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And then the fanwriters hit him with a semi. Just wait till they kiss.
Sometimes, a character is hated because he's annoying. Or because he came in after the show Jumped The Shark. Or because she's a raging Mary Sue and gets too much attention. The list goes on. More often, though, when Shipping comes into play, the character is hated for existing at all.
Hate shrines. Death Fics. Fics where the formerly sweet and loyal character cheats on the heroine with her two best friends and proceeds to murder her teammates, just so she can be with the Jerk With A Heart Of Gold, or the Stalker With A Crush, her cousin, or even her brother, or whomever else the fan prefers. They're all over the place. People who know nothing about the show or even the genre have heard just how much of the fandom hates the rival love interest.
The writer often claims some other justification for treating the character this way, but it all boils down to one very clear reason: He or she dared to get in the way of their OTP.
Can we get a little MST3K Mantra here, please?
This is especially virulent when the 'ship the fans want is on the wrong side of Cleaning Up Romantic Loose Ends. Paradoxically, this character is as likely to actually be part of an Official Couple as not. Beware if you're a girl and people ship your male best friends as Yaoi Guys, or conversely, if you're a boy and you hang around girls while yuri fanboys are watching. Not all yaoi fangirls/yuri fanboys do this, but it's quite common; fans of heterosexual pairings, for whatever reason, only seem to strike when characters actually fall in love. Perhaps they get sick of Bait And Switch Lesbians.
All of the main characters in Unwanted Harem series run the risk of suffering this in order to rationalize an author's 'ship. The Unlucky Everydude will take the brunt of the hatred, with fans preferring alternatives like a Bad Ass Marty Stu or another member of the harem. The Cheryl Blossom is especially prone to eliciting Die For Our Ship responses from shippers, as shippers on both sides of a Love Triangle will often put aside their differences and unite against him or her.
The Clingy Jealous Girl is an odd example, as she usually loses but is given the same amount of hate from the fandom. Yamato Nadeshiko aren't free of bashing either, which increases a thousandfold if her love rival is deemed "cooler" or "less girly, therefore stronger" by female fans. Tsundere are vulnerable either way: if she's too tsuntsun she'll be called " Jerkass, man hater, wife/husband beater", and if she's too deredere she'll be seen as a victim of Chickification regardless of it truly happening or not.
One of the most unusual victim magnets is the Chaste Hero, whose simple non-information makes figuring things out mostly guesswork. Any bishonen, especially tough guys and the Ensemble Darkhorse, will also incite Ship To Ship Combat over whom he should be with, whether it be a Betty And Veronica in-series or a Mary Sue in a Self Insert Fic.
It isn't even restricted to fictional characters either: real-life celebrities' love interests have become targets of hate too!
This trope is the opposite of Draco In Leather Pants; here, a character's faults are exaggerated or created from whole cloth, while their virtues are either ignored or rationalized away. Revenge Fic is very common in this mindset. Ron The Death Eater is often a result of this. This isn't limited to the fanbase either; when the writer wants to get rid of a threat to the Official Couple in a similar way, they're Derailing Love Interests.
A subtrope of both Shipping and Alternate Character Interpretation, with a heaping helping of Fan Dumb thrown into the mix. Note: although many fans actually believe these types of theories, other fanfic writers may simply use this trope dispassionately as a plot device to enable an alternate pairing in a story.
Beware before you proceed, as the examples are sure to contain spoilers for whoever wins, or be prime Wallbanger material.
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Examples
Anime & Manga
- Pictured above: Aoyama Masaya, Tokyo Mew Mew, Ichigo's canon love interest. Fans that prefer Ichigo with the Jerk With A Heart Of Gold or Stalker With A Crush often portray him as either an unimportant idiot who is quickly discarded or an evil mastermind cheating on her with Miwa, Moe or even Minto. Either interpretation completely ignores his kind, intelligent and loyal canon personality, and he usually ends up run over by a semi.
- This gets to the point where fanfic writers change the continuity so that Ichigo's Mysterious Protector, the Blue Knight, aka Ao no Kishi, actually turns out to be Ryou instead of Aoyama, despite this making very litte sense for certain reasons; although apparently 4Kids belongs to this category as well...
- Mamoru Chiba of Sailor Moon, who is consistently portrayed throughout every single part of the Sailor Moon franchise as Usagi's love interest. Because the final series, Sailor Stars, introduced Seiya Kou as a surrogate love interest while Mamoru was absent, many fans took it upon themselves to Fan Wank this into a real relationship. This is despite the fact that both the anime and manga (where Seiya appears) make the one-sided nature of Seiya's attraction to Usagi a major plot point, as well as disregarding five years of Mamoru being Usagi's true love in both the present and in their past lives.
- A good chunk of this ire actually stems from a plot arc in the anime where Mamoru broke up with Usagi over prophetic dreams that their relationship would cause her death, but also in ignorance of the fact that the two got back together again and saved the world and their future daughter because of the strength of their love for each other. It also didn't help that the writing of the arc did come off as contrived and melodramatic and Mamoru's character seemed to move into Character Derailment the longer he kept up the charade regardless of his good intentions. Either way, after that arc was over, it was never referenced again and the series showed Mamoru again as a serious but very devoted and loyal boyfriend... and the fanfic writers still bent over backwards to portray him as a heartless SOB that in reality hated Usagi.
- There's a super squicky subtrope of this that purports that Mamoru is in love with his own future daughter. Anime Usagi is shown to have a really childish jealousy of attention paid by Mamoru to Chibi-Usa, to the point where she even asks him in the Super S movie which one he loves more. Mamoru is understandably flabbergasted and gives no response (setting up a Chekhovs Gun when Usagi is later trapped in an illusion with a fake Mamoru. Some of his detractors will use this as evidence that he actually loves his daughter more than his girlfriend/future wife. It does not help that Chibi-Usa is quite clingy to him as well, and even refers to her father as her boyfriend.
- This can also happen in reverse, as some Mamoru/Usagi fans don't take kindly to people splitting up the "Ultimate OTP" of the fandom. Seiya Kou aka Sailor Starfighter in particular gets a lot of hatefics as if she actually deliberately tried to ruin Usagi's relationship to steal her from Mamoru, despite how respectful she was to Usagi's prior commitments and the nature of the anime plotline giving Seiya the impression that Mamoru had actually dumped Usagi without telling her since Mamoru's death wasn't revealed until the end of the anime's plot. Even Mamoru trusted her and Usagi and was in friendly terms with Seiya when they finally met. Both versions of Seiya (the Gender Bender from the anime and the Wholesome Crossdresser from the manga) took heat from the rabidshippers; the first more than the latter, yeah, but still.
- And we haven't even gotten to the Mary Sue fics that bashed Usagi to have Mamoru get it on with the Sue. Or the crossovers that bash not only Mamoru, but all of the Senshi (specially Rei, who briefly dated Mamoru in the anime but gave him up willingly) so she ditches the team and gets together with Ranma Saotome, Farfarello or Heero Yuy. Or the Usagi/Rei yuri fics that sound very similar to the Seiya/Usagi ones that make Mamoru a Jerk Ass...
- Don't forget Trunks from Dragonball Z!
- All you have to do to split up Usagi and Mamoru is make Mamoru a Jerk Ass. One Usagi/Haruka fic, without irony, condemned Mamoru for being a possessive, unloving jerk who was torturing Usagi's emotions and driving her into Haruka's virtuous arms. Meanwhile, it actually seemed approving of Haruka to romance Usagi while ignoring her live-in lover, Michiru, who suffers extreme Chickification and is okay with Haruka cheating on her. The story ended with Usagi and Mamoru together after Mamoru was harshly scolded for his evil ways and Haruka nobly giving up Usagi and still getting to walk home with an ever-loving Michiru.
- Rei Hino was demonized quite a bit by rabid Usagi/Mamoru fans for her crush on Mamoru. Which to be fair was Character Derailment compared to the original manga, but fans of the Eternal Couple could be absolutely brutal in their fics, painting her as a screaming, frothing homewrecker who wanted to kill Usagi and steal Mamoru all for herself. Nevermind that even then, Rei immediately stepped out of the way once she realized Usagi and Mamoru were meant to be, that she was the one the most protective of Usagi among the Senshi and Usagi trusted her the most out of anyone in the Senshi, that she was somewhat paired up with Yuuichiro, and that Rei was the most affected in the Stars anime when she learned that Usagi lost contact with Mamoru and hid that from them. "Why must Usagi suffer so much? It... it's so unfair!", anyone?.
- It was once quite popular during the English dub's heyday to portray Haruka as a Psycho Lesbian that either perverted or abused Michiru, all to ensure that a Relationship Gary Stu could enter the picture and rescue her from the sin of homosexuality. A subversion occurred on a once-infamous website that posited the reverse - that Haruka was actually a shy, gentle heterosexual woman and Michiru forced her to be a manly lesbian.
- What's even worse about that guy is that he, in all seriousness, said Takeuchi had no clue what she was doing and his THESIS on the lovers PROVED how Haruka was a shrinking violet turned to sin by the evil lesbian Michiru.
- Some of the less mature fans like to make Guido from Samurai Pizza Cats an abusive jerk, as they see him as a threat to the Speedy/Polly pairing. Which is ridiculous because Guido never shows any interest in Polly. For that matter, up until the Grand Finale, neither does Speedy - they only fought over the affections of Lucille up until Speedy fell for Polly at the 11th hour. When Polly and Speedy do hook up, Guido is happy for them. The crazy shippers seem to hate Guido for just being there, despite the fact his lack of interest means he's not an obstacle.
- Sakura Haruno, from Naruto, has the dual misfortune of being a girl that hung around boys shipped together and standing in the way of the major Fan Preferred Couple. Honestly, depending on your preference in which members of Team 7 should be together, this trope hits either Naruto, Sasuke, or Sakura. The fact that for a good first half of Naruto she was a Clingy Jealous Girl in regards to Sasuke only made her situation worse, because fans deliberately ignore her subsequent Character Development which started in the same first half where she was a Clingy Jealous Girl. It doesn't matter that Sakura's will to stop being The Load gave her quite the motivation, or that she came to truly care for Sasuke as the utterly damaged person he is/was instead of just mooning for "Sasuke-kun", or that she did toughen up to become an true Action Girl: she's still "The Pink Roach" for the fanbutts.
- There's also a fair amount regarding the Ino/Shikamaru/Temari triangle. Shika/Tema fans often turn Ino into a shallow and shrill bimbo that only thinks of her looks and that is way too stupid for Shikamaru. Shika/Ino fans often bash Temari by making her a domineering and cruel Yandere-bitch that stops at nothing to make Shikamaru hers. Now, a new girl named Shiho has taken a romantic interest in Shikamaru, becoming the triang's Cheryl Blossom... and Both Shikamaru x Temari and Shikamaru x Ino fans want her to die in a fire.
- Don't forget Karin bashing from both SasuNaru *and* SasuSaku fans. Fans often make her into an oversexed nympho with constantly opened legs (when she's really almost the exact opposite) and that tries so hard to "steal Sasuke from his rightful lovers, Sakura and/or Naruto", especially if the fic's setting is High School. True, Karin's infatuation with Sasuke was unhealthy and obsessive, considering that she planned to drug his teammates and rape him, but the shippers' attitude towards her still carries more than a whiff of this trope, especially since they ignore that most of her antics are Played For Laughs and as more of a character flaw than a marker of being "a bad person", that Sasuke knew what he was in for when he recruited her for his team, and that beyond this she does genuinely care for him.
- Or Hinata Hyuga, who's also bashed a lot for liking Naruto, or (seemingly) her cousin Neji. There are several fics where Hinata finds out that Naruto has the Kyuubi trapped inside him, and proceeds to hate or fear him, only to be slapped into shape by Sakura (which was disproved in Ch. 355-356). There's also the hate she receives for her characterization as a Shrinking Violet and a developing Yamato Nadeshiko, with such fans saying that "she's too weak and shy and doesn't deserve Naruto". Naruto/Hinata and Naruto/Sakura pairing wars get very ugly, and it's always assumed that Naruto x Hinata fans bash Sakura (while a majority of them don't), and Naru/Saku fans bash Hinata (again, while a good majority of them don't).
- Chapter 437 intensified the debate, as Hinata confessed her love to Naruto, and then was stabbed by Pain, causing the fandom to be divided over whether she survived Pain's attack and whether she should. Despite this, she's still alive, Sakura healed her in Chapter 442, and she was smiling happily when Sakura hugged Naruto after he defeated Pain - this seems to put the lie to fan claims that they are bitter rivals in love.
- Chapter 469 probably pissed a lot of shippers off, as Sakura follows Naruto to the Land of Iron, telling him she loves him and to give up trying to get Sasuke back, and that she doesn't love Sasuke. Naruto does not believe her one bit.
- Naru/Saku shippers seem to prefer to attack Sakura's mother! She's had about two lines in the anime and has made no appearance in the manga, but Naru/Saku shippers unleash the fury of Hell upon her.
- Shino is badly treated in the few fics about Kiba x Hinata. Which is odd, as Shino seems to have no romantic designs on her at all.
- Neji is sometimes treated poorly in fanfics that pair Hinata with someone else (more often with one of her teammates than with Naruto), and is sometimes portrayed as still hating Hinata even after his Heel Face Turn.
- In fact, there are very few people in Naruto that don't get bashed for one reason or another in terms of shipping.
- It's typically side characters that play a very, very small part. One of the most relevant examples is probably Matsuri who appeared as one of two Gaara fangirls in the manga. In a Filler arc she had the misfortune of being introduced as the only one willing to accept Gaara as her teacher during a training session. Raging fangirls hate her guts because of the possible Hot For Student-like Ship Tease moments she had with Gaara, something NO other girl on the show ever had. This page
 shows just how far Fan Dumb can go...
- Don't forget Sai. Who not only gets criticism from Shika/Ino shippers but probably gets lots of flak from Naru/Hina shippers for telling Sakura how much Naruto loves her.
- Amagi Michal, Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch, a Clingy Jealous Girl and Ill Girl who is very smitten with Kaito. Take out the clingy jealous part, and she's a lot like Tomoe Hotaru of Sailor Moon fame, but none of the latter's fans seem to realize this.
- Li Xiao-lang (Li Syaoran), Cardcaptor Sakura, a male canon love interest in a series with a very large Girls Love fandom. Despite the intense possibilities, he's not a particularly ornery guy and has a positive following as much as a negative one... though that still doesn't save the boy from being called "gaki" ("brat", Kero's nickname for him) by his haters, having his and Sakura's hook-up described as "evil heterosexual conspiracy forged by CLAMP and destined to screw up with the yuri" (Yes, CLAMP. Really!) or having rabid yuri fans twist him into an horrible abuser to pair up a whiny, wussified, victimized Sakura who suddenly forgets she can whip Syaoran's ass with the Sakura cards if he mistreats her, with an ultra saintly and perfect Tomoyo who's been twisted into a huge Possession Sue.
- Kaho Mizuki, Eriol's canon love interest, is hated by two groups of shippers: Eriol/Tomoyo fans and a smaller group of Touya/Yukito fans, even though her and Touya's former romantic history occurs well before the story, and in the story, Kaho is very supportive of Touya's new relationship. There's also a Hot For Student aspect to her relationship with Eriol that squicks people, though in truth, Eriol is not actually a kid.
- Your Milage May Vary on this. Most Touya/Yuki fans don't have a problem with Kaho, especially given the reason she broke it off with Touya was so he could get together with Yuki. It's a mite unfair to lob all the yaoi fans together on Kaho-hate. Aside from TRC, the CLAMP fandom is relativly sane campared to others.
- Even after Clingy Jealous Girl Meiling broke off her engagement to her Unlucky Childhood Friend Syaoran willingly and came to care for Sakura as well (which she tells to Tomoyo right after she gives up said Childhood Marriage Promise), she's still demonized by rabid Sakura/Syaoran shippers, which is rather silly because Sakura and Syaoran are by and large an Official Couple and Meiling comes to support it.
- Do remember that Meiling was an anime only character, and designed to be an antagonist to their relationship, so it's some what justified.
- Do remember that Fan Dumb flanderized what you said to death and often portrayed Meiling as a borrderline Complete Monster of sorts rather than the bratty but good-hearted rival she truly was, even saying that she would deliberately attack and hurt Sakura out of romantic jealousy (the Meiling who as much kicked her and Tomoyo outta Shaoran's apartment and was an Unknown Rival for a while, but still showed genuine care for her when needed?). So Yeah.
- And there's also the bashing of Nakuru Akizuki from rabid Touya/Yukito fans... and they're also an Official Couple. Nakuru did start out mostly after Touya's power in order to get rid of Yue and weaken Sakura's offensive entourage, giving Touya/Yukito fans a legitimate reason to dislike her, but became Just Friends (or Vitriolic Best Buds, from Touya's POV) to both of them after Touya and Yukito's Relationship Upgrade.
- Notable exception: Oddly enough, Futari Wa Pretty Cure, poster child of non-canon yuri shipping, doesn't have legions of people out to get Kiriya or Fujipi.
