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"When I'm in trouble, my hero will come to my rescue. I want to experience that at least once."
One of the methods writers use to jumpstart relationships. A variety of Samaritan Relationship Starter where Person A rescues Person B, causing said Person B to fall in love with Person A.
If done humorously, this is done at the beginning of a series, adding to the Harem. A staged rescue is a common simple plan to get a couple together.
Done seriously, this is one of the ways writers get a relationship hampered by Can Not Spit It Out started, as opposed to communication, or heck; they might not have even met or talked to each other previously.
"Anime's Favorite Contrived Meeting" is a possible sub-trope, or specific example of this:
An agile male character, often the Hero, meeting a female character ( Love Interests, etc) by saving them from being hit on by thugs, or older (college) men who seem lecherous.
Usually involves the thugs grabbing the female by the hand and pulling her away to have a "cup of tea" with them, or becoming violent as she stubbornly rejects their advances (may involve knives). Enter the hero, either hitting the offenders in the arm, or entering the scene by kicking the guy (head, solar plexus, etc), and saving her from forceful romantic advances.
Oddly enough some medieval romancers, despite being the reason Damsel In Distress is called that ("damsel" being the diminutive of medieval French for "lady"), actually sometimes didn't like this trope. Basically some of them thought that, since the girl now owed the guy, the resulting romance wasn't pure enough, aesthetically speaking. The various aristocrats who paid their bills mostly told 'em to shut up; part of the ideal of knighthood was being a protector, and who doesn't want to hear about a good deed they could actually do being rewarded with some sweet lovin'?
Expect a negative response from some if this chickifies an Action Girl (though this can be almost completely negated by having the couple take turns with the Distress Ball). Nevertheless, the Knight in Shining Armor saving the Distressed Damsel who he then weds and they lived Happily Ever After is at least Older Than Feudalism, going back at least as far as the myth of Perseus and Andromeda.
A subset of Meet Cute. A common fanfic for Shipping when the woman has too strong a personality for the writer to deal with. If Rescue Romance is a manly man's reward for being a valiant protector, the Florence Nightingale Effect is a womanly woman's reward for being a caring nurturer.
Compare Smooch of Victory, Rescue Sex, Relationship-Salvaging Disaster. Contrast A Match Made In Stockholm. See also The Dulcinea Effect.
Examples:
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Anime and Manga
- Averted in Ranma ½: Ranma Saotome saves Kodachi Kuno from falling off of a roof — but caused her to fall in the first place because he accidentally hit her in the head while she was running away from an attempt to ambush Akane Tendo. Kodachi fixates him on a romantic figure after she comes to, but Ranma does not reciprocate her feelings, due to a combination of having two existing Arranged Marriages (though he's only aware of one at the moment) and an Accidental Marriage (though neither he nor the girl in question are aware of it at this precise moment), and Kodachi's... unusual... ideas about romance. Her first action after regaining consciousness — well, second, her first is to cuddle to him and ask for his name — is to paralyze him with a bouquet of poison-laced roses so she can kiss him.
- Done in B.O.D.Y, when Ryoko is saved from creepy guys on the street by Jin.
- The normally strong-willed Haruhi from Ouran High School Host Club is unapproachable to the host club's cliched attempts at romantic talk. However, she's terrified to the point of cowering in the fetal position at the sound of thunder. Two of the male cast get closer to her by saving her from this.
- Done twice in the end of the anime when Haruhi chases down Tamaki in a horse drawn carriage to stop him from leaving the Host Club and his happiness. Then when she holds out her hand to reach for him, the carriage tumbles and the poor girl goes flying off the bridge... leading Tamaki to jump out of the car and rescue her.
- Momoka on Keroro Gunsou tries to stage one of these every couple of episodes, in order to get closer to Fuyuki. But Fuyuki's not the most athletic person, and the Keronians keep barging into things...
- Fate/stay night. Saber saves Shirou from Lancer, Shirou saves Saber from Berserker, Saber saves Shirou from Rider twice, Saber attempts to save Shirou from Ilya, Shirou saves Saber from Berserker again, Shirou saves Saber from Gilgamesh, Lancer saves the both of them(!?), and by that point Shirou and Saber are hopelessly infatuated with each other. Apparently, winning the affections of Saber will only cost you about 18 gallons of blood.
- Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch, based on the original The Little Mermaid story, has two Rescue Romances, both involving the same person and causing a rivalry that lasts the entire second season. Interestingly, Lucia saved Kaito from drowning when they were six, and Kaito does the "chase away perverts" variant multiple times in the story, but the former is more important to their relationship than the latter.
