"Guess where I got my good looks from!"
"Journey to Hill Valley: a place where the gene pool is so shallow, that everyone’s ancestor looks exactly the same as their descendants."
A character's descendant or ancestor is physically identical (or would be, except for small cosmetic changes) to the character himself, and often has the same name. A subsection of Uncanny Family Resemblance. Of course, he might just be his own ancestor.
This is normally the result of budget considerations when casting Time Travel stories, the consequence of having a long-term contract for a star when a show permanently jumps generations for some reason, or an excuse to do an Elseworld story with essentially the same character in a different setting.
If the character and descendant are one and the same, then that's My Grandson, Myself.
Despite the name, the trope is limited to neither males nor grandchildren.
If someone who knew the ancestor (via being a Time Abyss, user of Time Travel or thawed-out Human Popsicle) meets the descendent, they may remark "You haven't changed a bit!" and need to be corrected.
Compare with Visions of Another Self. When it's the life story that's identical, the character is a member of Generation Xerox. If the family surname also remains unchanged for a surprising amount of time, see Ridiculously Long-lived Family Name. This might occur if an actor plays their own grandparent, especially if that actor is also playing themselves. Subtrope of Strong Family Resemblance. Also see Single Line of Descent.
Of course, due to similarities in genetics, this can be compared to a Real Life version of the animation trope Only Six Faces.
Examples subpages:
Other examples:
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Asian Animation
- In Happy Friends, Huo Haha's ancestor Xiao Haha is never explicitly stated to be his grandpa, but the two still resemble each other quite a bit (same head shape, purple robes and purple color schemes in general). One of the main differences between the two is that Xiao Haha has a Wizard Beard and Huo Haha has a Perma-Stubble.
- In Noonbory and the Super 7, Noonbory bears an incredible resemblance to his grandfather, Hanubi, just with a brighter colour scheme and no moustache/tiny hat.
- In Pleasant Goat and Big Big Wolf, Wolffy looks exactly like his grandfather, Yellow Wolf, save for their fur color.
Audio Plays
- A Commander Korshal of the Galyari appears in Big Finish's Bernice Summerfield audio drama The Bone of Contention and the Big Finish Doctor Who audio drama Dreamtime, voiced in both by Steffan Rhodri. The former is set in the 27th century, the latter thousands of years in the future. According to Ahistory, Word of God from Simon A. Forward, who wrote both stories, is that the Galyari aren't that long-lived, but do pass their names on.
Comic Books
- Asterix:
- Asterix and the Class Act: Obelix's family tree consists entirely of "big-boned", red-mustached warriors. The modern-day Obelisc'h, whom the authors meet, even wears a blue-and-white striped jersey, reflecting his ancestor's stripey trousers. In Asterix and the Golden Sickle, however, Obelix has a cousin who is tiny, almost down to Asterix size, and appears rather frail. He still has the characteristic red hair, though.
- Asterix and the Actress introduces the pair's parents, with each father looking exactly like his son except for some wrinkles and white hair and the clothes. Their cloth patterns and colors (and, in Obelix' case, his trademark braids) come from their respective mothers.
- The DCU:
- Batman: Thomas Wayne looks exactly like his son, with the addition of a mustache. And sometimes not even that.
- Booster Gold: Gold's ancestor, Daniel Carter, has not only the same last name but appears nearly identical, despite them being over four hundred years of Carter generations apart. He even manages to have a nearly identical personality, despite all odds. Booster also encounters a First World War soldier who turns out to be Cyrus Lord, an ancestor of ex-JLI manager/sometime supervillain Maxwell Lord. Booster fails to appreciate this at first only because several weeks' beard growth and a bloody great bandage around his head disguise the fact that Cyrus is the spitting image of Max.
- Superman:
- Kal-El looks exactly like his biological father Jor-El, who looked as old as Superman is now when he died.
- The Kents: 19th century Smallville's Sheriff Nathaniel Kent looks exactly like Superman, despite Clark being adopted... and from another planet and species.
- The Krypton Chronicles: Superman and Supergirl research their family's history and discover that Kal-El is all but identical to their distant ancestor Erok-El, who lived ten millennia ago.
- Legion of Super-Heroes: In one issue, the descendants of modern-day Lex Luthor and Mr. Mxyzptlk look identical and have the same abilities as their ancestors, and are discriminated against by society because of what their ancestors did. The Legion and the stories surrounding it take place a thousand years in the future.
- The Three Ages of Superboy: Clark Kent travels to 1876 Missouri and runs into a girl who looks right like Lana Lang. Upon returning to the present day, Clark finds out that she was Lana's great-grandmother Laura Langdon.
- Superboy (1949) #217 introduces Laurel Kent, Clark Kent and Lois Lane's 30th century descendant, which looks almost identical to her 20th century female ancestor.
- Superman's Return to Krypton: Superman goes back in time and attends his biological parents' wedding on Krypton. One of the attendants remarks on his resemblance to Jor-El's father (ergo, Superman's grandfather)
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! - Supergirl's Greatest Challenge: Whizzy looks so much like his very distant ancestor Streaky the Supercat that Supergirl initially mistakes him with Streaky. They even share the same fur color and distinctive yellow lightning bolt marks on their sides.
- Wonder Woman:
- Wonder Woman (1942): In the Golden Age, Wonder Woman's mother Hippolyta resembled her enough that she could disguise herself as her daughter pretty easily. This idea was abandoned in the Silver Age when Hyppolyta suddenly started getting colored as a blonde. But then brought back during the time where she was filling in for a missing Wonder Woman in Wonder Woman (1987).
