History Main / RomanticPlotTumor

-->"A girl has to choose between her love for two pilots when it's not clear how she tells the difference between them."

* The most famous example (to the point that this trope was originally named "George Lucas Love Story") would probably be Anakin Skywalker's relationship with Padmé in ''[[Film/AttackOfTheClones Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones]]''. Whether this was the fault of Creator/GeorgeLucas' writing or the actors is up for debate; either way, you're left with an almost unwatchable love story that not only takes up a majority of the movie but also takes attention away from the perfectly serviceable assassination plot (although getting in the love story was inevitably necessary at some point). Aside from the badly done scenes themselves, the storyline went like this: Obi-Wan finds a planet of cloners—Anakin and Padme fall in love next to a river—Obi-Wan learns of a massive clone army—Anakin and Padmé fall in love in a field—Obi-Wan confronts Jango Fett—Anakin and Padmé fall in love while eating dinner. There was no flow to the romance; as a result, it felt as if they fell in love BecauseDestinySaysSo. This improves somewhat for ''[[Film/RevengeOfTheSith Revenge of the Sith]]'': while the love story is still uncompelling, it results in the conception of two major characters from the original trilogy and is pivotal to Anakin's turn to the Dark Side. Then again, putting the weight of the two most pivotal plot points of the trilogy on said unconvincing romance may not have been wise [[StrangledByTheRedString for other reasons...]]
** Ironically, the post-George Lucas ''Star Wars'' Sequel Trilogy contains a similarly divisive and story-overriding relationship beginning in ''Film/TheLastJedi'': initial enemies Rey and Kylo Ren develop a bond after he’s tortured and [[MindRape violated]] her before murdering one friend (his own father) and maiming another (Finn)... [[StrangledByTheRedString without much time,]] and [[UnfortunateImplications without much change in behavior on his part or much explanation as to why she feels attracted to him.]] The relationship was simultaneously as hated as this trope implies but ''also'' a popular pairing… by about [[BrokenBase half the fanbase.]] It managed to help make Kylo Ren (often seen as a CreatorsPet) a BaseBreakingCharacter and kicked off a change in focus on the story that spun off to contribute to ExecutiveMeddling and behind-the-scenes drama to cut short his run as DragonAscendant so he could pull a HeelFaceTurn against a [[AssPull “somehow returned” Emperor Palpatine]] and get kissed by Rey before dying… meaning the romance and its favored member did, in fact, take over the story.

* In the first ''Literature/RealmOfTheElderlings'' books, the ''Farseer Trilogy'', quite a bit of time is spent on the Fitz/Molly subplot and it gets quite tedious to listen to Fitz endlessly pining and [[{{Wangst}} wangsting]] over her when there's far more important matters going on (this is especially egregious in ''Royal Assassin''), especially as Molly herself isn't an interesting or even particularly likeable character and instead just spends her time bitching about how Fitz doesn't spend enough time with her and [[ItsAllAboutMe gets angry with him for having a life outside of her.]] You get the impression Fitz merely likes her because she's the only girl his age he knew growing up. It's even lampshaded in the third book when Kettle points out to Fitz that their love for each other was more about who they used to ''be'' rather than who they are and their relationship is based on childhood memories and not much else. Even Fitz comes to see Kettle's right [[spoiler:and decides to gracefully back away and let Burrich settle down with Molly instead, knowing Burrich deserves to be happy]].

* ''Franchise/{{Buffyverse}}'': The Buffy/Angel elements in "[[Recap/BuffyTheVampireSlayerS7E21EndOfDays End Of Days]]"/"[[Recap/BuffyTheVampireSlayerS7E22Chosen Chosen]]" and the entire episode "[[Recap/AngelS05E20TheGirlInQuestion The Girl in Question]]" are argued as Romantic Plot Tumors for their respective series, whose leads both changed and developed drastically different lives from the one they had together. Making it worse was their proximity to the end of each series, which used precious screentime that could have been dedicated to setting up the storyline of the finale.
** This happened in Season 3, as well. Instead of solely focusing on the much more interesting storyline of a Slayer (Faith) turning to the dark side, along with the Big Bad's motivations, half of the season was dedicated to Buffy and Angel sorting out their issues, despite the fact that it was utterly obvious how it was going to end (Angel would leave to star in his own show, breaking up with Buffy). In other words, they stretched out a conflict (of whether or not they could be together) that could have realistically lasted about three episodes (and actually ''did'' end during the first half of the season).

