Star Crossed Lovers / Live-Action TV

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Star-Crossed Lovers in Live-Action TV.

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• 13 Reasons Why: The situation is actually much worst than this. Over time it is made very clear that Hannah had strong reciprocating feeling for Clay, so much so they were one of the "11 Reasons Why Not", yet she never acted on them, and he was too shy to make a move himself. And there in lies the tragedy, they were Star-crossed without ever getting the chance to be Lovers.
• Despite (so they say) just being friends, Big Pete and Ellen get this in The Adventures of Pete & Pete special, "Apocalypse Pete," where their fathers declare a prank war on each other and forbid the two from interacting. The two immediately start pining for each other (in a totally platonic way, they swear!)
• All My Children: J.R./Babe and Cliff/Nina.
• Angel:
  • Angel and Cordelia. When Angel realizes his feelings for her, she's in a relationship with another. When she realizes her own feelings, she must Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence so an Eldritch Abomination can possess her. She ends up in a coma that she never wakes up from. Outlined in a conversation they have in "You're Welcome"
    Cordelia: Do you ever wonder...do you ever think about if we'd met up that night and had a chance to —
    Angel: All the time.
    Cordelia: Guess we missed our moment, huh?
    Angel: Maybe we were meant to. Maybe people like us just don't get to...have that.
    Cordelia: Angel, there are no people like us.
  • Fred and Wesley. She's oblivious to his feelings and dates Gunn for a while. When they finally hook up she's possessed by an ancient demon that essentially destroys her soul.
  • "Waiting in the Wings" has the prima ballerina and her lover Stefan. They were both part of the same ballet company and had planned to elope together, but a jealous wizard pulled the ballerina out of space and time. She now dances forever for him in a "Groundhog Day" Loop. Poor Angel once again gets possessed by the lovers' ghosts.
• Arrowverse
  • Arrow: Oliver Queen and Laurel Lance. The two are arguably the loves of each other's lives, but were never able to have a lasting relationship together in the show due to the baggage of their first relationship. Oliver loved Laurel, but he honestly believed he wasn't good enough for her thanks to his serial cheater antics prior to the Gambit, while Laurel loved Oliver but was never able to convince him to let her be a full part of his life because of his protectiveness and insecurities, which caused her to resent him for a time. Even when it seemed Oliver had moved on with Felicity Smoak, they still loved each other, but had convinced themselves it wouldn't work out. After Oliver and Felicity broke up for a time, he and Laurel were potentially in a position to restart their relationship — but before they could even entertain that thought, Laurel died, believing that Oliver had moved on for good. Oliver hadn't, and her death brings him closer to the breaking point more than anyone else's; he's only able to move on when he meets "Laurel" again in a Lotus-Eater Machine and tells her all the things that he couldn't say to his Laurel: that while he loved her, he wasn't the good man she loved, and that she always deserved better than him.
  • The Flash:
    • Caitlin Snow and Ronnie Raymond. The two were happily engaged the night of the Particle Accelerator, that is until the event that caused the core to go into meltdown, in which Ronnie sacrificed himself to try and contain the explosion in the pipeline, sealing himself inside and sending it upwards into the stratosphere, to save Central City, but most of all, to save Caitlin. Though Caitlin thought him dead and entered a near year-long mourning period, in truth Ronnie had merged with another man, Professor Martin Stein, and gained the meta power over fire, though Stein remained the primary personality in Ronnie's body. After Caitlin and her friends at STAR Lab separate the two, their reunion was short-lived, as neither Ronnie nor Stein could survive without the other, and were now hunted by the military. Going on the run, Firestorm, as the two would refer to each other when united, returned in time to help Barry Allen take down his Arch-Enemy, the Reverse Flash, and Caitlin and Ronnie finally wed each other. Unfortunately, their married life together only amounted to a couple of hours, as to help Barry close a singularity that could destroy not just Central City, but the world, Ronnie and Stein fused together as Firestorm so they could separate within the Singularity, disrupting the Event Horizon. While Barry was able to save Stein, Ronnie died during the incident due to being sucked inside, leaving Caitlin a widow, having had to witness the love of her life die not once, but twice.
