Troperville
Editing Help
Tools
Toys
|
|
|
Strangled By The Red String
|
Crow: [as the Queen] I'm going to be your love interest whether you like it or not.
What happens when the Red String Of Fate and Token Romance are done especially poorly? Essentially, you get Strangled By The Red String. Where the main character, who was once single, is implausibly thrown into a relationship that's forced down the audience's throat. Love At First Sight taken to a fictional extreme. These two people are always somehow making out or getting it on, even if they only knew each other for a few minutes before they started getting busy. Even worse is when they have been in the same group for a long time and have mostly ignored each other. A clear violation of the "Show, Don't Tell" rule.
And they just simply have to announce their love to the whole world. Oh, and suddenly all of the other characters are telling us how these two belong to each other.
But don't expect them to be able to share any interests, or even be able to have a conversation about anything but their schmoopy love. The audience is supposed to be happy for them, but usually they'll be more disgusted than anything.
Sometimes this is just the result of a story written without skill, but this is becoming more and more standard in many series nowadays, where you have Fanon-savvy authors that feel that if they don't officially "pair up" characters, someone else will. ( They're right, but it still happens even if they do.)
Often done to prove to the audience said character is not gay. Also a leading cause of Die For Our Ship. Sometimes this is an awkward attempt to lure a female audience by adding soap opera-ish tactics.
Often, the writers have to resort to Cleaning Up Romantic Loose Ends because the relationship can't compete with other possibilities.
See also Official Couple, Last Minute Hookup, and Romantic Plot Tumor. May be caused by The Dulcinea Effect. Compare Derailing Love Interests. For when the build-up takes place before the series, see New Old Flame.
Your Mileage May Vary on the following.
Examples:
open/close all folders
Anime
- Rumiko Takahashi, author of Ranma 1/2, Inuyasha, and Urusei Yatsura, is especially guilty of introducing characters just to pair up with other characters, then forgetting about them. Usually, they make a token appearance and then are never heard from again, or perhaps two or three times at best. Her justifications have driven away many former fans; she has stated on multiple occasions that she only creates some characters to attempt to deter fans from inventing pairings she didn't intend.
- Ranma 1/2... first of all, there's Akari Unryu; apparently, the demand for Ryoga to get a happy ending led to the creation of this girl, who is so perfect for Ryoga, and shows up so few times in her subsequent appearances that she has been derided as a canon relationship sue. Mousse got some major attempts at redeeming his character, which can actually come off as rather jarring due to the fact he spent the early series trying to kill Ranma; and once boasted along the lines that he would gladly break any rules and forsake any honor to get Shampoo, though Shampoo never changed her opinion of him- while she did occasionally show him some "soft" moments, she spent most of the series outright abusing him and, on one occasion, was perfectly willing to go and play videogames while abandoning him to what she believed would be certain death at the hands of a life-sapping demon. Ukyo got an (attempted) and very literal Last Minute Hookup in the form of an effeminate transvestite ninja master, who appeared less than Akari did.
- Urusei Yatsura is a case where this might actually be the happy ending; initially, Shinobu, the Tsundere with Super Strength, seems to be the Unlucky Childhood Friend, though she legitimately falls out of love with Ataru Moroboshi due to recognizing that he is an apparently irredeemable Loveable Sex Maniac... her next choice of crushes? Handsome Lech and Royal Brat Shuutaro Mendo, who's not only just as bad as Ataru in terms of lustfulness, but is also chasing after Cute Monster Girl Lum. Meanwhile, she's being pursued by the Gonkiest character in the series, a hulking, repulsive moron who repeatedly tries to ambush her. Finally, she earns the attention of Inaba, a shy and clumsy, but sweet, innocent and genuinely romantic character, whom she grows quite fond of. And then he only shows up in about one story...
- To some, Sango and Miroku suddenly hooking up in Inu Yasha can come off like this. The most cynical interpretations make claims along the lines of the author realising that here is another woman (and a legitimately strong, capable one who lacks the negative baggage of Kagome) in the party, so she had better couple her with someone else before fans start protesting that they'd prefer Sango and Inuyasha to be the Official Couple.
- Subaru, a character that appeared in two filler episodes of Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch, was introduced as a one-off love interest for Caren — possibly in retaliation to the piles of Twincest doujinshi featuring her and Noel, but you never know, because Pichi Pichi Pitch filler made no sense. Not only did Caren lose her Broken Bird personality for this episode, she became a chipper comic relief character for the rest of the season, even after he was gone. Note to writers: never apply this trope to someone that's Out Of Focus.
- Usagi and Mamoru from Sailor Moon, specifically the animated adaptation. During one of The Movies, Usagi is slightly depressed that she has no idea what Mamoru is like, can't have a conversation with him, and doesn't even understand his interests. This was originally lampshaded quite well in early appearances, where it was pointed out he was a cold fish with a mysterious past suffering from memory loss on top of being much older than Usagi. Their later failures to really interact with each other may have to do with the television writers not finding him very interesting, aside from a character for her to emote at — which is really his fundamental purpose, after all. Additional Lampshade Hanging occurs when in the same movie, Usagi decides not to trouble herself about it, as it's being unnecessarily pushy.
- The manga, on the other hand, made their relationship the center of the story and kept Mamoru as a major character throughout the series. They were also both teenagers when the manga started (one in middle school, one starting high school), thus rendering the age difference issue moot. This probably has to do with the manga following a more shojo formula and the anime following an action show formula.
- It also has something to do with the influence of Kunihiko Ikuhara (Revolutionary Girl Utena) who directed a large portion of the anime until SuperS. He's pretty much stated that two women are the ideal relationship, and some argue it was his influence that led to the creation of Haruka and Michiru. Of course, it seems that by the time the anime ended nobody was really listening to Naoko Takeuchi anymore - she was positively against the Starlights being men in their civilian forms and Seiya's infatuation with Usagi was seemingly based on one line in the manga.
- In Gundam SEED Destiny, Shinn and Lunamaria get together right after he has apparently killed her sister and her first love interest! Up until that point, they had a nice The Straight Will And Grace dynamic. It can be argued that Lunamaria was suffering of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and neither she nor Shinn were thinking straight (and both believed at the time that Lunamaria's sister and previous love interest were traitors; Luna probably would've killed them herself if the opportunity had present itself), but...even their fans dislike how they hooked up.