- On a couple of occasions where Diana's WWII era adventures are considered canon along with more modern day ones, Etta Candy is the name of two identical friends of hers, one of whom was the original leader of the paramilitary group the Holliday Girls during WWII and the other her daughter or other descendant during the modern day. Steve Trevor is generally dealt with by having him become immortal or spending a bunch of time some variety of dead in the interim before the Olympians and Chthonians brought him back.
- Disney Mouse and Duck Comics: Whenever the writers feel to let the story happen in a different time period, the story would usually feature a bunch of ancestors of the present day characters that are more or less identical to the modern versions - down to look, character and often even name (or a similar sounding name when the culture is changed).
- Doctor Who (Titan): After the Doctor and Sarah-Jane have an adventure in the Victorian era with a woman named Athena, she introduces them to her fiance, Naval Surgeon Albert Sullivan, who looks exactly like Naval Surgeon Harry Sullivan.
- Gold Digger (Antarctic Press): An ancient barbarian ancestor of Gina Diggers who looks a lot like her, including circular tattoos around the eyes that look like Gina's big glasses.
- Marvel Universe:
- Captain America:
- Sharon Carter looks identical to Peggy Carter, a hero of World War II and member of the French Resistance. Originally, the two were sisters but were retconned to be aunt and niece to ease timeline issues.
- Two stories feature The American Revolution hero Captain Stephen Rogers, who looks identical to his descendant. In the second story, he briefly wears a costume created by a British loyalist to satirize the American flag.
- Captain America: Hail Hydra! shows the history of Hydra from ancient Mesopotamia to the present day. The head of their immortality research is almost always a bald, bug-eyed man with a permanent Slasher Smile. Word of God is that this is the family line of Dr. Geist, the present-day holder of this position.
- Ms. Marvel: Ms. Marvel (2016) #36 shows a flashback to 1257 focusing on Kamala's ancestor, Kamilah of Samarkand, who's the spitting image of her 21st Century descendant. The sequence also shows counterparts to Kamala's closest friends, such as the Italian knight Sir Brunello (identical to Bruno Carelli, down to an implied crush on Kamilah), Sir Josuah (Josh), and Lady Zoë (Zoe Zimmer); while these aren't stated to actually be their counterparts' ancestors, they look identical to them and share their personalities.
- Wolverine: Logan grows up to look exactly like his biological father Thomas Logan. This was used as a Red Herring in Origin, with readers initially being led to believe that Thomas' other son Dog was the young Wolverine.
- X-Men:
- Jean Grey has an identical 17th-century ancestor, Lady Grey, who was a member of the Hellfire Club. Most of the other ancestors of major characters involved with the club are also identical.
- When Magik and Mirage accidentally visit Ancient Egypt (in the 11th century BC, three millennia before their time), they meet Storm's ancestor, whom they immediately mistake for her descendant. Which is confusing because Storm's maternal family is from Kenya. According to the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe, Storm's maternal family is a line of sorceresses/priestesses descended from a primeval goddess-entity called "the Bright Lady" who is implied to be an incarnation of Gaea the Earth-Goddess. This line is marked by white hair, blue eyes, and bizarre supernatural talents. So in fact, all of Storm's ancestors look alike, and this is justified as a supernatural trait.
- Captain America:
- Nikopol Trilogy: Alcide Nikopol and his son (also named Alcide) look virtually identical, and since the former has spent the last thirty years frozen, they even look like they're the same age.
- Patoruzú: Patoruzu's father, Patoruzek I, looks just like him.
- Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics): In an early, pre-Cerebus Syndrome issue, Sonic is sent back in time to prehistoric Mobius, where he meets prehistoric versions of himself and the Freedom Fighters.
- Tintin: Captain Haddock's 17th-century ancestor Sir Francis Haddock (in the original: Francois, Chevalier de Hadoque) looked exactly like him, except for the longer hair appropriate for the period. He had a similar penchant for drinking and swearing.
- Tomorrow Stories: Cobweb and her sidekick Clarice are descended from priestesses who discovered the secret of parthenogenesis, so they're genetically identical to their ancestors.
Comic Strips
- In the run-up to the Bicentennial, Doonesbury ran comics where Zonker related tales of his Minuteman ancestor Nate Harris, who looked exactly like Zonker in colonial garb.
- Elvie: Elvie's and James' ancestors in the year 1622 look the same as their present-day counterparts.
- Mafalda once found a picture of a little girl very similar to her. She asked her mom about it, and when she answered "that's me" Mafalda asked "why didn't you tell me you used to be my sister?!"
- The Phantom is about 21 generations of identical men with identical personalities. Although it is hard to tell how physically alike they are under the costume aside from build. One story tells of a Phantom who was noticeably shorter and bulkier than the previous Phantoms and had to seriously modify the costume.
- In Garfield, Jon's brother Doc Boy looks exactly the same as their dad, only with slightly more hair. Doc takes offence if this is pointed out; Dad takes offence at Doc taking offence.
Fan Works
- Better Bones AU: Ivypool looks just like her great-great grandfather Redtail, barring them having different coat colors. It unnerves Tigerstar, who killed Redtail, a lot.
- Bitter Repercussions: Sandstorm's son Redkit takes after his grandfather Redtail.
