Motherly Scientist: Difference between revisions

Most of the time, the plot starts with a [[Mad Scientist|brilliant doctor]] participating in an Evil Experiment on [[Tested On Humans|human test subjects]], most of them young children (and perhaps an older [[Peter Pan|Wendy]]) or students in a [[School for Scheming|conveniently-placed high school]]. Everything, of course, [[For Science!|in the name of Science]], or [[Utopia Justifies the Means|for the Greater Good]]. It could also happen that the doctor in question [[Unwitting Pawn|was deceived]] or coerced into performing said experiment - or maybe she just was hired to [[High Turnover Rate|keep the kids quiet]].

Sooner or later, an experiment goes [[Gone Horribly Wrong|horribly wrong]] (or [[Gone Horribly Right|horribly right]]), or the truth is [[The Reveal|finally revealed]], making the doctor [[Heel Realization|realize]] [[My God, What Have I Done?|the error of her ways]]. After rescuing them, she decides to become the test subjects' adoptive mother, forming a [[Secret Project Refugee Family]] and living [[Happily Ever After]].

In other cases, she just feels responsible for the guys now that they've grown up - or maybe there's some [[Earn Your Happy Ending|pending business to finish]] so she can [[Redemption Quest|redeem herself]] and move on with her life. And if you think a normal [[Mama Bear]] or [[Papa Wolf]] is fucking scary, Hell Hath No Fury like a Motherly/Fatherly Scientist with access to [[One -Man Army]] levels of weaponry, technology, money, or superpowers to protect his or her children.

# If the doctor's an expert in genetics, [[Gadgeteer Genius|cybernetics]], arcane magic, or alchemy, the plot starts when she creates [[FrankensteinsFrankenstein's Monster|a new life form]] or [[Artificial Intelligence]] with a [[Ridiculously Human Robots|ridiculously human]] body. The young child then begins to [[What Is This Thing You Call Love?|develop emotions]] [[Heartwarming Orphan|in such a way]] that the doctor's heart's is moved into raising the child as her own. In this scenario, it's common that the doctor serves as parent, [[Pinocchio Syndrome|psychologist and physicist]] for the [[Robot Kid]] who wants to [[Become a Real Boy]].<br /><br />The extremely rare inversion of this trope happens when the A.I. ''becomes'' the adoptive mother. Usually happens with a supercomputer storing [[Virtual Ghost|mommy's memories]].

If a scientist just happens to be a nice parent, this trope doesn't apply (see [[Mad Scientists Beautiful Daughter|Mad Scientist's Beautiful Daughter]]) unless her child was genetically engineered and carried inside her own womb or experimentally [[No Transhumanism Allowed|transformed into something else]].

Tend to overlap -- depending on the circumstances -- with [[Mad Scientist]] or [[Reluctant Mad Scientist]], [[Psychologist Teacher]], [[Kindly Vet]], [[Team Mom]] / [[Team Dad]], [[Mama Bear]] / [[Papa Wolf]], and in some extreme cases, [[Anti -Villain]].

{{examples|Examples:}}

* {{spoiler|Professor Harumi Kiyama}} from ''[[To Aru Kagaku no Railgun (Manga)|To Aru Kagaku no Railgun]]'' was originally an uninterested scientist left with the job of watching over a group of esper orphans, only to gradually start caring for them like a mother. {{spoiler|Then things go horribly wrong when the dangerous experiment they were a part of (which Harumi had been told was something safe) sends them all into comas, to Harumi's shock and her boss's utter indifference. With a corrupt administration refusing to help the students and instead covering up the incident, Harumi takes [[Well -Intentioned Extremist|desperate measures]] trying to find a cure.}}

* In ''[[Awakenings]]'', Robin Williams plays a research physician who uses an experimental drug to "awaken" the catatonic victims of a rare disease, becoming friends with many in the process, including Robert De Niro's character who had fallen into catatonia as a child. [[Based Onon a True Story]].

* ''[[Splice]]'' features Elsa starting out as Pinocchio Type 2 and Clive as the Free Willy type. Unfortunately for everyone involved, {{spoiler|Elsa [[In the Blood|has]] [[My Beloved Smother]] tendencies and Clive has a bad case of [[I'm a Man, I Can't Help It]].}}

* Leo Graf in [[Lois McMaster Bujold]]'s Falling Free is a Fatherly Scientist to the [[What Measure Is a Non -Human?|Quaddies]]. In the [[Vorkosigan Saga]] set decades (centuries?) after his death, he's a folk hero to their descendants.

* Dr. Brigid Tenenbaum from ''[[Bio Shock]]'' is the creator and protector of the Little Sisters, though she started off as an [[Evilutionary Biologist]] doing it [[For Science!]] before becoming [[The Atoner]].

* Dr. Light from the ''[[Mega Man (Video Game)|Mega Man]]'' series, especially in the ''[[Mega Man Megamix]]'' manga, where he tries to be a [[Papa Wolf]], even though there's really not much an old man can do against powerful robots or the government except provide tech support. He's still doing that for ''[[Mega Man X (Video Game)|Mega Man X]]'' a hundred years later, in the form of [[Infinity Plus One+1 Sword|Infinity Plus One Armors]].

** From the same series, Melody is the [[Mad ScientistsScientist's Beautiful Daughter|beautiful robotic daughter]] of a Fatherly Scientist.

* On ''[[Invader Zim]],'' [[Word of God]] says [[For Science!|Professor Membrane]]'s "son" [[Hero Antagonist|Dib]] was originally created as some sort of experiment ([[Fanon|possibly a clone]], since the two look alike).