- Around the time Digimon Adventure 02 came out, this editor was quite partial to the Sora/Yamato (Matt) pairing, since he thought the personalities of the two of them meshed quite well together... but he wasn't expecting anything romantic to really happen. Imagine his surprise when they actually got together. What's the catch here? The catch is that, up until the (in)famous Christmas episode, Sora and Yamato didn't really have much of a connection... or even spoke much to each other, for that matter. (Not to mention the fact that this editor always felt like Sora's personality was randomly changed.) The hook-up just... happened, without a reasonable explanation.
- Ken and Miyako don't fare much better. Yes, she expressed interest in him before the team knew he was the Digimon Kaiser, but for the rest of the season until the Distant Finale (where the two are married with kids), there wasn't much development between the two. At least, not as much as between Daisuke (Davis) and Ken, or Miyako and Hikari...
- The manga version of Sorcerer Hunters does this with the Carrot/Tira pairing. While it's made clear how Tira feels about Carrot, Carrot's own feelings are rarely brought into question, and even the few moments where he does seem to notice her as more than a sister figure aren't enough to convince some readers that the two were destined all along. Plus, in the short sequel ten years later their relationship isn't what most would consider True Love...
- Fushigi Yuugi, arguably. While Miaka and Tamahome's love eventually proves to be quite sincere and strong, her announcement that she's falling in love with him in the first manga volume is moving more than a little too fast, even for a shoujo series.
- Not to mention how Miaka is only 15 years old, yet claims she can't live without Tamahome. Right.
- Adette and Gouly from Overman King Gainer are both leaders of their respective squads but never talk much, and never have a romantic moment until the final two episodes where Adette kisses Gouly to awaken him from being Brainwashed And Crazy and the next episode sees her holding him, and doing some flirting with him. The only setup is the fact that Adette loves strong men, and Gouly is a badass ninja.
- It gets even stranger when you consider that: one, the other two romances in the series (Gainer and Sara, and Mamahd and Liubov) are handled quite a bit better; and two, that for the first few episodes Adette was in a relationship with Yassaba.
- Apparently, the Banpresto developers did not like the handling of the Adette/Gouly pairing as well. In Super Robot Wars K, this ship is uncerimoniously sunk when Adette gets back with Yassaba after the Overdevil's defeat.
- Any pairings in Dragon Ball and its continuities (except by Goku/Chichi, but for just a little bit, and especially Bulma/Vegeta).
- In the later Full Metal Panic novels, Sousuke and Kaname's relationship becomes this. Due to Character Derailment and slight Genre Shift, Kaname is transformed into an extreme Brainwashed Damsel In Distress that follows The Paolo Leonard around while Sousuke tries desperately to save her. And when she isn't acting Brainwashed, she just curls up and cries her eyes out, wondering why Sousuke would come save her (Hmm... why indeed). Unfortunately, the earlier part of the series established her as an Action Girl that was learning how to handle things on her own. One of the given reasons why they matched each other well was because she could stand with him as an equal who could protect herself. So after the later developments, their romantic relationship seemed pretty forced.
- Though this is justified as Kaname had been brainwashed into thinking that she had killed both Sousuke and Tessa. Leonard merely took advantage of that, not much of Paolo is he.
- While Cain of Count Cain flirts with (and presumably sleeps with) as many women as possible throughout the series, when he finally gets paired up with Meridiana it feels ridiculous, since she's just as vapid as any other woman he's met and slept with. She has nothing to distinguish her; she is the least unique character in the entire series. Even the author admitted that the fans didn't like her; she seemed surprised.
- Of course in this case "paired up" means "he fell in love with her then she died a gruesome death and was forgotten for the rest of the series." Also, given Cain's somewhat capricious nature and that by Word Of God he has a thing for delicate, frail Distressed Damsels, his sudden infatuation with Merediana isn't so surprising. For that matter, Count Cain mostly avoids this trope: Cain dies without being paired up with anyone, unless one counts the very explicit Ho Yay between him and Riff.
- Jil x Kaaya from Tower Of Druaga. This pairing was poorly written enough (especially in comparison to the more natural chemistry that Jil and Fatina had) that even many Kaaya fans were Jil X Fatina shippers.
Comic Books
- Some X-Men fans think this way about Scott dating a derailed Emma Frost. Some people at Marvel decided they didn't like Jean, so they forced Grant Morrison to drop a bridge on her. What's really bad is the excuse given for why they're dating so soon after that is "not" a rebound relationship (they did not even have a relationship or even an affair before, just Emma taking advantage of him when he was vulnerable).
- As proof it was contrived, there is this Bad Future that Jean needed to avert. Going back in time, like every other such future, somehow wasn't an option. Instead the only options were: 1. Scott and Emma didn't get together, the X-Men would fall apart and things go all to holy hell. 2. Jean brainwashes her husband into forgetting his feelings for Jean and giving in to his attraction to Emma. Wall Banger big time.
- Most X-Men fans regard the recent Black Panther/Storm nuptials as something akin to this. Many of those who were interested in the idea were annoyed at Reginald Hudlin's hamfisted railroading of the relationship from casual acquaintance to Wedding Of Perfect Couple as soon as possible.
- Many fans felt this way about the second Green Arrow, who spent his adolescence in a monastery and showed little interest in sex... until the writer had him sleep with some girl he just met, to prove his manliness and heterosexuality.
- What really makes fans throw up in their mouths a little when they think about it, is the fact that this woman had once raped his father!
- Y: The Last Man had Dr. Mann nurture a subtle infatuation with straight companion Agent 355 for about half the series. After they have sex and then argue about it, Allison is so disappointed she vents to virtual stranger Rose, who admits to being attracted to her. Next thing you know, they're having the best sex of Allison's life. Next thing after that they're practically married. Talk about Cleaning Up Romantic Loose Ends.
- Although there is the fact that Rose is The Mole, and was sent by the Australian navy to seduce Allison in order to worm her way into the last man's Nakama, which is why she seduced her so hard and so easily, which makes things a little more interesting, since she ended up falling in love with her anyway. On the other hand, the last arc of the series is a rather cruel subversion. Yorick's spent the entire series looking for his girlfriend Beth, whom he was proposing to when the Gendercide occurred and cut them off. He finally finds her, only for her to tell him that she was going to break up with him. As she tries to explain she doesn't want to break up with him now, he runs to 355, who tells him he loves her, and he reciprocates...and then 355 gets shot through the head. And then Beth ends up with his sister.