- Blackadder 40K: Tales from the Black Millennium
: The last chapter explains why every Blackadder looks identical: the very first Blackadder was a shaman who used magic to ensure that every time he died, he would reincarnate as the next available descendant, such as a grandson or great-grandson. It also explains the Baldricks: the first Blackadder was the one who came up with the idea of all the shamans collectively commiting suicide and merging into what would become the God-Emperor of Mankind, not to save the world, but so he could steal their jewelry. The Emperor cursed Blackadder into always having a Baldrick to follow him.
- born of hell('s kitchen): Foggy first disbelieves Matt when his friend claims having a seven-year-old son, but immediately changes his mind when he sees the boy — who shares a startling likeness with Jack Murdock.
- Confusion from longing goes with the theory that some Air Nomads escaped the genocide by passing as other ethnicities. Aang notices that Ty Lee is the granddaughter of an Air Nomad friend of his due to their extremely close resemblance.
- "Destiny and Voyager Crossroads": Indirectly features when Voyager crosses into a parallel universe and encounters Destiny. After Destiny crewmember Doctor Lisa Park has her sight restored by the Doctor, the Destiny crew are shocked to "recognise" him as Richard Woolsey. Checking historical records, the Doctor determines that his programmer, Lewis Zimmerman, is a direct descendant of Richard Woolsey's counterpart in his own universe, prompting both crews to be surprised at the coincidence.
- Diaries of a Madman: Cadance is a descendant of Sombra and mentioned to be the spitting image of Sombra's daughter.
- Happy End Of Evangelion: Mai, Shinji and Asuka's little girl, looks right like a red-haired version of her paternal grandmother Yui Ikari.
- Limpet AU:
- In "Driving Lord Vader", Darth Vader reflects on how Jaina looks almost identical to her great-grandmother Shmi.
- In a more metaphysical sense, Vader's and Luke's Force signatures are so similar to one another that it took some time for Luke's infant son to realize that his father and grandfather are, in fact, different people.
- Meg's Family Series has Chris and Jillian's twins Tilly and C.J., the former taking after her mother aside from being brunette (Though Family reveals that Jillian is actually a natural brunette) and the latter taking after Chris (The narration even notes that he even sounds like Chris but higher pitched).
- My Little Pony: Nine Elements: Pinkie's Granny Pie is revealed to look like an elderly version of Pinkie Pie herself. And even shared her ability to play several instruments at once (which Pinkie may have very well learned from her) and is considered an eccentric as well.
- Naru-Hina Chronicles: A flashback in Chapter 127 reveals that Hashirama Senju, the First Hokage, gave a mission to find new jutsu to Chihaya Namikaze, who was Minato's great-grandfather (and thus Naruto's great-great-grandfather). Said flashback shows that he looked an awful lot like Minato and Naruto. Also, Chihaya did that mission alongside a woman named Masuyo Hyuga, who looked identical to Naruto's lover Hinata Hyuga.
- Not Another Alicorn: Aside from messier hair and a slightly different cutie mark, Rainbow Dash is completely identical to her very distant grandmother Aurora, to the point where Luna briefly thinks she is Aurora come again. And she's right, since Rainbow is Aurora reincarnated.
- Operation Epic Beer Run, a The Martian fic: Dr. Beck tells a story from his med school days and notes that one of the uncles he mentions in the story is often mistaken for his father since they look so much alike. It's never explicitly stated but strongly implied that this uncle is Bucky Barnes under a cover identity.
- Pokémon Reset Bloodlines: Used for a major revelation in Chapter 24. Giovanni visits Felgrand in his cell and shows him a photo of Belladonna. After giving her a good look, he's left in shock at her resemblance to his mother Heratia (whom he and his brothers killed years ago), enraging him to see that one of his brothers broke their pact of never having children.
- Principal Celestia's Family Reunion: This is the basis of the story. Every member of Celestia and Luna's family looks like Celestia and Luna and has for fifteen generations, which is how there can be mortal human counterparts to the immortal alicorn rulers.
- Shard: When he first meets Pyrrha, Aero notices she looks very similar to Quinn, a friend of his from Totum, and asks if she has an ancestor by that name. Pyrrha doesn't know.
- Storm on the Horizon: Elisabet Sobeck, and by extension Aloy, was Chloe Price's daughter. Aloy's resemblance to Chloe, especially in her voice, is Max's first clue as to who Aloy really is.
- The Story of Silver Ketchum:
- Silver looks a lot like her great-grandfather Ash.
- Stoney is the spitting image of Brock and has his same personality as well.
- Tekka Dread: Ukyo XVII and Xian Pu are said to the spitting images of Ukyo Kuonji and Shampoo, the girls who could have been Ranma's fiances if he didn't get engulfed in the Tekkapod.
- Tunnel Vision, a Kim Possible fic:
- Kim and Ron travel through various different time periods as a result of a malfunctioning time-travel experiment. When they arrive in the time of the Revolutionary War, they encounter Kim's distant ancestor General Zim Possible, who looks almost exactly like Kim's father James (Zim's great-plus grandson), and his daughter Pim Possible apparently looks exactly like Kim herself (although Pim does not appear in the fic herself). They also run into the ancestors of Bonnie, Drakken and Shego in that time period.
- The spin-off AU Bridging the Gap (which depicts Kim and Ron being stuck in the past between 1903 and 1909) includes Kim and Ron encountering Kim's great-great aunt Mim Possible ("Rewriting History"), who initially mistakes Ron for her old friend Jon Stoppable while Ron assumes that Mim is Kim until they each clarify the other's identity.