- In Hayate the Combat Butler, Hayate and Nagi meet in a similar 'saved from thugs' fashion; unknown to Nagi, Hayate's original intention was to kidnap her - he was protecting his prey...Hayate is almost instantly regretful of his intentions, though.
- Hayate ends up saving a lot of the series' girls this way, and even a guy at one point—though that one didn't create any romantic undertones.
- The start of Tenshi Na Konamaiki.
- Tamahome rescues Miaka from some pervy thugs at the beginning of Fushigi Yuugi. Nakago, bastard that he is, does the same with Yui after the fact, and only encourages the resulting emotional vulnerability.
- Seiji Sawamura saves Takako Ayase in Midori No Hibi from a band of delinquents that were dragging her away. She falls in love shortly afterward when she sees him letting himself get beaten up without resorting to violence (fighting back) in order to save a friend and defuse the gang's grudge.
- Mobile Suit Victory Gundam has a very twisted example on the antagonists side when Katejina Loos falls for Chronocle Asher when he saves her from getting raped. By the end of the series, she becomes the most evil woman in Gundam, if not the most evil character period.
- Essentially the whole plot of Full Metal Panic!
- Also played with in an episode of Full Metal Panic? Fumoffu: the karate club's strategy for a "flirting contest" involves dressing up three of its members as thugs and having them accost young women so that Tsubaki can come to their rescue. It backfires spectacularly when the crowd of girls he's "rescued" in this fashion find out it was for a contest.
- Used slightly in Ai Yori Aoshi, when Kaoru kicks Aoi out of his apartment, then goes to rescue her. No fight occurs though... Basically sums up as: "Come on, that innocent girl is part of some big conspiracy? What am I, a freakin' moron? Uh oh, creeps 3 o'clock..."
- In their defense, the creeps were remarkably good-natured about the whole thing: at no point did they offer to rearrange Kaoru's features over the incident, and even reprimanded him for his poor treatment of the girl.
- Parodied in El-Hazard, when Fujisawa "saves" Miz from her monstrous looking manservant (she was screaming because the servant poured cold water on her instead of hot). Miz falls in love with him anyway and doesn't bother correcting him.
- This is later played straight when Shayla Shayla falls for Makoto after he takes a shot from a power staff for her. And again, in the Sequel Series when Makoto saves Kauru from drowning.
- Subverted in The Slayers - in the first episode, Gourry steps in to save Lina from Bandits, but she really didn't need the help. Also, while she does admit he's handsome and lets him continue traveling with her, the development of their relationship has more to do with their adventures together than their initial meeting (despite him having a Bodyguard Crush on her for quite a while).
- Parodied in The Prince of Tennis: Sakuno has a crush on Ryoma from the first time she saw him, when he stopped a show-off who was about to hit her on the face with his racket - but it turns out Ryoma had not even acknowledged Sakuno's presence back then, and only stopped the moron because he was too loud and didn't let him nap in the train.
- Somewhat inverted in the anime Blood+. Though Haji does end up saving Saya during their "first" meeting (at least long enough to get her to save herself), she initially mistakes him for a serial killer and runs scared.
- Luna in the Mega Man Star Force anime - Megaman saves her from falling to her death, and overnight she becomes a (non-evil) Stalker with a Crush. Happens to a lesser degree in the game.
- Arguably, Project A-Ko. B-Ko even cites rescuing C-Ko from a wolf as part of her grudge.
- This shows up mildly in the various Tenchi Muyo! continuities. In the manga, this ends up turned on its ear when Aeka waits for her saviour after being captured, hoping for a little Rescue Romance with Tenchi ... and finds Ryoko coming to the rescue (she knocked Tenchi out and took the only available spaceship so that he wouldn't be able to put himself at risk). Aeka's disappointed in the choice of rescuer, and Ryoko isn't very fond of the lack of gratitude.
- Subverted at the beginning of To Aru Majutsu no Index: Touma tries to get a delinquent hitting on Mikoto in a diner to leave her alone—saying that he's troubling her—and winds up getting chased off when the delinquent's friends return from the bathroom. When he finally seems to lose them and stops to rest, Mikoto walks up and admits to frying them to save trouble. Turns out Touma had known she was a powerful lightning esper the entire time, and had been trying to protect the delinquents. She then tries to blast him, and her determination as the Unknown Rival is increased.
- Played with in their first chronological meeting depicted in Railgun. Touma saves her from a group of delinquents and chastises them for hitting on a little girl. Predictably, Misaka doesn't take it well and fries the lot of them. However, due to Touma's right hand he is completely unharmed. It was only because of this immunity that she became interested in him, declaring him her rival.