- In Preacher, Jesse and Tulip fell in Love At First Sight and spend virtually all their time together in bed. Except when they're arguing about his refusal to let her fight at his side.
- Jesse inherited that trait. His father met his mother when, on John Custer's return from Vietnam, she spat on him as part of a Vietnam protest. Afterwards she went up to apologize to him (the people she'd hitchhiked with forced her to do it). Jesse was born a year later.
- Recent storylines of Batman involve his chance meeting and unexplained infatuation with supermodel/leader-of-a sovereign-nation and general waste of ink Jezebel Jet. The problem with this however, is that you need to get your head examined if you can't guess she's going to be a villain. For Christ's sake, Batman is the world's greatest detective.
- Somewhat subverted in that during the climax of the Batman R.I.P story, Batman tells Jet that he'd seen through her from the start and had been faking his relationship with her- he even credits his acting ability to Alfred's lessons.
- So add Genre Savvy to Batman's list of near-superpowers. You have to admit, it fits.
- Still, telling her his secret identity shortly after meeting her is a bit of a stretch.
- He didn't tell her; Jet "found out" when Bruce beat the crap out of the Nine-Eyed Man and Nightwing and Robin rushed in to "confirm it". She actually knew the whole damn time since she was part of Black Glove; hell the fact that she figured it out and accepted it so damn easily could be seen as a clue that something was up with her (not even Catwoman figured out Bruce was Bats, he had to reveal his identity to her).
- After Infinite Crisis, the "One Year Later" storyline in Wonder Woman found the title character suddenly involved in a relationship with Nemesis (Tom Tresser), a new co-worker and long-time minor DC character. Many fans felt this new hookup was rushed at best, especially since Tom was considerably more boorish than in previous appearances. Though this seems to have been due to Executive Meddling to make Diana seem "more human" (a major theme of the One Year Later storyline), new writer Gail Simone decided not to summarily dump the relationship, but is actually accelerating it (when Hippolyta, Diana's mother demands from Tom I Want Grandkids Now, for example) in a subplot that clearly is meant to be going somewhere, with a look at the consequences of such a relationship.
- And as of Wonder Woman #32, It's revealed that Diana never had romantic feelings towards Tom at all; she was just exploiting his feelings towards her to get him to father her daughters and replenish the Amazon population. Harsh. Word of Simone is that WW carefully never directly lied to Nemesis by claiming she was in love with him, and yes that does make Wondy a Jerkass.
- Actually, you'll find the above information was false and misleading on purpose, as it was said by an evil monster and all. Genocide took the truth and twisted it. She felt an attraction to Nemesis, decided to peruse it at a time where she was basically all alone, and while not in love with him she did feel something. The re population thing came from a a fantasy/daydream/thought where she and Tom might get toether, have kid and raise her as an Amazon if only to keep a small part of her culture alive should she and her mother die(as they where the last two Amazons around at the time, also mentioning it would be impossible to repopulate the island with just 2 people). Genocide took those facts and twisted it into "she doesn't even care about him and just wants his babies".
Film
- Enchanted was left with a bit of a problem when it paired up the Official Couple. That was done awkwardly enough, but the inevitable Pair The Spares that followed was so out of the blue (while somehow still being utterly predictable) that it probably caused an epidemic of eye-rolling. It caused a Broken Aesop too, since it contradicted the idea that true love doesn't come as fast as fairy tales suggest it does.
- The Aesop was already broken - instead of marrying a man she knew for a few hours, she married a man she knew for a few weeks.
- In the Wing Commander series of games, the relationship between Blair and Angel is built up slowly and believably. In the Wing Commander movie, the relationship between Blair and Angel happens just because it's supposed to, and Freddie Prinze Jr. (Blair) and Saffron Burrows (Angel) had less than zero on-screen chemistry together. This is probably to be expected, all things considered.
- The romance in the 2003 film Underworld was more than a little artificial. There's never any indication that Selene feels any real emotion toward her intended hookup, unless it's meant to be a dom/sub vibe (in which case setting him up to become the most powerful character in the franchise seems to shoot that in the head). Even more awkward in the sequel.
- Lens Wiesman (cowriter & director) is married to Kate Beckinsale (who played Selene). So yeah.
- Word Of God says this was the way it was supposed to be...sort of. Special Features on the Underworld DVD reveal that the two characters were not supposed to actually be "in love," but rather attracted to each other based on lust, confused feelings, being forced together, etc. There is "potential," and it might "grow" into love, but since they have yet to actually have any sort of conversation with each other about anything apart from vampires and werewolves, and since they have known each other for a total of about two days, they really do not feel "that way." Yet. Supposedly. Whether this makes the romance better or worse depends on how you look at it.
- The 2003 Australian film Japanese Story was a rather egregious example of this. Sandy goes from hating Hiromitsu to sleeping with him in the next scene with absolutely no explanation whatsoever. Soon after, he dies due to a diving accident and the rest of the movie is about Sandy being in deep mourning over a one-night stand.
- Parodied viciously in the ending of The Pirate Movie, when Mabel arbitrarily grabs Pirates and Daughters and throws them together, with even the last two male pirates getting stuck together with suitably shocked expressions.
- Almost any love interest in a Jet Li film. This is probably the most obvious in Romeo Must Die
 , wherein Li's character has better chemistry with Russell Wong's character Kai than he does with the stunning Aaliyah. Sometimes this has even been lampshaded, as it is in The One, with Li's character insisting stridently that he's not gay.
- The Star Wars prequels. However, maybe Padme is just a sucker for guys who seem adorably dorky and socially inept at first, but turn out to be dark emo types with a troubled past who become mass murderers.
- It's worth noting that as an implied political prodigy, arguably savant (elected to queenship at 13, appointed interstellar senator before 20) and thus no more socially normal than a Jedi, Padme and Anakin latch together because no one else they know is equally messed up.
- This is apparently In The Blood, since Mara comments in Star Wars: Union on how her marriage to Luke seems forced.
- Fans of Timothy Zahn's plotting believe that other authors spent ten in-universe years wasting the relationship potential and thus much preferred the marriage over prolonged UST that was even more forced.
- Sometimes, James Bond and his Girl of the Movie actually seem to be somewhat plausible together, but other times, it's very apparent that they're hooking up simply because it wouldn't be a James Bond film unless he gets a girl and she's the only real candidate.