    • In a twisted way, Iris and Savitar count. Savitar, being Barry's Time Remnant from the future, has all the memories of Iris that Barry has, and though he does still love her, and just might have let her live, even though it would mean his death, Savitar's hatred for Barry and the others out-trumps his love for her, though he does express a sense of regret at having to kill her. Even after his failed attempt at killing her, Iris and Barry attempt to save him from Erasure, realizing under all the hatred, a part of Savitar is still a part of the man she loves. However, when he betrays them, it is Iris that kills Savitar to save Barry, as he dies with a look of betrayal on his face.
  • Supergirl: Kara Danvers and Mon-El, the daughter of the House of El on Krypton and the prince of Daxam, respectively. It gets worse in season 2 finale when Mon-El is forced to leave Earth after Kara has no choice but to detonate a lead bomb to stop the Daximate invasion, saving his life but at the cost of never being able to return to Earth and be with Kara.
• Two examples from Babylon 5: Susan Ivanova and Marcus Cole and Susan Ivanova and Talia Winters. Let's just say there's a reason poor Susan is the trope namer for All Love Is Unrequited.
• Bates Motel: Norma Bates and Alex Romero, as you'd expect for a prequel to Psycho. After years of slow-burning Will They or Won't They?, they find a scant few weeks of true happiness together before Norma's psychotic son kills her and sends Alex spiraling down a very dark path of revenge. The only solace is that they are implied to wind up Together in Death, with their last words to each other making it painfully clear that they truly loved each other and always would.
• 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 Hera 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.
  • Played straight with Starbuck and Apollo. It's love at first sight for them...only she happens to be dating, and eventually gets engaged to, his younger brother—who dies partly as a result of a mistake she makes. They become best friends, teammates, and quasi-family to each other, but the guilt keeps them apart for years afterwards, to the point where they find it easier to hook up with—and eventually marry—other people rather than face their feelings for each other. They rekindle their romance, but being married makes it impossible. And then she dies, comes back for just long enough to lead the Fleet to Earth, and just when there seem to be no more obstacles left to them being together, she tells him she isn't coming back and vanishes into thin air.
    • Any Cylon/Human couple where the Cylon actually develops genuine feeling for the human could be considered this, as the humans don't react well when they inevitably find out their lovers aren't human.
• The underlying premise of Beauty and the Beast; she can't live in his world without giving up her job and her life, and he can't live in hers at all. Then in season 3 Catherine is shot and dies in Vincent's arms, while also making him promise to save their baby that had been stolen by her murderer.
• In The Big Bang Theory Raj says he can tell a very seductive astronomical story. Leonard laughs, telling him to try it on Penny. Raj tells a story based on the Chinese legend of Rigel and Altair, separated by the Milky way (see Mythology). Penney looks quite seduced, to the point where Leonard has to interrupt the story.[[/folder]]
• Hugh Laurie sings a song to his love in A Bit of Fry and Laurie, about how strange his devotion is given that they've never met and she has in fact been dead for almost 16 years.
• Bridgerton: In season 1, Anthony Bridgerton thinks this is the case for himself and his longtime mistress, Siena, since he is a viscount and she is a working-class opera singer. Despite he is pressured to give her up, he could hardly let her go. Siena is far more sensible and realistic about their relationship that when she's finally had enough of being kept from public, she eventually breaks up with him.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer:
  • Angel and Buffy Summers. The former is a 400-year-old vampire, the latter is destined to kill vampires. To boot, he'll lose his soul if he experiences 'perfect happiness' - and intimacy with Buffy falls under that umbrella.