- And played straight in the Sister arc. When Misaka is at the edge of despair and literally willing to die in the pathetic hope that it will save her clones...Touma shows up and saves all 9939 of her clones. That's where he went from (in Misaka's eyes) The Rival to an actual love interest. And at least one (likely far more) of those clones is also attracted to him, for similar reasons.
- The first meeting of Subaru and Ixpellia in StrikerS Sound Stage X of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha began with Subaru shielding Ix from falling debris, followed by Subaru fighting off the Mariages that came for Ix (with an accompanying image of a very battered Subaru cradling Ix as they gaze into each others eyes), and ended with Subaru symbolically and literally bringing Ix out of the darkness and into the light of the current era. When all of that was done, Ix saw Subaru as one of the only people she felt calm with because she rescued her. Unsurprisingly, there's a small but noticeable amount of supporters for this ship which would have been bigger, had Ix not entered her 1000 years of sleep.
- And for a straighter example in both senses of the phrase, we have Tohma and Lily, the main pairing for Force who first meet when Tohma finds Lily bound in an abandoned lab, releases her, and takes her with him.
- And, of course, more or less the basis for Fate/Nanoha. Nanoha is the one who helps her through her ordeals, after all.
- Satoshi Hojou saves Shion Sonozaki from a group of thugs in a flashback in Higurashi no Naku Koro ni (the same thugs who have also tried to attack Keiichi Maehara, Rika Furude, and Satoshi's sister Satoko in different timelines). This leads to Shion immediately falling in love with Satoshi. However, as this is Higurashi, her love is a bit different. (Only in two worlds, to be fair.)
- Gender inverted in the Ikki Tousen anime. Sonsaku Hakufu used to protect her cousin Shuuyu Koukin from bullies when they were small, and Koukin fell in love with Hakufu when they grew up.
- Given Setsuna's obvious Body Guard Crush on Konoka in Mahou Sensei Negima! and Konoka's reaction every time "Secchan" saves her, this forms much of the basis behind the casual observer's view of them. When they finally pactio (and Konoka seems to be hinting broadly that it's a gone from subtext to text) in Chapter 252, it happens immediately after Setsuna saved Konoka without even realizing it.
- Lampshaded early on when the girls think Negi is going to confess to Ku Fei as a result of her saving him that morning.
- Negi's first major interaction with Nodoka involved catching her after she fell off of a staircase, and he saved her from Evangeline not long after. When he saves her in Chapter 219 from a group of bounty hunters, he goes half-nuts on them when he sees what they're doing to her. They have a pretty serious moment after she rescues him in Chapter 228, at least until Kotarou jumps in.
- Negi's father Nagi and Negi's Tsundere mother Arika finally kiss right after he rescues her in Ch 269. Both HELL YEAH! and Awww..
- Roy Mustang and Riza Hawkeye spend the entirety of Fullmetal Alchemist saving each other. In chronological order, she gunned down an Ishvalan who was about to stab him during the war, and saved him from Scar by tripping him (It Makes Sense in Context), then he risked blowing their cover to save her from Gluttony, and later rescued both her and Al from Lust when she was in the middle of a suicidal breakdown, believing him dead. In later chapters, he went completely Ax Crazy againt Envy, when he/she/it admitted to killing Hughes. He only snapped out of it when she assured him she would keep her promise of shooting him if he ever became corrupted, but she would kill herself afterwards. And just when they got all that cleared up, they found themselves in a situation where she was dying from a jugular wound...and he couldn't save her. Luckily, someone who could showed up; the emotional scene which followed is easily one of the single most romantic things in the entire series.
- Doumeki saves Watanuki too many times to count in xxxHOLiC. Ho Yay ensues, at least for the fans.
- Tsukune from Rosario+Vampire earned Kurumu's (unwanted) affections when he stops Moka from ripping off her wings and tail. It wasn't a conventional rescue, but he definitely showed his good side.
- In the first episode, Princess Tutu saves Mytho after he jumps out a window to save a baby bird from a raven attack. She then starts to save him about Once an Episode until he starts to fall for her.
- Also, it's revealed in the second season that Rue met Mytho when he saved her from a crow attack, and she in turn saved his life by giving him water through a kiss. Fakir might count for Mytho, as well. Also Ahiru and Fakir's most romantic scenes come when they are rescuing each other.
- Recent chapters of D.N.Angel have hinted at a romance between Satoshi and Risa after he saves her from a deadly fall.