- In Terminator Reese claims to have been in love with Sarah ever since seeing her picture - however it comes across more like obsession (and the fact that he "loved" her without even meeting her doesn't help). Sarah is suspicious of him at first, but comes to trust him. Then, thanks to the fast pacing of the movie, they suddenly have sex. Then they spend the rest of the movie too busy fighting the Terminator to develop their relationship. At the end, Sarah says in a recording she's making for her son that she and Reese loved each-other enough for a life-time.
- In Titanic, the two main characters are young and clearly in lust, but it's hard to say if anything would have come of it even if Jack hadn't died. We learn that Rose went on to marry someone else (not the would-be-fiance she didn't like who was seen in the movie) and raise a family with him.... And yet in the final scene (presumed to be a vision of heaven), she's with Jack again.
Literature
- Wheel of Time took this trope and beat it to death. Probably the most notable example of this trope is Rand's relationship with Elayne, Min and Aviendha. The characters themselves feel pretty manipulated, but hey, prophecy can do that to you!
- A few Harry Potter fans complain that Harry and Ginny's romance in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince was given inadequate setup, especially in contrast to the very strongly foreshadowed romance between Ron and Hermione. Ginny did have a well-known crush on Harry since the first book, but Hermione claimed she outgrew it in book 5 (after Harry and Ron found out Ginny had a boyfriend) and the two had spent relatively little visible time together since, other than a notable incident in the second book. Harry did spend several months at the Weasleys', but very little of this was actually shown.
- Lupin and Tonks is often accused of this too, not all of which can be explained by the angry Sirius/Remus shippers. The relationship developed largely offscreen and out of Harry's line of sight, which could explain some of the perception that it came out of nowhere.
- Edward and Bella from Twilight. Bella's so in love with Edward that she skates right over the issue that he's a vampire who's attracted to the smell of her blood and is willing to give up her human life without any second thoughts to be with him, because... well, because he's so pretty with these Eyes Of Gold and copper hair. Plus, he protects her because he believes she can't take care of herself! Has she mentioned how dazzling his gold eyes are? Or how he sparkles? Or how his beauty makes him look like a glorious archangel...?
- This is especially blatant when you look at the better pairing in the books - the Jacob/Bella pairing. They've always known each other, they liked each other as friends first, when Edward disappeared, he brought her out of her shell, he was there to help her out of it (as a friend). They have actual shared interests that they developed together, like riding motorcycles, and common ground to discuss (having to grow up fast in order to help take care of their parents). Their arguments are more believable, and even when Edward returns, Bella realizes that she has more than friendship with Jacob - but still, the Word Of God forces everything into the Edward/Bella pairing. Even Edward, several times in the books, realizes that he's being selfish and Bella would be better off with Jake, but noooooo... What's worse - the author actually takes Jacob and makes him into a Squick-poctalyptic Beta Couple with Bella's unborn child (taken even further, it becomes a possible Love Triangle from Hell when the only male vampire/human hybrid realizes that Bella's child 'Nessie' is the only female vampire/human hybrid that's not a blood relative of his... and that he's over 150 years old, but looks like he's in his late teens). That was part of a very undignified Character Derailment that Meyer used to, once again, make sure everyone understands how much Ed and Bella were "meant to be".
- Not to mention Jacob goes through character derailment in the third book when he sexually assaults Bella, threatens to kill himself if she doesn't chose him, and basically acts like a complete jerk. He was once her best friend and a sweet guy and then he turns into Manipulative Boyfriend Number Two.
- Not to mention that as soon as she learned Edward's a vampire she suddenly stops thinking of him as creepy. He removed the motor of her car so she couldn't meet a male friend? He watched her in her sleep for several nights without her knowledge? Aww how romantic!
- The vast majority of characters in Xanth, particularly in the latter books, are paired up within days if not hours of meeting each other. Somewhat justified as it seems the land itself is the biggest shipper of them all.
- Occurs in the Whateley Universe, Blade Dancing series. Chou, the star, is in a relationship with Molly...mainly because, apparently, they are destined to be together. Literally, being in the same room makes them all 'warm and fuzzy'. Unfortunately, main interactions consist of "I feel complete when I'm with you." "Me too."
- Averted in "Summoning Sweeties", where they actually get a chance to really have down time, get along, and have some honestly sweet scenes together. (And some hilarious stuff, too!)
- S.L. Viehl seems to love this. The StarDoc series has Cherijo and Duncan, Dhreen and Ilona, and Squilyp and Garphawayn; Blade Dancer has Jory and Kol.
- Howls Moving Castle, by Diana Wynne Jones. The plot is well-written and in-depth, the story fascinating... but there's almost no actual romantic interaction between Howl and Sophie until the last two pages, where they suddenly decide they're madly in love. It seemed like Jones was just throwing them officially together at the end because they were supposed to fall in love, even if she never quite got around to developing it fully in the book. The Miyazaki movie was a lot less subtle about it.
- This is a place where reading carefully pays off: Howl knew Sophie was under a spell. He wasn't the only one, either... (And yes, it is there. For example, read the description of Howl when he arrives at the Witch's castle. He knew Miss Angorian was a fire demon, so who was it that he cared about enough to rush off and save without taking any care of his appearance? Yes.) Howl and Sophie's relationship seems a lot more realistically romantic than most "romances." It's not hearts and bubbles and flowers—it's meat and potatoes love. Simple.
- Diana Wynne Jones books in general are dense and it's easy not to notice a lot of things without a repeat read. As the above indicates, there is actually quite a lot of hinting at Sophie and Howl falling in love with each other over the course of the story, the most blatant being when he stops taking care of his appearance.
- Maximum Ride started out with just the gentlest of implied romance between the two main characters, focusing mainly on an intricate plot revolving around the mad scientists who created them. Then book four hit, the plot disappeared, and suddenly they were all over each other, all the time. The fandom was thrilled for the most part... except for those who realized that these two characters were, for all intents and purposes, brother and sister...
- Dagny and John from Atlas Shrugged. Ms. Rand spends literally hundreds of pages carefully and painstakingly building up the relationship between Dagny and Hank, only to have her casually toss him aside when she meets John, who is her One True Love.
