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Two lovers — usually teenagers — destined to be kept apart no matter how hard they struggle to be together. It may be Fate or just Feuding Families, or even something as mundane as a few hundred miles, but something will always be in their way. Often, the two can only be Together In Death. Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet is the most famous example of this archetype (and provides the title of the trope) but it dates back at least as far as the ancient Greeks, making it Older Than Dirt.
A version of this trope which is at least discredited if not actually dead and buried in modern fiction but was true in the past and works in historical settings is Love Above One's Station, i. e. being in love with someone from a different social class. Yes, it's hard even today to have a relationship with someone from a very different background, but in the old days, it was completely out of order; you'd be treated with utter contempt and risk violence and/or arrest if you were from the lower class and courted a "better," and a "better" who reciprocated would be disowned or sent to a nunnery or asylum. This leads to all those usually tragic "servant/slave/peasant loves the lord/lady/king/queen" stories.
Compare Dating Catwoman, where the relationship is forbidden but doesn't end as tragically. Notice the overlaps with Interspecies Romance and Mixed Marriage. Also compare Bury Your Gays. Often the case for any Vampire Werewolf Love Triangle.
Contrast Happily Married.
Examples
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Anime and Manga
- Sakura and Syaoran in Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle. At first, even though they are physically together, Sakura is never allowed to remember she is in love with him (that is, from the looks of it, until all her feathers are found). Then it gets much, much more complicated, with all the complications putting more distance between them, metaphorically. That clones of both are involved is only the the beginning.
- In the Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch manga, Rina and Hanon both fall in love with humans, knowing full well that they will eventually have to leave them to rule over their kingdoms. (Hamasaki actually has a mermaid ancestor, but this seems inconsequential.) They tell Lucia this too, but her guy turns out to be the prince of an ancient powerful race that can breathe underwater, so she's safe.
- Hippo and Yuuri. Just... Hippo and Yuuri.
- Mari and Hagino from Blue Drop are divided by the fact that one is a high school student and the other the commander of an alien battleship, whose people plan to invade earth.
- Wolf's Rain has not one but three sets of lovers, all of whom could be considered "star-crossed" in various ways.
- Much of Lord Darcia's motivation for becoming the series' villain involves his lover Hamona falling into a coma and subsequently dying, which he blames on the wolves.
- Hubb Leboski spends most of the series trying to get back together with his ex-wife Cher Degré, which indirectly leads to his getting involved with the wolves.
- The wolf Hige, who's always dreamed of finding a hot babe, eventually gets together with the wolf-dog Blue.
- Of course, with everything else that's going on nobody gets much time for romance, and they all die in the OVA episodes. At the very end Hige is apparently reincarnated as a human, along with the other wolves, but we don't see Blue.
- Kazuya and Erika in Daimos. Kazuya is the pilot of Daimos, defender of Earth from the Balm invaders. While Erika is the little sister of Richter, Prince of Balm and leader of the invasion.
- Chrono of Chrono Crusade has the worst luck when it comes to relationships. First, he meets Mary Magdalene, who informs him after he's known her for months that she has had prophetic dreams since she was a child that he would be the one to take her life. He does, although not in the way either one expects. He's so guilt-ridden over her death that he sleeps for 50 years in her tomb, waiting for his energy to deplete to join her in death. But Rosette Christopher comes and wakes him up from his years of slumber, and things start to be going good for him...until her brother Joshua is kidnapped by Aion and he's forced to make a contract with her, slowly draining away at her life. In the anime they die together, Rosette as a result of the contract and Chrono from his wounds in the final battle, but in the manga they spend six years apart, and Chrono arrives back to her side just in time for her to die in his arms. It's implied that he lives on for decades afterwards.
- Subverted in Princess Tutu. Ahiru is forced to give up the pendant she uses to transform into a girl to save Mytho, but Fakir still promises to stay by her side, even though she's now just a duck.
- The Berserk universe has made it its personal mission to ensure that Guts and Casca never find happiness.