** Some feel this way about Matt and Karen's brief dating arc in season 2. While the build-up and initial execution is sweet, the fact that it's ended so abruptly just as it was getting started due to Elektra's re-entrance into Matt's life, ''and'' the fact that there are some viewers seem to prefer him with Elektra, made some people feel like it was kind of pointless. Matt coming clean with Karen about his secret identity in the last scene of season 2 doesn't help, as many (especially the Matt / Elektra shippers) believed that Matt was only settling with Karen because of Elektra getting killed by the Hand.

*** Then, before they finally put Lucas and Peyton together in season 4, they made Brooke and Lucas definitely accept they weren't really in love with each other and then Lucas realized Peyton was the one for him all along, basically going back to the exact same point they left things at the end of season 1 and thus making everything that happened between Peyton, Lucas and Brooke in season 2 and 3 regarding the love triangle completely useless and pointless.

* The Sam/Amelia romance on ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'' suffered from this. The romance being told entirely through flashbacks robbed the audience of seeing the natural progression and framing the story in opposition to not just the current {{monster of the week}}, but also the much more interesting storyline of Dean escaping Purgatory, essentially set the whole romance up as a plot tumor. The most JustForFun/{{Egregious}} example would be showing Dean first finding himself in Purgatory, then cutting to... Sam running over a dog and meeting Amelia. What really upset a lot of viewers was that Sam basically abandoned his brother to purgatory to pursue this relationship, which felt like a serious bit of CharacterDerailment for a pair that had literally gone to Hell and back for each other.

* Thrall and Aggra from ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft: Cataclysm'', whose romantic arc received more attention and focus than most of the expansion's other plots despite having almost no relevance to the actual story. Metzen, one of the lead writers for ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'', outright loathed the Thrall and Jaina ship which was extremely popular amongst the fanbase. He wanted everyone to know that cross-species relationships just weren't going to happen on his watch. Even if he had to shove a forced romance down everyone's throats to make his point.

* One of the more heavily disliked aspects of ''WesternAnimation/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles2012'' is Donatello's constant crush on April. It wasn't so bad during the first season where it just popped up every now and then, but in season two the new writers decided to take it and make it the primary aspect of Don's character, making every single one of his appearances devoted to him lamenting on his crush on April and getting jealous over Casey, which has also wound up limiting April's character development as well. Even worse is by the end of the season it seemed that the whole love-triangle aspect was finally resolved, only for the whole thing to come back with a vengeance early on in the third season. By that point, fans had become sick of it. They circled back on it tho.

* While the Richard Castle[=/=]Kate Beckett relationship dynamic on ''Series/{{Castle}}'' is ''not'' one of these, since the relationship dynamic between the two has for better or worse been the central driving engine of the show since the first episode, one of the frequent criticisms of the 'significant other' arcs of seasons three and four was that splitting Castle and Beckett up to be with other romantic partners damaged the chemistry between them and just bogged the show down with unnecessarily angsty and predictable subplots that ultimately didn't really go anywhere.

[[folder:Web Animation]]
* ''WebAnimation/HelluvaBoss'': Over time, Blitzo and Stolas' relationship has been increasingly labelled as this, with a lot of the fanbase feeling it's not strong enough on its own to warrant essentially being the overarching plot of the entire show. There are those who criticize it for not feeling fleshed out because it's usually relegated to being the B-plot of an episode at best, and when it ''is'' the major focus of an episode, the next episode rarely if at all follows up on it, [[AwesomenessWithdrawal forcing viewers to wait for even the tiniest morsel of information to reveal itself about how the relationship is going over long periods of time]]. However, there are also those who believe that it's still gotten too ''much'' screentime, and that instead of specifically focusing on Blitzo and Stolas the show should be more broadly exploring [[ByronicHero Blitzo's attempts to connect with his co-workers, friends and family]] rather than his specific aversion to romantic love. All in all, more and more people in the fanbase are clamoring for a single dedicated Stolitz episode where the issue is decided once and for all and the pair either [[OfficialCouple become a couple]] or [[BetterAsFriends figure out that they aren't compatible]].
[[/folder]]

* The love affair between Yuki and Hitomi in ''Anime/{{ICE}}'' comes out of left field and goes nowhere for the rest of the OVA.

* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyEquestriaGirls'':
** When trailers for ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyEquestriaGirls1'' prominently featured a potential {{Love Interest|s}} for main character Twilight Sparkle, the fans were outraged. When the movie came out, only scene with said love interest proved vital to the main plot and no romantic tension was ever resolved in the following films, with ''[[WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyEquestriaGirlsLegendOfEverfree Legend of Everfree]]'' having a character [[LampshadeHanging directly telling the love interest that he should just give up making that relationship happen]].
** Speaking of ''Legend of the Everfree'', the human world's Twilight enters a relationship with Timber in that film. It only helps Twilight's emotional problems ''very'' temporarily, and has '''no''' role in actually helping her overcome the fears she developed in [[WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyEquestriaGirlsFriendshipGames the previous film]], yet takes a visible part of the movie's running time.

* [[WordOfGod According to]] Creator/LaurenFaust, her intentions were to avoid giving the main characters in ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' romantic interests for this exact reason. Even after new showrunners took over, this idea stuck; when romance plots ''do'' occur in the show, they are both the main plot of the episode and reserved for side characters, such as Princess Cadance and Shining Armor's marriage. The DistantFinale breaks that rule somewhat by showing that Pinkie Pie is now married to Cheese Sandwich, but the romance isn't given much focus other than "look how much the main characters have grown", and there is no romantic ''plot'' to speak of since the romance happened entirely off-screen during the decades-long TimeSkip.

* ''Series/{{Friends}}'': Ross and Rachel. Dear GOD Ross and Rachel. It seemed that no matter what else was going on, the show made sure you never forgot about Ross and Rachel, often pushing their storyline front and center during the entire run of the show. It should be noted, however, that the show also made a point of having the other four main characters make no secret that they were getting sick and tired of Ross and Rachel’s drama (Phoebe in one episode refers to it as “a bunch of high school crap no one really cares about” and Monica, when making fun of Rachel impersonates her by saying this “I love Ross, I hate Ross, I love Ross, I hate Ross!”).

* ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague'': While t has plenty of supporters, the crush the show gave Characters/{{Wonder Woman|TheCharacter}} on Characters/{{Batman|TheCharacter}} has also been frequently accused of this by a few Wonder Woman fans. These fans preceived the relationship as the creators of the show, many of whom were admitted Batman fanboys like Creator/BruceTimm, turning DC's premier heroine into a cheerleader for Batman. The fact that the series ''WesternAnimation/BatmanBeyond'' had already made the pairing DoomedByCanon served to make any romantic moments between the two even more superfluous.

* ''ComicBook/BatmanTomKing'' got accused of this in regards to the Batman/Catwoman romance, mostly because Bruce became obsessed with it, especially after [[spoiler:Selina ditched him at the altar]]. After that happened, it was the only thing in the world that mattered to Bruce, causing him to flat-out abuse his family in frankly unforgivable ways and claim that Selina was the only person who could make him happy. What was supposed to be a psychological romp and character study of Batman was greatly diminished by the fact that it essentially ignored his relationships with every other character ''but'' Selina and to a lesser extent Alfred.
* ''ComicBook/SonicTheHedgehogArchieComics'' in spades, especially during the period between the 90s and 160s. To wit, Sonic and Sally had been part of a WillTheyOrWontThey plot for ages when they decided to toss in Mina Mongoose as a third wheel. This lasted all of 30-40 issues before Sonic and Sally became the OfficialCouple. For all of ten issues before they broke up again. Then there was the time Sonic was with Fiona, which didn't pan out and she ended up with his AlternateUniverse EvilTwin Scourge. Then Sally spends time with Monkey Khan before rehooking up with Sonic ''again''... only to get turned into a robot. When the universe had to be rebooted, Archie quietly dropped Sonic and Sally's relationship entirely, which actually proved greatly beneficial for both characters.
* Characters/StarLord's first solo series ended up suffering from this for most of its run. It had a good start, introducing some characters like a lost sister of Peter and some interesting plots like the mystery of a new villain who put a bounty on Peter's head. However, it also introduced [[Characters/MarvelComicsKittyPryde Kitty Pryde]], who became Peter's new girlfriend in another book. At first, it looked like the relationship would be developed as a side plot in between Peter's many adventures, however, the couple was well-received by fans, and soon the book turned into the Star-Lord & Kitty Pryde romantic adventures. Every other subplot was forgotten with the exception of the one with the new villain, in favor of showcasing Peter and Kitty's developing relationship to the point that a whole crossover event was planned just to keep developing the relationship.