- In Black Cat, Train happened to be visiting the same part of town as Kyoko. She gets attacked by thugs, and he decides to intervene, easily disarming all of them. Although she actually didn't need saving, this caused her to fall in love at first sight. She proceeds to become another Stalker with a Crush of his, though all of it is rather hopeless for her, considering his personality.
- Vision of Escaflowne has something of a mutual Rescue Romance: Van starts falling in love with Hitomi after she pulls a Diving Save on him in episode 6, saving him from being impaled by Dilandau. Meanwhile, Hitomi begins seeing Van as something beyond "that guy I'm tagging along with until I can get back home" after he saves her from a kidnapping attempt (rather than the expected Knight in Shining Armor, Allen) in the subsequent episode.
- Played with repeatedly in Monster: Tenma's first meeting with adult Nina when she's waiting by Heidelberg castle seems like it's going this way, except for the aversion they never unambiguously get beyond Will They or Won't They?, the inversion she ends up rescuing him that time, and by being there, they both fail to save her foster parents, and the disturbing subversion that her Meet Cute-ish Lampshade Hanging response to Tenma's appearance ("Are you my prince?") is primed by a series of anonymous romantic emails which are actually from her twin brother..
- In a more straightforward(!) subversion, both the Big Bad and The Dragon frequently pose as rescuers and unexpected friends and allies, romantically or otherwise, in order to further their plans. Karl's quasi-idolatrous friendship with Johan also just keeps on giving on the Dramatic Irony and Fridge Horror fronts, the more you find out about Karl's family and Johan's connections with them.
- Johan's own Mind Game Ship fixation on Tenma could also be seen as a very warped one-sided version of this, for all Johan's questionable reassurance that he sees Tenma as a father figure since Tenma saved his life when he was a very young boy.
- Also by way of subversion, Tenma's repeated rescues of his Stalker with a Crush ex Eva who eventually gets the nearest to straight version of this trope with her bodyguard Martin, and Nina's response to Tenma saving her brother.
- Surprisingly averted when Nina is rescued and nursed back to health by Lipsky. He develops feelings for her, but she doesn't seem to view him as anything more than a close friend
- Doubly-inverted in Naruto when Hinata jumps in to try to save Naruto from Pain. She tells Naruto that she can't stay back while he's in danger because she loves him, then attacks Pain - who simply smacks her down, stabs her, and insinuates to Naruto that she's dead. Naruto promptly loses it worse than he ever has before. The anime turns it into an Ironic Echo with both characters in the opposite positions when they were younger, against bullies.
- Played straight with Karin, who's implied to have fallen for Sasuke after he saved her from a bear in a Chuunin exam she was taking.
- Also spoofed in filler Episode 101. In a flashback Kakashi easily defeats the pathetic Moya Triad who had been pestering a random woman, and afterwards she's completely smitten with Kakashi.
- Played straight with Naruto's parents, Minato and Kushina. She fell in love with him when he saved her from the Kumo ninjas that kidnapped her when she was a kid, then complimented on the red hair that other children used as a reason to bully her.
- Subverted in School Rumble - the entire reason Harima grew facial hair, wears sunglasses, and became a delinquent was so that he could be close to Tenma without her recognizing him. He fell in love with her after saving her from hoodlums, and took her back to his place because she was unconscious. When he leaned in for the traditional kiss, she woke up and thought he was about to molest her (or already had).
- In Pokémon Special, Yellow both gains admiration for and falls in love with Red after he saves her life from a rampaging Dratini, prompting her to be determined to save ''him'' when she learns that he's gone missing. Of course, Red, being as oblivious as he is, doesn't recognize her as the girl he once saved and probably never bothered wondering why she through so much trouble for him.
- Played for Laughs in the Bleach anime, where once Yoruichi rescues Soifon and the toughest Tsundere in the series goes all goggly-eyed and gushy. To be fair, Soifon has been crushing hard on her beloved Yoruichi-sama for a while...
- This is the reason why Momo Hinamori is in love with Sousuke Aizen, as he had saved her life and those of her friends when she was younger. Unfortunately, Aizen is the Big Bad and a Complete Monster who sees her as nothing more than a pawn.
- In Katekyo Hitman Reborn!, Tsuna saves Gokudera from his own bombs, leading to a Stalker with a Crush situation. This show is kinda known for its ridiculous amounts of Ho Yay.
- Also Haru fell for Tsuna after he saved her from drowning.
- Subverted in Gundam Wing's Episode Zero manga, where Middie Une falls in love with No-name aka the future Trowa Barton, but she still betrays the mercenary group they belong to.