Live Action TV
- Buffy and Riley in Buffy The Vampire Slayer, whose entire relationship seemed to be built on how Buffy needed a boyfriend after Angel spunoff into his own series. It didn't last long, and when he leaves and returns later, he's revealed to now be married to a different, older Action Girl he met on a mission. Happily married, no less. Joss claimed that he had intended for Riley and Buffy to stay together, but that fans didn't like the idea of Buffy being in a happy relationship. He evidently missed the fact that it was more due to the fans not liking Riley.
- None of the writers seems to like leaving Buffy happily unattached, although, this being a Joss Whedon show, the relationships don't tend to work out well. Season five saw flirtation with someone who turns out to be a vessel for the Big Bad (somewhat predictably, he ends up Killed Off For Real); in season six, the producers stuffed her into a depression-induced sadomasochistic relationship with Spike, and the new Buffy Season Eight comics that continue the series seem to be heading towards pairing her with Xander Harris.
- In the Season Eight comic, though there is tension between Xander and Buffy, Buffy eventually ends up in bed with Satsu, a female Slayer. Granted, they've since broken up...
- Willow and Kennedy in Season Seven. Because everyone hates Kennedy.
- Starbuck's relationship with Anders in the 2000s Battlestar Galactica, which also served to completely derail the romantic tension that had built up between her and Apollo for the first two seasons. (In this case, it was Katee Sackhoff, the actor, who took a fancy to Anders' character, originally intended as a one-off, and insisted he be written back into the show.)
- Apollo was also in a forced and loveless marriage with Dualla. TWoP even coined a term for it: "The Love That All of a Sudden". In fact, there were scenes in several previous episodes that showed them growing closer to each other, all of which ended up being cut. Eventually the writers just said "screw it" and threw them together without any buildup.
- It's worth noting that both of those relationships but especially the Apollo/Dualla relationships fail spectacularly, and they're portrayed as something that Apollo And Starbuck leapt into while avoiding their feelings for each other. Doesn't really fall under the trope so much as it mimics the dumb choices people make when it comes to relationships quite well.
- The above is a bit outdated. It's since been shown that Anders is Starbuck's true love. Apollo still carries the torch for her, however.
- Alternative Character Interpretation is that Apollo went into a kind of 'knee jerk revenge mode' and proposed to Dualla because he knew it would upset Starbuck (which it did) which fits with both Apollo and Starbuck behaving like angry 12 year olds with each other throughout the shows entire run, and the astonishing lack of care he showed to Dualla knowing he still wanted Starbuck.
- Ugly Betty fell into a Sophomore Slump by wringing too much drama out of Betty's love life with Henry. The sad thing is, on the rare occasions the writers don't obsess with soap-opera shenanigans, Betty and Henry are an awesome and entertaining couple, making this one of the few TV couples who are actually more compelling when they're happy than not.
- Smallville spent season after season trying to force Clark and Lana into being a convincing couple, when a) Tom Welling and Kristin Kreuk had almost no chemistry, b) Lana isn't a particularly nice person, when it comes down to it, c) we all know they don't end up together in the "real" story anyway, and d) most fans intensely dislike Lana. They were writing the whole series around this "great" romance, and it still felt artificial and tacked on.
- In the final season of Star Trek Voyager, the writers inflicted a Last Minute Hookup on Seven-of-Nine and threw her into a relationship with Chakotay. Cue the wedding bells.
- This was due to behind-the-scenes politicking; Robert Beltran was complaining, correctly, that his character had become irrelevant, so they shut his mouth by slipping Jeri Ryan's tongue into it. As consolation prizes go, that's pretty darn consoling.
- Almost every relationship in Heroes, especially in the second season. Notably Peter/Simone, Maya/Sylar, Peter/Caitlin, Hiro/Yaeko, and Claire/West. Luckily, they seem to have given up.
- Played extremely straight with Matt/Daphne, in which a psychic vision convinces one character he's "supposed" to be with another. Unsurprisingly his "love" is skeptical and although she plays along she frequently points out how this is not any sort of basis for a real relationship.
- And even more recently, Elle/Sylar. While slightly better than many of the above, seriously, where did that come from?
- Shannon and Sayid in Lost. The former is a whiny, sheltered Ill Girl. The latter is a serious former soldier and one of the most capable survivors. The actor playing Sayid demanded a love interest, so, they set him up with the least compatible character. After a tiny bit of horribly out of place and forced set-up, they suddenly get together...and she's killed in the same episode. Ironically, after she had finally gotten some bits of Character Development. Huuuuuuh.
- Doctor Who: "Invasion of Time": companion Leela decides to stay on Gallifrey and marry the guard Andred. There's been nothing romantic between them. (The actors tried to suggest attraction in the story with their acting, but the script didn't give them much to work with.) It was basically, Doctor: "Come on, Leela, let's go." Leela: "No, I'm going to stay here and marry Andred." Doctor: "Okay, bye." (This happened because the actress told the producer she was leaving at the end of the season, and he kept trying to change her mind.)
- This is made (slightly) less jarring when you consider that there is fairly strong reason for her to stay behind even without a "love interest"— it's a much more familiar lifestyle, and it could have been a welcome return to normalcy. The marriage could have been an excuse to stay around and a way to make herself one of the tribe, with whatever mild attraction that had developed so far between them just being a bonus, rather than the motivation. These were the only normal (from her point of view) people she'd met since first encountering The Doctor, and she never seemed incredibly enthusiastic about the whole exploring space-and-time thing.
- It has been said that this works, as Leela is a savage and would likely pick a mate based on physical attractiveness and prowess rather than personality; the alpha male, in effect. This argument would be more compelling, however, if the character she was married off to wasn't such a drip!
- Another theory that has currency in certain parts of fandom is that Andred is The Beard and Leela's real love interest is Rodan.
- The Big Finish audio drama series Gallifrey subverts this relationship in a fairly satisfying way. In a nutshell, Andred goes off on an undercover mission without telling Leela, regenerating into a man that she comes to loathe and despise - and, much to Andred's surprise, she continues to loathe and despise him when he tells her who he really is. It all ends up with Leela saying something to the effect of "I obviously didn't know you as well as I thought" - which is to say, not at all.