* Robyn's romance with German Villaraigosa, in ''ComicBook/RobynHood The Curse''. It's not only that her romantic interest in him doesn't bring anything to the story, beyond an excuse to keep the plots of [[spoiler: Sam's possession and the ritual murders around the city]] connected. But it's also the fact that Robyn Hood is... well, Robyn Hood. So how do you think a character named like that, would feel about a rich asshole that thinks that he can get away with everything because he has money?
* Most of the relationships in ''ComicBook/SpiderMan'' since "ComicBook/BrandNewDay" can be seen as such. Most of them have no bearing on any of the ongoing plots at all. Even Peter's relationship with Carlie Cooper -- which was set up since the very beginning of BND, with plenty of time spent emphasizing just how "perfect" the two are for each other - ultimately ends up being largely irrelevant and has hardly any impact on any of the major events in Peter's life. Even in ''ComicBook/SpiderIsland,'' Peter's relationship with MJ -- his ex-wife/ girlfriend -- is more important to the plot than his relationship with Carlie, who was his girlfriend at the time. This is especially egregious since the creators emphasized how important Peter being single was to the story, essentially arguing that the stories "couldn't work" if Peter wasn't single. The Carlie relationship has actually become fairly critical to the main plot in ''ComicBook/SuperiorSpiderMan'', well after the actual relationship ended. [[spoiler: Carlie is one of the few people who knows that Doc Ock has taken over Peter Parker's body.]] However, this is only made worse by the fact that Carlie just isn't that interesting or sympathetic as a character on her own and her "relationship" with Peter is by far one of the least convincing romantic subplots the web-slinger's ever had.
* The ''Franchise/XMen'' series loves to drum up romantic tension between two seemingly randomly selected characters. Usually it only leads to one or two scenes of flirtation -- a "Romantic Plot Freckle" if you will; sometimes it leads to an actual ongoing relationship - a "Romantic Plot Appendage," say; but sometimes it ends up as a full-fledged Romantic Plot Tumor, with an inordinate page count being devoted to a relationship that ends up being dropped as soon as the writer loses interest (or left the book) to be rarely, if ever, mentioned again. The one example of this which hasn't gone into remission, despite ''both'' sides of it being ''dead'', would be Characters/{{Wolverine|JamesLoganHowlett}} and [[Characters/MarvelComicsJeanGrey Jean]] (Old Man Logan and Teen Jean are around, but have more of an IntergenerationalFriendship than anything else - which is good because as observed in comic, anything else would be creepy). Canon-wise, [[Characters/MarvelComicsCyclops Scott]] and Jean were the OneTruePairing, with Wolverine housing a crush on Jean and Scott being jealous. But eventually, they included Jean being attracted to Wolverine despite Scott's existence, though any time Scott got overly jealous he'd be called out on this, despite, you know, actually having good reason to be annoyed. Wolverine basically ends up with the only thing going for him is his love for Jean, and he'll angst about his inability to have her because of Cyclops despite the fact he has a lot more things to complain about, and Jean will all but cheat on Cyclops without actually consummating anything with Wolverine until it ends up with her almost stringing them both. Basically, whenever this gets played up, usually at least one of these three end up being driven entirely by this in characterization. To make matters worse, it seeped into the films, being the biggest defining romance in the series - though they did at least have the sense to have Jean be fond of Logan, but not be inclined to do anything more than flirt a little and, as Logan puts it, she ultimately chose Scott.
* When Franchise/WonderWoman was rebooted [[ComicBook/WonderWoman1987 Post-Crisis]] her traditional love interest [[Characters/WonderWomanAllies Steve Trevor]] was paired up with Etta Candy instead and every attempt to put Diana in a relationship with a new guy was met with derision and lack of interest by the fans and rarely did anything for the story other than distract from it. This, combined with the wildly successful ''Film/WonderWoman2017'' movie (where Diana and Steve's romance was highlighted as one of the best parts of the film), is probably why Steve was restored as Diana's primary love interest ComicBook/DCRebirth onward.

* ''Series/{{Wednesday}}'': The Xavier/Wednesday/Tyler love triangle has been denounced by fans as the worst part of the first season. Many fans believe it is entirely out of character for Wednesday Addams to be in such a plot and that it was showhorned because they're a conventional trope in the YA genre. None of the characters can make the viewer buy that they're attracted, let alone in love with one another, so the amount of time that the story spends trying to add relationship drama just feels like time that could be spent on other, more interesting sub-plots and characters (including characters who arguably had better romantic chemistry with Wednesday but weren't conventional hunky males).

* The movie ''Fabian. Going To The Dogs'' mostly resolves around the romance between protagonist Jakob Fabian and aspiring actress Cornelia Battenberg, which is turned into the overarching narrative of the movie. The movie is based on a novel by Erich Kaestner, which tells its story very differently: Rather than an overarching plot the novel consists of many subplots in which the protagonist encounters different people. The love story with Cornelia, which seems quite conventional in conparison, is just one of them. The movie also cuts on Fabian’s relationship to his best friend Labude, which is a very important relationship and character foil to Fabian in the novel.