  • Averted with the season 3 episode "The Wish." In an alternate timeline, Buffy doesn't recognize Angel (saying crudely "Is this a 'get into my pants' thing?" when he starts talking about destiny), is fully prepared to leave him chained up when she discovers he's a vampire and has absolutely no reaction when Angel dies saving her life.
  • "I Only Have Eyes For You" shows the ghosts of two Star Crossed Lovers - a teacher from the 1950s and one of her students. When they realised they couldn't be together, the student shot her and then killed himself. Naturally, Angel and Buffy end up possessed by their ghosts and forced to live out their final moments.
  • In season 7, Buffy herself put it best:
  Buffy: I loved Angel more than I will ever love anything in this life!
• Charmed:
  • Cole Turner and Phoebe Halliwell. Cole is a half-human demon sent to kill the Charmed Ones. He pretends to court Phoebe but then falls in love for real. Although she fakes his death to save him from her sisters and he ends up human for a brief period, things don't end well.
  • The show did a Whole-Plot Reference to the film Ladyhawke mentioned above. This time the girl's boss was a demon and cursed the couple in jealousy. A Convenient Eclipse nullifies the curse and allows them to break the spell with True Love's Kiss.
  • Piper fell in love with an innocent in the episode "Dead Man Dating". The problem? He's a ghost. There's one point where all she wants to do is hold him, but she just passes right through him. Of course, she has to help him move on.
  • Piper later experienced this when she fell in love with her whitelighter Leo. It turns out her mother had done the same and even conceived another daughter. Although the Elders grant their blessing eventually, things get complicated when Leo becomes an Elder too - and is required to leave his family.
• In Chinese Paladin 3, the mortal Chanqing and demigoddess Zixuan have two separate Reincarnation Romances which end tragically. By the third time around, Zixuan and Chanqing have both learned from their mistakes and are willing to do anything to make it work. And then they still can't be together.
• Cobra Kai:
  • Samantha LaRusso and Miguel Diaz. She's the daughter of Daniel LaRusso, he's the top student of Johnny Lawrence's at Cobra Kai dojo, a place her dad has very personal reasons to dislike. Sam understands full well how poorly her dad will likely react to her dating his teenage Arch-Nemesis' star pupil, so goes to great lengths to conceal the relationship... which means Miguel thinks she's dumping him for Robby Keene, which becomes fact after one bout of Alcohol-Induced Stupidity. A lot of the drama in season 2 isn't necessarily because of Daniel's rivalry with Johnny, but from Sam and Miguel each not fully getting over the other while entering into respective rebound relationships with Robby and with Tory Nichols. Then, while attending a party hosted by Moon, Sam drunkenly kisses Miguel after learning from Aisha how Miguel returned Mr Miyagi's Medal of Honor (which Hawk had stolen). The act is seen by Tory, who decides to pick a fight with Sam at school. This sets off a full-on karate rumble between the students of Miyagi-Do and Cobra Kai, which ends with Sam and Miguel in the hospital. Come season 3, Sam and Miguel get back together after Miguel breaks it off with his Cobra Kai friends, who've become more aggressive under John Kreese, and come up with the idea to combine their senseis' dojos to take down Kreese.
  • The LaRussos actually really like Robby Keene and think he's a great kid, nothing at all like his dad... but Daniel has a hard time overlooking the fact that he's Johnny Lawrence's son, and there's still that level of friction in their relationship. Unlike Sam and Miguel, both understand the potential pitfalls of their relationship and ease into revealing it to Sam's parents. Then it comes to a crashing end after Robby cripples Miguel during the school brawl at the end of season 2.
• Cold Case: In "Best Friends", Rose and Billie were an interracial same-sex couple in the early 1930s. After he finds out, Rose's brother attempts to murder Billie, before they flee together. This has a tragic end, as you might expect.
• The Confessions of Frannie Langton: Even if Marguerite (a rich white woman) was not murdered, the fact she's married (with no prospect of divorce at the time) along with the homophobia and racism of the time means that her relationship with Frannie, who's her black maid, was always doomed.