- Kouji and Natsu from Yes! Precure 5, however... The fact that they turn into Talking Animal sidekicks Coco and Nuts spurred the hatred by providing Squick as a ready excuse. They eventually found fandom support, however.
- In Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha fandom, it seems the Nanoha/Fate fans and Nanoha/Yuuno fans reserve more disdain for each other than the actual characters, though some obnoxious people threaten the competition to tick rival shippers off. This seemed to die down as Yuuno was slowly edged out of screentime and Fate was elevated to co-star, until his reintroduction in the years-after sequel StrikerS. Nanoha's Chaste Hero status and a boatload of Ship Tease for either side leaves enough wiggleroom for fans to chew on.
- Relena Darlian/Peacecraft, in the fangirl-popular Gundam series Gundam Wing is maybe the most famous victim of Die For Our Ship ever in the anime field. She is often Flanderized as a Rich Bitch, a Yandere or sometimes even a Card Carrying Villain by fans who prefer the Heero/Duo pairing, despite the fact that said pairing is virtually non-existent throughout the series (All the Ho Yay went to Trowa and Quatre, huh) and the lyrics to her Image Song "Always a Secret" depicting her as a sweet girl who'd be very willing to let go of Heero if he fell in love with someone else.
- Technically, this happens to most of the show's female cast in varying degrees, since there's a 1-to-1 ratio of men to women among the primary cast, even if they don't express any overt signs of romantic love for their counterparts. Relena gets it the worst because of a bad first impression. Other common victims are Duo's potential girlfriend Hilde, Treize's right-hand Lady Une and Quatre's rival/counterpart Dorothy, who also receives a good deal of hate for opposing and hurting The Woobie during a fight late in the show. Catherine Bloom is surprisingly scot free, though maybe that comes from her and Trowa acting more like siblings than potential lovers. It is hinted in the Episode Zero manga that they may be blood siblings.
- Gundam Wing's director Masashi Ikeda once admitted that he can't write romances, and that he was more concerned with politics. This is sometimes taken as evidence Relena and Heero aren't a "real" couple; this may be technically true, but is usually invoked with a ridiculously acidic portrayal of Relena in fanfics by people who prefer Heero with other (male) characters, and can also be taken to mean that he can't write Ho Yay tinted romance either. Oddly enough, the other girls who are, shall we say, "assigned" to each of the other male leads don't catch nearly the same amount of heat.
- This is common in Tenchi Muyo!, if for no other reason than the characters are usually already doing it themselves:
- Princess Ayeka is hated by the pro-Ryoko/pro-Tenchi x Ryoko fans. The reverse is also true, particularly those familar with the Alternate Continuity Tenchi Universe TV series and movie Tenchi Forever, which show a slant in Ryoko's direction. Still, the hatred against Ayeka was practically there pretty much from the start, since some Ryoko fans deemed Ryoko as stronger and more worthy because she was less tradtionally feminine than the more proper and sometimes comically prissy Ayeka.
- Sakuya Kumashiro from Tenchi in Tokyo was added in as a third love interest, and was actually picked over both Ryoko and Ayeka, leading both fan segments to hate her, which leaves her with very few fans. She didn't make it to the end of the series, though.
- Noike from the newest Tenchi OVA series is also hated for this, as well as for being both a borderline Canon Sue and a Jonas Quinn for the popular Alternate Continuity character Kiyone Makibi.
- And all of this is incredibly ironic since the Word Of God has stated that Tenchi eventually just marries them all. Of course, some people just ignore that as well. Fan Dumb indeed.
- Nachi from Mugen Densetsu Takamagahara Dream Saga has a bit of this; she's also transsexual, and therefore has more fuel for jokes at her expense.
- Expanded Universe example: Mana Kirishima, of the Neon Genesis Evangelion game Girlfriend of Steel 1. "Girlfriend" as in "Shinji's girlfriend", which pisses off those who ship him with Asuka, Rei, Misato, or Kaworu and love to accuse her of being a Relationship Sue.
- Several Shinji/Rei 'shippers have managed to Flanderize Asuka as not just being Tsundere but outright psychotic. And then there's the Shinji/Asuka fic where Rei is either a soulless zombie or creepier than Kaworu. Heavens above, there is a fanfic somewhere where Maya was turned into a secretly evil and psychotic member of the SEELE council who had implanted Adam's embryo onto her hand just to facilitate Ritsuko/Gendo of all things.
- In School Rumble, a large slice of the fanbase wants to see Tenma drop dead. Apart from the Tenma fans, which want Eri to drop dead. The two groups are mutually exclusive and add up to exactly 99% of the show's audience. The remaining 1% is almost wholly composed of Yakumo/Harima shippers who earnestly believe their ship is the closest one to canon and the former two groups delude themselves.
- May/Haruka from Pokémon (by Pokeshippers and Misty/Kasumi fans in general), to the point where some of them stopped watching after Misty left the series. This emigration meant that things pretty much cooled down within the online fandom after a couple of years, and the return of negativity for Dawn/Hikari's introduction was much more short-lived, only persisting with the rabid May/Haruka fans.
- To put it in a bigger perspective, every female lead that came after Misty was subject to the Replacement Scrappy treatment.
- The remaining Misty fans have an alarming tendency to kill her sisters off via house fire in fanfiction — literal Die For Our Ship, as this takes Misty off the bus and puts her back into position to be a (romantic) factor. It's confusing in that, despite their relative incompetence at head-to-head fights (which are Serious Business), we're talking about people who can summon living fire extinguishers basically at will. (Besides, their presence was the whole reason that Misty could even go on the journey instead of stay in the gym!) The better uses of this device turn into Hurt Comfort Fic (to which Sturgeons Law still applied) while the others make token references at best. Of course, Ayame/Violet bears more than a passing resemblance to the oft-killed Hyatt...
- Misty herself has been bashed for "being in the way" of the (apparent) Ho Yay between Ash and Gary or Brock.
- Another startling fanfiction trend relates to Contestshipping (May/Drew) fics. As of late, some writers seem to have developed a fixation with plucking Brendan (the male playable character from the R/S/E games) out of nowhere to act as a generic villain who underhandedly plots to steal May away from Drew. This is a particularly strident example, in that Brendan technically does not even exist in the same continuity as the anime series. Worse yet, he has no established personality in any fiction, people that ship him with May are relatively few (nowadays, anyway), and Contestshipping was already practically canon to begin with (or as close as Pokemon pairings can get without actually being canon). It's as if they simply decided to find a random patsy to help them drive their point home even further.
- On a similar note, Advanceshippers (Ash/May) tend to portray Drew as a lecherous young man who only wants one thing from May. Aside from the sheer absurdity of portraying a friendly rival that way, does anyone think a children's television show like Pokemon would explore issues like this?
- And let's not forget Rocketshippers, shall we? Though in contrast to the above examples, characters like Ash, Butch and Cassidy are bashed for simply being in opposition to Jessie and James, not because one might have romantic interest in either party. Some of the more rabid shippers think the very existence of these three is a threat or a personal affront to Jessie and James's possible love.
- But let's not forget that anti-Rocketshippers, who very often believe James is gay, will demonize Jessie beyond belief just so James will come running over to Brock/Butch/whoever. Or they'll kill her off in some way, because clearly the only thing getting in the way of James' chances for a happy homosexual relationship is that filthy walking vagina he
is friends with is forced to work with every single day. A few anti-Rocketshippers do believe James is straight but will still do the same thing to Jessie so that James will be with a "nicer" girl. And it never happens the other way around. Granted, James is The Woobie and Jessie is kinda... bitchy. But for crying out loud, she doesn't deserve this. If she did, do you think she and James would have been friends for this long?
- Back in the days of the Digimon fandom, just about every single character had a squad of people out to get them for getting in the way of this or that pairing, most of which would never even happen, and even if it did, many of these victims would have no interest in breaking it up. The main triangles, though, were Takeru-Hikari-Daisuke and Taichi-Sora-Yamato, one a very frequent Ship Tease and the other involving an Official Couple. And before you ask, no, there was no specific popular combination of happy couple and evil rival; the combinations in each triangle were pretty much of equal frequency. Yes, counting the yaoi options.
- Made infinitely more frustrating that, in the end, the victor of the Taichi-Sora-Yamato triangle is Sora/Yamato, which had relatively no build-up compared to the fan-favorites Taichi/Sora and Taichi/Yamato. Takeru-Hikari-Daisuke ends worse—a tie. None of the ships—Takeru/Hikari, Hikari/Daisuke, or Daisuke/Takeru—become canon. The three characters end up with nameless, faceless characters. Evidently, the writers for Digimon felt that it was better not to please anyone than to please half the fanbase at the cost of the other half.
- Don't forget how Miyako took the brunt of the bashing in the Miyako-Ken-Daisuke pairings, because she got Ken in the Distant Finale.
- And not even the foreign Digidestined that appeared in maybe two or three episodes are safe from bashing. Catherine, the French blonde girl who helped Takeru and Taichi and got kisses from them in return, is often seen as an horrible threat to Taichi/Sora and/or Takeru/Hikari. In a similar vein Wallace, who got a kiss from Hikari, has got both Takeru/Hikari and Daisuke/Hikari fans out for his blood. Same goes to Rosa, the Mexican little girl infatuated with Ken, who's very much maligned by Daisuke/Ken fans: many after-Grand Finale rants took pot shots at lots of charas, and poor Rosa was the one-shot female who took the hardest ones (bratty, bitchy, whiny, Ken-obsessed, Wormmon didn't like her so she had to be a little bitch).
- Asuka Tenjouin/Alexis Rhodes of Yu-Gi-Oh GX is not only hated and called all manner of bad names for being the token female love interest and Ms Fanservice in a show filled past the brink with Ho Yay, but for vehemently refusing to get into a relationship with Manjyome/Chazz.
- There's at least one fan that will vilify anyone who so much dares to speak of Judai hooking up with anyone but Asuka, especially if said hook-up is with Canon Sue Johan/Jesse. With the series over now, it seems they took the best way out and had no ships resolved.
- Anzu Mazaki of Yu-Gi-Oh!, Yugi's childhood friend, not only has the misfortune of being one of the very few girls in the series and being the crusader of The Power of Friendship, but is also involved in a Love Triangle with two of the main male characters (in the same body, but still...). As a result, enraged yaoi shippers depict her as a complete idiot or a homophobic harpy who wants the bishies all to herself. She's usually killed off horribly at the end of the fic.
- Mai is also sometimes depicted as a sad old slut, usually when the pairing in question is Joey/Kaiba. Or Joey/anybody, really.
- Tristan/Hiroto, one of the cheerleaders, is usually the Token Homophobe, especially in Joey/Kaiba and Yugi/Anybody. How vocal he is about it tends to depend on the level of Badass of the people involved.
- Unless he's being paired with Duke/Ryuuji, as a way of tying up loose ends.
- In some Kaiba/Shizuka(Serenity) fics, Joey quickly turns Knight's Templar Big Brother when he finds out about their relationship and then cranks it Up To Eleven. This can happen on both sides if Serenity is paired up with Kaiba's little brother, Mokuba, sometimes resulting in Star Crossed Lovers.
- The opposite also happens sometimes in Joey/Kaiba, with Serenity being painted as the bitchy, ungrateful little sister who wants to steal her brother's one true love. This all makes this troper's brain fall out.
- Divine of Yu-Gi-Oh 5Ds. Go to a horde of Yusei/Aki-fangirls, throw in this name and watch what will happen. It's definitely not fun. Despite him dying even TWO times, which is also persumably killing off his chances for a future developement of his romance with Aki in the show, the fans just can't stop bashing him, depict him raping, beating and insulting the living crap out of her, usually dying a terrible death at the end of every single one of their fanfictions, when in the show, even if he used her for her powers and if only towards her, he was in fact pretty caring and protective.
- In Bleach, ever since Barrier Warrior and Cloud Cuckoo Lander Orihime Inoue started to take a bigger role in the storyline and was revealed to actually be in love with Ichigo as well as MUCH more powerful than anybody would think, militant and enraged Ichigo/Rukia fangirls twist her into a Rukia-hating, Ichigo-obsessed stalker to make Rukia look like a better match for him. Never mind that Orihime is the depressed and passive kind of jealous, that she adores Rukia (to the point of actively rejecting the idea of hating her, as well as praising Rukia's kindness and strength), and that Rukia herself adores Orihime and sees her own issues reflected in her. This has become so bad that everyone in the Ichigo/Rukia corner has been stereotyped as Orihime bashers, including sane ones who like or at least respect Orihime and hate the idea of being lumped with the crazies.
- Some fans go as far as to twist the very sweet (and femslashy, for some) scene between them where Rukia vehemently tells Orihime that she's a great person, pulling her from the Heroic BSOD state she's been for a while into a "Cat Fight" where Rukia curses and bitches at Orihime for laying her eyes on Ichigo. Way to ruin a great scene, dumbasses.
- Many Ichigo/Orihime fans also do this, painting poor Rukia in a horrible light by twisting her into an evil, possessive and bitchy Yandere who wants Orihime dead and away from her boytoy and completely hates her old friend Renji Abarai for having some feelings for her, despite all evidence pointing towards how she deeply loves both of them.
- Speaking of Renji, some twist both him and Byakuya into wife-beaters, rapists, etc. to favor the Ichigo/Rukia coupling. Granted, it happens less than Orihime bashing, but still...
- For many reasons, some Renji/Ichigo fans can get batshit crazy. This Troper (Who happens to be a Renji/Ichigo fan himself, thank you very much) has seen fanfics where BOTH Orihime and Rukia are turned into awful human beings and pushing the two into each others arms. These are extremely rare as most Renji/Ichigo fans are nice NORMAL slashers who have respect for both Rukia and Orihime, but still...
- Poor Uryuu Ishida gets it from rabid fans from both sides. The Ichigo/Rukia section blames him for failing to seduce Orihime and make her forget about Ichigo (no matter how out of character that would be), and more recently, for assisting her in an endeavour where she ended up saving Ichigo's life (instead of Rukia) and Ichigo went berserk to protect her. Those in the other camp insist he is a) not good enough for their darling, pure and perfect goddess and/or b) a douchebag that doesn't let Orihime fight for herself, never mind that everybody, including Ichigo, wants her to keep out of fights. Both sides are convinced that he's a limp-wristed flamer.
- To be fair, when Uryu keeps Orihime out of fights, he has more of a Stay In The Kitchen mindset than Ichigo does, as he expresses the belief that Orihime is not suited for fighting (although Chad and Rukia are the only ones to openly express faith in Orihime's abilities and potential), which makes it easier for fans to bash him for treating Orihime as helpless and gloss over other characters doing the same.
- It wasn't a Stay In The Kitchen thing, it was a -She's a kind hearted person who is a pacifist that hates hurting people and only wants to be out in the field to fufil the only thing she perceives as strength, thing. Orihime's inability to physically harm people, not matter her powers, is a valid point in not having her fight people directly. She can help and be strong, she just doesn't have to do so that causes her mental distress but she insists on doing it anyway. Ishida felt that was a problem, not a "God woman, just make me a sandwich" mindset.
- Some of the most rabid Momo Hinamori haters are Hitsugaya/Matsumoto shippers who have somehow convinced themselves that Hitsugaya isn't allowed to care for two girls at the same time (even if it's in different ways) and must choose between his sexy and self-assured lieutenant and his broken adoptive sister. Or maybe that's because those fans also happen to hate Hinamori, even if she's not paired with Hitsugaya at all. And finally, she's not safe from het-pairing lovers only: Momo is also often bashed for the sake of some yaoi pairs, like Aizen/Gin.
- And finally? Soi Fong is frequently twisted into a mixture of Psycho Lesbian and rabid misandrist by the most militant Urahara/Yoruichi shippers. Even on this very wiki. What is especially ironic is that Urahara himself would likely be overjoyed at the prospect of Soi Fong/Yoruichi.
- The most recent chapter actually seems to support the hate for the character. She hates people just because they were saved by Urahara 100 years ago and actually refuses to kill an enemy of the Gotei 13 until Hacchi agrees to lock Urahara in a barrier for a MONTH.
- Correct me if I'm wrong but IIRC she doesn't know the real story behind the vizards and Urahara's exiles. She might simply regard Urahara as a traitor and Complete Monster who experimented on shinigami.
- Did it say that her grudge comes from directly their relationships with Yoruichi? Besides, lots of the Fan Dumb bashing IS tied to fandom homophobia: a troper listed Soi Fong in the Psycho Lesbian trope while referring to her as a "mere peon" (when their backstory leaves clear that Yoruichi DOES care for the lady, whether romantically or not) and then calling Urahara "Yoruichi's dear friend" (which he is, but they're NOT an Official Couple — they've just been given quite the Ship Tease). Ew.
- Vizard business aside, Soi Fong realizes that Yoruichi abandoned soul society, and abandoned her, for 100 years, to hang out with Urahara. It could matter less what the reasons were, or whether or not Yoruichi is actually interested in him, Soi Fong would still hate Urahara's guts. That and his personality is exactly the kind of thing that would drive her to murder anyways.