- Unexpected Surprise: The main plot is kicked off when Adrien returns to Paris and finds a girl with Marinette's freckles... and his mother's face.
- The Wizarding Prince of Twilight: Maeglin utterly fails at remaining incognito at the Gap since he's basically a smaller, younger version of his grandfather Fingolfin, the High King of the Noldor Elves. There's also a gender inversion with Celegorm who suffered a great deal of grief for being a male version of his grandmother Miriel, as he's the only child among Fëanor's offspring to inherit her white hair and ethereal beauty.
Films — Animation
- In Pixar's Coco, Miguel Rivera's straight-parted and messy bangs, beauty mark, and dimple makes him resemble his great-great-grandfather. It's Foreshadowing that it's Héctor who is Miguel's true great-great-grandfather, not Ernesto de la Cruz, who has curled bangs and slicked back hair. This also is a subtle plot point — this was how Coco was able to remember Héctor all these years, because her great-grandson reminded her of her father.
- Abuela Alma Madrigal from Disney's Encanto very much resembles many of her children and grandchildren when she was younger.
- As revealed in Hey Arnold! The Movie, Alphonse Perrier du von Scheck looks just like his ancestor Archibald von Scheck, only that the latter has a wig.
- In Moana, Chief Tui looks just like his ancestor Matai Vasa, only with a bulkier physique.
- In Turning Red, Grandma Wu has a very strong resemblance to her ancestress Sun Yee, at least when in human form.
- Cattrick Lynxley from Zootopia 2 looks a lot like his ancestor Ebenezer Lynxley.
Literature
- The 39 Clues: Apparently, Hope Cahill is nearly identical to her ancestor, Madeleine Cahill—who lived several hundred years before Hope.
- Heralds of Valdemar: A character comments that "The Ashkevron family look tends to breed true, and when it doesn't the poor thing generally runs off to Haven." On one occasion a young woman of that family shows up at the capital and identifies an aunt she had never even met with "You must be Savil, you have the nose."
- A Brother's Price: Jerin resembles his grandfather enough to prove that they're related. Apparently, that's where Jerin gets his good looks from.
- Aubrey-Maturin: Sam Panda, Jack Aubrey's illegitimate black son, is described as "the spit, the counterpart, the image of Jack Aubrey with some twenty years and several stone taken off, done in shining ebony," although their noses are mentioned as being different. It's enough so that everyone immediately realizes who he is.
- The Baby-Sitters Club: One of the later books has Claudia thinking she might be adopted due to some flimsy circumstantial evidence. When she finally talks to her parents about it, they assure her that she's not - and as proof, they show her old photographs of her beloved grandmother Mimi, who looked exactly like Claudia when she was young.
- Beware of Chicken: Bi De notices when viewing the memories in the ancient crystal that the current younger generation of Azure Hills cultivators bear an uncanny resemblance to their ancestors who were the companions of Tianlan Shan's previous Connected One Xiaoshi and founders of their sects. As they are all tied to Tianlan and the circumstances of her rise and fall, this may not be a coincidence but instead the work of fate or the heavens.
- Caraval: Caraval has an identical granddaughter. Tella is described as having a round face with honey-blonde hair. This is exactly how their grandmother is said to have looked when she was young.
- Fletch: Carioca, Fletch: Fletch travels to Brazil, where he uncannily resembles a light-skinned Brazilian who was murdered decades before. All except Fletch believe he is the reincarnation, including the murderer, who tries again. Fletch even dreams of characters of Brazilian mythology he had not known about.
- The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids has a non-human example with Li'l Thymon, the young Adorable Abomination, who looks just like a kid version of his uncle Lord Thymon (except green instead of blue).
- The Case of Charles Dexter Ward: Charles notices his uncanny resemblance to the portraits of his sorcerous ancestor, Joseph Curwen, who apparently cast a spell that ensured one of his descendants would look like him, inherit his knowledge, and be compelled to resurrect him. Shorty after Curwen has been resurrected by Ward, the sorcerer kills the young man, and proceeds to masquerade as him.
- The Changing Land: The resurrected priestess Semirama helps the protagonist because he happens to be the spitting image of his ancestor, who was her lover.
- Coldfire Trilogy: After selling his soul for undead immortality, the Hunter dropped in on his family every so often, killing all of them except the one who looked most like him. (Vanity being one of his defining character traits.) Fast-forward nine hundred years or and you have descendants who still look exactly like him. Possibly helped along by the fact that the ambient wild magic is more than capable of warping genetics.
- In the fifth Diary of a Wimpy Kid book, we meet Greg's second cousin once removed who looked exactly like Greg when he was the latter's age.
- Doctor Who Expanded Universe:
- The Past Doctor Adventures novel The Eleventh Tiger teases the idea that Ian Chesterton has crossed his own timestream as the amnesiac Major Chesterton, before revealing the Major is actually Ian's Identical Great-Great-Grandfather.
- And in the Eighth Doctor Adventures book The Taint, Fitz's great-grandfather's Obliviously Evil twin is recognizably similar to Fitz himself: same long nose, straggly hair, and thin face and build. Fitz keeps finding him "infuriatingly familiar", quite possibly because he's looking at an older (but not that much, for some reason) version of the same face he shaves (or not) every morning. Also, unsettlingly, he has moments of acting like a Psychopathic Manchild version of Fitz.