- Doctor Who actually has another infamous example of this: the posthumous(!) pairing of Peri with King Yrcanos at the end of 'Trial of a Time Lord'. Apparently, Colin Baker was distressed by Peri's death (not really a spoiler, just keep reading) at the end of the 'Mindwarp' portion of the Trial story arc and mentioned this to producer John Nathan-Turner. JNT, in his usual subtle way, fixed the problem by giving the Inquisitor a quick line stating that Peri is living happily with Yrcanos as a warrior queen - despite the fact that nothing in the story, apart from the brief clip of his putting his hand on her shoulder that is shown after that line, supports that romance, and doing a Ret Con of it makes a hash of the entire end of the story. (Come to think of it, "a hash" is not a bad description for "Trial", anyway...)
- On the other hand, Yrcanos was played by BRIAN BLESSED! This male, asexual Troper would happily live on a hostile alien planet if it meant being married to BRIAN BLESSED! Provided the planet had a good supply of Otologists.
- The writing staff of Star Trek The Next Generation developed a bizarre obsession with hooking up Troi and Worf in the show's final season, despite the two never having any kind of romantic chemistry before and Troi having a long standing Will They Or Wont They with Riker. (They had been toying with the idea for a while, which is why the two characters had been interacting more, but it hadn't been romantic at all.) Thankfully they soon regained their senses and none of the TNG films have any mention of the relationship. Of course, that lack itself is jarring.
- Though it's disturbing that the 'honourable' Worf comments in Star Trek: Insurrection that he believes Riker had feelings for Troi all along, including the period when he himself was... you know what.
- In an early draft of the script for Nemesis, when Worf is complaining about having to be naked at Riker and Troi's wedding, Troi had a line where she quipped, "Don't be shy, I've already seen it." For better or for worse, it's missing from the final cut.
- Rodney McKay, repeatedly, in the last two seasons of Stargate Atlantis. The first major girlfriend, Katie Brown, was a drippy botanist that he had nothing in common with whatsoever, and the second was Jennifer Keller, who had previously seemed to have a nice thing going on with Ronon. This may have had something to do with the fact that the most popular ship in the entire fandom was McKay/Sheppard.
- Keller was shown to have a thing for both Mc Kay and Ronon, and in the end decided she wanted to be with Mc Kay more.
- Specially considering that in the first season in 'Letters From Pegasus' it is shown that there's actually a female scientist in the expedition who's got a crush on Rodney. For his smarts! Too bad they let that one slip away.
- Foreman and Thirteen on House, who went from "awkward conversations in the locker room" to "awkward kiss in a conference room" to "willing to commit career suicide for this person" in the span of about two weeks. Which, in fairness, is lampshaded by Thirteen herself at one point.
- Lilly and Oliver have been friends for years. They've seen the best and worst of each other, the best and worst of times, and have been there for each other through all of it. Let's not forget that they have numerous common interests. Do the writers use any of these perfectly legitimate story elements as a basis for their Relationship Upgrade? Please, this is the Disney Channel! Instead, we get some contrived story about how her head fit into his neck and how she smelled like apples. And they go from being good friends to all PDA all the time.
Theater
- Really, most musical theater is like this. There isn't much justification that would fly in the real world for the relationships in everything from Phantom of the Opera and Miss Saigon to Carousel and Annie Get Your Gun. I think musical theater fans just accept this as part of the genre, due to constraints of time and the medium, and the fact the focus is more on the music than on stellar and believable plots.
- What makes the Annie Get Your Gun example even worse is that in real life, Frank Butler lost and married Annie anyway, later becoming her manager. There was seriously no reason to have the musical end the way it did except to appeal to then-audiences.
- Measure for Measure is a particular bad example of this; Isabella and Duke Vincentio are paired off at the end of the plot despite a) knowing each other for about two days and b) the entire plot revolving around Isabella not wanting to give up her chastity and monastic life.
- Actually not the case; the ending is ambiguous. Yes, the Duke proposes, but Isabella doesn't accept, and it's up to the director to decide whether she will or not.
- Gilbert And Sullivan operas sometimes try to hook up everyone they possibly can during the last song, even if they haven't spoken a word to each other through the performance.
Video Games
- A lot of Role Playing Game characters are pretty much forced to end up with the "main girl", whether the player wants it to happen or not. Avoiding this trope can prove to be exceedingly difficult even in games that offer multiple pairings since 1.) The "main girl" starts so far ahead of anyone else on the meter that being nice to her in any way locks you into her ending route or 2.) The game strongly suggests that the "main girl" is the 'correct' choice and deviating from it makes you feel like a jerk. In other words, going for anyone other than the "main girl" will most likely make you feel you did something the game didn't want you to do.
- Squall and Rinoa from Final Fantasy VIII are often accused of this, due to Squall's anti-social nature. The problem is that the relationship is masked in character development and subtext so much that, if you're busy focusing on the Epic Sci-Fi Fantasy Action or expected the game to explicitly label the couples and their "important" scenes as the seven games before it do, you probably miss it.
- And you really don't have a choice in FFVIII. Unlike some other games where character interaction makes a difference, there is no possible way to make Squall fall in love with anyone but Rinoa because their romance is intricately entwined with the plot.
- Final Fantasy X even goes so far to Ship Tease you with a meaningless dialogue between Tidus and whichever character he has the highest affection score with where you're given the choice of Rikku, Lulu, and Yuna - but no matter what, he's Meant To Be with Yuna. The game even goes another step by actually implenting an unseen relationship point system that only affects a few cutscenes and not the plot as a whole. His final Limit Break even depicts the girl he has the highest affect rating with - meaning there's a one in three chance it's not Yuna.
- This is made even worse by the fact that Lulu tends to end up with the most points for all of said cutscenes. Yuna is pretty darn useless for most of the game until near the end she suddenly becomes one of the best characters, and Rikku isn't even in the party for so long that by the time you get to the first cutscene, you've had maybe half an hour at the most of actual gameplay with her.
- The ending of Shining Force II saw the main character getting engaged to the princess, after waking her from a magically induced coma with a kiss - and she was a minor character put to sleep early in the game, but the hero must get a princess, right? It had a (possibly involuntary) Lampshade Hanging in the ending itself, with Sarah being quite unhappy and disappointed about it.
- The Fire Emblem games usually avert this, allowing for multiple pairing possibilities for both main characters and lesser characters (although they'll often at least try to guide you towards a specific pairing, you don't have to follow it.) Then... there's Seisen no Keifu (FE4), which does force its hero into a predetermined relationship. In the second level. It's not quite strangled — Sigurd and Dierdre get along very well indeed — but the Red String is uncomfortably tight.