- Also happened to Souma Oogami of Kannazuki No Miko, with fans likening him to an idiot or an overbearing bastard (of course, as nice as he could be, he is choosing the wrong series to love his girl). This decreased considerably (but still doesn't stop completely) when the series ended with Souma voluntarily stepping back after Himeko and Chikane confessed their love to each other.
- The tiny Hell Teacher Nube fandom really loathes the local Christmas Cake, Ritsuko Takahashi. At first, she's bashed and called "shallow" and a "bitch" for rejecting Nuubee's advances (which were in the Dogged Nice Guy league, so of course Ritsuko would've been weirded out) in a regular basis. And when she does fall for Nuubee after finally seeing his good side, she's bashed and called "third wheel bitch" for threatening the Nuubee/Yukime ship.
- Princess Amelia of The Slayers is widely hated, especially by fangirls who are Zelgadis/Lina, Zelgadis/Xellos, or Zelgadis/Mary Sue shippers.
- Don't forget the bashing that poor Staff Chick Sylphiel gets for "getting in between" Lina and Gourry. And often even Gourry gets bashed by Lina/Zelgadis fans — when he isn't paired off with Sylphiel, he tends to be either foolish, or a sexist monster that can only be defeated by Zel.
- Essentially every character in Ranma ½ has experienced both this trope and Draco In Leather Pants at one point or another, often with one portrayal arising as a backlash to another.
- For instance, Akane's Tsundere tendencies are frequently flanderized to the point of literal psychosis (The Bitter End, anyone?). Even after the end of the manga, many fics would suddenly have her relationship with Ranma inexplicably taking a sudden turn for the worse. This has led fans of her character to emphasize her compassionate side, sometimes overcorrecting to the point of "Saint Akane" who is an absolute Love Martyr.
- On the other hand, Shampoo is often written by fans as being heartless, psychotic, downright evil, and willing to kill Akane and Mousse in cold blood and VERY violently in front of Ranma to get her "Airen"'s love.
- In Shampoo's case she's actually been explicitly depicted as an upbeat casual killer within the source material, heck "obstacle is for killing" is her personal motto, but usually as crafty and manipulative. She has been more than willing to butcher people in public as well though.
- Likewise, Ryōga's eternal grudge and posing as P-Chan, while not exactly admirable, often result in his being flanderized into a Complete Monster to pave the way for Ranma/Akane. This is despite the fact that in canon he's saved Ranma's life, helped him up when Ranma truly needed it (and Ranma also gave him a helping hand) and eventually begins to get over Akane, hooking up with Akari instead. In fact, it's especially strange when you consider that out of all of Ranma and Akane's long-term suitors, Ryōga is one of the very few (if not the only one) who willingly steps aside.
- In contrast, Ranma's own arrogance and personality flaws are frequently overlooked because of his harsh childhood and the many demands honor has placed upon him. This leads other fans to remind the readers of the times that he's stretched honor to his advantage, performed petty con artistry on much of the cast, and otherwise holds responsibility for his troubles.
- Ukyō is also made a Love Martyr, much at the expense of Akane (two words: Mike Rhea). And at others, she's as bashed as Shampoo by "Saint Akane" fans. And don't forget the fic where Ukyō was turned into a dog.
- And Heaven help them if it's a crossover pairing: all of the above and then some. It's what This Troper calls the "Poor Little Ranma" fic: make the rest of the cast as worse as you can, and let your preferred person "rescue" him from his terrible life.
- The problem is that EVERY character in the cast is a grade-A JerkAss at one point or another. Pick two characters, any two characters. Somewhere in the anime or the manga, there's a scene where one of them is a jackass to the other.
- In The Prince of Tennis fandom, Sakuno and Tomoka are very often bashed by yaoi fans since they both have crushes on Ryoma Echizen, the male lead who is very slashable in fandom despite being just 12-to-13 years old. And if Tomoka and Sakuno are maligned for being females, then the girls from the Dating Sims are... well, let's not get into it.
- Yanagi Renji has been bashed by Inui/Kaidoh fans ever since his and Inui's backstory was brought up, because he used to be Inui's best friend and partner before Inui met Kaidoh and left him without saying anything when his family moved. That's seen as Renji being an horrible and heartless person who hates Inui and wants him to suffer, so his ruthless in-courts behavior (which is a trademark of the Rikkaidai team as a whole) is a "proof" of his cruelty. Even when, in the OAV, Renji begs Inui to forfeit the match when he gets injured by Kirihara during their doubles match in the finals, thus proving his bashers wrong. The fact that he's acting emotional in front of Yukimura himself should clue these fans in, but some still insist Renji is faking his concern for Inui.
- Inui/Kaidoh fans have also been known to bash Momoshiro, who (it is implied) later became Kaidoh's vice-captain after Inui graduated, by flanderizing his Big Eater and Fun Personified character traits to make him an absolute idiot who stuffs his mouth, causes trouble for Kaidoh, and barely does anything else.
- We also have the bad treatment Seiichi Yukimura receives from rabid Atobe/Sanada fans due to Sanada's obsessive (and very slashy) devotion to Yukimura, which they see as an obstacle for their ultra-prettified Possession Sue version of Atobe. And some particularly rabid Sanada/Yukimura fans retaliate by bashing Atobe for daring to get in the way of their super-perfect and super-beautiful OTP.
- Or how some Fujicest fans demonize and bash Yuuta's scheming and flamboyant manager, Hajime Mizuki. Granted, Mizuki wasn't introduced as the most likeable person, but not only *did* he pay the price for it, he's not as heartless as rabid Fujicest fans claim he is.
- Or the portrayals of Tezuka and Saeki in fics and doujinshii depicting a Tezuka/Fuji/Saeki love triangle, depending on who the fan writer or doujinshi author likes with Fuji the best. Saeki often takes the brunt of it, sadly; This Troper remembers a doujinshi that, aside of horribly derailing Fuji and Tezuka's characters, portrayed Saeki as a Stalker With A Crush who used Fuji's insecurities to try stealing him from Tezuka as he was in rehab, manipulating the emotionally fragile Fuji into having sex with him during that time — and making sure Tezuka would *know* about it. Even after Saeki did get a bit better and apologized to Tezuka and Fuji in the end, some dialogue quotes suggested that he would still not give up on pursuing Fuji. Talk about a borderline male Yandere.
- In Shakugan No Shana, the desire to see Yoshida Kazumi's soul eaten by a Tomogara in a painful way for getting between Shana and Sakai Yuuji is extremely spread among the fandom. That Kazumi is presented as a fairly Flat Character at first didn't help her case any.
- Kazumi received a hougu from Pheles in season 2, allowing her to summon Pheles at the cost of her own life. Certain fans think that such a summoning would be a very good idea... Not to mention the reaction by viewers of the second season to her seemingly using that Hougu and fading away...only for the scene to be revealed as one that never actually happened a heartbeat later.
- Which is completely retarded, like many other fanfic of this kind, since she poses no threat whatsoever to Shana. Seriously, everyone knows by the end of the first episode that it's a 99% chance that it'll be Shana and Yuuji at the end.
- Hikaru Hiyama in Kimagure Orange Road. It's true that The Movie made her really fixated on Kyôsuke, but it's not like she was the only one to blame for the whole fuck-up either: Kyōsuke and Madoka were as guilty as Hikaru, and the three suffered horribly because of it... but Hikaru is the only one who gets bitchslapped by fandom.
- Susanna Marlowe from Candy Candy gets this so bad that women in their thirties and forties behave like whiny teenyboppers whenever reminded of how Susanna got Terry instead of Candy, after Candy decides to give him up willingly, since Susanna almost got killed for him and ended up crippled and with her acting career in tatters.
- In the Inu Yasha fandom, there are rabid Kikyou/Inu-Yasha fans accusing Kagome of being a Tsundere Sue or a Clingy Jealous Girl, and Kagome/Inu-Yasha fans react by calling Kikyou an evil whore who still wants to drag Inu-Yasha into Hell with her. Add the Kouga/Kagome shippers who bash Ayame and the Sango/Miroku fans who bash Kuranosuke Takeda too.
- Don't forget the Sango/Inu-Yasha shippers who regularly declare war on Miroku and Kagome for the purpose of facilitating a pairing teased once by a line meant to demonstrate solidarity, not lust!
- Speaking of Kouga/Kagome, that pairing gets a lot of heat from Inu-Yasha/Kagome shippers. Poor Kouga is an EBUL misogynist who will never appreciate Kagome the way Inu-Yasha does, despite the fact that he brings her flowers and gives up his whole human-eating lifestyle to please her... and keeps with it, even after he realizes he'll never get the girl.
- Sesshomaru/Rin and Sesshomaru/Kagome shippers regularly bash Kagura for daring to be canonly in love with Sesshomaru even though she died in the manga. Sesshomaru/Kagura shippers don't bash Rin and Kagome as often because it speaks well of Kagura if she likes her love interest's Morality Pet and his brother's girlfriend, though it still happens from time to time.
- Also the fact that Sesshomaru has been shown to return her feelings, and the fact that Rin herself supports a romance between the two (an obvious signal that she does not see Sesshomaru as a love interest) tends to really grate their cheese because it adds to their feeling of being threatened. Sessh/Kagura writers might sometimes bash Kagome if they dislike her, but never Rin, since she isn't a threat. They do, however, tend to bash Sara, an anime-only filler character.
- In Dragon Ball Z... Yamcha often gets twisted into a wife-beater by fans of the Bulma/Vegeta pairing. As long as we're on the subject, why shippers think that a wife-beater would be worse than an Omnicidal Maniac is anyone's guess.
- Many Dragon Ball Z fanfics have had Yamcha cheating on Bulma with another woman as the impetus for Bulma to break it off with him and get together with Vegeta, who had pulled a Heel Face Turn by the time the Frieza saga was over, though he was still something of an arrogant Jerk Ass. Most of the fic in question was of the year or so before the arrival of the Androids which resulted in the birth of Bulma and Vegeta's son, Trunks. In the canon, Bulma and Yamcha (who before meeting Bulma was absolutely petrified of women) broke up because it just wasn't working out between the two of them.
- There's also the Trunks/Marron (Kuririn and #18's daughter) who bash Pan, and the Trunks/Pan fans who bash Marron, neither of whom have done anything to suggest a romantic rivalry. In fact, poor Marron doesn't do anything at all.
- There appears to be quite a bit of animosity in the Mai-HiME shipping camp between those deciding whether to pair Natsuki Kuga exclusively with Shizuru Fujino (Natsuki's most important person in Hi ME and her schoolgirl crush in Otome, a dyed-in-the-wool Schoolgirl/School Supervisor Lesbian with an obvious crush on her) or Nao Yuuki (who teases her like crazy in Mai-Otome), with fans of one pairing painting the designated "third wheel" as an evil harpy deserving of death (despite both Shizuru and Nao being examples of Draco In Leather Pants).
- Speaking of Mai-Otome, many shippers of the Akane/Kazuya pairing (yes, they exist) would like nothing better than Mahya falling down the stairs and breaking a leg or something, for the annoying "crime" of interrupting any romantic moment between the two and generally acting like Garderobe's "romance police". Mahya is not a romantic rival, to be sure, but she still does get in the way of the pairing.
- Shizuru/Natsuki fans who follow Otome also don't like Tomoe Marguerite, and make up a large section of her anti-fandom. It doesn't help Tomoe's case that she actually does attempt to hurt/kill people (even going as far as to willingly join the bad guys) so that she can be the only one to get Shizuru's eye/pants... though the kiss was likely the straw that broke the nanomachine-powered camel's back.
- The tagline to the harem anime SHUFFLE is "Which girl would you choose?" Better pick FAST, because the Instant Fanclubs depicted in the show have carried over into the fandom, and they're just as crazy as on TV. Kitto Kitto Kaede (pro Kaede Fuyou) and Ai Ai Asa (pro Asa Shigure) in particular have deep, deep vendettas against each other's characters.
- In Romeo X Juliet, Mad Dictator's Handsome Son Romeo Candorebanto Montague has a fiancée named Hermione di Borromeo. She's sweet, has an odd hairstyle, starts as a Yamato Nadeshiko but has an episode that features her as a momentary Yandere, and is in between Romeo's destined love with a Juliet portrayed as a mix of Bifauxnen and Action Girl for plot reasons. Of course, no matter how sympathetic she is in canon (which is rare for a Paolo), a good part of the fandom sees Hermione as an evil, stupid slut who must die so the Strong and Cool Juliet can have her Romeo, kthxbai.
- In Gundam SEED and its sequel: The ire of Athrun/Cagalli fans, after canon went against them in Gundam SEED Destiny, brought lots of bashing of Meyrin Hawke, Lunamaria "Luna" Hawke and Meer Campbell... to the point that some people have either: a) sworn off SEED as a whole SOLELY for the Ship Sinking; b) sworn off the Athrun/Cagalli pairing, or c) bashed AsuCaga back for the evil it inflicted on their girls or ships - especially poor Cagalli.
Mod: "(...) The nice, calm, and friendly Lacus Clyne; a symbol of peace and love. Practiced smile, monotonous voice, and uncompromising pacifism be damned! She is annoyingly perfect, unrealistic, boring, and seemingly unaffected by the harsh events surrounding her; the very opposite of the passionate, albeit unstable, and fiery tempered Fllay."
- If you're a more or less sane Code Geass fan, do not mention the name Shirley Fenette in front of rabid Lelouch/C.C. or Lelouch/Kallen fans (and even then, it's probably best to isolate Lulu/C.C. and Lulu/Kallen fans from each other for a while). Even after Shirley actually died for the ship.
- There's one message board where one poster insists that Shirley is an evil, heartless, manipulative bitch for using her father's death as an "excuse" to get closer to Lelouch, ignoring that she admitted it was selfish and apologized to Lelouch for it, and Lulu actually reciprocates her feelings to some extent. Interestingly enough, compare the above to Mao's little Hannibal Lecture he gives to Shirley in Episode 14 of the first season.
- Also, a good part of the hatred that sprung for Rolo comes from people being convinced that he killed Shirley solely out of psychotic love jealousy. Forget that Shirley had the bad luck of saying the wrong thing at the worst moment, Rolo killed Lulu's ONE TWU WUB solely to steal Lulu's heart for himself.
- And now? Kallen is getting LOTS of hate. Because she kissed Lelouch in episode 22 of R2. When that happened, cue to lots of fans (and not only Lelouch/C.C or Suzaku/Lelouch shippers)screaming "Bitch!" "Whore!" "Slut!" "Skank!" "Kallen is not cool anymore because she's acting like a chick, OH NOES!"
- This is probably just a symptom of the fact that Code Geass seems to have spawned one of the most bitter and divisive fandoms in recent memory. Absolutely anything seems a good reason for Geass fans to entrench themselves and blame the other side for all the fandom's problems (and for their own bad behavior). So it's probably not very surprising that the shipping is this way too.
- Which is all incredibly amusing/distressing when you realise that until Lelouch got, er, "unmasked", not only was the harem ending supported by Divine Right Of Rulership and genetics (Emperor Chuck and his 108 wives, anyone?), but by two prospective haremettes, the not-entirely-in-the-closet Milly and the unappreciated Kaguya.
- In regards to Kaleido Star, Kenneth "Ken" Robbins has a crush on Sora Naegino, the very femslashable female lead, but has so far escaped from the yuri fans' rage. But those who ship Sora with the second season's White Haired Pretty Boy Leon Oswald have huge hate-ons for Leon's partner, the arrogant and child-like Chinese Girl May Wong.
- School Days shippers can often behave just as idiotically as the characters they're shipping, if not more. Aside from the obvious Makoto-bashing (though it's not like he doesn't deserve it), Sekai fans call Kotonoha a "stupid, psycho, anti-feminist whore" for being Makoto-obsessed to the point of mental illness, and in return Kotonoha fans just won't stop referring to Sekai as "prostitute", "traitor", "backstabber" and "hypocrite". It doesn't help that in the manga and some of the "bad" game endings, Sekai is seen as selfish and manipulative, instead of an impulsive and confused teen; what makes it even worse is that Kotonoha is genuinely crazy when murderous or suicidal (seen by her Mind Control Eyes), but in at least two PS2 game endings Sekai seems creepily sane when she does the same.
- Shippers in the Death Note fandom have been known to come to blows over whether Mello should be with Matt or Near, despite the fact that Matt featured in all of ten panels in the manga, and his appearance in the anime was even briefer.
- Much loathing is also directed at Misa Amane for "standing in the way" of Light/L, even though Light sees both of them as obstacles on his path to world domination.
- And then there's Halle Lidner. Sweet Lord, poor Halle...
- No matter what your opinion of the Ichigo 100% ending is, you will be despised by an opposing shipping group, despite the fact that it's universally agreed that the lead, Junpei, is a loser. I guess that entire theory about harem leads being losers so the audience can relate to them is true, as much as the fans hate them.