- Doctor Who Novelisations
- The novelisation of The Massacre says that Anne Chaplet and her presumed descendent Dodo looked "identical". This is not the case in the TV version, although the actresses do look very similar.
- The novelisation of The Star Beast adds a scene at the start with a cleaner named Stew Ferguson, who thinks he vaguely recognises the Fourteenth Doctor from the time all those planets appeared in the sky, when he was working as a milkman. This presumably means that he's the milkman who met the Tenth Doctor during "The Stolen Earth", played by Andrew Bullivant. When he sees the TARDIS it reminds him of his grandad, who was a policeman in the fifties. Buillivant also played PC Ferguson in the The Sarah Jane Adventures episode "The Temptation of Sarah Jane Smith".
- Exaggerated in Noel B. Gerson's Double Vision. Not only do Ron and his 18th-century ancestor Sir Ronald Bentley look startlingly similar, right down to identical birthmarks, but Ron's wife Candace resembles Sir Ronald's mistress Candace Pemberton and Ron's childhood girlfriend Millie St. John resembles Sir Ronald's wife Millicent.
- Dune: Miles Teg is noted for his resemblance to his millennia-dead ancestor Duke Leto Atreides I. The character himself has noted that he has found looking at portraits of Leto I to be like looking into a mirror. Being a servant of the Bene Gesserit, Miles' resemblance was deliberately bred in.
- Discworld: Eric: Rincewind (and his demonology hacker companion) travels back to a fantasy counterpart of the Trojan War, where he meets a sensibly devious adventurer named Lavaeolus. He does not realize the relationship until later but notes that Lavaeolus looks very handsome. It is implied that Lav is an ancestor of Rincewind's (and in Dog Latin it is revealed that Lavaeolus means "rinser of winds"). Unfortunately, the illustrations don't reflect this.
- Subverted in Everything Is Illuminated, in which every time the statue of the ancestor needs a touch-up, it is made to look like the current male heir.
- Used as the basis of Robert Sheckley's story "Double Indemnity": a man time-travels to the past to find his ancestor, since said ancestor looks almost exactly like him, which would allow him to pose as the man's time-travel mishap-born clone (for sake of an insurance scam). Apparently, the man's criteria for choosing the right ancestor was simply "someone who would not be missed", and the only reason he rejects several candidates is that they happen to have acquired differences (missing an arm, covered with pox) — implying that every single one of his ancestors is identical.
- Father Brown:
- "The Doom of the Darnaways": Chesterton subverts the trope: Father Brown concludes that the painting of the ancestor was a fraud, being a painting of the heir so that he would appear to have such a resemblance to the ancestor.
- "The Worst Crime in the World": Sir John Musgrave and his son Captain James Musgrave share a family resemblance strong enough that the son can kill his father and impersonate him by shaving his beard and wearing a wig.
- In the Forgotten Realms Sembia novels, there are two characters named Shamur Karn, great-aunt and great-neice, who look so similar that when the elder Shamur, aged 27, was sent forward in time fifty years to when the younger one had died at around the same age, the family decided to just have her take her great-niece's place. Nobody noticed, including her fiance (although it was an Arranged Marriage).
- Garrett, P.I.: Gilded Latten Bones: A suspect's sketch is recognized to be identical to a man forty years dead. Subverted, as it turns out to be the original man, who'd been Faking the Dead and using age-reversal magic.
- Harry Potter:
- Harry is noted for his resemblance to his father but with his mother's eyes. Later subverted when we get a detailed picture of what James Potter actually looked like at Harry's age; the resemblance is strong enough that they could be mistaken for one another at a distance or from behind, but stood side by side it would be fairly obvious which was which even without the eye-color difference.
- Albus Potter turns out to be the spitting image of Harry, green eyes and all.
- The Heroes of Olympus: Leo is the spitting image of his great grandfather Sammy, Hazel Levesque's best friend and crush in the 1940s
- The History of the Galaxy: John Mitchell St. Ivo looks almost exactly like his great-grandfather Erlik St. Ivo, the founder of Galactic Cybersystems thanks to several generations of inbreeding starting with Erlik himself, who married his cousin Liza in order to maintain the secrecy of the company (whose headquarters and automated production lines were located on a remote, uninhabited world). Erlik and Liza had a son and a daughter, whose DNA they modified so they weren't genetically related, allowing the children to continue the line. Apparently, the fact that they still had the same parents and were raised as brother and sister didn't create any issues. This continued until the birth of André St. Ivo, whose intelligence was far below normal. Realizing a fresh "infusion" of blood was necessary to keep the family (and the business) going, André's parents didn't have a second child, forcing him to look for a bride on other worlds. André ended up marrying Theia Mitchell, who wound up effectively running Galactic Cybersystems and gave birth to two healthy sons: Aramant (who looked exactly like André) and John. André, jealous of Theia, has her shot and then her almost-dead body turned into a bio-doll for his pleasure. Meanwhile, Aramant is groomed as André's successor, while John grows up in an Idle Rich lifestyle. One day, Aramant finds out the truth about his mother, who was kept in stasis while André wasn't using her body and tries to wake her. Thanks to his resemblance to his father, he is killed by Theia who manages to break her mental conditioning who doesn't know how much time has passed. John ends up mortally wounded by André's robots and has his mind copied onto an android, who was modeled on Erlik St. Ivo. Given that John looks like Erlik, this turns out to be a happy coincidence.