- The second half of the game, however, stars their son Celice as the new hero, and he has numerous romantic options for the player to choose from.
- In Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn, you are shoved into a romance with Jaheira five minutes after she found the mangled corpse of her husband in a dungeon. Luckily you can break the romance early on.
- In Bully, Jimmy Hopkins can date and be involved with 14 different characters, including other boys. But the ending shows him ending up with Zoe no matter what you do. To be fair, Zoe is the only girl he shows more than a passing interest in.
- Lampshaded in Pokemon with the Destiny Knot item. It's a Red String Of Fate that's only purpose IS to strangle.
- Harvest Moon is... complicated to approach. You have most games in which marriage is optional, and if you decide to do it, you get to pick from a handful of the available characters. Some argue that it's pointless to have a choice, some are very militant in their choices. Gamers really got the red string in the Wonderful Life games, in which marriage is essential to get past the 1/10th point of the game. If you don't want to get married or don't like the roster of candidates? Too bad.
- The hero of Mad Paradox ends up married and raising a family with a completely nondescript girl he's rescued from the Big Bad, and she only appears once in the beginning (in the background of a vision) and once at the end (after you've defeated the Big Bad). And they treat this as some sort of grand romantic ending. Meanwhile, the hot green-haired Nakama girl who's accompanied you for most of the game through good and bad, battling evil and putting it on the line for you... just sorta wanders off with a pithy "It was fun, bye-bye". Most unsatisfying ending ever.
- Horribly done in Metal Gear Solid 4, which came from a lineage which has previously handled relationships very well. The relationship between Otacon and Naomi basically came out of nowhere and completely throttled the potentially more interesting interactions between him and Snake. She even shows up after her own death in order to draw Otacon's attention away from a Crowning Moment Of Awesome which could have been milked for significantly better drama. It's so bad that some suspect it was an attempt at Ship Sinking Snake/Otacon.
- You have to remember though, someone Otacon loves has to die each game. The developers just didn't have the heart to kill Snake. Kojima wanted to though. And more.
- It's also obviously intentional, though not entirely intentional on the writers' parts. Snake and Otacon's voice actors for the English dub admit to playing up their Ho Yay, Snake is either giving Naomi dirty looks or just looking dejected the entire time she's coming onto Otacon, Otacon is so traumatized by every single event that centers around women in his life that he has no idea how to behave responsibly in these situations, and Naomi is using it against him to manipulate him. All in all, while the red string is firmly tightened around Otacon's neck, Naomi's the one holding it.
- Wild ARMs 2 has a ridiculous example of this. If you pick up optional character Marivel, she suddenly effectively shacks up with Tony when everyone else is having romantic scenes that make sense. Tony is a minor NPC, and they didn't even share a single line of dialogue before suddenly being set up as a couple.
- Serge and Kid of Chrono Cross. The player can leave have Serge treat Kid like crap, ignore her at every turn, leave her die a slow death by poison, stab her in the chest, apparently use and manipulate her and then kill her *again*, and finally leaving her in a coma reliving the single most traumatic day in her life, and she'll still be in love with a man she barely knows who already has a girlfriend. Her only mandatory interactions with Serge come from the manipulations of another character. Yet even after the game smacks a big fat Reset Button after killing the Time Devourer, she's apparently so in love with Serge that she will promise to find him and the game completely ignores the fact that, again, he already has a girlfriend. The game treats this a cherished romance and there's even concept art depicting a married Serge and Kid. Bet there's going to be some really awkward stories to tell the children...
- And let's not forget that Kid, who is really Schala and merges with Schala after the game ends (maybe?), cares more about this guy she barely knows than her own brother who went insane from her rejection of his offer to help her for no reason whatsoever. She will never mention that she even has a brother - she just wants her Sergey-poo.
- Polka and Allegretto of Eternal Sonata have very little chemistry together. Over the course of the game, Polka spends more time (and has more chemistry) with Chopin. But since he's a) old enough to be her father, and b) dying, they shove her together with Allegretto at the end...right after a cutscene that implies she threw herself off a cliff for Chopin after being forced to kill him.
- Emil and Marta from Tales Of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World are a particularly strong case — Marta's fallen in love with Emil when he saves her from attacking soldiers (except he didn't really, that was Lloyd, though she never finds out), and her Clingy Jealous Girl status is played up for laughs as Emil shrugs and sighs off her advances, not necessarily indicating that he's not interested. Until the plot point that deconstructs the idea, when Emil explodes at her for thinking of him as some kind of Prince Charming-esque Knight In Shining Armor when he doesn't feel he can live up to that image. She's notably shocked, and most of her interactions with him after they make up are much more reasonable, moving the Official Couple away from Token Romance and more towards real love.
- In Dragon Quest V, you have two (or three) choices for the titular 'Heavenly Bride': childhood friend Bianca, shy and wealthy Flora/Nera, and Nera's bossy and bratty older sister Debora. The game very heavily leans toward Bianca as 'the right choice', especially in the original version: choose Flora over her, and Bianca gets bodyslammed hard by Diabolus Ex Machina. While this drama-dump is thankfully averted in the DS remake, the romance can still feel like this, considering you barely know any of these girls by the time you have to pick out your bride.
- Ironically, most players would have picked Bianca anyway, so the Guilt Based Gaming really wasn't necessary at all.
- In the hypothetical novels which don't actually exist, Jaheira is the canonical love interest for the male protagonist Bhaalspawn in Baldurs Gate (even though she's happily married in the first game). This is somewhat reflected in-game by a slightly deeper romance storyline with her—one that becomes dependent on an important non-romance subquest and gives more experience and better items for success, as well as a happy ending that isn't ridiculous in Throne of Bhaal. However, the other romances have their own setpieces and rewards, though somewhat less well-developed.
- Chrono Trigger. The rerelease for the PSX (and subsequently the DS) has an animated cutscene at the end, portraying the marriage of Crono and Princess Nadia, AKA Marle. OK, we had one hug between the two, and a tiny amount of slightly sweet dialogue when Marle was revived. That's it. Since one half of that pairing was completely silent throughout the game, it's very hard to relate him to any romance at all, but much less a random girl he only met a short while ago.