- Oh, Princess Tutu fandom. No matter how human she is, how much she hurts for being abused by her evil father and her love interest when he turns evil and how she actually learns from her mistakes, Rue/Princess Kraehe keeps getting crap from rabid Mytho/Ahiru fans for stealing Mytho from the Sue-fied version of Ahiru they have in their minds. Nevermind that later Ahiru bonds more with Mytho's companion Fakir, and how Mytho ultimately chooses Rue as his Princess freely, after she rejects her evil father and pulls a heart-wretching Heroic Sacrifice.
- Not to mention a datebook that explicitly states Ahiru's feelings for Mytho are actually those of admiration, and that she's totally fallen for Fakir by the very end of the series.
- The Marmalade Boy fandom, surprisingly, doesn't bash the people involved in the ridiculously huge Love Dodecahedron that much (outside of hating Jinny Golding for pulling something so stupid that even she regrets it later... but the hardest, cruelest bashing actually piles up on handsome teacher Shinichi "Nat-chan" Namura, who's the love interest of Miki's best friend Meiko Akizuki. Yes, this is one of the cases where a Hot For Student situation is developed sympathetically, but the fans who ship Meiko with Satoshi Miwa just will not stop calling Namura-sensei "pedophile" or "asshole who makes Meiko suffer for nothing". Even after Satoshi sees he cannot sway Meiko away from Namura and pulls an I Want My Beloved To Be Happy along with Namura's Unlucky Childhood Friend, Ryouko-sensei.
- In a Ranka vs. Sheryl debate on a Macross Frontier forum thread, Ranka gets criticized for being a "barely legal loli moeblob", while Sheryl gets flak for her overly flirty attitude and her somewhat selfish, overbearing personality, even if onscreen, when both are not being rivals to each other about Alto, they have somewhat of a Sempai Kohai relationship, and care for each other a lot.
- The series producer (or director/creator, can't remember), said that "Being with only one girl isn't the only way to go", which could be a massive Take That to First Girl Wins and/or Last Girl Wins; definitely an endorsement of Tenchi Solution.
- The Fan Dumb got to the point where a well respected member of a non-English speaking forum actually made up supposed facts to make the impression that one of the creators supported one ship over the other and this was generally seen as fact until members of a different forum got suspicious and tracked down the supposed magazine where the information came from and found out that it was all a lie. (A FAQ with a summary of the events can be found here.)
- Cowboy Bebop fans love to pair off Spike and Faye. Julia can go die in a fire. Or better said, she can get shot on a roof top. Well, that was canon, but it certainly didn't help Faye's cause if there was one.
- Fushigi Yuugi fans who would have rather seen Miaka Yuuki hook up with Hotohori or Tasuki often bash Tamahome or kill him off in their fics to make either of the former pairings possible. (Oddly enough, fans of the Miaka/Yui pairing have yet to resort to this.)
- Alternately, some fics have Miaka conveniently die in childbirth so that Tamahome and [insert male character and/or Mary Sue here] can not only hook up, they'll have a little family when they do.
- And Tetsuya, Yui's canon love interest, is sometimes portrayed as abusive or unfaithful so that Yui and Suboshi can get together somehow. Similar to the Vegeta/Bulma/Yamcha situation, it's unclear why a Moral Event Horizon-crosser is somehow an upgrade...
- Even the Girls Love romantic comedy Strawberry Panic isn't immune to this. The Shizuma/Nagisa shippers and the Tamao/Nagisa shippers can get quite violent when provoked. There is also a very large body of fans were angry that Yaya didn't get Hikari, and would rather see Amane get Stuffed In The Fridge.
- And they were that close from killing Amane off after she fell off her horse...she gets better to the distain of every Yaya fan out there. Amane just made a lot of enemies in one fell swoop.
- The Sorcerer Hunters sidestory novels introduced a character named Enzeru Fish, who fell in love with Tira at first sight. At least one rabid Carrot/Tira fan was not too happy about that◊. Another fan bashed Chocolat for having a crush on Carrot as well.
- On the yaoi side of things, Carrot is often demonized into a homophobic Jerkass who would disown Marron for being in love with Gateau. Conversely, Gateau is made into a raping bastard for the sake of Carrot/Marron or Marron/Tira.
- In Elfen Lied, Lucy/Kouta fans hate Team Mom Yuuka with a fiery passion. Even when, well, she's not exactly the biggest threat to their relationship... but the fact that Lucy murdered Kouta's father and sister is.
- A somewhat surprising exception can be found in the Vision of Escaflowne fandom. The one who gets the hardest and cruelest bashing from fangirls for getting in between Van Fanel and Hitomi Kanzaki is... not Merle the Cat Girl. Though fans do complain about Merle, the one hated the most is actually Allen Schezar, the blond-haired bishonen with a convoluted love life prior to meeting Hitomi (don't ask), who is seen as "sexist", "control freak" and "traitor" because he got to kiss Hitomi in front of Van... when the three were in a sort-of weird More Than Mind Control situation enacted by Folken and the twin catgirls and staged by Dornkirk. That was not Allen's fault (and neither Hitomi's, nor Van's), but people still use that scene to woobify Van and bash Allen.
- Rurouni Kenshin fandom has the infamous "Kaoru is soooo emotional and sweet and that makes her better for Kenshin than the ice cold Mary Sue Tomoe" v/s "Kaoru is a stupid, clingy little bitch and Tomoe was a perfect goddess who made Kenshin truly happy" wars. Never mind that Tomoe was dead long before Kaoru came into the picture, which means that neither of them poses any threat to the opposing ship. It's as if the fans refuse to believe that Kenshin can fall in love more than once in his life.
- And if we go to Sanosuke / Megumi fans... Argh. Their treatment of Sayo is horrible. Makes even less sense since not only she's an anime-only character, but she dies.
- In the Suzumiya Haruhi franchise, some Kyon/Yuki and Kyon/Mikuru fans just won't stop overexaggerating Haruhi's childish, sociopathic and impulsive behavior to downright evil and/or psychotic degrees and denying all the Character Development she got, while turning the "rival" into a victimised Purity Sue to "prove" how more "deserving" she is of Kyon's love than Haruhi. To them, Kyon doesn't care for Haruhi at all and ONLY puts up with her because he's forced to as a member of the SOS Brigade (read: he doesn't want her to re-write reality without knowing it, but would ditch her immediately if he could). Nevermind that Kyon does gently but clearly tell Yuki in the novels that he likes all the craziness Haruhi brings to his life. Not to mention that, without her, Yuki and Mikuru wouldn't even be there, so it's thanks to "the evil Haruhi" that they even have chances to approach Kyon.
- Though, to be fair, Kyon/Haruhi fans aren't entirely innocent of this either. A number of the more diehard fans seem unable to accept Haruhi's reduced role in the series, and instead paint Mikuru as an evil, Manipulative Bitch who is activly attempting to steal Kyon away from Haruhi.
- HarukixKyonko vs ItsukoxKyonko.
- To a lesser degree than the others, Haruhi x Mikuru and Kyon x Haruhi.
- And Kyon gets bashed by Haruhi/Mikuru shippers for being a threat to both sides of their ship.
- And funnily (for the Ship Wars going on around the fandom, not because I'm a ghost of a Discredited Trope), the Itsuki/Kyon shippers are just bitter about it all. Pages and pages of Itsuki angst, at times turning him into a complete psycho concerning his inability to be with Kyon, especially because of God-Haruhi, though not limited to it (albeit usually inside his head)... Though given his charade...
- The fanbase on at least one anime website is bitterly, bitterly divided on their opinion of Meido Siesta's overtures towards Saito in the anime Zero No Tsukaima complete with rabid fannish gibbering for her death. As of the second season, Saito is married to his "master", Louise , making them a semi-official pairing.
- Boys Love version. In Yami No Matsuei, some Muraki x Tsuzuki fans don't see Miraki's repulsive acts of villainy as the main obstacle to get Muraki into Tsuzuki's pants. The "evil pest" is actually Tsuzuki's partner and Muraki's victim, Hisoka Kurosaki, therefore they bash the crap out of Hisoka and gleefully forget how Muraki is not your average Officer And A Gentleman, but a cruel and sadistic mass murderer who wants Tsuzuki not only because he's pretty, but to use his body to revive his evil half-brother Saki... and kill him as revenge for ruining his life.
- And if you go read some Tsuzuki x Hisoka fics, you might find hate towards Ill Girl Tsubaki Kakyouin as well.
- While Ayaka and Noriko from Gravitation have received their share of bashing, despite Ayaka willingly conceding Yuki to Shuichi and Noriko being Happily Married to a much older man in the manga, the majority of fanfics simply don't bring them up at all. The guys don't get off as easily: either Yuki is an abusive, heartless bastard and Shuichi deserves much better than him (usually Hiro), or Tohma is a psycho stalker who gets in the way of Shuichi and Yuki's love. Granted, Yuki isn't the nicest person and Tohma did try to keep Shuichi and Yuki apart at one point, but neither of them is as evil as many fans would like to believe.
- Once upon a time, the Cyborg 009 fandom had a buttload of this. Poor Team Mom Francoise/003 was not only seen as "weak" because she didn't always fight, but if you liked your yaoi (even if it didn't involve her being a "threat") it was a sort-of pre-requisite to hate her. And those who shipped her with Joe/009 fought back... by bashing the most obvious "competition", Princess Ixquic and Carl Eckermann alias Sphinx. Heck, This Troper remembers a fic that not only reduced them to romance novel stereotype, but bashed Joe's childhood friend Mary Onodera just to make the "plot" more believable.
- While the Ship Wars have calmed down considerably, the Fullmetal Alchemist fandom spent some time being a major headache. The loudest were the Roy/Riza fans, who hated Ed, Havoc, Al, or anyone else who had even the remotest potential to break up their OTP, but every one of the Major Pairings had its rage-filled fans. And God forbid you were one of those who shipped multiple pairings that traded off characters, threesomes, or didn't like shipping at all.
- Winry can count herself lucky, since most of the fandom doesn't bother to kill her in fanfic, just pairs her off with Al so Ed can go be gay with Roy. They mostly ignore her completely if they ship the brothers together (or with their own alchemist Mary Sue). Surprisingly, Riza takes very little heat from Roy/Ed shippers, probably because in the anime it's easy to dismiss her feelings as one-sided. Naturally, it didn't help matters when The Movie played up the Ho Yay even more and had both Ed and Roy ignoring their canon love interests, then sent the Elrics off to an Alternate Universe without sparing a thought for Winry. This Het Is Ew outlook only helps to fuel the civil war in the fandom, since among fans of the manga the various canon het pairings are by far the most popular.
- Another case that's more or less forgotten but was horrible in its time was the war between Domon/Allenby and Domon/Rain shippers in the G Gundam fandom. This Troper still shudders as she remembers how Allenby was called "mannish idiot", "ugly bitch" or "stupid whore" by Domon/Rain fans for crushing on the first person who saw her as a person and not a Tyke Bomb, and being reminded of how Rain was called "fanservice on legs", "whiny slut" or "Clingy Jealous Girl" by Domon/Ally fanits and the rumors that the author of the G Gundam manga had a bias against Rain don't help either.
- Exception: despite the sheer popularity of the Neil "Lockon Stratos" Dylandy x Tieria Erde yaoi pairing in the Gundam 00 fandom, its fangirls never seem to bash Feldt Grace for having a sweet crush on Lockon. In fact, many of them actually like her.
- Sadly, it has started... in Feldt's "defense". More than a few Feldt x Lyle Dylandy (Neil's Backup Twin) fans bash Anew Returner HARD and call her a Canon Sue for threatening their OTP. Which is ironic and utterly stupid, since before Anew ever was in the picture, Lyle actually preferred to put on a Jerkass Facade in front of Feldt and push her away, rather than encourage her to pursue his affections. Needless to say, the fact that Lyle and Anew have now hooked up in canon hasn't helped matters at all. Poor Anew.
- And now episode 19 has made things worse still for Anew, and not just for shipping reasons either: she has been revealed her Innovator identity to the Ptolemy crew and has turned on them, both probably shooting Lasse and, in the preview, holding Mileina at gunpoint. It should be noted, however, that there's a good chance that the supposedly "traitorous" Anew is actually a Manchurian Agent who's right now under Mind Control, courtesy of the captured Revive AND Ribbons. Strange how Anew is hated for seemingly turning evil, and yet her "twin" and her "boss" continue to be cuddled by fangirls regardless of the fact they're responsible for it...
- And now, as of episode 20, this trope has been invoked with Anew Returner's tragic death. The negative perception fangirls had of her isn't helped at all by the fact that Anew herself wasn't convinced that her time/feelings for Lyle were true until it was way too late.
- As for 00's main star Setsuna, there are those who ship him with Marina or with Nena. The odds are most likely in Marina's favor now since Nena was killed by Louise. However, the two aforementioned ladies are.. not well liked. As a result, some fans paired Setsuna with other characters such as his Gundams, his fellow Meisters, Saji, Graham, Louise or Feldt. The last one mentioned already made her move, and unlike the two ladies, she's likeable.
- As far as Saji-Louise shippers go, they now have every right to bash Louise's partner Andrei Smirnov for trying to win Louise's heart, as he has certainly became The Scrappy for crossing the Moral Event Horizon by killing his father, Colonel Sergei Smirnov. And again by interrupting Saji and Louise during an important conversation during Episode 19. And again in episode 24 when he directly assults Saji blaming him for Louise's deteriorating mental condition. Fortunately, Setsuna is there to prevent it, and then Andrei is swayed away from them by his interaction with Marie.
- Axis Powers Hetalia, despite being a show full of Ho Yay-fueled Moe Anthropomorphisms, has a fandom that's largely free of Shipping Wars, probably because almost any pairing can be justified as (historical) canon and the female characters are generally liked. But even it isn't completely free from this trope:
- While the majority of Russia/America fans don't hate England for possibly having a crush on America, there are still a few of them who exaggerate his 'tsun' behavior towards America to Jerkass or even psychotic levels to make Russia into a more viable romantic option for America. The worst cases have England as a Yandere torturing an America who's apparently lost all ability to single-handedly fling him across the room and needs to be rescued from England's abuse or find solace in Russia's arms. This even appears in a couple of ostensibly America/England fics just to show how horrible and unhealthy America/England would be, because it's not as if England ever acts 'dere' around America or America ever *likes* snarking at and insulting him back on equal ground.
- There's also the portrayal of Austria in some Prussia/Hungary fanwork. Since the Austria/Hungary Official Couple can be very easily seen as an Arranged Marriage due to the Austro-Hungarian Compromise, some P/H fans basically twist Austria into a sort-of Kichiku Megane, portraying him as cold, snobbish and neglectful of Hungary's emotional needs to the point of emotional abuse so she can be justified into seeking out comfort in the "more fun, passionate" Prussia's arms and cheating on her husband with him. They don't go so far as to make Austria beat the hell out of Hungary (who's still physically stronger than he is, anyway), but they "forget" that they get along pretty well even after their "divorce"...
- Even Hungary, normally embraced by fans for being a Hot Amazon and Yaoi Fangirl, isn't 100% free of this. There are at least two Germany/Austria fics where she's portrayed as a Clingy Jealous Girl who breaks the Austro-Hungarian compromise solely because Austria pays less attention to her than she wants to. Seems somebody hasn't read the Anschluss and/or Valentines strips, huh?
- A more subdued version is having Hungary only as the local Yaoi Fangirl who loves watching others hit on Austria, but neglecting to have them interact in a more personal/romantic way. That brings out quite a bit of Unfortunate Implications: having a woman hang out with the slashable guys is okay as long as she doesn't dare to set her eyes on the guy she's canonly interested on, because her only acceptable "role" is to serve as the Otaku Surrogate and possible Possession Sue on whom the fangirls can project their own personalities. Way to flatten the character, Fan Dumb.
- The Ship To Ship Combat between Russia/Lithuania and Poland/Lithuania shippers has fallen more than once into this. The most rabid Poland/Lithuania shippers portray Russia as a Complete Monster who beats and rapes Lithuania For The Evulz (Russia is a canon Psychopathic Manchild and Yandere, but many Poland/Liet fans ignore his sympathetic backstory and iron out all nuances in his character to make him into the stock evil antagonist), and the most vocal Russia/Lithuania fans take Poland's initial selfishness and Dumb Blonde quirks (played for laughs in-series) to Character Exaggeration extremes, denying his Character Development.
- Belarus, as the Yandere stalker of Russia, who not only is the fandom bicycle but also her brother, doesn't get nearly as much hate as you'd expect and many fans actually enjoy her Played For Laughs role as the stalker of the stalker. However, more serious fics that pair Russia up with someone other than Belarus often turn her into a Complete Monster without a drop of sympathy or depth. True, Belarus canonly resents anyone Russia shows interest in and she doesn't get a Freudian Excuse or Hidden Depths regarding her behavior like her brother does, but the worst thing she did in canon was breaking Lithuania's fingers - and that was solely done for humor on a date that Lithuania himself asked Belarus for. Having her go out of her way to tie up and rape Lithuania is probably taking it too far.