- In The Hound of the Baskervilles, Jack Stapleton looks exactly like his ancestor, Hugo Baskerville, except without "the broad plumed hat, the curling love-locks, [and] the white lace collar."
- The title character of The Indigo Series mistakes Veness for Fenran at first glance. And then falls for him on his own virtues. Meaning, that he dies.
- Ishtar, The Heroine of the Kadingir saga, is an exact copy of her grandmother Nirgal, which every character she comes across makes sure to point out.
- In Robert E. Howard's "Kings of the Night", Bran Mak Morn looks so much like his ancestor Brule that Kull takes him for him. Despite a few intervening millennia.
- In the Liaden Universe, when Miri Robertson goes to the home of her long lost family, a portrait of her grandmother Miri Tiazan reveals that she's a dead ringer for the original. It actually takes her a moment to realize that it isn't a mirror.
- In one of the appendices of The Lord of the Rings, it's mentioned that the Longbeard dwarves will sometimes produce an heir who resembles their original ancestor Durin so much that they not only name him Durin but believe that he is the same Durin, returned to them. Up to Durin VII are recorded as Kings of Durin's Folk, it's unclear if this practice is maintained outside of the direct line of succession.
- Arwen is said to be extremely similar to her great-great-grandmother, Luthien Tinuviel. Overlaps with Generation Xerox as both women choose to relinquish their immortality for love of a mortal man.
- The Lost Prince: The Lost Prince's present-day descendant bears a striking resemblance to the surviving portrait of his distinguished ancestor considering the number of intervening generations. Many Samavians choose to take this as a sign that the Lost Prince has been reincarnated to return in person, which makes as much sense as any other explanation.
- The protagonist in The Misenchanted Sword by Lawrence Watt-Evans realizes that there will be problems when he starts not dying, so he writes a will, heads off for adventure, "dies," and returns as the "relative named in the will."
- Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children: Jacob looks much like his grandfather Abraham did at his age. They are not identical, but Miss Peregrine remarks on the similarities, and it's enough to make Emma's crush on Jacob at least a little creepy.
- The line of Berethnet queens in The Priory of the Orange Tree stretches back centuries, but one character walking the portrait gallery says that the thirty-six queens from the first to the latest could all be sisters from their looks. This, coupled with the fact that the queens always give birth to one child and that child is always a girl, reinforces the belief that line is blessed by Galian the Saint (although others whisper that it hints of sorcery). It is actually because they are descended from Kalyba the enchantress, who used Cleolind's guise to marry Galian.
- In Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey, the Thorpes describe Catherine as the image of her brother, whom they know. Catherine, on the other hand, expects Henry and Eleanor's mother's portrait to look very like one or the other of them, from reading novels in which a portrait looks as much like the child as the mother, and finds it not very close at all.
- Överenskommelser: Beatrice Löwenström has obviously inherited both her appearance and her personality from her paternal grandmother. The resemblance is mentioned no less than four times.
- Lampshaded in The Pendragon Adventure. A young minor character that Bobby Pendragon and friends meet in 1937 is still alive in the present. In order to explain why they haven't aged at all, Bobby's friend Gunny tells him that they're the grandsons of the people he met in 1937.
- The Pillars of the Earth: Jack looks enough like his own father to be mistaken for his father's ghost when he inadvertently visits his father's old home town.
- Septimus Heap: Physik: Jenna is often confused with her distant ancestor Esmeralda.
- Space Brat: In the climax of book 4, the Dips raise the statue of their Lost Lord of Silliness out of the ground, and find that it's not just a statue of a Poodnoobie like they'd thought — the real Lord of Silliness is the Dip riding on it, who looks identical to Gumbo, one of the supporting Dips throughout the book (and whom the others quickly assume is the Lord of Silliness). Blork quickly figures out that it has to be her many-times removed great-grandfather, but he doesn't tell the Dips that.
- In The Stone Prince, Demnor is this to his great-uncle, causing his grandfather and mother to distrust him because they consider the uncle to have been weak.
- The Vampire Chronicles: Jessica Reeves is said to bear a striking resemblance to her distant ancestress Maharet, despite them being six thousand years apart.
- Welkin Weasels: Sylver's descendants all bear his lightning-bolt birthmark. Mawk and Scirf's descendants Maudlin and Scruff apparently fall under this trope as well, as Monty is able to instantly guess exactly which members of the outlaw band were their ancestors.
Music
- Gloryhammer's hero Angus McFife from the first album, played by singer Thomas Winkler, is succeeded in the next two albums by his descendant Angus McFife XIII, played by Thomas Winkler. Then the trope seems to be averted with Angus McFife V in "Fly Away" when Winkler is replaced as both singer and McFife by Sozos Michael. But then Michael also appears as Angus McFife I in the video for "The Holy Flaming Hammer of Unholy Cosmic Frost" (before continuing as Angus McFife II for the rest of the album), meaning the first Angus has been performed by both Winkler and Michael, and the other Anguses all appear looking like either one or the other, so maybe story-wise, they all look the same after all.
Podcasts
- The Are You Afraid of the Dark Universe? pitch for a Frankenstein (1931) remake includes Igor Waldman, hypothetically played by David Dastmalchian. The Dark Universe Holiday Special a few years later introduces Ygor Waldman, Igor's descendant who works at the modern day Frankenstein estate and is also (hypothetically) played by Dastmalchian.