- In the Studio Ghibli version of Howl's Moving Castle, Howl and Sophie meet when two soldiers hit on Sophie. Howl uses his magic to send them away. It gets better when Howl takes to the air in order to save both of them from the blob-men of the Witch of the Waste.
- Specifically invoked and then harshly deconstructed in Detective Conan, where a guy who hopelessly crushes on Ran, Sonoko and Shinichi's sempai Asami drugs her when they go karaoke singing and then secretly sets her place in fire, hoping she'd finally fall for him when he rescued her. In the end, not only Ran is the one who really rescues Asami, but Conan (through Sonoko in the manga, and Kogoro in the anime) reveals his gambit to everyone, harshly calling him out on his selfishness.
- Both played straight and played with in Gun X Sword. Van and Wendy meet when he rescues her, but he wasn't trying to rescue her; apparently, he thought she was already dead. Later in the same episode, he deliberately chooses to rescue her, despite having turned down her offer of marriage.
- Gunslinger Girl. Cyborg girl Triela has her Love Epiphany when she discovers that not only did her handler Victor Hilshire save her from a Snuff Film, but he became her handler solely to continue protecting her.
- Played with in the BL manga Cool/Uncool by Kai Asou. The story is about how main characters Yukihisa (uke) and Takashi (seme), now best friends, get together, but Yukihisa gives backstory to their relationship by remembering their first meeting in elementary school, where Yukihisa is a bullied transfer student whose tormentors are Takashi's group of friends. When Yukihisa is eventually called out in a schoolyard fight, the manga seems to set up this trope when Yukihisa is put in a two-on-situation. When the reader turns the page, it ends up with Yukihisa kicking the asses of his bullies, and when Takashi arrives, supposedly to rescue him and thereby invoke this trope, Yukihisa ends up tacking him to the ground as if he were another bully.
- In Wild Rock, the first time Yuuen and Emba meet Yuuen is about to be killed by a giant sabre-toothed animal he had been trying to hunt. Emba flies in out of nowhere and stabs it in the neck, and promptly tells Yuuen he's incapable of wielding a weapon. The others get riled up over this but Yuuen is just grateful to have been saved. Emba also gets injured rescuing him from a giant alligator later on. The trope is not quite played straight with their fathers, where it was Selim's own hunting trap that he had to save Yuni from.
- Gloriously subverted in Fujimura-kun Mates. The titular character, Fujimura, once saved a girl from a group of delinquents. Then a very cute and grateful imouto character shows up at his school, initially assumed to be the girl he saved. Turns out, she's the leader of the deliquents!
- In Flame of Recca, Recca and Yanagi meet in a 'saved from forceful advances' scenario.
- Played slightly-more-straight in the anime when Recca pushes her out of the way of a bunch of falling girders.
- Invoked twice in Canaan. Maria Oosawa wants to replay her first meeting with the titual Action Girl, so she intentionally gets in trouble. Also, Liang Qi had set up a trap for Alphard to get captured in the beginning so that Liang Qi would get to rescue her. Alphard was very aware of this; and went along merely because she was curious where Liang Qi was going with it.
- Ox saves his long-time Love Interest Kim from Arachne and Arachnophobia, which earns him a Relationship Upgrade. Other pairings in this series will more than likely be the result of this, in particular Soul/Maka as the former has placed himself in harm's way to protect the latter and actually shielded her while falling. The Foe Yay and Ho Yay pairing Kid/Black*Star can be this since Black*Star is the one who saves Kid from the Book of Eibon.
- In Tiger & Bunny, Kotetsu Kaburagi and Tomoe Amamiya's relationship was kick-started when Kotetsu rescued her from a factory explosion. Of course, the fact that he was an aspiring superhero and she was a raging superhero fangirl might have had something to do with it.
- Invoked intentionally in Mawaru-Penguindrum, when Ringo tries to stage an incident where she's drowning so her crush Tabuki will rescue her. Subverted since it fails, so Shoma has to save her. OTOH, if you ship Ringo/Shoma instead of Ringo/Tabuki, this trope can be seen as played straight... maybe.
- In Code Geass Nina falls for Euphemia after the princess saves her.
- Lovely Complex: Seiko falls for Otani after Otani saves him from a dog.
- City Hunter, combined with Girl of the Week, Ryo usually gets someone he's hired to protect to like him.
- Invoked and parodied in Daily Lives Of High School Boys. In the "High School Boys and the Saviour" skit, a Bishōnen sees three Japanese Delinquents harassing Ringo and steps in to beat them up... except the "delinquents" were just asking her a favor for the student council, and allowed themselves to be beat up to spare the "Saviour" the embarrassment of having misunderstood the situation...by invoking this trope.