- Subverted in the Vampire Princess Miyu OAV's. Kei Yuzuki is a human who at first only wanted eternal youth and beauty, consulting the Uncanny Valley Girl from his school, Ranka. Turns out she's a Shinma and she promises to give him what he wants yet planning to make him her prey... but later, the guy ends up falling in love with her, despite knowing who she is. Much to her own shock, Ranka herself finds herself returning these feelings. Then, Ranka transforms Kei into a Shinma, so Miyu (who had her eyes set on him too, thus she was horribly humiliated when she found out) had to send them both to the Dark. The last time we see them, they happily and peacefully walk together towards the Shinma world.
- Takaki and Akari in Five Centimeters Per Second are an interesting example in that they have marginally more of a chance at a happy ending than most examples, but it doesn't stop their movie from being a huge Tear Jerker.
- Saji Crossroad and Louise Halevy fit this trope after the Wham Episode of Gundam 00. The second season has them fighting on opposite sides, as he's forced to join Celestial Being to save his life and she's become a Dark Action Girl for the A-Laws. It takes them LOTS of effort to get back together.
- Lyle Dylandy and Anew Returner also fit in. It doesn't end well for them, since she turns out to be an Innovator and betrays Celestial Being. However, when Lyle offers her a Last Second Chance she almost takes it, only to be mind controlled by Ribbons Almark into fighting him anyway and she eventually has to be killed by Setsuna to keep her from killing Lyle.
- Mikako and Noboru in Voices of a Distant Star are separated by a huge amount of space, not to mention a growing difference in age as Noboru grows older on Earth but Mikako remains 15 years old.
- Note that (as in the entry on Time Dilation) this is due to her sending a message and the movie skipping over to when he receives it, years in the future. The gates they use to jump distances don't seem to actually induce Time Dilation effects, because at the end you actually see Mikako's message from Agharta arriving to a 24-year-old Noboru, thus suggesting that the same amount of time passes for her as it does for him (otherwise he would have been even older). When (Don't say "if", please!) they finally find each other, they should still be about the same age. But they are still really "the first generation of lovers separated by time and space", because the long distance means they have to wait years to hear back from each other.
- In Arashi No Yoru Ni: Averted. Mei and Gabu seem doomed to part ways because their Interspecies Romance is frowned upon by both their kin, but they find one another again in the end.
- Basilisk, which is essentially a Japanese Tokugawa-era send up of "Romeo and Juliet" has its star crossed lovers: Gennosuke from the Kouga and Oboro from the Iga. They even make reference to the old belief that star-crossed lovers will be reborn as twin siblings.
- Also, the beginning of the show shows another pair of star crossed lovers: Koga Danjou and Iga Ogen, Gennosuke's grandpa and Oboro's grandma respectively.
- Ai and Yota from Video Girl Ai, since he's a human and she's a Robot Girl who shouldn't have human feelings.
- Two of Adachi Mitsuru's manga series feature romances forbidden by feuding parents. In Rough, the parents run rival confectionery businesses. In Katsu!, the fathers are former boxing rivals. In both cases, the girl's father is more rabid than the boy's father.
- In the village of Hinamizawa, there were Satoshi Honjou and Shion Sonozaki.
- Code Geass has two couples like this: Ougi and Viletta, then Lelouch and Shirley. The first ones subvert the trope and get their happy ending... the second couple plays it depressingly straight
- Very twisted Boys Love example: Riki and Iason Mink from Ai No Kusabi.
- Simon and Nia from Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann in a truly epic Tear Jerker ending. Lampshaded in-series by the Big Bad. Nice guys really do finish last.
Comic Books
- Young Avengers: Cassie Lang (Stature) and Nate Richards (Iron Lad) seem destined to be star-crossed lovers, separated by centuries and because Nate's destined to grow up to be the evil supervillain Kang the Conqueror.
- While it's unclear how strongly his feelings are returned, Charlie Brown's hopeless infatuation with the Little Red-Haired Girl is tragically doomed to remain Star-Crossed, as he lacks the nerve to speak to her.
- Nikolai Dante: the title character and Jena Makarov end up in this situation because Nikolai is an illegitimate scion of the Romanov family, who eventually go to war with the Makarovs.
- Hawkman and Hawkgirl. If they aknowledge their love for each other they will be killed by their reincarnating archenemy. Because Destiny Says So.
