Troperville
Help us survive. All donations are anonymous on the wiki and unacknowledged, as we don't wish to create a hierarchy among Tropers.
Editing
Tools
|
|
|
|
Mr Neat/Tidy/Law-Abiding/By-The-Book forced to work/live with Mr Messy/Slob/Zany/Risk-Taker/Plays-By-His-Own-Rules. Despite the name, they're usually not actually a couple.
The couple might be cops.
The original Odd Couple were The Odd Couple, a Sit Com based on a movie based on a play of the same title, about two divorcees, Neat Freak Felix Unger and his Trash Of The Titans friend Oscar Madison, having to live together.
See also: Salt And Pepper, Different As Night And Day. Compare Heterosexual Life Partners.
If it's not the two main characters, it's an Odd Friendship.
Examples:
- Gap has Tom and David, although Tom is only played this way from david's perspective.
- Michael and Joey from My Two Dads.
- Larry and Balki from Perfect Strangers.
- Scully and Mulder from The X Files (at least until Scully began to believe)
- Logical, scientific Brennan and intuitive, religious Booth from Bones
- Nana and Hachi (who is also really named Nana) from Nana.
- Full House had an Odd Trio.
- The Simpsons spoofed the genre (and the fact that buddy shows often have forced puns as titles) when Troy MacClure announced his new show, "Handle with Care" (in which a retired cop ("Jack Handle") and a retired criminal live together) and declared "We're the original Odd Couple!"
- Part of the premise of Futari Wa Pretty Cure; the two unlikely partners are a sports-loving tomboy and a brainy class rep.
- Averted by Bottom: Richie and Eddie are forever playing catch with the Idiot Ball; there's always one stupid guy and one angry guy, but which is which is never constant, even within a single episode or a single scene.
- Mark and Jeremy from Peep Show are a classic example.
- A literary example is Isaac Asimov's "Robot Detective" novels, where the couple is an intelligent robot detective and a robot-hating human policeman. They Fight Crime.
- A few of the captain-lieutenant teams from Bleach do this. Most notable are big ol' bloodthirsty Kenpachi Zaraki and cute little Yachiru, and slacker Kyoraku Shunsui and duty-bound Ise Nanao. The team of Byakuya Kuchiki (cold, Aloof Big Brother) and Renji Abarai (extremely emotional) is notable too.
- The Akatsuki team of Hidan (religious, detests money-grubbing people) and Kazuku (money-grubbing, detests religious people) from Naruto works here too.
- On Inuyasha, Sesshoumaru (another cold, Aloof Big Brother) has a murderous contempt for humanity yet he allows Rin, a sweet, loveable human girl to accompany him with no objections and treats her as a daughter.
- The stern, mature Yomi and goofy, brash, hyperactive Tomo on Azumanga Daioh.
- Francisco (Newcomer) and Sikes (who doesn't like Newcomers) in both the movie and the television version of Alien Nation.
- If we're going to say that, then what about Virgil Tibbs (black and Northern) and Bill Gillespie (redneck) in In The Heat Of The Night?
- Pinky And The Brain.
- The "Beast Princess" Seness Giat and Yamato Nadeshiko Eirote Borchard in Scrapped Princess.
- Saintly jack of trades journalist meets choleric, eccentric alcoholic - who could this possibly be? Tintin and his Captain, of course.
- When the producers of what would eventually become Mythbusters first approached Jamie Hyneman re: hosting the show, he objected on the grounds that he is...not exactly an extrovert ("Do you even have moods?" "No."). He suggested importing a much more outgoing colleague, Adam Savage, as co-host. The result has developed into one of the funniest, most charismatic Odd Couple pairings going.
- Caim and the dragon in Drakengard. Caim hates all dragons because a dragon killed his parents, and the dragon hates all of humanity.
- DI Sam Tyler and DCI Gene Hunt in Life On Mars are, respectively, an uptight, by-the-book, and slightly crazy cop trained in the modern and forensics-heavy methods of policing, and a reckless, bastardly, and semi-alcoholic cop trained in the 1970s Cowboy Cop method of breaking down doors and having people arrested for cattle-rustling because he needed an excuse to get them off the streets. At one point in the show, they beat each other up in a hospital room and the camera cuts to them sitting down together having a smoke and talking about their job. No one found anything interesting about this at all.
- Clark Kent and Lex Luthor from Smallville.
- In Justice League, Green Lantern and Flash. Lampshaded once when after a fight, John uses his ring to tie up the group of villains and delivers the "Guess that's a wrap" line. After receiving stares from his teammates, he apologizes for the lame pun and states that he's been spending a lot of time with Flash.
- The Mighty Boosh revolves around the relationship between Vince Noir (super-trendy, cheerful, fey social butterfly with big eyes) and Howard Moon (anxious, introverted, masculine jazz aficionado with small eyes). Vince is often mistaken for Howard's wife, and Howard is often mistaken for Vince's father or geography teacher. The Odd Couple dynamic has an additional level to it, as it mirrors the real-life dynamic between actors Noel Fielding and Julian Barratt.
- Conventional, polite nice guy John Watson and eccentric, sarcastic junkie Sherlock Holmes, who were originally forced to live together because neither of them could afford an apartment by himself. (Which makes this trope...)
- Nicky and Rod from Avenue Q. Their personalities are very similar to the original Odd Couple.
- Not to mention Bert and Ernie from Sesame Street, which they were more directly based on.
- Country Mouse Arika Yumemiya and straight-laced #1-ranked student Nina Wang in Mai-Otome. Can also be applied to Arika and snobby Rebellious Princess Mashiro Blan de Windbloom.
- Vince and Errol from 15 Storeys High. Vince is a mildly eccentric misanthrope (not to the extent of being wacky, but he gets his decorating ideas from pornographic magazines), whereas Errol is naive, trusting, freindly and helpful.
- Ken and Ray in In Bruges, Ken being the warmhearted, wiser man and Ray being the impertinent, non-PC young one. Ken likes Bruges for the scenery; Ray hates it for being so boring.
- Con Men Pettersson & Bendel, from the novel of the same name. Pettersson is a dashing but rather naive homeless man whom most people take to straight away; Bendel is a scrawny illegal immigrant and financial genius who must have a Charisma score of about -10.
- Yuno and Miyako from Hidamari Sketch have very different personalities, which doesn't prevent them from being very close. Miyako's often energetic efforts to show her feelings for Yuno are especially endearing at times.
- Boisterous evil genius Jumba and meek, kindly scholar Pleakely on Lilo And Stitch.
- The movie Turner & Hooch (1989) (German Title: Scott & Hooch) with Tom Hanks as the obsessive Neat Freak bachelor cop Scott Turner having to share his pristine apartment with... Hooch, a large slobbering he-dog of the Dogue de Bordeaux breed, the only witness in a murder case.
- The Shadowrun rulebooks mention a Trideo show very popular in the Cyber Punk world, a remake of The Odd Couple with a student hermetic magician in the role of Felix Unger and a student shaman in the role of his sloppy flatmate Madison.
- The Pits
 comic strips, by John Cook (artist of Sev Trek and the other Sev cartoons), has Neat Freak Herman suffering from two annoying sloppy bachelor flatmates: dumb womanizing Lance and the messy slacker Wayne, a textbook Trash Of The Titans example. Things get worse when Herman gets a girlfriend.
|
|