Ballads
- In the Child Ballad The Lord of Lorn and the False Steward, the young lord saves his life by promising to never to tell that his servant robbed him; the servant turns him into a servant, until the daughter of a local lord figures out how to get the story out of him. Whereupon they promptly marry.
- In The Ballad of the Bog by Mark Lewis, a young man rescues a girl possessed by a ghost/an Eldritch Abomination, and gets her in his arms.
- Tam Lin.
Comics
- Superman's first encounter with Lois Lane Post Crisis was the rescue of a space shuttle she was on. It sorta became a trend.
- Also a Running Gag / In Joke between the two.
- In their original Golden Age meeting (at least when he was in costume), Superman saves Lois from some gangsters who aren't happy about Lois', erm, professional dedication.
- The Marvel Universe also has a Les Yay/Friendship variation of this. After Rogue drained her powers, Ms. Marvel was rescued by the first Spider-Woman and was counseled to get over her trauma/pain of power-loss, which is the beginning of their friendship... or Les Yay.YMMV
- The comic continuations of Gargoyles featured Lexington and Staghart rescuing each other. The Bad Guys series also featured Dingo rescuing Hunter and her him. Word Of God says Hunter and Dingo will be together. Jury still out on Staghart and Lexington. (But Slash Fic writers can dream....)
Fairy Tales and Folklore
- Katie Crackernuts saves an ill prince from The Fair Folk, after getting the promise that she can marry him if she stays with him for three nights. He is instantly agreeable even though he had been too ill to speak with her before.
- The fairy tale type The Girl Helps the Hero Flee: a hero falls under the villain's power. The heroine, often the villain's daughter, tells him how to escape the impossible tasks, or performs the magic to allow his escape, and usually both. They invariably intend to marry immediately and do marry in the end.
- In The Two Brothers and The Three Princes and their Beasts, the hero saves the princess from the dragon, and she immediately agrees to marry him.
- In The Blue Mountains, the hero must suffer a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown for three nights to free the heroine, whereupon she immediately agrees to marry him.
- In Soria Moria Castle, the three princesses are held prisoner by three trolls and the hero must kill the trolls to rescue them. He gets his pick.
- In some versions of the King Arthur legend this is the start of Lancelot's and Guinevere's affair. More commonly Lancelot rescues her because of his love for her, but their love isn't consummated till after the rescue.
- Back in Chretien it's done one better, with implications that Guinevere is playing Meleagant with full knowledge Lancelot will save her, knowing that this gives him a right to her (in a narrative sense, if not a legal one).
- Prince Charming from Snow White, who never even has a conversation with Snow White before kissing her apparently dead body, then carrying her off into the sunset. Likewise the Prince in Sleeping Beauty.
- A male example of a rescuee is the prince in The Little Mermaid: In the original Hans Christian Andersen version, the prince never knew that the mermaid had saved him and wasn't in love with her — he was in love with the girl from the temple who found him on the beach (who he thought rescued him), whom he believed he could never marry because of her vocation. It turned out that she was not a nun but had simply been sent there to be educated by the sisters, and was in fact the princess his father was pressuring him to marry.
Fanfictions
- Deliberately averted in the Firefly fanfic Forward, where Jayne and River end up saving each other while they are being held prisoner by Niska. While the aftermath of those events resulted in the two of them developing into a more platonic relationship, it didn't directly result in romance. There are hints that there might be a River/Jayne romance developing later on, however.
Film
- Back to the Future I and III feature these as major plot points.
- A main plot device in all three movie versions of King Kong, although the sexuality of the relationship between Anne and Kong was toned down to platonic love in the 2005 version.
- Disney loves this trope.
- Lady and the Tramp: Tramp saves Lady from nasty dogs and the pound. Then she and the other dogs save him from the dog catcher.
- Notice that in Disney's Beauty and the Beast, Belle and the Beast's Relationship Upgrade immediately follows the Beast rescuing her from wolves. She returns the favor by not leaving him to die in the snow after he collapses from the effort of said rescue.
- The Little Mermaid: Ariel saves Eric from drowning, who falls in love with her voice. Then he saves her.
- Hercules: Hercules tries this with Meg, but she's less than impressed. Then, she saves him after a big blowup.
- Let's not forget that it all started with a mouse. And his girlfriend. A lot.
- Used (and lampshaded, see the quote above) in Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within to restart the romance between the lead girl and her old love, the military captain. First he hauls her out of alien-infected city, then she performs a life-saving surgery on him... Works way better than a Red String of Fate.