- In Blackest Night #1, finally Hawkgirl admits that she's fallen in love with Hawkman. Immediately, they are killed and turned into Black Lanterns. Toldja.
Film
- Rose and Jack from 1997's Titanic are probably the most infamous use of this trope.
- Repo! The Genetic Opera has a subversion in Grave-Robber and Amber Sweet—they'd fit this trope perfectly, if they actually gave a damn about each other.
- Anakin Skywalker and Padmé Amidala from Star Wars. Due to their respective roles as Jedi and senator requiring them to be on different planets, they were often literally star crossed. Even their romance theme was entitled: Across the Stars.
- Did we mention that Jedi were not allowed to marry until the New Republic era?
- Jamal and Latika in the movie Slumdog Millionaire. At least until the very end of the movie.
- The titular tribesman Uncas and Alice, proper English girl, in Last Of The Mohicans. Barely a word is spoken between them, but we know they are destined for this. Sure enough, Alice commits suicide after Uncas dies trying to save her.
- Darkly subverted in Heathers. Everyone in town thinks the two dead high school football players killed themselves because they were gay lovers who believed that the community would never accept them. Everyone, that is, except for the two people who murdered them and forged the suicide note that lead the town to believe that two heterosexual football players were secretly gay lovers.
- Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon: Rebellious Princess Jen and Lovable Rogue Lo, Lady Of War Shu Lien and Warrior Therapist Li Mubai. The first couple gets together in the end (for a very brief period of time.) The second ends as Her Heart Will Go On after Mubai dies in Shu Lien's arms.
- The lovers in My Beautiful Laundrette are maximally star-crossed. One is from a tradition-minded Pakistani family, the other runs with National Front skinheads, and both are boys.
- Ladyhawke - the title character Isabeau and her lover Captain Navarre travel together but only ever set eyes upon each other for the briefest moment because due to a curse, Isabeau turns into a hawk at dawn and Navarre turns into a wolf at sunset.
- In The Lion King 2: Kiara and Kovu.
Folklore
- Chinese mythology speaks of the Weaver and the Cowherd, a legend of the stars Vega and Altair. Star-crossed lovers Zhi Nu and Niu Lang are separated forever across the Milky Way. They may only reunite once a year when magpies form a bridge between them. This is the basis of the Chinese cultural equivalent to Valentine's Day.
- Tanabata no Matsuri is the Japanese version with Orihime and Hikoboshi as the star-crossed lovers.
Literature
- Hilariously lampshaded and (eventually) averted in David Eddings' The Belgariad and The Malloreon: A knight and a lady are in love, but she is married to another man. Various other protagonists grumble about the fact all three characters are genre-aware of their plight, play up to it, and even actively avoid possible solutions because they love the melodrama so much. Eventually, after the husband dies, the main character gets sick of the ongoing Wangst and forces the couple to get married at the point of a seven-foot-long sword.
- Parodied in the Discworld novel Mort with the characters of Mellius and Gretelina "whose pure, passionate and soul-searing affair would have scorched the pages of History if they had not, by some unexplained quirk of fate, been born two hundred years apart on different continents."
- Two examples from The Dresden Files: Harry and Susan are the more obvious, but also Thomas and Justine. Thomas is an incubus, while Justine is a rather disturbed hottie. At first, their relationship was just for mutual benefit; he could feed off her life energy, while he was her psychiatric drug. Unfortunately, Thomas is, quite literally, Allergic To Love, so when they actually did fall for each other, the relationship had to be immediately cut off.
- Though romance is not a major theme in the books, Eisenhorn and Bequin from the Warhammer 40000: Eisenhorn series. Eisenhorn is a Psyker and Bequin is a Blank (anti-psyker), thus meaning it was painful for Eisenhorn just to be near Bequin. The only time he is able to be close to her and open his heart is when Bequin is in a coma (thus canceling her 'Blankness'), after trying and failing to stop a possessed Imperial Titan. Unfortunately she doesn't wake up.
- Lyra and Will from the His Dark Materials series, specifically the last book, The Amber Spyglass.