** The fourth season love triangle with Marley, Ryder, and Jake takes a good chunk of time out of almost every episode and feels ''very'' uninspired due to the fact that all three characters are [[{{Expy}} copies]] of original ones: Marley was dubbed "The New Rachel," Jake is Puck's half-brother and has his attitude, and Ryder is yet another football jock who secretly loves to perform. Considering the nature of the show, and the fact that the two boys have much better chemistry with each other than either of them has with her, many fans wished they'd just come out as bi and go at it.

* ''Series/{{Wednesday}}'': The Xavier/Wednesday/Tyler love triangle has been denounced by fans as the worst part of the first season. Many fans believe it is entirely out of character for Wednesday Addams to be in such a plot and that it was showhorned because they're a conventional trope in the YA genre. None of the characters can make the viewer buy that they're attracted, let alone in love with one another, so the amount of time that the story spends trying to add relationship drama just feels like time that could be spent on other, more interesting sub-plots and characters.

* ''Manga/FoodWars'' began an arc about the appearance of underground chefs who threaten to smear Tootsuki's reputation by abusing the Shokugeki system. This set-up was apparently nothing but a vehicle to introduce a ''romantic'' rival who wants to win Erina's hand. This ended up invalidating Erina's CharacterDevelopment. She went from a strong girl to a fragile person who is willing to turn her back on her friends and spend the rest of her life with some obnoxious creepy stranger just to satisfy her absentee mother who prioritizes gourmet over her daughter's wellbeing. Worse, Soma and Asahi make it clear that they are only interested in Erina's God Tongue to further their culinary skills, although Soma is slightly concerned for her wellbeing. Soma finally quashes Asahi, only for Erina to conveniently regain her confidence and curb stomp Soma at the BLUE finals. Soma heads overseas and cuts off contact with Erina. In the epilogue, in an [[{{Squick}} inane twist]], Asahi is revealed to be [[spoiler:Erina's half-brother and Azami's illegitimate son, retrospectively making the whole BLUE Arc to be SurpriseIncest.]] The conclusion of the epilogue exacerbated it further: [[spoiler:The ShipTease between Soma and Erina ultimately results in a MaybeEverAfter, meaning that there was never a reason to introduce a LoveTriangle in the first place.]]

* [[ComicBook/GuardiansOfTheGalaxy Star-Lord]]'s first solo series ended up suffering from this for most of its run. It had a good start, introducing some characters like a lost sister of Peter and some interesting plots like the mystery of a new villain who put a bounty on Peter's head. However, it also introduced ComicBook/KittyPryde, who became Peter's new girlfriend in another book. At first, it looked like the relationship would be developed as a side plot in between Peter's many adventures, however, the couple was well-received by fans, and soon the book turned into the Star-Lord & Kitty Pryde romantic adventures. Every other subplot was forgotten with the exception of the one with the new villain, in favor of showcasing Peter and Kitty's developing relationship to the point that a whole crossover event was planned just to keep developing the relationship.