- A very... "special" Russia/Liet fanworker in Deviantart has a fanart where she not only bashes the China/Russia pairing to shreds, but draws Russia killing China and burning his corpse in a fire. And the less said about her romanticized view of Russia/Liet (as opposed to a Mind Game Ship), the better.
- Science Ninja Team Gatchaman is a refreshingly calm and wank-free fandom, but that hasn't stopped some authors from making Ken into an asshole as a set-up for the Jun x Ryu pairings, or one particular Ken x Joe writer from demonizing Jun into a Clingy Jealous Girl of the worst kind.
- Some FAKE fans bash Clingy Jealous Guy J.J. for his obsessive crush on Dee, which to be fair is over the top but they also forget J.J. is a pretty good cop otherwise and that he later gives up on Dee - getting together with Drake instead (sorta). Others accuse Berkley Rose of being a rapist due to his attraction to Ryo (the most he ever did to Ryo was a Forceful Kiss, and Ryo punched him in the face for even trying that), and some extreme cases of Hurt Comfort Fic have the fangirl creating an evil Mary Sue to rape Ryo just so Dee can come in and rescue him.
- This happens quite often to Keiko Yukimura in Yu Yu Hakusho, as fans either love her and think she's a great match with Yusuke or hate her and usually make her out to be a jealous bitch (or kill her) so that they can pair him with Kuwabara, Kurama, Hiei, or an Original Character. The same thing also happens to Mukuro, Hiei's boss and potential love interest, who is made out to look like a man and be a power-hungry maniac, if she's mentioned at all, in order to facilitate his hooking up with Kurama. Which is a shame, as the two share a sweet, if somewhat disturbing relationship, especially in the manga.
- We can't forget the hate Kuwabara gets for not being a bishie and turning into putty when he's next to Yukina, can we? Yeah, a good part of the hate isn't pairing based, but some Kurama/Yukina fans DO have huge hate-ons for Kuwabara, so...
- This happens to just about every female Weiss Kreuz character who's shown some kind of romantic interest in any of the eight main characters. Ouka Sakaki probably comes off worst: despite the fact that she is both Omi's cousin and dead, fanficcers are still capable of transforming her into an arrogant, shallow Rich Bitch who Omi only dated because he was too polite to tell her where to go. In fact, though none of the four Hitman With A Heart regulars' love affairs last more than a few episodes and Aya's feelings for Sakura were no more than platonic, their would-be love interests are far too frequently bashed for getting in the way of the Ho Yay or a Mary Sue, with Youji's ex-girlfriend Asuka, who was dead before the series even began, being about the only exception.
- Even in Asuka's case some shippers have suggested Youji only hung around with her in the first place in an attempt to prove he wasn't gay, or they sub in a Mary Sue to serve as his childhood sweetheart in her place.
- This trope often gets applied to Ken for no reason other than his close friendship with Youji would make Youji's new love look less important. When he's not being ignored completely as a result he's written as a clueless moron, the token misogynist homophobe, or both.
- All of this is made especially silly by the fact that canon depicts all of the main characters, especially the four protagonists, as terminal Doom Magnets who are almost guaranteed to get a bridge dropped on anyone who gets too close to them.
- Should Amu end up with Ikuto or Tadase? Would you even mention Kukai into the fray? So far, the fandom is largely peaceful, though it seems to be leaning toward Amu/Tadase.
- Actually, the fandom is definitely not peaceful, with about 90 percent of the fandom basically touting Ikuto/Amu as the deepest, greatest love story ever told and calling Tadase too girly (at best) and potentially evil (at worst). They even lambaste him for ruining Ikuto/Amu moments that actually started off as Tadase/Amu moments until Ikuto showed up uninvited.
- In the anime, they're most likely just trying to balance the two couple's moments out. In the manga version, however, it's definitely leaning towards Amu/Ikuto.
- Naru Narusegawa of Love Hina is demonized by fans of Keitaro/Mutsumi, Keitaro/Shinobu, etc. On the other hand, some Keitarou/Naru fans bash Motoko and demonize her behavior towards Keitarou, while failing to aknowledge that Naru can be just as bad when at her worst. In fact, the whole Love Hina example that used to be here actually fell victim to Ship To Ship Combat mentality and had to go, making it a great proof of the trope.
- In Fruits Basket, the bashing/Canon Sue accusations of Tohru Honda by rabid "feminist" fangirls is a given, but This Troper has also seen Kyo dubbed as "abusive wife-beater" (by Tohru/Yuki fans, who also refer to Machi Kuragi as "Relationship Sue"), Yuki as "male Rich Bitch Jerk Ass" (by Kyo/Tohru fans) and Rin as "emo whore" (by Yuki/Haru fans). And let's not even talk of how disgruntled Tohru/Yuki fans treat poor Tohru for daring to choose "abusive asshole" Kyo over "nice perfect gorgeous" Yuki
- The Konami (Konata/Kagami) fanboys can be so rabid, they have been known in the past to bash Miyuki just for the act of being on screen for a few moments. If these fans were the majority, chances are that Miyuki would really die for their ship. It's perhaps a telling sign of the temptations of shipping and Fan Dumbness that an anime satirizing anime tropes and conventions should itself suffer from shipwars.
- An alternate-universe OVA series for Da Capo, in which the fan-preferred Kotori wins, was released several years after the original series. In this series, Die For Our Ship is actually invoked: Nemu is shown to have died some time before the story begins. A number of fans were... quite happy about this.
- Probably the current #1 cause of dislike for Kaaya from Tower of Druaga...
- Since a sizable chunk of the readership is into xxxHOLiC for the Ho Yay between Watanuki and Domeki, it's a wonder most people don't outright hate Himawari, Watanuki's canon Love Interest. They just tend to pretend she doesn't exist at all. It helps that she's into said Ho Yay, too.
- Also, certain shippers actually like the idea of Doumeki's Ho Yay with Watanuki being one-sided. It's not so much that they like Watanuki/Himawari as that, in that way, Watanuki is completely clueless to Doumeki's feelings for him.
- Lupin III fandom is small enough — and the Estrogen Brigade portion of it especially so — that people don't actively flame one another, for the most part. The Lupin/Jigen, Jigen/Goemon, Lupin/Goemon and Lupin/Zenigata shippers can often hold quite civil and mature conversations with one another. What they will not tolerate is Lupin/Fujiko. Or Anyone/Fujiko, for that matter. Granted, she's devious as a cat and twice as manipulative, but you'd be hard pressed to find any named character on the show who isn't. The Lupin fangirls hate her because she's "mean" to their cute little thief (who harasses every attractive woman he meets, including her); the Goemon fangirls don't care for her 'cause she seduced then dumped their man in the first season (the only really justified complaint on this list); the Jigen fangirls agree with their adorably scruffy gunman, that she's "trouble" (again, take look at the others' track records); and the Zenigata fangirls (yep, they exist) just think she's a vapid bimbo (who is capable of building an explosive device powerful enough to destroy a solid oak door but small enough to fit inside a high heel. This isn't even taking into account the number of times she's saved her male compatriots' necks by charming her way into serving as The Mole when needed. Or the number of times she's freaked out at the thought of Lupin being in peril).
- Captain Tsubasa fandom, PLEASE stop bashing Kumi Sugimoto for daring to have a crush on Tsubasa Ohzora and not being shy about it. She never ever hated Sanae Nakazawa for liking him as well, and in the manga she went as far as to confront Sanae on their common love for him (in a very apologetic and sweet way, gotta add), then take Tsubasa's rejection and his love for Sanae with incredible grace, and push him towards his soon-to-be Victorious Childhood Friend without any ulterior thoughts. So why does This Troper see Kumi written in fanfiction as a bitchy, idiotic Yandere who'd rather kill Tsubasa and/or Sanae than wish them happiness? Bitch, please.
- Full Metal Panic. The shipping for Gauron/Sōsuke. Especially noticeable after the Character Derailment of poor Kaname in the later novels, where quite a few fans Abandoned Ship and actually came to the conclusion that Sōsuke would have been better off continuing on with being the emotionless, Assassin Saint Kashim and ending up with Gauron. In fact, there are actually numerous fans of the pairing that feel that Gauron loved Sōsuke and understood him more than Kaname. Therefore, they "matched together better." This is, of course, ignoring all the incredibly creepy and disturbing things that Gauron did, such as being a pedophile molester that desired and obsessed over Sōsuke since the latter was twelve, killed (or attempted to) all of Sôsuke's friends / love interests, laid waste to an entire city just so he could get off on seeing Sōsuke's depressed face one last time, and fantasizing about raping Sōsuke's corpse.
- Katekyo Hitman Reborn. Oh lord, what happens with any female that's paired with Tsuna. Let's face it — a lot of shippers feel that Het Is Ew. Quite a few fanfics / theories that fangirls come up with to kill the pairing of Tsuna and Kyoko is that: 1. She's actually secretly his twin sister; 2. He eventually realizes that she's a bitch that's in love with Gokudera (which prompts him to go off with Gokudera himself); 3. She rejects him and he goes off with one of his male guardians.
- this troper has found that they majority of the Katekyo Hitman Reborn fandom is open to pretty much any pairing, granted Kyoko and Haru are generally disliked, other females (because there are more than those two) are often paired with the same males we find in malexmale pairings, I've also found while one may have an OTP for the series, they generally don't mind the characters being paired with others
- Any guesses as to why Nagisa Furukawa is nicknamed "Miss Cockroach"? A part of it comes from her Hair Antennae. The rest... well, ask more than one Tomoya/(read: Tomoyo, Kyou, Ryou, Kotomi) shipper.
- Kaorin from Azumanga Daioh is often portrayed as an evil, scheming Yandere bitch who will try to steal poor sweet Sakaki away from the prefered partner.
- Crazy as it might sound, a fair number of Zoro/Robin fans seem bitter towards Franky and tend to dismiss or bash him as immature and weird (WHAT MANGA HAVE THEY BEEN READING?!), which probably stems from how he's had a lot more meaningful interaction/character development with Robin than Zoro despite being on the same side for a shorter period of time. That's all. Seriously.
- And some Zoro/Nami fans have taken to bashing Tashigi due to being threatened by her possibly showing small hints that she might like Zoro and says she should inexplicably end up with Smoker instead. Painfully brainless when you consider it was never Tashigi's goal to be anyone's woman, and that she doesn't even NEED to end up with anyone at all (which leads to some Unfortunate Implications about what these fans seem to think the role of female characters as a whole should be.)
- Let's take special note of the enmity growing between the Luffy/Boa and Luffy/Nami fans. Dear shippers: Luffy values people period. He'd probably think you were a loser if you hated on either Boa or Nami. Please reread the damn story to appreciate the fact it's mostly about camaderie and these things aren't worth dwelling upon seriously. Thank you.
- Kuroshitsuji: Elizabeth. Poor, poor little Elizabeth.
- And After School Nightmare's Kureha Fujishiro. Yeah, she's a Clingy Jealous Girl who finds solace in Mashiro's company because she Does Not Like Men, but still... Poor, poor horribly sexually abused Kureha. It's made worse by the Draco In Leather Pants status granted to Sou Mizuhashi, Mashiro's other love interest...
- The cast of Ouran High School Host Club have all fallen victim to this. Because you can rationalise pretty much any pairing with Haruhi, fanfic writers will portray any characters percieved as being in the way as evil, controlling, abusive, and the like, particularly Hikaru in Kaoru/Haruhi and vice-versa, or Mori in Honi/Haruhi, and often Tamaki in anything. Because ho yay can also be seen in any way you want, there's always at least one victim, usually Haruhi or that character's heterosexual life partner.
- And if you follow the anime and ship Tamaki/Haruhi, you're expected to hate Eclaire Tonerre. Sure, she wasn't a saint. but I don't think she deserves the utter hatred she sometimes gets...
- Wait, where is Vampire Knight? Some of the fans (this troper included) desire so much Kaname's death that they stopped reading the manga.
- Yuuki isn't exactly liked either, as far as This Troper knows.
Comic Books
- Jean Grey/ Cyclops/ Wolverine from X-Men has long been a complicated storm of controversy. Many fans have shipped Wolverine/Jean Grey since the day Wolverine joined the X-Men, but Marvel has long refused to give into fan demands, so fans engage in Scott and Jean bashing. Of course, they've also engaged in massive amounts of Character Derailment with regards to Cyclops (first abandoning his wife Madelyne Pryor and newborn son Nathan Summers, something not even Jean approved of and later, dealing with his post-traumatic astral possession stress by sleeping with reformed villainess Emma Frost (also derailed into a sort of Tsundere Sue), who agreed to the sort of kinky sex/role-playing because Jean refused to engage in — while portraying Jean Grey as a forgiving/enabling saint who ultimately gave her blessing to Scott and Emma on her deathbed). Meanwhile, perhaps spurned by those who dislike the often misogynistic views upon marriage that Marvel takes (i.e. it's always the woman's fault if a marriage fails in a Marvel Comic), Marvel in recent years have portrayed Wolverine as refusing to consider a relationship with Jean out of respect for Scott, even going so far as to reject a desperate Jean's advances when she confided to Wolverine that Scott was refusing to touch her sexually. So, the Bad Ass is "always right" and his love rival is "always wrong". Duh.
- In typical Mark Millar fashion, Ultimate X-Men had the "cool guy" Wolverine not only take Jean Grey's virginity, but also STAB the nerdy, put-upon "loser" Ultimate Cyclops and leave him to die, in order to ensure Jean would be his and his alone. And the Fan Dumb rejoiced!
- Also in the X-Men camp, mentioning the Rogue/Gambit relationship in general is a nice way to start a barbecue. Mostly because Wolverine/Gambit is extremely popular among slash writers as well as the movie-centric Rogue/Iceman or Rogue/Wolverine pairing and old school comic Rogue/Magneto/Joseph pairings.
- This troper is a veteran of the Pete vs. Piotr flame wars. When Warren Ellis first hooked up Pete Wisdom and Kitty Pryde in Excalibur, Colussus' initial reaction was to beat the dogsnot out of Wisdom. This despite the fact that in his most recent previous appearance, Colossus came across as very level-headed and wasn't even thinking of Kitty. Ellis himself admitted that he wrote Colossus as out of character. Alas, the damage was done, and Colossus is still reviled by a vocal sub-group of X-fans for one OOC moment. Many Pryde/Wisdom fanfics thus treat Colossus as mentally retarded at best and a rapist at worst.
- Any female that "gets in the way of" Batman family Ho Yay is almost guaranteed a vilifying in fandom. Similarly, Lois is often conveniently simply not brought up as if she didn't exist to get in the way of Batman/Superman Ho Yay.
- The exception to this rule is Stephanie Brown (Spoiler/Robin IV), formerly Tim Drake's (Robin III) canonical love interest, who generally suffered fanbase vilification only when her existence was getting in the way of hooking Tim up with another girl. Apparently Ho Yay is less desirable when it's between a teenaged boy and any of the rest of the adults in the Bat-family.
- Amusingly, during the period of time between Spoiler's canon death and DC editorial retconning her as having only been a faked death, the generally dominant fan reaction was to be upset that she died, not to celebrate new 'ship possibilities.
- Well, Catwoman is pretty popular.
- A canon example (is that even possible?) could be David in Strangers in Paradise. He loves Katchoo, and eventually we realise that Katchoo loves him (or else has loved him all along, or maybe...). Typical Dogged Nice Guy with whom Katchoo (and sometimes Francine) forms a loving, reasonably stable relationship with. But he has to die of a brain tumor at the end so Katchoo and Francine can be together without him. Granted, Katchoo and Francine were the obvious couple from the start, but still.
- Scarlet Witch/Vision/Wonder Man is another one, with the nasty result of writers routinely doing horrible things to Vision (erasing his mind, killing off his and Wanda's children, vivisecting him) in order to make Wonder Man and Scarlet Witch a couple. When writer Kurt Busiek FINALLY had Vision confront Wonder Man for his assholery, Busiek pulled a WTF move by having Wonder Man tell Vision that he should feel sorry for Wonder Man under the logic that Simon being a jealous, homewrecking asshole towards Vision was acceptable and that Vision should shut the fuck up and be happy that Simon got the girl, at the expense of ruining Vision's life. Of course, Busiek "reset" things at the end of his run, via having Wonder Man dump Wanda while being held in a concentration camp by Kang the Conquerer, because he didn't want to settle down and have kids with Wanda, like she wanted...
- Of course, this is all irrelevent these days, what with Brian Michael Bendis senselessly killing Vision off in Avengers Disassembled, having Wonder Man utterly forget Wanda even existed as far as not giving a damn about her, sending poor Wanda into the cornfield, and having Hawkeye once again obsessing over Wanda and his crush on her, even though he has long outgrown his crush on Wanda and settled on just being friends with her.
- Some Wonder Woman fans hate any guy that she looks like developing a relationship with, apparently feeling that nobody is worthy of her, which makes it more a case of "Die for her celibacy".
- Exceptions: Steve Trevor due to Grandfather Clause (though he's not really an option post-Crisis on Infinite Earths), Superman (although the presence of Lois means that's pretty much limited to Elseworlds) and Batman.
