The Five Most Competent Fictional Fathers

Dads tend to get a bad rap in fiction. Admittedly, it's for entirely justifiable reasons; all those scumbags and conmen and absentees and abusers and failures who appear in both pivotal and transient capacities across a voluminous body of creative works had their gestation, somewhat horrifyingly, in someone's paternal progenitor, somewhere.

But it's Father's Day, so let's not focus on the negatives. My old man would never forgive me if I did, and I don't know that I can handle that kind of guilt today.

5. Homer Simpson, The Simpsons

I know what you're thinking – one item in and I've already forgotten what “competent” means. Yes, Homer Jay Simpson is an incredibly flawed man, and the dark side of his parenting – the functional alcoholism, the child strangulation, occasionally thinking he has a child named Magaggie – shouldn't be ignored or treated too lightly. A lot of Homer's issues can be traced back to his own poorly supervised childhood, but, while not an excuse, that does nothing to diminish how much he cares about, and does for, his kids.

A man willing to walk up a mountain for his kid is a man who gives a shit.

He taught Bart the rules of the playground and how to shave, and tries to foster the boy's street smarts over his book smarts. But he doesn't begrudge Lisa's intelligence – he's proud of her and encourages her interests and views, even if he disagrees with or doesn't understand them. His apparently neglectful approach to Maggie is often played for laughs, but show me someone who doesn't tear up at the “DO IT FOR HER” photo collage at Homer's workstation and I'll show you someone who is probably dead inside. He even took a baptism bullet to spare his kids a fate as Flanderses – don't tell me he's not a committed parent.

That's love, people.

4. Henry Spencer, Psych

If there is any dad on this list who typifies the idea of tough love, it's Henry Spencer. In the hopes that his young son, Shawn, would follow in his policeman footsteps, Henry refined Shawn's exceptional mental abilities from a young age and taught him important life skills, like how to break out of the boot of a car. By, uh, locking him in the boot of a car.

“Dad? Thank god. I can't remember your lesson about sex dungeons.”

I realise how insane that sounds, but understand that all that militaristic training came in handy for the adult Shawn in his career as a (fake) psychic detective. A career that Henry not only takes some measure of pride in – Shawn's essentially what Henry wants him to be, just not the way he'd hoped – but fundamentally makes possible by backing up Shawn's claims of being a psychic to the police chief herself. Although the two are somewhat understandably estranged at the series' outset, over time Henry becomes a crucial part of Shawn and partner Gus' operation, aiding them in solving several cases without ever being implicated, and even helps clean up a crime scene Shawn and Gus accidentally taint in a fit of ineptitude. I don't even know any dads with those kinds of skills.

If your father would help you clean this mess up, you're a lucky person.

3. Marlin, Finding Nemo

He might be a clownfish, but overprotective widower Marlin goddamn well means business when it comes to looking after his son, Nemo. Having watched his son get captured by scuba divers while out being a disobedient little smartass, Marlin embarks on a journey from the Great Barrier Reef to Sydney Harbour to get him back. On his way, he faces deep-sea horrors, tenuously vegetarian sharks, surfer turtles and putting up with Ellen for a 4000-kilometre round trip, which just – I mean, can you imagine?

“Go ahead. Eat me. She will not shut the fuck up.”

Much of Marlin's progress is really the result of blind luck over any well-executed grand plan to locate and retrieve his son, but his resilience and determination in doing so are simply undeniable. He's a tiny little clownfish and he swims two-thirds the length of the country in pursuit of his wayward son. Meanwhile, I don't even want to walk to the shops down the road. If Marlin considers his mission in life to be keeping Nemo safe, then you can't say he doesn't go to the most extreme of lengths to accomplish it.

The most extreme of lengths.

2. Bobby Singer, Supernatural

OK, Bobby isn't technically a father, but as the cap-wearing, bearded sage himself says: Family don't end with blood, boy.

But the family business does usually involve a buttload of it.

The demon-hunting brothers Winchester had a real dad, obviously, but there's no question that Bobby is more of a father to Sam and Dean than the obsessive and abusive John Winchester ever was, and it doesn't take long for that to become apparent following his death and the boys' permanent gravitation into Bobby's care.

There's not a phone call about anything at any hour of the day that Bobby wouldn't take or make to ensure Sam and Dean's safety; not an ancient tome he wouldn't pore through or lead he wouldn't follow to help them figure out how to kill all manner of paranormal beast. And, even when Bobby finally shuffled off the mortal coil, he refused to go much further, hanging around as a ghost and keeping an eye on Sam and Dean from beyond the grave. Well, until he let go to prevent his unavoidable transformation into a vengeful spirit. That dedication alone earns him a spot for all the father figures out there.

“Did you dip the ivory dagger in goat's blood? Uh huh. Well, do that first.”

1. Louie, Louie

The other dads on this list are a cartoon, hero cop, anthropomorphic fish, and demon-slaying surrogate, all of which are impressive in their own right, but they are all of them trumped in fatherhood points by everyone's favourite misery guts, Louis C.K. His character Louie is a simple guy; a hard-working comedian living in New York, estranged from his wife, just trying to get through the day. He may be a borderline misanthrope, but if there is anything on Earth that gives him joy in life other than comedy, it's his daughters.

You can tell much of the real Louis C.K. is reflected in the fictional Louie's approach to parenting, which involves being refreshingly frank with his girls about the way the world works. He's a single dad with plenty of shortcomings, but he tries hard to encourage his girls to question their environment, nurtures their creative expression and instils in them strong values about how not to grow up into total assholes. He regularly admits they drive him crazy, but he is nonetheless there for them, cares for them and, more than anyone else here, he's the one who has the most parenting qualities in common with the best dads in the world.

Happy Father's Day.