- About half of all romantic relationships in A Song Of Ice And Fire.
- The two main characters of The Hunger Games use this trope for all it's worth.
- Devdas : The book (and subsequent movie versions) is definitely of the second variation, having been written in 1917 when such rules still existed. The titular hero (son of a wealthy upper-class family) and Childhood Sweetheart Paro (daughter of a middle class trader family) fall in love upon adulthood, but because Devdas is too weak-willed to stand up to his father's disapproval of their getting married, the two of them spend the remainder of the book apart. He spends his days drinking and mourning her, while Paro is in an Arranged Marraige to an older aristocratic gentleman. Sensing that he's close to death because of his drinking and despair, Devdas crawls to Paro's house and dies in front of her gate, fulfilling a promise he made to her on the day of her wedding, and Paro can't even see his face because of the rules of Purdah.
Live Action TV
- Buffy and Angel in Buffy The Vampire Slayer.
- Everyone falls into this eventually. Jenny and Giles in season 2. Willow and Oz in season 4. Willow and Tara in season 6. Xander and Anya, Buffy and Spike in season 7. Joss Whedon is mean.
- Angel and Cordelia in Angel.
- Played for laughs in Degrassi Junior High. Snake and Melanie are hopelessly crushing on each other, but every attempt they make to date ends in a comic disaster. In one episode, they plan to meet at a Wild Teen Party. Snake and his friends are put in charge of bringing the beer, but get arrested by the cops on the way — so Melanie doesn't get to see him, and the Wild Teen Party doesn't get to be wild.
- Played much straighter with Joey and Caitlin.
- Sayid and Nadia, Lost: he searches for her for eight years, finds her, and marries her. She's killed only months later.
- Played with in Battlestar Galactica. Helo and Athena are in love. The problem? He's one of the few surviving humans left and she's an agent of the Cylon race that just nuked his species to near extinction. The result is that she spends the majority of the second season locked up in a holding cell and the two of them have to deal with people who want to abort their unborn child and rape her for information. Ultimately, this trope is subverted as Athena has won acceptance, been freed from prison and married to the man she loves after the timeskip in between seasons.
- The Doctor and Rose, *oh goodness* the Doctor and Rose. At least that's how we're intended to perceive their literally here-and-gone-again relationship over seasons 1-4 of the new series.
- Oddly enough the Ultraman series has this with Ultraman Ace's hosts Seiji and Yuuko (yes two people become him at least at first). At first it seems like a standard blooming romance between hero and heroine but then a Wham Episode hits. Yuuko is a kind of energy being from the moon, and having accomplished her task on Earth must leave. Seiji is heart broken but swears to keep her in his heart as he becomes the sole host of Ace. However in the Grand Finale Seiji must merge with Ace permanently and he too has to leave Earth, as Ace has duties on the Ultraman homeworld. Decades later (both in series and in real life) Seiji and Yuuko would finally meet again during the Aniversery series Ultraman Mebius, and sort of confess their feelings to each other. Since both are energy beings now its implied that they could potentially get together.
- Michael Scott and Holly Flax. The dorkiest, most adorable pair of soulmates you ever did see, cruelly seperated by Dunder-Mifflin corporate for business reasons (he's the Scranton office manager, she's in HR.) Michael fully intends on waiting for her as long as it takes. Awwwww.
Mythology
Music
- The Decemberists' song "We Both Go Down Together" is about a common girl and a young man of rich means whose parents don't approve of his love to said common girl. They solve their problem in the classical manner, if you get my drift.
- There's also an alternate lyrical interpretation that takes the unlucky rich kid's somewhat patronising tone and extrapolates that rather than preparing to die with her, he's leading her on so he can murder her, possibly for being pregnant with his child.
- There's also also the interpretation that the rich male is actually a deluded rapist who believes that they are in love. The rape angle seems to make sense, but the leaving her for being pregnant fits in well with the theory that We Both Go Down Together and Lesley Anne Levine are interlinked. Possibly it's a bit of both.
