When King Charles is officially crowned at the Coronation in a few weeks time, he is reportedly pleased to know that his youngest son Prince Harry will be there to support him on the historical day.
However, Harry's fractured relationship with his father has at times been complicated, especially in recent years after the Duke dropped damaging allegations against the royals in bombshell interviews, as well as in his shocking Netflix series and controversial memoir, Spare.
Over the years, Harry has accused his dad of cutting him off financially, criticised his parenting techniques and even called him a liar, the Mirror reports. Despite all of this, the Duke of Sussex still accepted the King's invitation to the Coronation and is expected to attend the event on May 6.
Does this mean relations between the pair are looking up? Here we take a look through the most significant points in their relationship bond as father and son and how they got to where they are now...
Childhood days
Harry is the youngest son of Charles and his late ex-wife Princess Diana. Speaking in a 1994 documentary, Charles told how he tried to spend as much time as possible with his two children.
However, royal biographer Penny Junor once alleged that Charles had been a 'remote figure' in his son's lives. She previously told the Daily Beast: "It is a slightly tricky relationship because Charles has always been quite a remote figure, he has always been consumed by work.
"That’s not a product of a lack of love. It’s a product of the fact he is so focused on his work, and the need to make a difference in the world that, like many people who are seeking to make a difference in the world, he has sometimes overlooked friends and loved ones beside him."
Diana's death
As a young boy, Harry not only lost his mother but watched the very public breakdown of his parent's marriage unfold which played out in the full media spotlight.
In 1997, a year after Charles and Diana's divorce was finalised, Diana was tragically killed in a horrific car crash in Paris which left her two young sons heartbroken. Both William and Harry had been staying at Balmoral with Charles at the time and it was down to their dad to break the awful news to them.
In 2017, Harry praised Charles for the way he looked after both him and William after their mother's sudden death. In a BBC documentary, Harry said: "One of the hardest things for a parent to have to do is to tell your children that your other parent has died.
"How you deal with that, I don't know. But, you know, he was there for us. He was the one out of two left and he tried to do his best to make sure that we were protected and looked after.
"But you know, he was going through the same grieving process as well."
But in his memoir, Spare his opinion seemed to have changed as he recalled how when Charles told him of his mother's death, he didn't even hug him and admits his dad was not cut out to be a single parent.
Closer than William
Harry guest-edited The Today programme on BBC Radio 4 in 2017, where he interviewed Charles - affectionately referring to him as 'Pa'.
During the interview, Harry spoke of how much he values his father's opinion saying: "I do end up picking your brains more now than I ever have done."
Speaking of the pair's relationship last year, royal expert and author Robert Jobson even remarked how Harry had been closer to Charles than his older brother William was.
Wedding woes
Harry began dating his now wife Meghan Markle in 2016 before the pair tied the knot at St George's Chapel in Windsor in May 2018. In the lead-up to the big day, it was revealed that Meghan's father Thomas would not be attending the ceremony and Charles stepped in to walk Meghan part-way down the aisle instead.
Speaking about the moment, Harry told a 2018 BBC documentary: "I asked him to and I think he knew it was coming, and he immediately said 'yes, of course, I'll do whatever Meghan needs and I'm here to support you.'
"For him, that's a fantastic opportunity to step up and be that support, and you know he's our father so of course he's going to be there for us."
Sandringham Summit
However, only just one year after they became a working royal couple, Harry and Meghan made the decision to step down from their roles and quit the Firm.
A summit was held at Sandringham between the Queen, Harry, Charles and William to negotiate a deal but Harry and Meghan eventually ended up settling in California with young son Archie. It was then after that the visible cracks began to show in the bond between Harry and his father as well as with his brother William.
Harry recounted what happened behind the scenes when the late Queen Elizabeth summoned Charles, William and Harry to Sandringham in his and Meghan's bombshell Netflix series and accused his dad of saying things that 'were not true'.
Oprah fallout and money rows
Harry and Meghan sat down for a highly anticipated chat with Oprah Winfrey in March 2021 which was highly televised and proved to be explosive.