- Densha Otoko (Train Guy) is the apparently-true story of a shy nerd who scares off a chikan from harassing a young woman on a train. When she unexpectedly sends him a note and an expensive present, he has to draw on the collective wisdom of an otaku message board to navigate the greatest crisis of his life.
- Spaceballs, which somehow is played straight with no Lampshade Hanging.
- Lampshaded in Speed in which Sandra Bullock's character tells Keanu Reeves' character "Relationships based on extreme circumstances rarely work." Sure enough, by the sequel, she's got a new guy.
- It also features one of the best bond one liners when the line is echoed back later by Keanu's character and she responds 'Then we'll have to base it on sex.'
- Judging by the sequel, the sex must not have been all that great. Wah-wah-waaaaaaaaahhhhhh...
- Shrek, being an Affectionate Parody of fairy tales, goes to town with this one: Princess Fiona and Shrek meet when he rescues her from a tower and a dragon. She thinks he's supposed to be her Knight in Shining Armor with whom she will share True Love's Kiss, until he explains that he's actually an ogre who was just sent there to do the rescuing so Lord Farquaad wouldn't have to. Of course, "Rescue By Proxy Romance" isn't nearly as romantic, and ultimately Fiona and Shrek end up falling in love anyway.
- In Pirates of the Caribbean, a child Will was rescued from a wrecked ship by the crew of a nearby boat that a just-as-young Elizabeth and her dad were travelling in. In fact, little Elizabeth was the one who saw Will lying unconscious between what was left of the other ship and alerted the sailors.
- Titanic: Jack rescues Rose when she attempts suicide. She falls for him, and upon telling her story 84 years later, says that he saved her in every way a person could be saved.
- Woody Allen's Scoop has the heroine deliberately attract the attention of a guy she wants to investigate for possible murder by pretending to drown so he can rescue her, and striking up a romance afterwards. Later he tries to drown her for real. Good thing she was actually captain of her high school swim team.
- The Star Wars Original trilogy went all over the board with this trope. Han & Luke rescue Leia. Shortly thereafter, Leia saves Han & Luke (and Chewie). Luke and Leia then seem to be playing the trope as straight as an arrow (the "for luck" kiss, the scene before Luke boards his X-Wing, Leia's clear distress at Luke's communications, etc) Then Han returns and saves Luke, and by extension everybody on Yavin 4. In The Empire Strikes Back, Han and Leia are constantly helping each other during their Relationship Upgrade. Finally in Return of the Jedi, it's Leia who saves Han twice.
- After being rescued in Small Soldiers, Christy apparently forgets about her boyfriend in favor of the protagonist. This probably has something to do with said boyfriend fleeing by himself, while the protagonist sticks around to help her.
- The German film The Princess and the Warrior. Psychiatric nurse Sissi is knocked down by a truck and has her life saved with a tracheotomy done by ex-soldier turned criminal Bobo Reimer. She becomes obsessed with tracking him down, convinced that they are destined to be together.
- Wild Wild West. This appears to be happening after Artemus and Jim West rescue Rita Escobar (Rita flirts with both of them and Jim West thinks they'll "end up in the saddle"). It turns out to be a subversion: Rita is actually playing both men to get them to take her along so she can help rescue Professor Escobar...her husband.
Literature
- He goes down three times and gets up twice. The trope is subverted a second time in that despite the fact that he's rescued her from having an inappropriate crush on a lying jerk, Encyclopedia and Sally never seem to be anything other than close friends.
- In The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Phoebus rescues Esmeralda, causing the latter to fall hopelessly in love with the former.
- Twilight: Bella and Edward were already secretly interested in each other. But it took Edward saving her from Tyler's out of control van to get their relationship going.
- Played with in A Song of Ice and Fire with Tyrion's first wife, Tysha. It's first played straight with a slight twist: she falls in love, not with the dashing knight who most directly and physically rescued her from a group of bandits and implied would-be rapists (older brother Jaime), but the malformed midget who comforted her afterward (younger brother Tyrion). Then it's subverted when it turns out that Tysha was a prostitute and the whole thing was staged for Tyrion's benefit by Jaime, who thought it was about time his little brother had a woman. THEN it's reinsubverted, or something, when it turns out that their father Twyin, incensed at his son's marriage to a commoner, forced Jaime to tell Tyrion she was a prostitute when she actually wasn't. (Or at least, she wasn't hired by Jaime; Twyin considered her a whore because he believed that her only motivation for marrying Tyrion was his family's money. How pure her motives actually were is unknown.) Then It Got Worse.