Print Media
- A 1989 issue of Radio Times commemorated the bicentennial of The French Revolution with an 'Allo 'Allo! story about an ancestor of Rene who was involved in the revolution as reluctantly as Rene himself was involved in La Résistance. This was illustrated with caricatures of Rene's actor, Gorden Kaye, in period costume.
Pro Wrestling
- Newling to Yinling, who was eventually killed off in Fighting Opera Hustle.
Theatre
- In Allegiance (2012), the modern-day version of the protagonist (who appears only in the first and last scenes) is played by the same actor who plays the protagonist's grandfather during the rest of the show (which is a flashback to the 1940s).
- Reversed, but essentially the same: In a (frequently cut) scene from the final act of Angels in America, Prior meets the spirit of Louis' grandmother Sarah, whose funeral was one of the first scenes in the show. Kushner specifically states in the published script that Sarah is to be played by the actor who plays Louis, though obviously in some kind of costume and makeup.
- The action of Arcadia is set in both the early nineteenth and late twentieth centuries. When the play is staged, the same actor is used to play Augustus, a character from the nineteenth century, and Gus, from the twentieth. It's not explicitly stated that the latter is directly descended from the former, but they are certainly related. (There is also a possibility that they are intended to actually be the same character.)
- In the original stage version of Auntie Mame the actor who plays young Patrick Dennis for the first half of the show reappears as adult Patrick's son in the final scene.
- The play Coram Boy has two actors playing one character, Alexander Ashbrooke—one is a girl who plays him as a young man, and in the first act it switches in a brilliant piece of staging to being a man that plays him. The actress who played Alexander as a young man returns in the second act as his son, Aaron.
- In Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, the young version of Hermione is played by the same actor as her daughter Rose. Scorpius even mistakes her for Rose.
- In the 1960 telecast of Peter Pan (1954), in the epilogue, Wendy's daughter Jane is played by the same actress who played the child Wendy through most of the production, while the adult Wendy is played by a Time Shifted Actress. Averted in the revival that was telecast in 2000, however, where the same young adult actress plays Wendy both as a child and as a woman, just with a more mature hairstyle and Glasses of Aging in the epilogue, while Jane is played by a separate actress.
- Most productions of Show Boat which don't outright cut the Eleven O'Clock Number will have it performed by the same actress playing Magnolia in the person of her daughter Kim. (Kim also appears earlier as a child, and in the final tableau as an extra turned away from the audience.)
- Sunday in the Park with George has a double whammy: the actors who play painter Georges Seurat and his fictional mistress Dot in Act I play Georges and Dot's daughter Marie (in old lady makeup) and Marie's grandson George in Act II. The rest of the cast plays new roles, too, but that's more a matter of economy.
- The adult narrator in the Framing Device of The Ocean at the End of the Lane is played by the same actor as his father in the flashback.
Visual Novels
- Choices: Stories You Play tends to reuse assets across books. One of the earliest examples is Zenobia and Olivia Nevrakis from The Crown & the Flame and The Royal Romance respectively. Many of the characters from the Interquel The Royal Masquerade resemble their ancestors in the former story and their descendants in the latter.
- Kori, from Time Hollow, ends up in a relationship with the protagonist's uncle, after sending him back through time to save her from certain death. In the present day, after the credits, we meet a girl who looks exactly like Kori, implied to be her daughter.
- The Great Ace Attorney, a Spin-Off series of the Ace Attorney franchise that's set in the beginning of the 20th century, has two cases of this.
- The protagonist of the Spin-Off Ryunosuke Naruhodo is the ancestor of Phoenix Wright (Ryuichi Naruhodo in Japan), as can be told since Ryunosuke looks like Phoenix, only lacking the latter's Anime Hair and Unusual Eyebrows, as shown in this offical art◊ for comparison.
- Similarly, the first rival prosecutor of the Spin-Off, Taketsuchi Auchi◊, is the ancestor of main series prosecutors Winston Payne◊(Takefumi Auchi) and Gaspen Payne◊(Fumitake Auchi).
- The protagonist of the Spin-Off Ryunosuke Naruhodo is the ancestor of Phoenix Wright (Ryuichi Naruhodo in Japan), as can be told since Ryunosuke looks like Phoenix, only lacking the latter's Anime Hair and Unusual Eyebrows, as shown in this offical art
- In Umineko: When They Cry, Genji remarks that Battler looks a lot like Kinzo used to back when he was young. He is not wrong◊. This is taken further when Battler's hair turns white in Twilight of the Golden Witch and he cuts it short, taking the "damn-near" out of damn-near identical.
Web Animation
- In Deadly Space Action!, Gregarion the Sea Barbarian is either an identical ancestor or an Identical Stranger to Lemarion the Space Barbarian.
- Etra chan saw it!: Sometimes the parent and their child are portrayed by the same actor of their respective ages.
- In this episode, Karin and her aunt (also Karin) are identical to each other. It also serves as a plot point as Hiiragi is creepily obsessed with his sister before going after Karin as well, for having an identical appearance to her aunt.
- In one episode, Karin's sister is Yuri, their mother is also Yuri, and Yuri's twin daughters are also Yuri.
- In this episode
- Vic and Vic Jr. (who was multiple generations removed) in Red vs. Blue use identical models and voice actors. This is played for laughs more than anything else. Later seasons strongly imply that not only was Vic Jr. actually just Vic being deceptive, but that Vic wasn't even human. Later confirmed that VIC is an AI created to oversee the simulation troopers. He was originally serious and businesslike, until Agent Florida (a.k.a. Captain Butch Flowers) accidentally knocked out his power cable, resulting in data corruption and personality changes.
