's Instagram, his mother found a picture of Steve as a child and showed it to Robert, and he legitimately thought it was just a retro-styled picture of himself. The resemblance is truly uncanny, and according to Wes Mannion, Steve's closest friend, it's only going to become more striking as Robert gets into his twenties.
    • Robert's sister, Bindi, also takes after Steve to a degree, though she more closely resembles Terri.
  • Actress Elizabeth Olsen had the same facial structure as her older sisters, the Olsen Twins
  • Al Capone and his mother Teresa Capone.
  • Woody Harrelson and his father, Charles Harrelson.
  • Eddie Murphy and his brother Charlie Murphy (on the right). Seen here.
  • John Kani and his son Atandwa look so similar that when Atandwa portrayed the younger version of his father's character King T'Chaka in Black Panther (2018), several viewers mistook it for another instance of Marvel Studios using Digital De-Aging in their films.
  • John Lennon and his son, Sean Lennon, as seen here.
  • Jake and Logan Paul.
  • Pedro Pascal and his older sister, Amazon Studios executive Javiera Balmaceda, both resemble their father, Dr. José Balmaceda. Pascal lampshaded his similarities to Dr. Balmaceda on the set of Game of Thrones, while studying the Oberyn Martell cast prepared for the episode "The Mountain and the Viper".
    "Holy shit. I really look like my dad."
  • Damon Wayans and his son Damon Wayans, Jr. could easily be mistaken for brothers.
  • Hank Williams III looked so much like his grandfather, Hank Williams, that when the actress Minnie Pearl met the younger Hank, she is said to have exclaimed "Lord, honey, you're a ghost!"
  • Prince William, Prince of Wales, looks like a male version of his late mother Princess Diana of Wales.
  • James Gandolfini and his son Michael, which is a good part of the reason why Michael was cast as young Tony Soprano in The Sopranos prequel film The Many Saints of Newark.
  • Zoë Kravitz is a carbon copy of her mother, Lisa Bonet. Lisa Bonet's son also looks like her while her other daughter is a female version of Jason Momoa.
  • After Black Widow's release, many people noted that Ever Anderson, the actress playing young Natasha, looked so much like her mother Milla Jovovich.
  • Brad Dourif and his daughter Fiona Dourif. So much so that Fiona was able to portray a past Charles Lee Ray in Chucky.
  • While there are certain clear differences, Nastassja Kinski looks reasonably like a genderflip of her father, Klaus Kinski.
  • Maya Hawke looks a lot like her mother Uma Thurman.
  • Broadway actor Ben Platt and his father, producer Marc Platt.
  • Gary Busey and his son Jake Busey. If those front teeth don't convince you, nothing else will.
  • Father-son comic actors of the famous Wayans family, Damon and Damon, Jr., look eerily alike (albeit the younger Wayans has hair and usually wears a beard/goatee).
  • Whoopi Goldberg and her mother.
  • AC/DC's Stevie Young greatly resembles his uncle Malcolm, whom he briefly replaced while the latter temporarily left the band for health reasons (and later became his permanent replacement when Malcolm retires). Their physical resemblance is such that, at that time, many fans don't even realize that he wasn't Malcolm. It helps that Stevie is only three years younger than Malcolm.
  • The sons of Joseph P. Kennedy (the Kennedy family of American political fame) all had very strong resemblances to one another: Joseph Jr., and John, Robert, and Ted standing together really shows the remarkable resemblance.
  • Anne Boleyn and her daughter Elizabeth I. This is due to the fact that most portraits of Anne Boleyn were painted after her death and based on Elizabeth's features. Still, many noted that Elizabeth inherited her mother's complexion, dark eyes, high cheekbones and face shape.note 
  • Carew Raleigh, the youngest son of Sir Walter Raleigh, looked so much like his father that King James (who ordered Sir Walter be executed) complained that it was like looking at a ghost and refused to restore the rights of blood to him.
  • The Marx Brothers looked almost identical to each other. Out of costume and makeup, the only real way to tell them apart was by their height.

 
Feedback

Video Example(s):

Top

Goku's clone I mean son

Apparently Goten is born already looking like a little Goku. Both Gohan and Goku even lampshades it.

How well does it match the trope?

4.92 (12 votes)

Example of:

Main / GenerationXerox

Media sources:

Report