During the interview, Harry accused his father of cutting him off financially after he had stepped down as a royal and claimed he had stopped taking his phone calls.
Harry said: "My family literally cut me off financially. I've got what my mum left me, and without that, we would not have been able to do this. I think she saw it coming."
Harry added that it was the inspiration behind why he and Meghan had sought to land a Netflix deal for their documentary. The Duke said he felt 'really let down' by his father as he explained: "He knows what pain feels like.
"Of course I will always love him but there's a lot of hurt that's happened and I will continue to make it one of my priorities to try and heal that."
Meanwhile in his book King Charles III: Our King, author Robert Jobson claims the late Queen advised Harry to go directly to his father when he started speaking of money problems.
He writes: "Prince Charles simply stopped taking Harry's calls after his son swore at him and repeatedly asked for funds. When the Queen asked Charles why he hadn't given in, he told her that he wasn't a bank."
Funeral argument
Only weeks after the bombshell Oprah chat, Harry was back in the UK in April 2021 to face his family at the funeral of his grandfather, Prince Philip. This was the first time he had met with Charles and William since the interview and the trio attempted peace talks after the service.
In Spare, Harry alleges that his older brother lunged at him in and verbally attacked him while Charles pleaded with his two sons: "Please, boys - don’t make my final years a misery."
After the confrontation, the next time Harry met with his father was on a secret visit to the UK a year later along with Meghan which was described as a cordial yet awkward occasion. In a follow up interview, the Duke refused to say whether or not he missed his dad.
The couple also attended the late Queen's Platinum Jubilee celebrations but in a chat with a magazine, just days before the former monarch's death, Meghan said Harry previously told her: "I lost my dad in this process".
Balmoral row
The next big row between Harry and Charles came when the late Queen was in her final hours at her beloved home Balmoral in the Scottish highlands.
Harry and Meghan were conveniently in the UK on a charity visit when it emerged that the former monarch's health had taken a turn for the worse and the royals all rushed to be by her side.
Among them were William, Prince Andrew, Prince Edward and his wife Sophie who took a flight from London to Scotland. Harry took a separate private jet from his relatives and wrote in his memoir Spare he was told that Meghan shouldn't be coming with him as Kate Middleton, wife of William, was not attending.
He wrote that his father told him he was welcome at Balmoral 'but he didn't want.. her'. He explains: "He started to lay out his reason, which was nonsensical, and disrespectful, and I wasn’t having it.
"Don't ever speak about my wife that way. He stammered, apologetic, saying he simply didn't want a lot of people around.
"No other wives were coming, Kate wasn't coming, he said, therefore Meg shouldn't." Just days later when Charles addressed the nation for the first time as King, he expressed his love for Harry and Meghan.
However, when his youngest son came back to the UK last month to attend a legal hearing, the monarch was 'too busy' to make time to see him.
Coronation reconciliation?
However, most recently, after weeks of speculation Harry has finally confirmed that he will be attending his father's Coronation in Westminster Abbey in just over two weeks time.
However, it will be a solo visit as his wife Meghan, 41 stays at home with their children Prince Archie, whose birthday falls on the same day as the Coronation and his sister, Princess Lilibet who is two in June.
It means Harry will be left to face the awkward aftermath of his Netflix series and explosive memoir Spare alone as he meets with the King, Queen Consort Camilla and the Prince and Princess of Wales for the first time since their releases.
However, it has been reported that Harry will only be attending the official crowning ceremony and will be skipping the King's Coronation concert to fly back home to the US.
The Duke of Sussex has told his father, who was pleased to know his son would be attending, that he will not stay for the weekends of celebrations following the monumental event on May 6.
But the Mirror's royal editor Russell Myers says it remains to be seen whether or not Harry's trip to the UK will provide an opportunity for him and Charles to reconcile.
He said: "It goes without saying that the King and other senior royals have an awful lot on their plate. When it comes to rehearsing and preparing for the May 6 event, Charles will, as a father, be delighted that his youngest son will be by his side for the most important moment in his life - but they will all have to wait for another day to discuss the mending of their devastated relationships."
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