- Note that, while nobody tends to actually kill them in fic, shipping Diana with Clark or Bruce is still a huge Broken Base issue and a great way to start a flame war at just about any comics forum. Rama and Io, on the other hand, Diana's two most obscure suitors (one simply in a storyarc nobody read, the other a female love interest too subtle for most fans to pick up on), are generally liked by anyone who's actually heard of them, and are probably protected from this mostly by the fact that most fans aren't aware of them.
- Die For Our Ship canonically happened with the death of Gwen Stacy in Spider-Man, as writer Gerry Conway has stated that a big reason for killing her off was that he felt Peter and Mary Jane deserved to be together.
- Green Arrow is often vilified by Dinah/Babs shippers due to his and Dinah's relationship. They even bashed him when he was dead but nowhere near the extent they've done since he was resurrected. And it's just gotten worse since he and Dinah tied the knot.
- Believe it or not, Joker gets this a lot from the Ivy/Harley shippers. Justified in that Ivy does treat Harley better... somewhat.
- Please Elaborate. This troper fails to see how they could actually make Joker worse. He tries to kill Harley on a regular basis, and I definitely wouldn't put him past beatings/rape.
- Another canon (or Dis Continuity, depending on your opinion of it) example: The Polaris/Havok/Nurse Annie triangle during Chuck Austen's run on Uncanny X-Men. While Lorna has never been the most stable of people, Austen blew her mental issues into full-blown bitchy psychosis in order to justify getting Havok together with the nurse he telepathically dated while in a coma (caused by her telepath son, who wanted a daddy and wasn't above committing mind rape in order to force Havok to be said daddy). This ended with Havok dumping Polaris at the altar for Annie, and Polaris flipping her shit and attempting to kill them both before Juggernaut knocked her out. She was put into psychic therapy; they ran off to Paris together, seemingly supported by all of the other X-Men. The fact that Austen wasn't at all shy about telling people that Annie was directly modeled off his own wife, and he envisioned himself as Havok, did absolutely nothing to help fans accept the pairing, especially since after that Annie was throwing herself at Iceman while still being with Havok. It's no wonder Austen, upon leaving the book, put Annie on a bus out of town with her son to protect his much reviled character from future reprisals. Though Austen did have her last scene feature a nebulous scene where it's implied that Annie's mind-raping son has hooked up with Elias Bogan, a Complete Monster of a disembodied telepath who liked to trick kids into selling their parents to him to use as slaves to rape and torture for his own sick amusement.
- Captain America/Iron Man shippers are often accused of doing this to Sharon Carter. Strangely enough the only time a bashing fic did appear on the main livejournal community for the pairing, the author was quickly told off and everyone agreed that just wasn't on.
- Or the community does a more quiet version of DFOS, This Troper has read multiple fanfics that pair her with WINTER SOLDIER or just mention her in passing as "it never really worked out between them." They treat her more as a casual-ex-turned-friend if she's lucky, or a "it never would have worked out anyways" to justify Cap jumping Tony's pistons.
- Given that Cap and Sharon broke up and got back together multiple times in the canon, I'm not sure it's a case of DFOS, especially if she's not treated hatefully.
- Justified with Tony Stark's ex-girls many of which have whipped him, shot him, sold him out, and slept with his best friend. It's no wonder the fans think he might be better off dating guys.
Films — Animation
- One could say that this trope is inverted for Corpse Bride — the one the Victor/Emily shippers want to die is Victor, given that the other half of the couple also happens to be a corpse. That said, there has been a fair amount of vilifying of Victoria in post-film Victor/Emily fanfics, portraying her as a gold digger or just plain mean to Victor. (And it can probably be argued that leaving Victoria at Barkis's tender mercies in other A Us is A Fate Worse Than Death.)
Films — Live Action
- Will Turner from Pirates of the Caribbean. Ever since he married Elizabeth Swann, many of those who wanted Elizabeth with Jack Sparrow are making him out to be a rapist, an abuser, or both.
- Either that, or Elizabeth is called a Canon Sue and bashed repeatedly for driving a wedge between the Jack/Will relationship.
- Ever since The Lord of the Rings books were made into movies, Arwen has been loathed by Éowyn teenyboppers who see her as the obstacle for Éowyn to get Aragorn's love, or as a "bad bad girly girl". The Aragorn/Legolas slashers also have it against her.
- Faramir also gets some flack from rabid Aragorn/Éowyn fans, who see him as being less worthy of her than Aragorn. Nevermind that Aragorn himself sunk that ship by pointing out how unhappy Éowyn would've been if she married him, and later was very happy when she and Faramir became the Beta Couple...
- And both Éowyn and Arwen catch heat from the Mary Sue creators who ship their unholy spawn with Aragorn or Faramir. They get even more from the Yaoi Fangirl contingent who must have Aragorn sidling up to, say, Legolas? (Or even Boromir, despite being dead.) In one fic, Arwen was turned into such a shrill harpy that in a post-series tale set in the present day, she actually sold the mummies of her and Aragorn's children to a museum just to hurt him. (Srsly.) Éowyn is more likely to just get written off as "that butch chick".
- In the Sweeney Todd movie fandom, Lucy Barker gets some serious hate from Sweeney/Mrs. Lovett shippers. Yes, there are shippers for Sweeney Todd; There are shippers for everything...especially for everything played by Johnny Depp.
- Due to Bollywood marketing being dependent on which combo of actors and actresses is the screen couple (referred as a "jodi" by Indians and the Industry), fans of a particular screen couple (who often do several movies together if successful) will fight fans of another couple. Shah Rukh Khan/Kajol is the quintessential example these days.
- A certain portion of Kirk/Spock fans have had quite a bit trouble dealing with the fact that in the 2009 reboot movie Spock/Uhura is canon, and some rather nasty stuff has been said about Uhura as a result.
Close Films — Live Action
Literature
- Ron and Ginny Weasley, of Harry Potter fame, are loathed by many militant Harry/Hermione shippers, after the author confirmed Harry/Ginny and Ron/Hermione as canon in Harry Potter And The Half Blood Prince. Ginny was hated even before then, perhaps in response to the Harry/Ginny shippers who were correctly predicting the couple's canonization, but probably more directly related to her increased prominence in Harry Potter And The Order Of The Phoenix. There is a (much) smaller subset of shippers who bash Harry for being "stupid" enough to choose Ginny over Hermione, or because they would have preferred to see Ginny get together with Harry's rival Draco Malfoy. While this happens, the sensible Harry/Hermione shippers would rather not have anything to do with them.
- There is a subset of Ginny bashers who seriously believe that Harry's 'chest monster' is due to the canonical use of love potion on Harry, and have written extensive theses trying to prove this.
- Note that that page begins with the author's theory that in fact the entire point of the Harry Potter books, intended by JK Rowling herself, is to lie to the reader and get them to figure out the truth themselves. What. The. Hell?!
- As noted on the Ron The Death Eater page, the Weasleys in general tend to get this from rabid shippers. This Troper has seen Ron and Ginny killed off in rather graphic fashion in fic, often before the story even starts. And worst of all, no one seems to care that they're dead.
- The pointlessness of the Weasley-bashing is emphasized even further by extremely well-written Harry/Hermione fics (written by the more peaceful fans of the pairing) who cheerfully pair Ron off with Luna and Ginny off with Neville and proceed as scheduled. It's also fairly popular to pair Ron with Susan Bones or another Hufflepuff, and Ginny off with Dean Thomas... the point being, the Weasleys can be perfectly happy (and remain close to Harry) while getting together with other people. The Hatedom seems to forget this.
- Poor Cho Chang gets it from basically everyone who ships Harry with someone else. This started even before Book Five, when all we knew about her was that she was a pretty and popular athlete, who (gently) turned Harry down on his first attempt to ask her out. This extended into real life, when actress Katie Leung was picked to play Cho in the films. She got criticism of her looks, her racial background, even death threats.
- Also in Harry Potter, although Nymphadora Tonks is well-liked by the majority of the fandom, there are a small but outspoken group of slashers who have a conspiracy theory that she was written into the story at the last minute to prove that Remus Lupin wasn't gay with either Sirius Black or Severus Snape, the most common ships.
- The idea that she was written in to disprove Lupin's gayness is silly, but she does suffer from being little more than a love interest. Tonks basically doesn't have anything to do that's important to the plot aside from being Lupin's love interest, and it's a pretty messed up romance at that. For all that she's both liked and hated, she's just a marginal character who is an accomplished Order member that dies so that the new generation can have a war orphan.
- In the books themselves, Rowling seems to have made a common subversion of the practice: Cedric Diggory's death conveniently enabled the Cho Chang/Harry relationship briefly hinted at in Goblet of Fire... which then canonically fell apart in the next book. (She did warn the readers in Goblet of Fire promotional interviews, but suspiciously the forewarned fatality would grease the wheels of plot.)
- Rowling has stated in interviews that some characters married people who were never seen in the books. This news did not go down well with fans of alternative ships.
- Many Snape/Lily shippers mercilessly bash James for bullying Snape at school, conveniently forgetting that Snape spent his adult career bullying children and can be easily seen as Lily's Stalker With A Crush.
- Most rabid shippers are likely to defend their characters such as James or Snape saying they're not jerks, they're just misunderstood. The same can be said for rabid Ginny and Hermione fans. And of course, screaming about how much you love your ship and how blind everyone else is to not see the chemistry written in the books before hand, when all the sane people want to do is read their books in peace, is a sure way to get them on your side.
- You guys should see the intense hate Ron gets from the Snape/Hermione shippers. It's actually a really, really popular ship, and Ron gets an amazing amount of vitriol hurled at him for not being good enough for Hermione, while Snape is her intellectual equal in need of some tender love and care because he is misunderstood and has been wronged all his life.
- The two kindest Snape/Hermione fics this troper has read (both by the same author) respectively had Ron die a heroic death in the war against Voldemort and Hermione only start to hook up with Snape after a suitable mourning period, and one where Ron & Hermione had no attraction to each other beyond the hormonal and eventually agreed that they should date other people. Yes, stuffed in the fridge and/or reduced to the emotional depth of a teaspoon, that's when the Snape/Hermione fic is being nice to Ron. This Troper does not want to know what the nasty is like.
- The kindest this troper has read usually have Ron/Hermione either just very good friends with some chemistry who don't quite click, or in one case the story was set after the Epilogue. Ron died after falling off his broom, and Hermione was devastated, but eventually met Snape who had been, um, hiding. Fortunately, most Snape/Hermione this troper reads involves Ron and Hermione dating, but then deciding their interests are too different. This troper used to be prone to Ron-bashing herself, a little, but Deathly Hallows put paid to that.
It was Narcissa who finally broke the stalemate. “Take these prisoners down to the cellar, Greyback,”* she commanded in her thin, cold voice.
“Wait!” interpolated Bellatrix. “All except . . . except for the Mudblood.”
“No!” cried Ron. “You can have me, keep me!”
- In general Ron falls victim to this the most. He is often portrayed as either having the mental capacities of a three-year-old (while not as intelligent as Hermione or Harry in the books, he's certainly not stupid), or outright cheating on Hermione with no explanation on why. This is all so Hermione can get a new look and a new attitude and go shack up with Draco/Harry/Snape/somebody else.
- Ron and Hermione are often targeted even if people are pairing Harry up with somebody completely different, normally Draco, although Snape and Blaise Zabini are common too. Their friendship is portrayed as shallow, sometimes even revealing that they were paid to be his friends, or else them being so emotionally apathetic that Harry rejects them. This is ultimately so Harry can wallow in how alone he is in the world until his new love interest can be there for him, and show him kindness, understanding, and love.
- Amy March from Little Women is universally hated for stealing Laurie from Jo; this hatred can even easily be seen in films, in which writers cannot change the ending for Jo/Laurie, but they still show Amy in a bad light. This is especially funny, given that Jo herself rejected Laurie twice, did everything to stop him from proposing, including leaving home, and even wanted him to marry one of her sisters - Meg in the first volume, Beth in the second. Jo chose another guy and had a happy marriage, but the fandom who still prefers her with Laurie is as strong today as it was over a hundred years ago when the writer revolted.
- Les Miserables fandom (yes, there is one) has a contingent out to get Cosette. Granted, it's not easy when your rival is The Woobie. Marius also gets bashed for choosing Cosette over Eponine, because obviously he can't choose who he falls in love with. This is why we can't have nice things.
- This fandom is surprisingly violent, and all the crazier since the "choice" is between a girl who survives until curtain and a girl who dies! Also, the book portrays the fan favorite Eponine as a crazed stalker, and the Marius/Cosette relationship is way more supported, which illuminates just how insane the Marius/Eponine shippers are sometimes.
- Although Marius/Eponine shippers can be mindbogglingly stupid, the rival ship, Marius/Cosette, is if anything, more venomous, with their arguments often degenerating into personal attacks. Thus the stereotype of the Marius/Eponine shipper as a basement-dwelling social nobody who is completely ignorant that 'Ponine is a metaphor for the restrictive social class system of Imperial France and who cuts their wrists to "On My Own."
- The musical may be to blame here: the main problem seems to be that Marius knows that Cosette is his True Love (with a capital T) within seconds of glimpsing her in the street. So there's yet another contingent: Marius/nobody, because one girl is a crazed stalker and the other he's only known for ten minutes. The musical also fails to give Cosette anything in the way of character development, so perhaps some people go with Eponine because at least she has a little more to her than pretty soprano ingenue.
- Approximately half of The Phantom of the Opera fanfics in existence rewrite Raoul as abusive, alcoholic, womanizing, and/or an indifferent lover in an attempt to justify matching Christine up with the title character — never mind the fact the latter is an emotionally unstable Stalker With A Crush and a known murderer.
- Not to mention that both Raoul and Christine are canonically in late teens-early 20's during the story, while the Phantom is a 50+ man. Whose face resembles a rotting skull. Who has a history of sadism, misanthropy and madness.
- The Dresden Files: Harry/Murphy, Harry/Susan and Harry/Elaine shippers do not like Luccio.
- Granted, the relationship is going to be... problematic, given that the 11th book begins with Morgan, Luccio's former second in command and close comrade in arms, being accused of being the traitor, and Dresden hiding him, with a pretty high probability that Luccio will be leading the hunt for him.
- By the end of the 11th book, the whole Die For Our Ship thing becomes moot, because it turns out Luccio has been mind-whammied into her relationship with Harry so the mole can keep an eye on him. Ouch.
- Even the Warrior Cats fandom has this. Ashfur is generally hated for getting in the way of Brambleclaw/Squirrelflight. Either Spottedleaf or Sandstorm are bashed for loving Firestar.
- And on the flipside, Brambleclaw is bashed for getting in the way of Ashfur/Squirrelflight, and Squirrelflight is bashed for the whole Love Triangle thing happening in the first place.
- In the case of Spottedleaf, even the author bashes her for loving Firestar, even though she's already killed the shipping as much as she possibly can without making either of them go out of character.
- And also Nightcloud. Which is funny, because she's just a minor character who has only shown up four times and has only had about five lines of dialogue, and clearly poses no threat to Leafpool and Crowfeather. Crowfeather doesn't even make eye contact with her until Sunrise. Pretty much the only reason the rivalry exists is because Crowfeather patrolled her borders to prove his loyalty.
Live Action TV
Video Games
- Kairi of Kingdom Hearts is rabidly hated by many Sora/Riku shippers, despite being a very kind-hearted princess type of a trio of friends without much overt romantic interest. Generally, she's portrayed by the shippers as a selfish, homophobic bitch who hates Riku (usually due to one scene where she expressed distrust toward him, which wasn't all that invalid) and wants Sora for herself, and usually ends up dying in some over-the-top fashion.
- There also exists a cult following for Sora/Namine that are positively vicious toward Kairi, making her out to be dumb, selfish, and evil while insisting that Namine is perfectly wonderful in every way, so she deserves to be with Sora. On the flip side, whenever Sora/Kairi shippers actually turn up, half of them seem to demonize Namine, saying that she messed with Sora's memories and tried to steal him away from Kairi, which she actually did do...under the orders of her evil, abusive guardians, and once they were defeated, she set things right with Sora. The big kicker to all of this? Kairi and Namine are the SAME BEING anyway! Honestly, it's enough to give one a brain tumor...
- The Organization (or, the "ORGY-nization" if you see all the pairings) XIII are all either hated or loved for various reasons in terms of fandom, but Larxene is often depicted as more of an evil, violent and sadistic bitch than necessary or just forgotten altogether in order to advance any of the yaoi pairings. Note that half of the Organization hasn't even canonically met (or at least on screen). This only encourages it by leading to shipping at near-random and therefore, bashing of rival ships. When you have people loathing Zexion for getting in the way of Xigbar/Demyx, who doesn't even appear in the same game as either of them, you know something is seriously wrong...
- Namine, as Roxas' implied Love Interest (as well as having a... complicated relation to the Sora/Kairi relationship), gets this treatment only about as often as she gets written as an enabler. According to what this troper has observed, she's liked among fangirls for the sole reason that they generally don't see her as any threat to any ship. Dare to suggest otherwise and that favorable view on her fades fast. Poor Namine...