- Played straight, lampshaded, invoked, and all-around played with in Stephanie Laurens' Cynster Sisters trilogy*
Viscount Breckenridge to the Rescue, In Pursuit of Eliza Cynster, and The Capture of the Earl of Glencrae . It fits, since they're set in the late 1820s.
- Edgar Rice Burroughs. All the time. Some of the more notable ones:
- In A Princess of Mars, Dejah Thoris doesn't admit to her attraction until John Carter rescues her.
- In The Chessman of Mars, Gahan finds and rescues Tara when her shipwreck had ended with her prisoner.
- In A Fighting Man of Mars, Tan Handron stumbles across Tavia and rescues her. It takes him a while to figure out the romance part, though.
- In The Monster Men, Bulan and Virginia met when he rescues her from the title monsters.
- Teased, but ultimately subverted in Mort. "We talked about it. Then we thought, just because you happen to rescue a princess, you shouldn't rush into things." Death specifically refers to the Snow White/Sleeping Beauty version as a bad idea.
Live Action TV
Video Games
Visual Novels
- According to Desiree in Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations, she fell in love with Ron Delite when he saved her from a pair of thugs. And then he passed out.
Web Animation
Web Originals
- Played with in Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog. Captain Hammer "saves" Penny from a runaway van and they become an item. Even though he saved her by throwing her into a pile of trash. And it was really Dr. Horrible who stopped the van.
Webcomics
- In Mayonaka Densha Hatsune and Tom first meet when he saves her from Jack the Ripper. If Hatsune's Anguished Declaration of Love later on is to be believed, this was also the point when she fell in love with him.
- In Freefall, Florence and the veterinarian, Winston, develop an attraction to each other ...awkward, since they're different species. Anyway, Florence acknowledges to herself that having been rescued by Winston plays no small part in her attraction to him.
- In El Goonish Shive, Justin falls in love with Elliot after being saved from bullies (slightly late, but that's besides the point). Unfortunately for Justin, who is pretty much a Woobie, Elliot doesn't swing that way.
- In Gunnerkrigg Court Jack Hyland develops a crush on Antimony Carver after she helps free his mind from the grip of an ethereal spider.
- Which is later subverted. He doesn't love Antimony - he loves Zimmy, the girl whose mind the ethereal spider came from.
- Which is still played straight: Zimmy was the one who directly confronted the spider, before killing it.
- In Homestuck, this is what Dirk plans on trying to attempt a seduction of Jake.
Western Animation
- Invoked in an episode of Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, where a Fangirl of Sonic's falls off a tall building. Sonic, being the hero that he is, zooms over and saves her. When Tails asks her about how she fell off the roof, she says, "Oh, that? I jumped. I wanted you to save me! How else was I going to meet you, silly?"
- In an episode of Kim Possible, Ron dreams of saving Kim, and then actually does.
- Not to mention Kim saves Ron numerous times throughout the show.
- Another male rescuee example comes from My Life as a Teenage Robot. In "Attack of the 5 1/2 Foot Geek", Sheldon meets (and falls hard for) Jenny after she saves him from some bullies in shop class.
- Paulina in Danny Phantom. The first time she's rescued, she acknowledges that Danny is a good ghost (in a town then on Untrusting Community level), but it was his second rescue that Paulina had fallen madly in love with Danny Phantom. (Although this turns into a cast of Loves My Alter Ego, and they actually never get together.)
- A Robot Chicken sketch featured a nerd winning a date with Scarlett Johanson in a contest. When she arrives, she hardly masks her frustration with the situation. Suddenly, a bunch of goons hired by the nerd "attack" the two during the date, causing the nerd to "chase" them off. She instantly falls in love with him, and we get a Happily Ever After montage of them marrying, having kids, etc. Then we see the nerd at his death bed confessing the ruse to Scarlett who, instead of being outraged, suddenly starts speaking in a man's voice and claiming she's not the real Scarlett Johanson but a (male) impersonator. The revelation causes the nerd to flatline right then and there and "Scarlett" to break down in tears.
- In Phineas and Ferb, "The Beak" and the ending of "Vanessassary Roughness" have Phineas and Ferb rescuing their love interest from danger.
Real Life
- A standard trick by private investigators or spies to gain someone's trust is to stage a fake barfight or street mugging, with the investigator as the Good Samaritan coming in "save" him or her.
- Called the "Florence Nightingale Effect" when it happens in hospitals. Although named more for nurses (or doctors) who fall in love with their patients, the reverse also holds true.
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