Webcomics
- In the sprite comic 194X, Kalinka and Ran strongly resemble their WWII-era ancestors. It's hard to decide whether the fact that Ran is a robot makes this better or worse.
- In Dragon City, Erin and Beatrix look like blue and green versions of their father Sam (respectively, though Trixie turns out to actually be his granddaughter), and Jonas looks like a red version of their mother Rachel. Rachel and her sister Sarah look like their mother, too.
- In The Dreamer, 21st—century Bea and 18th—century Bea look exactly the same.
- In El Goonish Shive, we are told Nanase is the spitting image of her Aunt Noriko, and while when Noriko was finally seen they weren't exactly identical, they do genuinely look very similar, aside from Noriko's facial scar that she hed been hiding.
- In Endstone, Jon comments on how uncanny it is, the way his daughter resembles his mother.
- In Erma when visiting the Yōkai side of the family, everyone comments how the titular Erma is identical to her Stringy-Haired Ghost Girl mother, Emiko, when she was younger.
- In Erstwhile, the princess is the image of her dead mother. This is Not A Good Thing.
- Tarvek Sturmvarous in Girl Genius apparently looks so much like his father did at his age that the Time Abyss Big Bad initially thinks he is the same person.
- In Gourmet Hound, Chef Palmier briefly mistakes Lucy for her grandmother Lynn.
- Gunnerkrigg Court's Antimony and her mother. There's a very good reason for this.
- Homestuck: Averted. All of the characters involved in an SBURB session have a parent or ancestor who resembles them, and troll culture (due to Bizarre Alien Reproduction making tracing lineage impossible) even has characters latch on to historical figures who share the most physical features, calling those "ancestors", but it's rare for them to be identical. Quite a feat, considering the limited art style. Interestingly, the one person who does subscribe to this trope is Dad: he looks like a less hairy version of his grandfather by adoption, Colonel Sassacre.
- Irregular Webcomic!'s Ishmael's grandfather is identical to him. Same with the Mythbusters. Well, kinda. They're actually each other's grandfathers, thanks to abuse of the My Own Grandpa trope, and therefore their own great-great grandfathers. The grandfathers we see turn out to be unrelated to the Mythbusters at all.
- In Jix, Lauren's daughter, Alice, in flashforwards look like a young version of Lauren.
- Coney Dewclaw, the carnivorous rabbit in Kevin & Kell, looks exactly like her grandmother Dorothy Kindle did when she was Coney's age. Unfortunately for Coney, that includes her height, meaning she's the shortest of her peer group once they start hitting their growth spurts. When Coney does get a growth spurt, it's only in her ears, which causes them to flop over...which just makes the resemblance to Dorothy even more uncanny. The only obvious difference is that, while Coney is a blonde, Dorothy has been depicted in flashbacks as a brunette before her hair turned white.
Coney: I wondered at what point I'd start to look like my grandmother...
- In Narbonic, versions of Helen, Dave, and Mell appear each generation. Partly justified as the Helens are cloning themselves, which becomes a plot point during a Mental Time Travel arc when Dave mistakes Helen's mother for her daughter.
- The Order of the Stick: Elan and Nale's father is depicted exactly like his sons, only with gray hair due to age, and brown hair in flashbacks (though it is hard to tell).
- Ozy and Millie: Most of Ozy's adoptive ancestors that Llewellyn tells stories about appear highly similar to Llewellyn. Possibly justified in that Llewellyn may or may not be making them up.
- The time travel storyline of PvP includes a presumed ancestor of Max Powers who looks and behaves just like him. Modern technology was invisible to medieval Max just as Skull was (until recently) invisible to modern Max.
- Lampshaded in Questionable Content with Marten's dad, who strongly resembles him except for the hair, though that's in part due to Generic Cuteness. Upon meeting Mr. Reed, Dora exclaims "You're going to be so hot when you go gray!"
- The protagonist of Quentyn Quinn, Space Ranger is a distant descendant of the hero of Tales of the Questor and looks almost the same (even has the same white forelock). Though he does seem a little older and more experienced.
- In the Walkyverse and Dumbing of Age, Joe's father Richard looks exactly like him with a beard. (In Shortpacked!, Joe grows a beard and Richard's goes grey.) Ethan's father in Dumbing of Age also looks exactly like him with a moustache. Most other characters have a strong resemblance to their parents, but aren't identical, since Willis's preferred method is Patchwork Kids.
- In The Wretched Ones, the trope spans 3 generations as John, his father David, and their ancestor Nicholas all look strikingly similar (at least, David in his youth). This goes for Charlie and his father as well.
Web Original
- Due to a narrow selection of male partners, the mother of Dee from Tales of MU is the spitting image of her great-great-grandmother, the family's current matriarch. Not one to waste an opportunity, the matriarch uses her descendant as assassin bait.
Web Videos
- Subverted in Le Visiteur du Futur: Raph tries to prevent the ancestor of the Visitor from meeting the mother of his future child. After revealing that he is the Visitor posing as his ancestor, he tells Raph: "You thought my ancestor had the same face as me? That's completely dumb."
- In "The Descendents of Pompeii," an official Doctor Who webcast, Maxine and her daughter Evie are played by Tracy Childs and Fransesca Fowler, who played Metella and Evelina in "The Fires of Pompeii". Their family also has a strong Generation Xerox element to it, with the same professions recurring.