- Poor Xion has been overly abused by the Sora/Riku fangirls due to a couple of released cutscenes showing her and Riku at the same time. You'd really think they'd shut up now, though... especially since dear Xion is actually a transgendered, incomplete clone of Sora. Who ends up looking exactly like Sora near her final moments.
- And let's not go into the Axel/Roxas fangirls' reaction to her....
- An especially ironic example would be Princess Zelda, who is frequently bashed and vilified in slashfics wherein Link is paired up with her male-looking ninja alter ego (who is promptly retconned to actually ''be'' male), Sheik. But then again, the disconnect between the perpetually Distressed Damsel that Zelda is in game after game and the actually cool Future Badass that Sheik was may have something to do with it (even though she's gotten much better post "Ocarina of Time", extending to "Wind Waker" and "Twilight Princess."
- This tendency toward Zelda bashing has continued with the release of Twilight Princess, where the Link/Midna shippers keep creating ways to reopen access to the Twilight Realm, chuck Zelda through it, and bring Midna back - if not outright have the princess of Hyrule be the first victim of the next conflict. And let's not talk about Ilia...
- Don't forget Ocarina of Time, which arguably added multiple love interests depending on who you ask. Saria, Malon, Zelda, and Ruto all suffer. The older Nabooru, who both has the most overt interest in him and has the least dialogue, gets rather less negative attention. Princess Ruto, who finagled a Childhood Marriage Promise, is the most loathed girl by the shippers, with almost every fic she's in blowing her somewhat spoiled attitude entirely out of proportion and making her a Stalker With A Crush - if they don't turn her into a Ralph Wiggum entirely.
- Ironically, the only Zelda games that actually make any implicit romantic connection between a Zelda and a Link are the second game when an ancient Zelda is implied to kiss Link behind a curtain and a linked Oracle of Ages and Oracle of Seasons ending shows Zelda kissing Link's cheek, who swoons as hearts float above his head, rather than either of the above. Your Mileage May Vary, though.
- All of the above is probably the reason why Wind Waker had only three significant female characters: One was princess Zelda, the next showed obvious attraction to another boy and the last was... Link's sister. Then there's this weird fairy queen with the crush on Link, but hardly anyone ever remembers her. This pretty much the best Nintendo could do to avoid rapid shipping wars. Also, making Tetra an actual girl, instead of a girl pretending to be a boy was probably a wise choise as well... At least, there are little to no Wind Waker shipping wars out there and the only ones the Yaoi Fangirls pair Toon Link up with are... pretty much all of the other Links. But nothing Wind Waker intern.
- The shipping wars over Final Fantasy VII are pretty brutal. Since Square heavily leans towards Cloud and Tifa, but still hasn't shown them, say, kissing, married, or engaged in explicit carnal relations, several people who wanted him hooked up with Aerith instead have often grasped at straws, claiming that Square has not proven anything or is even engaging in Ship Tease with the Compilation. The matter of Aerith is somewhat harder to resolve since she and Zack are both dead, but Aerith still exists within the Lifestream so she's able to still play an active role in the plot. One piece of the Compilation deals with her trying to sort out whether she loved Cloud, Zack, or the person Cloud became when he essentially took over for Zack. All this has actually caused another side - a group of people so tired of the ship wars that they refuse to believe Square has settled anything rather than hear one more long drawn out argument. So to recap, the sides are Cloud/Tifa, Cloud/Aerith, Zack/Aerith, and Cloud/Heterosexual Life Partners. Interestingly, the fandom almost always portrays the male characters sympathetically, but the brutal character assassinations of Aerith/Tifa from the opposite sides of the 'LTD' - "Love Triangle Debate" - largely ignore the fact that the two characters were canonically friends. This may be indication of the majority gender amongst writers of ship fic...
- Then, there's Yuffie. If fandom didn't already hate her as The Scrappy, the very small complication she adds to any arm of the Cloud/Tifa/Aerith triangle you're going after is enough to make her absolutely detested. Throw in the het fandom's tendency to pair her with Vincent (optional characters go well together, one supposes?), and the yaoi fandom is ready to gut her.
- Square also contributed with a little Ship Tease in the game itself, since the players could have Cloud go on a date with Aerith, Tifa, Yuffie...or Barret. Sadly, there is nobody willing to go to battle over a Cloud/Barret pairing.
- This troper played through the game and got the distinct impression that there was some Getting Crap Past The Radar involved in the final scene where Tifa and Cloud sleep together the night before they enter the Northern Crater to face Sephiroth in the final battle. Mentioning this in other FFVII fan circles left a few singes.
- The Final Fantasy VIII fandom is rife with shipping fans united only by their hatred of Rinoa for getting Squall, and a raging desire to see him hooked up with anyone else. The majority of this is focused on Quistis or Seifer, but other shipping ranges from the odd (Selphie, Fujin) to the even more Ho Yay (Irvine, Zell) to the bizarre (....Cerberus/Squall? MY EYES).
- Amy Rose in Sonic the Hedgehog (and to some extent, Sally Acorn in the Archie Sonic comics) is forever reviled by Sonic/Tails slash shippers, a prospect made easier due to her Stalker With A Crush status. The Sally and Amy fans also hate each other's characters, each blaming the others' chosen character for making the series Jump The Shark and Flanderization destroying theirs.
- Don't forget Elise, Sonic's awkward love interest in Sonic 06. She's hated by Sonamy fans and even just fans who hate her for her personality.
- Depending on what is supported, Shadow, Knuckles, and Rouge are subjected to this treatment, with Rouge being portrayed as an evil seductress trying to lure Knuckles and Shadow away from each other by the Shadow x Knuckles shippers, Shadow being portrayed as a gun-toting manic by the Knuckles x Rouge shippers, and Knuckles being portrayed as abusive and obsessive by the Rouge x Shadow shippers.
- This is also the case with the Shadamy shippers, who usually portray Sonic as a Jerkass who doesn't want Amy until she's off with someone else.
- Many fanfics kill Sonic off in order to pair Amy up with... Mecha Sonic.
- As much as she's beloved by fans, Krystal in Star Fox still gets flack for impeding Fox's presumed relationships with Falco and/or Wolf.
- There are also those who would have preferred that Fox hook up with Fara, a character who appeared in a Nintendo Power comic bur not in any of the games.
- Tales Of Symphonia has this for Colette, the female lead who interferes with alternate pairings (both het and yaoi) for the male lead. She's detested by much of the fandom, mostly for being a Distressed Damsel, a situation that is highly agitated by the fact that, statwise and storywise, she's actually an incredibly capable Glass Cannon. And she's still a Distressed Damsel. This already bad situation is completely destroyed by the presence of Sheena, a female with obvious interest in the male lead who has a tragic past, giving her aspects of the Woobie, and whose Character Development is much more interesting than Colette's, and to top it off is portrayed as a fully-capable Action Girl (But statistically, she's proven to be The Scrappy). And this is despite the fact that, in real life, most people would probably love Colette. Including, in-universe, almost all of her romantic rivals.
- Zelos is loathed by some Lloyd/Sheena fans, who take the worst of his Handsome Lech persona and turn him into a straight up Jerk Ass.
- At least he can be perceived as a threat, unlike many other examples on this page, due to his canonical interest in Sheena.
- Fortunately, while it is possible to both kill off Zelos and pair Lloyd up with Sheena in the game, you cannot do both at the same time.
- And if you DO kill off Zelos, you've not only thrown off the canon altogther, you've throughly set Lloyd up with Colette, So Yeah.
- Curiously enough, Zelos/Sheena shippers seem to be much less vocal than the other groups.
- Tales Of Legendia also has this for Shirley, who, like Colette in Symphonia, is the game's female lead. She interferes with alternate pairings for Senel (Senel/Chloe apparently being the overwhelming favourite), especially since she and Senel apparently become "engaged" at the end of the Main Quest. But even so, it would seem that the vast majority of the Legendia fandom just generally wish Shirley to burn in the fiery depths of hell anyway.
- This is made slightly ridiculous by Senel being a Chaste Hero, who shows no interest in anyone bar his dead ex-girlfriend. Indeed, the two girls actually bond in one scene over the fact that he doesn't seem to have anything but friendship for either of them! (Despite Shirley being engaged to him, bizarrely enough.)
- Even more absurd is that both Senel/Shirley AND Senel/Chloe were already suffering from Shipping Bed Death by the point a love triangle emerged. Neither got together with him in the end, but their pining for him prior to that wore thin VERY fast. It makes one consider the possibility that perhaps any pairing with Chaste Hero Senel isn't a good idea at all...
- Fire Emblem 7 has this in spades. In generally, thanks to the support system, which gives characters both nifty Character Development and stat bonuses, Fire Emblem tends to be a breeding ground for shipwars. It doesn't help that several fans view certain ships as a better couple. Some examples are... :
- Ninian the Dancer is the biggest victim of this from from rabid Lyn/Eliwood, Eliwood/Hector, and Mary Sue fans who bash her for being angsty (for reasons which aren't necessarily related to Eliwood) as well as for standing in between their pairing of choice.
- Similarly, quiet and melancholy Staff Chick Priscilla is bashed six ways from Sunday for having a crush on her brother and being jealous of his best friend/love interest, being a possible love interest to three guys who arguably have homoerotic subtext with other guys, and occasionally for supposedly being an obstacle to another guy's love-hate relationship with another girl.
- Angst-ridden Pheraen knight Harken is often forgotten or shoved aside so that his canon fiance Isadora can hook up with dashing thief Legault.
- Sain already gets a lot of crap for being a flirt as it is, but throw pairings like Kent/Fiora and Wil/Rebecca into the mix and it gets worse.
- Some Wil/Rebecca fans not only hate Sain, but also detest Rebecca's other possible love interest, Lowen.
- People who pair Erk with other people often bash Serra in the process - especially in fanfiction, where Erk seems to become a mouthpiece for the author's hate of Serra. Serra herself is portrayed as a selfish Erk-obsessed shrew of a woman (there is a fic where she was willing to let one of the other girls die from an injury so she could have Erk to herself) and is "properly" rebuffed in the end. Similarly, Erk is bashed by people who pair Serra with Oswin or Matthew, who portray him as if he truly loathed Serra instead of caring for her yet not being able to say it.
- Leila and Matthew's canon love for her are shoved to the side to make room for the more popular Matthew/Guy(even despite the obvious denial over the LACK of evidence to support this pairing).
- And let's not forget the fighting that goes on over which pairings create the children of certain characters in Fuuin no Tsurugi.
- Fire Emblem 4 suffers from a bit of this as well:
- Beowulf suffers a lot of hate in the fandom as it is, but Finn/Lachesis gives the haters even more fuel for their fire. In turn, Beowulf fans scorn the Finn/Lachesis pairing, blaming its very existence for the fact that their favorite character isn't liked.
- Levin/Fury fans turn up their noses at Sylvia. Levin/Sylvia fans turn up their noses at Fury. Levin/Tiltyu fans turn up their noses at both.
- In Fire Emblem 3, some fans decided Marth goes better with either Catria. However they're generally pretty civil with Caeda/Marth fans. Its mostly the Marth/Mary Sue shippers(who generally never even played the game) who do the bashing.
- Fire Emblem 9 has Ike/Soren shippers who bash Elincia to no end. This, despite the fact that Ike shows no interest in her romantically. It's mostly stopped now that the sequel shows Elincia really coming into her own. The tenth game implies she ends up with Geoffrey. And you can make Ike and Soren's Ho Yay more or less canon, if you get their supports.
- Not to mention the very, very ugly war between Tibarn/Reyson shippers and Naesala/Reyson shippers.
- Another one where the tenth game comes to the rescue, as it sets up a canonical relationship between Naesala and Reyson's sister, Leanne. Looking back on it, there were definitely hints of that relationship back in the ninth game, where Leanne was just an NPC.
- In Fire Emblem 10, main character Micaiah occasionally gets bashed for her romance with Sothe and standing in the way of Ho Yay, on top of getting bashed for being a Canon Sue.
- In Fire Emblem 8, some Joshua/Artur fans quite vocally bash Natasha and the Joshua/Natasha couple.
- This Troper also remembers seeing Colm bashed as well by people who preferred to pair up Neimi with someone else.
- For the King of Fighters fandom, we have Kyo's girlfriend Yuki. Sweet, outspoken, straight A student... and absolutely hated by Kyo/Iori slashers, Kyo/Shingo shippers and authors who want their Author Avatars to hump Kyo instead of this unfortunate Naive Everygirl who gets caught in the crossfight between Kyo and the Orochi clan who want to sacrifice her to bring Orochi back into this world, since she's the last descendant of the legendary Kushinada sacrificial maid.
- In Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney, there isn't a lot of bashing, but the majority of what there is is thrown against Iris, for daring to be the twin sister of the Yandere Dahlia Hawthorne and Phoenix's ex-girlfriend who actually dated him to save him from her evil sister. To several Phoenix/Edgeworth shippers, this means Iris is "an evil, hypocritical, stupid Canon Sue whore who keeps Phoenix and Miles away from each other"). To make things worse, the case that introduced Iris also gave fuel for both Phoenix/Maya and Phoenix/Edgeworth shippers, making her something of a Cheryl Blossom. Fortunately, the series never resolves potential romances between the main characters, which keeps bashing to a minimum.
- Omitsu from the Ganbare Goemon series is seen as The Obstructive Love Interest, getting bashed by the shippers when her existence isn't being completely ignored by them. Her canon love interest Goemon is instead often paired up with the more popular Action Girl Yae, Sasuke, or even his own future descendant, Shishi Jurokubei. To make things worse for her, Omitsu is portrayed as a Clingy Jealous Girl in the TV anime (until she gets some Character Development in that area later on, but her detractors conveniently ignore this), and the creator of the most long-running and successful manga adaptation has a heavy bias towards Yae. She just can't win.
- Metal Gear Solid fans who prefer Otacon over Meryl can actually kill her off in game if they so choose. No, it's not canon, but it's better than nothing.
- No such luck with EVA in MGS3, though, which is a shame, since she arguably deserves it (much more so than Meryl, at any rate).
- They appear to have noticed this and provided ample evidence for both this and Snake/Ocelot, letting you chose which one you like better. Word Of God even confirmed the latter as Canon, at least on Ocelot's part.
- The fourth game provides some subtle mockery if you're looking for it, where Ocelot and Eva are secretly both on the same side. Ocelot decides to maintain the masquerade by shooting her with a turret gun and setting her on fire. That will teach her for going near his man...
- MGS4 sets up a romance between Naomi and Otacon, over which Snake shows visible signs of annoyance. Later on in the story she commits suicide by deactivating the nanomachines that are keeping her alive.
- Since Naomi has a list of Kick The Dog moments as long as one's arm, it's probably for the best that she did die. Heaven knows what her standing with the fandom would be if she had survived to get in the way of Snake/Otacon.
- And then there's the horrible treatment Rosemary gets from people who ship Raiden with the other characters, especially from the slash shippers. While admittedly annoying in Sons of Liberty with plenty of narmalicious quotes, people really took Accentuate The Negative to the extremes with her character. The sheer amount of vitriol sent her way would almost make the non-MGS fan think she was the true villain of the series and more depraved than Vamp and more monsterous than Volgin. She did become more likeable for some when Guns of the Patriots rolled around though.
- Johnny Sasaki has recently received this treatment as well. In the forth game, he gets to marry Meryl, since then, some pretty rabid Snake/Meryl shippers have brutally bashed his brains out.
- Even the Mario fandom suffers from this. Mario himself has been bashed and demonized in fanfiction for the sake of pairing Peach with Bowser or Luigi, and tomboyish Princess Daisy is bashed by people who want to pair Luigi with Peach.
- There are countless Soul Series fanfics where the non-playable character Rothion gets killed off (thankfully, without any bastardization) so they can pair his wife Sophitia off with someone else, usually Siegfried or Taki.
- Even Megaman Battle Network suffers from this. Meiru, in particular, gets all the hatred of the yaoi fans (not to mention an humiliating Fan Nickname) for daring to stand in the way of Netto/Enzan... never mind that Netto/Meiru is the Official Couple, as the sixth game shows in the ending. And the ever-shrinking Netto/Meiru fandom tends to demean Dekao, who has a huge crush of the pink-haired girl... And let's not even speak of the feud between Enzan/Yaito and Enzan/Anetta fans!
- On a related note: Mega Man Star Force. Two het pairings (Geo/Sonia and Geo/Luna) are all but canon and the first game has some heavy Ho Yay between Geo and Pat. Throw in any other oddball pairings implied from the anime or whatever and you start to see the problem. It's mostly contained to the two big het pairings, though - G/S shippers say Luna's too much of a Clingy Jealous Girl, G/L shippers say Sonia and Geo are Like Brother And Sister.
- Drakengard fandom falls into this habit as well, with both Nowe/Manah and Nowe/Eris fans blasting the third side of the Love Triangle for getting in the way on their OTP. Usually, it is Manah who gets the brunt of the hatred (which probably also has something to do with the fact that she was the Big Bad in the first game)... but there are quite a few Eris-haters out there, too...