- This is an unfair analysis. First of all, Marle shows attraction for Crono starting in the first scene at the fair. Second of all, while Crono doesn't speak, his actions belie a return of that attraction; otherwise why would he risk his life by going through the time portal after her at the fair? Not to mention many other times in the game. Third of all, any time Marle is in your party, there are little bits that are suggestive of their relationship growing over [[Incredibly Lame Pun:time]]. Admittedly, it can seem sudden if the player has avoided keeping Marle in the party whenever possible, but you should have seen that one coming from 5 minutes into the game.
Web Comics
- Almost immediately after Gabby from Namir Deiter realizes she's over her longtime crush on the main character (a straight girl), she's seduced by her never-before-seen academic partner, and they're joined at the hip from then on.
- ...a never-before-seen academic partner who thinks nothing of having Anything That Moves on the side. Whatever her other storytelling strengths, Isabel Marks tends to break out the Fists of Ham when it comes to romance.
- Beth and Fisk from Better Days fall into this. Never do we see the characters discussing their hopes, dreams, or fears together. They become sex friends about a day after they meet with little provocation. Then while Fisk is serving his time in the military, Beth somehow falls deeper in love with him during his absence. Even though she is actively dating two other men who are more financially secure, physically and emotionally available to her than Fisk is. If they aren't having sex then they are talking to each other in bed right after sex but it's never about anything important. Sans one time when Beth desperately wants Fisk to live with her, these two characters never express how much they supposedly mean to each other and the reader is supposed to assume that their relationship is deeper than just their sex drive. Of course Fisk enters the secret organization seemingly ignoring Beth's heartfelt and desperate confession of love to make him stay put and is now training to become an anti-terrorist super spy just like his dad.
- She does eventually give up on him and settled down with her boyfriend Aron instead, so this could arguably be a deconstruction of the whole concept.
- More that it just shifted the one who's being strangled over to Fisk by the red string to his childhood girlfriend Elizabeth. So basically it's just a different "Beth" that got red-string garroted.
- The first half of Aoi House seems to build up to a will-they-or-won't-they tension between Alex and Elle, only to throw it out in favor of pairing him with fan favorite Morgan in the second half, despite Morgan's crush being infantile at best and Alex ignoring her for most of the series.
- Kevin And Kell featured longtime character Rhonda getting Put On A Bus by marrying her online boyfriend. The problem? Her online boyfriend was first mentioned and introduced in the strip merely days before this event took place. Up until that point, Rhonda had been dating Edgar since high school and the previous year had even featured a story arc where they broke up over Edgar's sexism, but got back together once Edgar humiliated himself trying to learn how to hunt to show that he cared more about Rhonda's acceptance than his own species'. This storyline literally ignored the previous plotline's existence, causing some serious Character Derailment when Rhonda complained that Edgar ignored her and Edgar was still acting like a sexist jerk out of the blue, entirely so Rhonda could dump him and marry this new character without any guilt. The real kicker was that the previous plotline had taken several weeks to resolve, while Rhonda's marriage and subsequent disappearance from the strip happened over only one week.
Western Animation
- In the 1990s Fantastic Four animated series, Johnny Storm meets the Inhuman Medusa, drools over her for two and a half episodes, finds out she's married, and winds up drooling over her cousin, Crystal, for half of one. In the end, the Inhumans' city is sealed off from the rest of the world. Suddenly, Crystal, whom he's known all of a few hours, was the love of his life, and he spends every episode after this - literally every episode - pining for her. (He does get her back in the end, though.) Maybe heroes really do just love redheads that much.
- The 1960s comics show the exact same Torch/Crystal relationship, and in that case, they barely even speak THREE SENTENCES to each other before declaring themselves lovers-for-life, and the Torch spends the next SEVERAL arcs pining over the girl. Eventually though, Crystal winds up married to Quicksilver.
- Subverted in Ultimate Marvel Universe, where he quotes the 'Lovers-for-life' verbatim, then shrugs and admits "I just thought we might get a good thing going." Ultimate Torch is a player.
- Gwen and Kevin in Ben 10 Alien Force — The ship is dropped on the viewer with absolutely no set-up, no basis, no rationality in the very first episode. Kevin almost wrecking his precious car to tell Ben not to be rude to Gwen could be attributed to his Badass Decay, but "I'll follow you anywhere"? Were the writers afraid that if they took the time for some actual development, the show might be canceled before their new favorite couple actually got together? Ben's relationship with the new character Julie is hardly any better.
- Many believe that having Kevin thrown in was to keep the Shippers from pairing Gwen and Ben.
- Beast Machines: Has two! Silverbolt and Blackarachnia's went from Dating Catwoman to Star Crossed Lovers that consumed BA's character arc. Botanica was a floral beauty with a brain and backbone, brought into the show to re-inforce its central metaphor, then stuffed into a relationship with bar-topping Rattrap.
- In Robots, Rodney and Cappy only seem to end up together by decree - no chemistry, and Piper gets more and better screentime. Then again, perhaps she was meant to look much younger?...
- Averted in Total Drama Island. A few couples hook up rather suddenly—-notable Harold with Leshawna and Owen with Izzy. In the former case, she ends it shortly afterwards, leading to a one-sided romance that lasts throughout the second season; meanwhile Owen and Izzy's relationship became basically off-and-on, which actually seems to fit Izzy's manic nature.
- During Puccini's writing of the opera Turandot, he apparently abandoned it before the end because he was unable to justify Calaf being in love with the psychotic, man-hating ice queen Turandot when the pure-hearted slave girl, Liu, had remained loyal to him for so long. He had apparently wanted Calaf to fall in love with and marry Liu, wheras the libretto (as well as the story the libretto was based on) had Liu tortured to suicide, after which Calaf then marries Turandot. After his death, the opera was eventually completed by one of his students.
- Not to mention that most people who watch the opera end up feeling the same way as Puccini.
Pornography
- From movies to hentai to "erotic stories", this is so common that is it to be expected. Granted, most of them don't have any sort of story, but even in the ones that have a story or are based on a story (usually hentai versions of a popular anime); two characters suddenly jump at each other. Even if they clearly had a different personality or sexuality that would not allow this pairing. (Or often, more-than-pair...ing.) And if it actually has enough of a story to have side characters, they will act like nothing surprising happened and this is completely normal, and will act like before after the sex is over.(If there is an "after the sex is over" part of the story.) Aversions are so rare that if character development actually happens, one could follow the story for the surprise value and ignore the fact that it's porn.
Fanfic
|
|