* Robyn's romance with German Villaraigosa, in ''ComicBook/RobynHood The Curse''. It's not only that her romantic interest in him doesn't bring anything to the story, beyond an excuse to keep the plots of [[spoiler: Sam's posession and the ritual murders around the city]] connected. But it's also the fact that Robyn Hood is... well, Robyn Hood. So how do you think a character named like that, would feel about a rich asshole that thinks that he can get away with everything because he has money?
* Most of the relationships in ''Franchise/SpiderMan'' since "ComicBook/BrandNewDay" can be seen as such. Most of them have no bearing on any of the ongoing plots at all. Even Peter's relationship with Carlie Cooper -- which was set up since the very beginning of BND, with plenty of time spent emphasizing just how "perfect" the two are for each other - ultimately ends up being largely irrelevant and has hardly any impact on any of the major events in Peter's life. Even in ''ComicBook/SpiderIsland,'' Peter's relationship with MJ -- his ex-wife/ girlfriend -- is more important to the plot than his relationship with Carlie, who was his girlfriend at the time. This is especially egregious since the creators emphasized how important Peter being single was to the story, essentially arguing that the stories "couldn't work" if Peter wasn't single. The Carlie relationship has actually become fairly critical to the main plot in ''ComicBook/SuperiorSpiderMan'', well after the actual relationship ended. [[spoiler: Carlie is one of the few people who knows that Doc Ock has taken over Peter Parker's body.]] However, this is only made worse by the fact that Carlie just isn't that interesting or sympathetic as a character on her own and her "relationship" with Peter is by far one of the least convincing romantic subplots the web-slinger's ever had.
* The ''Franchise/XMen'' series loves to drum up romantic tension between two seemingly randomly selected characters. Usually it only leads to one or two scenes of flirtation -- a "Romantic Plot Freckle" if you will; sometimes it leads to an actual ongoing relationship - a "Romantic Plot Appendage," say; but sometimes it ends up as a full-fledged Romantic Plot Tumor, with an inordinate page count being devoted to a relationship that ends up being dropped as soon as the writer loses interest (or left the book) to be rarely, if ever, mentioned again. The one example of this which hasn't gone into remission, despite ''both'' sides of it being ''dead'', would be ComicBook/{{Wolverine}} and ComicBook/{{Jean|Grey}} (Old Man Logan and Teen Jean are around, but have more of an IntergenerationalFriendship than anything else - which is good because as observed in comic, anything else would be creepy). Canon-wise, [[ComicBook/{{Cyclops}} Scott]] and Jean were the OneTruePairing, with Wolverine housing a crush on Jean and Scott being jealous. But eventually, they included Jean being attracted to Wolverine despite Scott's existence, though any time Scott got overly jealous he'd be called out on this, despite, you know, actually having good reason to be annoyed. Wolverine basically ends up with the only thing going for him is his love for Jean, and he'll angst about his inability to have her because of Cyclops despite the fact he has a lot more things to complain about, and Jean will all but cheat on Cyclops without actually consummating anything with Wolverine until it ends up with her almost stringing them both. Basically, whenever this gets played up, usually at least one of these three end up being driven entirely by this in characterization. To make matters worse, it seeped into the films, being the biggest defining romance in the series - though they did at least have the sense to have Jean be fond of Logan, but not be inclined to do anything more than flirt a little and, as Logan puts it, she ultimately chose Scott.
* When Franchise/WonderWoman was rebooted [[ComicBook/WonderWoman1987 Post-Crisis]] her traditional love interest ComicBook/SteveTrevor was paired up with Etta Candy instead and every attempt to put Diana in a relationship with a new guy was met with derision and lack of interest by the fans and rarely did anything for the story other than distract from it. This, combined with the wildly successful ''Film/WonderWoman2017'' movie (where Diana and Steve's romance was highlighted as one of the best parts of the film), is probably why Steve was restored as Diana's primary love interest ComicBook/DCRebirth onward.

* The relationship between the Baroness and Duke is pretty central to the storyline of ''Film/GIJoeTheRiseOfCobra'', even if it feels unnecessary to the mythos. G.I. Joe, after all, has no small shortage of improbable relationships across every canon. Ripcord and Scarlet's relationship, however, seems to have drawn almost universal scorn.

* The film adaption of ''[[Film/PercyJacksonAndTheOlympians The Lightning Thief]]'' unfortunately gravitates towards this level, which was one of the many complaints fans had towards the film. This is partially brought on by the age upgrade in the film. While the book series grows the romance to fit with the age of the characters (from twelve to sixteen), the film has the characters at age sixteen, making the character development moot.

* A common criticism of Creator/SamRaimi’s Spider-Man trilogy. With many feeling the romance, or more so the buildup to the romance, taking too much of the plot. Especially in the sequels.

* In ''Series/PeakyBlinders'', Tommy and Grace are teased in the first Season even though Grace is TheMole working for his enemy, she eventually falls for him for real but still ends up selling him out and leaves Birmingham at the end of the first season. Come season two and Tommy has a new LoveInterest, May, but ends up in a LoveTriangle with Grace when she briefly returns to Birmingham and the season finale has ''three'' women (May, Grace, and Lizzy) waiting for him. He ends up [[spoiler: marrying Grace]] in season three because she got pregnant, but this is cut short when [[spoiler: Grace dies.]] The plot tumor comes in two parts - firstly because not only did Tommy "fall for" Grace when he knew absolutely nothing about her and knew she'd lied to him several times before he discovered she was working for Campbell but he is still hung up over Grace at the beginning of season two despite the fact she, you know, ''sold him out to his worst enemy'' and [[EasilyForgiven he forgives her for this for seemingly no apparent reason]] (Polly even lampshades this) and secondly, she continues to appear in the show ''long'' after her character has served her purpose. Tommy continues to [[spoiler: hallucinate Grace years after her death]] and seems inexplicably incapable of getting over her even after [[spoiler: he marries Lizzy and has a daughter with her]]. This is especially egregious because she's the only character Tommy does this with - he lost his first love, Greta, and his friends [[spoiler: Danny and Freddie]], his own mother and [[spoiler: ''John'']], but none of them keep showing up and interrupting the story over and over again when they're supposed to be gone like Grace does.