- Pity Anomen Delryn of Baldur's Gate, a noble would-be paladin who is deeply flawed with pride and, to a degree, selfishness, despite his essentially honorable and kind nature. He arguably caused the npc modding community, and tends to suffer badly at the hands of the fanfic community, usually in favor of Xan, Edwin, or Kelsey. On the other side of the gender equation, the naive and idealistic Aerie tends to be revealed to be secretly evil, a Clingy Jealous Girl, or worse. Oddly enough, it's the female portion of the fanbase that seems to hate Aerie the most...
- The last part is likely due to the fact that canonically she hooks up with Haer'dalis, who for some bizarre reason has a potent following despite being himself a complete ass. This may be due to his immense pair of leather pants.
- Though Aerie later breaks up with Haer'Dalis for a realistic reason: Haer'Dalis is a joyfully nihilistic person who revels in everything proceeding towards destruction, collapse, and failure-including Aerie. She finally realizes this in Throne of Bhaal and leaves him.
- Lili from Tekken on the early parts are often portrayed as a full blown Rich Bitch or The Libby, in order to accomodate relationships with people she's not even closely related with (e.g: Steve and Christie). And here, she's just being a normal Ojou who happens to like fighting...
- Spyro The Dragon. Yes, even this fandom has some nasty eruptions:
- Probably the worst flak is given to Spyro/Cynder, although Sierra themselves pretty much showed that they were the one true pairing. Many claims hold Cynder as a cliched character with a generic dark past, leading to ridiculous flame wars with fans and non-fans.
- Then there are those who will fight about Flame/Ember and Spyro/Ember.
- Don't forget the ones who prefer Spyro/Elora.
- Then there are those who think Spyro is better off without a love interest.
- Final Fantasy Tactics saw a little bit of an uproar over a scene added into the Updated Rerelease that suddenly seemed to pair Mustadio and Agrias after a build up which led to nowhere between Ramza and Agrias. fans weren't exactly thrilled.
Web Comics
- Missi from Misfile is hated for getting between Ash and Emily. Current sentiment on its forums is that Missi should die in a car accident, preferably one involving a steep cliff. It doesn't help that Missi has moved from The Paolo to the Stalker With A Crush. It also doesn't help that the characters are obsessed with racing cars along steep cliffs...
- Dominic Deegan + Ho Yay = Internet Backdraft.
- The ship in Penny and Aggie with the most vehement followers is...none. Specifically, the lack of a ship between Penny and Aggie, with adherents calling any hints of them being attracted to each other (outside of Sara's head) "fanfic."
- It doesn't help that the comic is clearly aware of the shipping and loves to toy with the concept without actually confirming anything. The end of 20 2020 Pennies had people at it for weeks.
- Boy Meets Boy Cy/Skids shippers were definitely furious at Ronnie's existence. The character appeared at the height of the Cy/Skids tension, after it was revealed that Cy did indeed have feelings for Skids. The relationship between them is never resolved and Ronnie, an anime fangirl who wears a Duo Maxwell braid and pulls the interest of both boys seems to be an intentional play on this trope.
- Within the Megatokyo fandom, the Piro/Kimiko shippers tend to do this to Miho. Simmilarly, the Miho/Ping shippers give this treatment to Piro.
- Amusingly enough, Miho/Piro shippers tend to do this to... Piro again, who's they consider an insensitive Jerkass who constant rags on a completely innocent girl, but should get with her anyway.
- Nearly all of Davan's girlfriends suffer this at the hands of the die-hard Davan/Pee-Jee shippers. This may be justified in the case of Eva (who is revealed to have cheated on Davan with no less than four people during their relationship), but is completely uncalled for in the cases of Branwen and Vannessa. Not so much in the case of Lynn, but that's probably because she barely received any characterization at all, and was explicitly only in it for the sex.
Western Animation
- Lizzie Devine, Numbuh One's girlfriend during most of Codename Kids Next Door is often bashed. Numbuh Two is also often bashed for getting in the way of 1/5, despite the fact he's not even in a relationship with Numbuh Five.
- Though it is hinted in The Grand Finale that Numbuh Two may have married Numbuh Five when they grew up (despite his canon crush on 5's sister Cree). Not to mention, in the series Lizzie breaks up with Nigel willingly.
- Also, 34 shippers (the name is often used intentionally) are constantly at war with the Ho Yay-obsessed 14 shippers.
- The idea of Numbuh Two being bashed by 1/5 shippers is rather exaggerated; most 1/5 shippers I know prefer to just pair Numbuh 2 with Numbuh 86 (including me, 'cause it's cute) or an OC.
- It was prevalent when this example was written, in 2005 or so. It may have become less so since then.
- Terra, from Teen Titans, was absolutely loathed by Beast Boy/Raven shippers after appearing in season two. After her revelation as Slade's apprentice, the hate magnified even more, and many fics were written featuring Terra as a maniacal sociopath... which ironically fits the *original* comic version of her. The show's version is quite different.
- Starfire, as part of the Official Couple, tends to get a LOT of hatred from Robin/Raven fans.
- Some Daria fans are still upset that Daria got over her crush on the cool slacker Trent and ended up with the charming preppie Tom, even though Tom is exactly like Daria, except male and well-adjusted, while it's made clear in the series that she would have been really unhappy with Trent. Perhaps some of this antipathy stems from that fact that initially it seemed like Daria "stole" Tom from Jane, although the characters all eventually got past it and agreed it was unintentional and probably inevitable. The really weird part is that Tom and Daria broke up at the end of the series anyway, so they're free to ship her with anyone else... and they still try to kill him.
- Avatar: The Last Airbender... hold on... this may take a while:
- Mai: Both Mai and Jin were well-received and tolerated even by Zutara (Zuko/Katara) shippers, if only because they served as fangirl surrogates, until a Season 3 clip aired featuring Mai kissing Zuko, leading to escalating hatred, petty name-calling, further canon denial, and Fan Art wars.
- Umm, I don't know what corner of the fandom the above troper was in, but from my experience most of fandom and especially the zutarians hated Mai and Jin from the get go. Katara was already their fangirl surrogate, and they didn't like the newcomers.
- Jin: Actually, Jin had quite a bit of attacks on her from a verbal section of the Zutara fans and even some of the early Maiko fans. Most of it calling her a slut or a gold digger (despite not knowing he was a prince) apparently due to the fact that she is more endowed than most of the girls. Rage against her was relatively short lived, as it became quickly clear that she would not be a recurring character.
- Aang: Since they can't kill off the Kid Hero, many Zutara shippers make Aang so childish that he makes Honey-sempai look like a man of deep gravitas. Often, they'll use a High School AU to get him out of the way in middle school.
- Others assume Avatars were Celibate Heroes or else rapidly became villainous. Until Word Of God and a canon episode discredited this idea implicitly, it was (for a time) among the primary means of pushing Aang to the side and, due to ancillary material, fiercely contested by Kataang shippers during the long drought of new TV eps of 2007.
- To be fair, most shippers simply discounted Aang on the grounds that he was 12 years old. They also usually assigned a big sister/little brother type relationship to Aang and Katara, villainizing neither.
- Some Zutara shippers are quite vicious towards Aang. While most of their complaints are related to the finale and his way of dealing with the Fire Lord, many also accuse him of being a Gary Stu and Kataang of being unoriginal and boring compared to the "oh so realistic and darker" Zutara.
- A few Toph/Katara shippers are pretty nasty to Aang in their fanfics, twisting him into a jealous asshole who just wants to hurt Toph for "stealing" Katara from him.
- Zuko: A section of the Katara/Aang fandom have become openly hostile to Zuko due to the popularity of the non-canon Zuko/Katara ship, often abusing him as emo and ugly.
- Katara: Extreme Maiko fans bash Katara as a Canon Sue who became far too good at water bending, far too quickly.
- Suki: You'd be surprised at the number of Toph/Sokka shippers who were saddened and angered to discover Suki was still alive. Now they're the poster Love Triangle for Avril Lavigne's "Girlfriend." A few Sokka/Azula shippers have recently come out of the woodwork to bash Suki as well.
- In a rare pro-fem example, Sprx from Super Robot Monkey Team Hyper Force Go! has been through this. Oftentimes is a variant, where there's no other love interest for Nova, but Sprx is made to seem like a horrible boyfriend, acting more perverted than he usually does.
- Josh Mankey from Kim Possible is usually vilified for standing in the way of Kim/Ron. He is usually depicted as womanizing, manipulative, and/or abusive. This is even though he was shown as caring and understanding the few times he dated Kim, and Kim and Ron hadn't shown any kind of romantic interest in each other until the third season.
- Ron's ex-love interest Yori is amazingly immune from this despite a mutual crush being canon for awhile, she receives very little hate in fanfiction and generally remains as likable as she is in the show. This can probably be attributed to her graceful acceptance of Kim and Ron's relationship in the season four episode "Big Bother". She also remains the favored character for Kigo shippers to pair off Ron with.
- Kim also suffers from this in "Rongo" stories that pair him with Shego. Some are well done, but often Kim is transformed into a demanding, jealous bitch who treats Ron like dirt. One wallbanging fic had her slash her wrists after the pair were married.
- A small faction of Kigo writers also portray Ron as a completely incompetent and useless tag-along who doesn't have any redeeming qualities. Thus, someone who doesn't "deserve" Kim. These more extreme Shippers portray his friendship with Kim as little more than "generosity" (i.e., pity) on Kim's part. He usually isn't killed off by such writers, but usually has his role reduced to little more than an annoying Scrappy everyone else puts up with.
- Kigo writers have a habit of taking Drakken to two extremes to get him out of the picture: one has him as a bigoted Jerkass that can't stand to see Shego with anyone else (especially not a woman, though that bias is never indicated in the show at all) and the other has him as a worthless loser that couldn't tie his shoes without Shego and is holding her back from being successful.
- There's also the "Ron was just a rebound" plot device which could go two ways. One one hand, it could be used against Ron so Kim can dump him for someone else the shipper prefers her with. On the other, it could be used to make Kim look like a bitch so that Ron runs into the arms of another for comfort.
- Danny Phantom had Samantha "Sam" Manson (the one Danny ended up with) early in the fandom who was hated, despised, and bashed in fanfiction written by Danny fangirls where Danny always ended up with the writer's original character; to this day the worst of those stories are still archived in Quizilla. However, the hate for Sam toned down when Valerie Gray goes through not only Character Development but a Gondor Calls For Aid episode where she and Danny become friends, and eventually turning into Dating Catwoman situation. Since then, Valerie has become despised by a large part of the fandom (even though they broke up because Valerie didn't want to put Danny in danger) because they've secretly maintained romantic feelings for each other). It's not surprising to find a fanfic in which Sam is depressed over Danny and Valerie's relationship and it turns out Danny is only dating Valerie because he thinks Sam will never love him and never loved Valerie in the first place.
- Of course, Danny/Valerie shippers frequently claim Sam is some kind of manipulative shrew that thinks of Danny as a tool for her own agendas.
- The Fairly Oddparents: Timmy/Trixie shippers end up bashing Tootie, and Timmy/Tootie shippers bash Trixie. And there are Timmy/Veronica, Timmy/Vicky, Timmy/Cindy, Timmy/Cosmo and Timmy/Molly. But it is mostly Trixie and Tootie though that do the bashing. The others don't raise as much argument. In one fanfic, Tootie even went to the evil side (something she would never do on the show). It is even said to happen with the writers too.
- In Batman Beyond, the Terry x Maxine fans really hated Terry's canon girlfriend, Dana.
- Gargoyles fans have never entirely forgiven Angela for picking Broadway over Brooklyn.
- In X Men Evolution, though the hate against the Tsundere Jean Grey was a given because her "love rival" for Scott's affection was the Goth and wangsty Rogue, there was a genderflipped surprise. Lance aka Avalanche, a Troubled But Cute Jerk With A Heart Of Gold who would generally be widely loved, was subjected to quite the degree of bashing by lots of fans of the Fan Preferred Couple Kurt x Kitty, who derailed him as a rapist and girlfriend beater in their fanwork to favor Kurt. However, when Kurt got Fan Of Underdog Amanda Sefton as his girlfriend, she was generally respected and liked by fandom.
- Now if the episode where Kitty found Dani Moonstar in the cave had been Rahne finds Dani Moonstar in the cave...
- Ben 10: shippers of the Ben/Gwen pairing have, more than once, bashed Kevin for getting together with Gwen in Ben 10 Alien Force.
- As for Ben, Kai is often portrayed in fanfiction as a snobby Rich Bitch-esque character.
- And, of course, nobody likes Ben's canon love interest Julie, whose existence sometimes makes Ben/Kevin Ho Yay shippers and Cousinshippers Ship Mates.
- Kevin/Gwen fans now perceive Charmcaster as getting in the way of their ship due to her seducing Kevin in her Alien Force debut episode. This ignores that Charmcaster was just being a manipulative bitch and had no feelings toward Kevin whatsoever, and that Kevin's behavior in the episode, before and after the seduction, is what hurt Gwen.
- The Spectacular Spider Man: Liz Allen is certainly going to get this treatment later in the show, if the season 2 episode summaries are accurate.
- Shock and horror! A subversion! When Liz came onto the scene, many viewers hated her for getting in the way of Peter/Gwen. However, once it became clear that Peter really loved Gwen and Liz was just a Hopeless Suitor, hatred was replaced with pity and Liz became one of the most sympethetic characters in the series. It really helps that her inevitable breakup with Peter was a real Tear Jerker.
- A great number of fans of the movie Felidae are huge fans of the Francis/Felicity pairing despite the fact that Felicity is brutally decapitated only minutes after she's introduced in the film and that the cat Francis had sex with in the film is the one who becomes his mate. It probably has something to do with the fact that Felicity is set up as a sweet, naïve Ill Girl shortly before she dies. By contrast, Nhozemptekh—exotically pretty as she may be—is unfortunately given little character development beyond being basically a Nubile Savage in kitty form.
- Many shippers of the Jake/Rose relationship in American Dragon Jake Long became irate when Jake flirted with a certain pink-hat wearing girl for the simple fact that she was a girl that Jake was attracted to who was not Rose. In fact, she was even speculated be the "Siren" of a later episode and even working for the Dark Dragon. As the show played out, however, said girl proved to be nothing more than an extra with a few lines.
- Phoebus, from the Disney version of The Hunchback Of Notre Dame, gets this a lot from people who prefer Esmeralda to be with either Quasimodo or Frollo. Instead of being the wry, sensible man he is, Phoebus is portrayed as an abusive Jerkass (Which is completely accurate in the novel, where Phoebus is pretty much the only main character without a single redeeming quality, but assuming the people who bash him have read the novel is giving them too much credit). Quasi/Esme shippers, especially, seem to think that having Esme end up with Phoebus is a betrayal of the film's "Looks don't matter" message, Completely Missing The Point that "Looks don't matter" also means you shouldn't hate attractive people.
- Suzy Johnson of Phineas and Ferb is a subversion of this because she is Jeremy's little sister. The fact that she doesn't want her brother to have a girlfriend like Candace, though, makes her one of the least popular characters.
- Trent of Total Drama Island is often bashed by people who would rather see Gwen and Cody together. Gwen/Cody fanfics usually portray Trent as a shallow, abusive jerk who almost always dumps Gwen for Lindsay (most of the time, though, they just kill him off in a literal Die For Our Ship). You can just imagine the delight of many when Gwen and Trent broke up in the fifth episode of Total Drama Action—-though ironically, for the opposite reason: he was too clingy.
- Another major Shipping War lately: Duncan/Courtney vs. Duncan/Gwen. Though the latter are only close friends so far, both the characters on the show and many fans suspect they will wind up together, leading to both Courtney- and Gwen-bashing among the fandom.
- South Park isn't safe either. Kelly and Tammy are very often hated by fangirls who have a crush on Kenny. Wendy, Bebe and a few others are disliked for the same reasons.
- The Power Puff Girls fandom. Powerpuff/Rowdyruff shippers are surprisingly vicious towards anyone who even touches pairings but the Girls and their color counterparts, fact that the Boys are their Evil Twins and that Buttercup had more sexual — I mean, tension towards Ace than towards Butch aside, and that's just for starters.
- The owner of the Rikochet/Buena Girl Yahoo! group once ran a poll asking "Do you hate Penny Plutonium because her crush on Rikochet interferes with his relationship with Buena Girl?" Immediately following, he got responses voting for "Yes! Death to Penny Plutonium!"
- Jimmy/Cindy shippers in Jimmy Neutron do not approve of the existence of Betty, or in some cases April.
- For what it's worth, Cindy sure as heck doesn't approve of Betty either...
- Code Lyoko's Ulrich/Yumi shippers tend to take the flawed character aspects of alternate love interests Sissi (who is definitely shallow, bratty, and annoying, but does show Jerk With A Heart Of Gold tendencies) and William (a definite Stalker With A Crush, but more dark than evil) and exaggerate them beyond recognition until there's no way they could threaten their beloved ship. Or save themselves the trouble and kill them off. Or pair them with each other.
Real Life
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