- O Valencia, on the other hand, is spot-on for this trope; in fact, the first bit almost seems lifted from Romeo And Juliet: A young mobster (probably son of the Don/Boss/whathaveyou) falls in love with Valencia, the daughter of a rival Don; her sister rats on them; her brother confronts them; Valencia runs to her lover's side just as her brother is shooting, and gets hit instead; she dies in her lover's arms; the lover decides to go on a Roaring Rampage Of Revenge.
- Referenced in the Blue Oyster Cult song "Don't Fear The Reaper" as well.
- The song "Barricade" by Stars is occasionally, and erroneously, taken to be about a pair of revolutionary lovers who are torn away from each other by The Man. It's actually about a pair of violent football hooligans who are only being kept apart by the fact that one of them grows up and gets a job while the other stays a shiftless thug. Members of the band are somewhat... annoyed by the first interpretation...
- The song "Jueves" by the spanish group La Oreja de Van Gogh, is about a man and a woman who confess their love for each other in a train... just seconds before dying in the terrorist attacks of March 11th.
- "Aisareru Hana, Aisarenu Hana" ("Loved Flower, Unloved Flower") and "Futari wa" ("The Two of Us") by Miyuki Nakajima. The former tells the story of a Love Triangle where a man married the "loved flower" in an Arranged Marriage, and, although the "loved flower" thought that he loved her, he never loved her and instead was in love with the "unloved flower," who took his marriage to the "loved" as betrayal, although she never gave up on her love for him after being reborn again and again. The latter is a modern variation on Love Above One's Station. It tells of the love between a prostitute and a client who cannot have an actual relationship with her without being rejected by his friends.
- "Running Bear", famously sung by Johnny Preston, is essentially a Romeo and Juliet story between two Indians from warring tribes.
Theater
- Subverted in the musical The Fantasticks: two neighboring fathers maintain the appearance of an virulent feud and forbid their children (a son and a daughter) to even look at each other as part of a scheme to get them to fall in love and marry.
- Shakespeare did this a lot, either because he liked it or his audiences did.
- Again, Tristan and Isolde, but now in the opera by Richard Wagner.
- Haemon and Antigone in Antigone by Sophocles.
Video Games
- Fei and Elly in Xenogears, multiple times. They are trapped in an endless cycle of reincarnation, and every single time it ends quite badly for both of them. Until they break the cycle, of course. At least one of their doomed romances has shades of Love Above One's Station.
- Arc and Elle of Terranigma find themselves in an almost identical situation, as they reincarnate endlessly to save the world... and be killed off just as their love blooms and the world is safe, each time.
- Aerith and Cloud in Final Fantasy VII, and Aerith and Zack in Crisis Core. Aerith really just has no luck with relationships. Of course Aerith and Zack could be together in Advent Children.
- Tequila and Billie, the daughter of Big Bad Mr. Wong in John Woo Presents Stranglehold.
- Timpani and Blumiere of Super Paper Mario. Or, as you know them for most of the game, Tippi and Count Bleck.
- Arguable, as the two may or may not be actually dead.
- In Fire Emblem, this really happens to Priscilla, if she is paired with either the myrmidon Guy or the Dragon Rider Heath. Basically, she's a noble girl. But Guy is a tribesman from Sacae, and Heath is a deserter from Bern. So in the end, they back down. This is especially true on the Heath-Priscilla pairing, their A Support Conversation is almost on Tear Jerker level.
- Don't forget Legault/Isadora, Renault/Isadora and Harken/Vaida.
- The 6th game had Miledy and Gale, which reaches near-epic levels of Tear Jerker, especially when you let Miledy talk to Gale before you kill him.
- Arcueid/Shiki from Shingetsutan Tsukihime.
- Might as well throw Saber/Shiro in there. They're even worse since at least Arcueid/Shiki had a "Good Ending" and maybe a sequel to the "True Ending?"
- Laguna and Julia in Final Fantasy VIII. His son and her daughter have rather more success.
- EVERY single pair of lovers in Odin Sphere.
- This could apply to Tidus and Yuna with Tidus being actually a dream of the Fayth. But at the good ending of Final Fantasy X 2, they are happily reunited.
Webcomics
Western Animation
Real Life
- This
 example, between a Hindu boy and a Muslim girl. ;-;
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