** PlayedWith in Season 15 with Sam and Eileen, in that Eileen turned out to be an unwitting plant for Chuck - basically a ''deliberate'' RomanticPlotTumor. On the other hand, PlayedStraight in a variety of ways, including: Eileen appearing far more romantically interested in Sam than vice versa (arguably some CharacterDerailment for the hitherto-independent Eileen, whose role in the plot became solely "love interest for Sam"); Sam himself appearing mostly confused by the whole thing and not especially romantically interested in Eileen; confusion as to why Chuck would need a spy in the first place when he could already see everything Sam and Dean were doing; and writers seemingly not sure what to do with Eileen or the fledgling relationship after Chuck's mid-season reveal, taking it entirely offscreen thereafter. In the second half of the season, Sam and Eileen appear to never even see each other save for a single date when Sam needed to be out of the way for plot reasons - but then near the end of the season, we see Eileen has a picture of Sam as her cell background, again indicating a more serious relationship. The fact that Eileen apparently [[DeathIsCheap died and was resurrected]] in the final episodes, and Sam never seems to so much as text her to see if she's okay ([[spoiler:and is implied to have married someone else in the DistantFinale]]), caps off the confusion.

* ''Series/{{Twin Peaks}}'' had its fair share, but probably the least popular was James[=/=]Evelyn, which had no bearing on any other plot and became a major contributor to Season 2's notorious SeasonalRot.

* The tendency for this kind of behavior in radio soap operas was famously skewered by Creator/StanFreberg in a skit called [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajPbgklMNxA ''John And Marsha'']]. An entire intelligible narrative made solely out of the two actors [[SayMyName saying each others' names in different tones]]. It actually works pretty well.

* Raynor and Kerrigan of ''VideoGame/StarcraftII'', turned a political struggle between three races seen in ''VideoGame/{{Starcraft}}'' into a sci-fi two-person love story where everything in the Koprulu Sector happens because of these two. Metzen even specifically states in an interview that the story of ''Starcraft'' is really just a love story between two characters... despite the game being built around the idea of strategically moving large armies against each other.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Archer}}'': Lana and Archer's NewOldFlame in season 6 -- as well as a bit of season 7 -- takes up so much time that some major plotlines were almost ignored. This is not at all helped by the fact that, midway through it, they seem to start repeating the same toxic behavior that separated them in the first place: Archer's bouts of immaturity and impulsiveness together with Lana's bouts of jealousy and righteousness.

* ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague'': While t has plenty of supporters, the crush the show gave ComicBook/WonderWoman on ComicBook/{{Batman}} has also been frequently accused of this by a few Wonder Woman fans. These fans preceived the relationship as the creators of the show, many of whom were admitted Batman fanboys like Creator/BruceTimm, turning DC's premier heroine into a cheerleader for Batman. The fact that the series ''WesternAnimation/BatmanBeyond'' had already made the pairing DoomedByCanon served to make any romantic moments between the two even more superfluous.

* This was seen as the main problem with ''WesternAnimation/RegularShow'' during its middle seasons, with some viewers being unenthused by many episodes concerning Mordecai's rocky love life. The show itself jokes about this in its final, LeaningOnTheFourthWall episodes, with the Seer noting that viewer interest had leveled off once Mordecai started dating Margaret.
** Season 6 in particular is widely disliked due to the sheer amount of episodes dealing with the LoveTriangle between Mordecai, Margaret, and CJ. Many fans quickly got tired of it due to seeing CJ as both a better match for Mordecai and a more interesting character than Margaret, or conversely thought the CJ relationship had run its course due to her trust issues and Mordecai [[TookALevelInJerkass taking a level in jerkass]]. Other common criticisms were that it overshadowed the development Rigby and [[spoiler:Eileen]]'s relationship, or that some fans just didn't care about the romance at all. In fact, Rigby and [[spoiler:Eileen]] later became a fairly popular ship due to them having a far more [[BetaCouple healthy and supportive dynamic]].

* The media has often been [[WorstNewsJudgmentEver accused of this when it comes to news]], with focus on celebrity gossip, relationships, and breakups over... well, real news. An example would be ''The New York Post'' on January 1, 2012. On December 31, 2011, news sources reported about further unrest in Syria, the acknowledgement of Kim Jong Un as the supreme leader of North Korea and a warning about the nation not changing their policies, general elections in Jamaica, saber-rattling by Iran against the United States and Israel (or the other way, depending on how you look at it), and Russell Brand ending his marriage to Katy Perry. which story showed up on the front page of the New York Post.

* ''Series/TheUmbrellaAcademy2019'': The most criticized plotline of season 1 was the UnresolvedSexualTension between adopted siblings Luther and Allison. The six main characters were raised together from infancy and refer to each other as siblings, so even though Luther and Alison are [[NotBloodSiblings not biologically related]], watching them have the hots for each other made a lot of viewers uncomfortable. The series responded to this criticism, largely scrapping the plot in season 2, and then in season 3 definitively ShipSinking it with a very dark NearRapeExperience. In an [[https://decider.com/2022/06/26/umbrella-academy-season-3-episode-5-tom-hopper-emmy-raver-lampman-interview/ interview]], Creator/TomHopper said of that scene:

** ''The Ridonculous Race'' also had Stephanie/Ryan. Unlike with Carrie/Devin, the reaction to them is about as negative as previous ''Total Drama'' examples (if not, worse) due to many finding their immaturity to be very insufferable (most of their post-breakup conversations boil down to them yelling and screaming at each other) as well as dodging elimination '''three''' times due to most of them conveniently falling into the "Non-elimination episode if an important character loses" trap that the original series was guilty of.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'': The Korra/Mako/Asami love triangle was widely criticized as bogging down season 2 with unnecessary romantic drama. The producers responded to this criticism by excising the love triangle entirely from later seasons and even mocking it in one episode where Mako admits how pointlessly messy his past romances with Korra and Asami were.

* ''LightNovel/MayoChiki'' is so much about Kinjirou and Subaru's relationship, it doesn't make the cut for SupportingHarem since the other haremettes are clearly just there for variety... but since they're so OutOfFocus they don't really do that well.

* ''LightNovel/ShakuganNoShana'' introduces an unimportant romantic plot rather early on. After a few yearly arcs had passed, it's to the point that ''more'' time is spent on telling you how this unimportant romantic subplot side-character ''feels'' about the events than on [[ShowDontTell actually showing these events]].

* ''LightNovel/SwordArtOnline'' has Kirito and Asuna. Their relationship practically overtakes the whole ''escaping the MMORPG'' storyline, even though it barely has any development. Still, they end up kissing (not before some BelligerentSexualTension), get married (only in-game, though), have sex ([[DidTheyOrDidntThey supposedly]]), and kind of adopt a child [[spoiler:(which is actually an artificial intelligence)]]. One wonders why the makers even bothered with Kirito's SupportingHarem when we are supposed to believe that Kirito and Asuna were meant for each other from the beginning. Compounded in that the writer himself admits regularly that he has no idea how to write supporting female characters, so he just makes them love interests.

* ''Fanfic/ForgedDestiny'' suffers from this. Jaune's romance with Blake ends up forming a significant amount of Books 3 and 4, and to the detriment of the rest of the cast due to him being the point-of-view character. The author would take notice and promise to reduce this in the next book, only for Book 5 to arguably make it worse, with much of the story being focused on their relationship threatening to fall apart due to Jaune carrying the IdiotBall regarding both his love life and the main story for the entire arc.

* ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeagueCrisisOnTwoEarths'': The main story was about the league trying to liberate an alternate earth from an evil Justice League, but spent quite a bit of time developing a romance between Rose Wilson-2 and ComicBook/MartianManhunter. Had the story taken place in the Franchise/DCAnimatedUniverse (as originally intended) it would have probably been valuable character development for him, but it's pointless when that's taken out of the equation.

* The movie ''Fabian. Going To The Dogs'' mostly resolved around the romance between protagonist Jakob Fabian and aspiring actress Cornelia Battenberg, which is turned into the overarching narrative of the movie. The movie is based on a novel by Erich Kaestner, which handles it very differently: Rather than an overarching plot the novel consists of many subplots in which the protagonist encounters different people - the love story with Cornelia is just one of them. The movie instead falls short on Fabian’s relationship to his best friend Labude, which is a very important relationship and character fool to Fabian in the novel.

* The movie „Fabian. Going To The Dogs“ mostly resolved around the romance between protagonist Fabian and aspiring actress Cornelia, which is turned into the overarching narrative of the movie. The book by Erich Kästner this movie is based on handles this very differently: Rather than an overarching plot the novel consists of many subplots in which the protagonist encounters different people. The movie also falls short on Fabian’s relationship to his best friend Labude.