• Crash Landing on You:
  • The entire premise is how is love supposed to happen between a woman from South Korea and a man from North Korea given the tense political situation between their countries. The ending allows them some degrees of happiness, as they reunite once a year when he's allowed to leave North Korea to play piano in Switzerland and she can meet with him abroad.
  • Discussed at one point; Se-ri compares her and Jeong-hyuk to Romeo and Juliet, and when the North Korean village wives don't get the reference, she uses the myth of Chilseok instead, and they are much more amenable to her situation after that.
• Dawson Leery and Joey Potter from Dawson's Creek. The two are soulmates and even admit it as much, although Joey ends up with Pacey in the end. Joey referred to herself and Dawson as "ill-fated, star-crossed soulmates". Pacey even compares Dawson/Joey to Romeo/Juliet in 5.05. Jen asks Dawson how he and Joey "the star-crossed lovers" are doing in season two.
• 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.
  • In Degrassi: The Next Generation, this happens with just about every couple. Special mention to JT and Liberty though; JT was stabbed and killed before he could tell Liberty that he still loved her.
    • And then taken further as of Season 12 with Maya and Cam, the latter of whom committed suicide.
• The Doctor and Rose in Doctor Who. The episode "School Reunion" has him explicitly tell her that, because of his long lifespan, it's impossible for them to stay together.
  The Doctor: You can spend the rest of your life with me, but I can't spend the rest of my life with you. It's the curse of the Time Lords.
  • At the end of Series 2, Rose becomes trapped in a parallel universe, and over the course of Series 4, as the Big Bad of the story arc causes the barriers between them to begin to crumble, she finds her way back to him. The matter is sort-of resolved in the finale "Journey's End" — a part-human clone of the Tenth Doctor ends up as a Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest with her in the alternate world.
  • The Doctor and River are also this, considering that the audience and the Doctor know not only that River will die but also the last time he will see her before her death. In their most recent encounter with each other, "The Husbands of River Song", that time comes to pass...and subverts the trope at last with the reveal that their last night together on Darillium will last twenty-four years.
  • The Doctor and Clara Oswald were brought together by an enemy looking to cause trouble, and their relationship faces many trials as it gradually deepens into love. In Series 7, she has to become "The Impossible Girl" to save him from the Great Intelligence; later his centuries-long sojourn on Trenzalore almost ends with his final death. In Series 8, he becomes an older-looking, broodier man who feels uncomfortable trying to romance a mere mortal; her subsequent romance with fellow teacher Danny Pink and her attempt to live a double life as a result ends with his death three times over, followed by the Doctor and Clara separating over a terrible misunderstanding and mutual lies. They are reunited in the follow-up Christmas Special and their relationship is renewed, but over the course of Series 9 each struggles to keep the other safe and the question of what will happen when they must be parted for good looms, with the Doctor outright brooding about this and in "The Girl Who Died" he nearly breaks the show's self-imposed The "I Love You" Stigma in trying to express this to Clara. In "Face the Raven", Clara is Killed Off For Real in a Senseless Sacrifice. The Doctor then spends "Heaven Sent" trapped and tortured by enemies and letting his anguish and rage over this event grow and grow over the course of billions of years, and in the finale "Hell Bent" he has become a Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds willing to risk destroying the universe to save Clara from said death, defying a fixed point in time. In the end, they are parted for what looks to be forever, given that while she is still travelling the universe as a functional immortal, he has taken a mind wipe and can only remember the adventures he had with her. He cannot recognize her on sight or recall why he loved her so, so deeply. Both know this is all for the best, given how destructive their love was becoming for them and others.
• Downton Abbey:
  • Lady Sybil and Branson. She is an Earl's daughter and he is the family chauffeur. Mrs. Hughes warns him that he stands to lose his job and gain a broken heart when she finds them holding hands. As of the end of series 2, they are married with a baby on the way, although Lord Grantham isn't pleased. But to really show that they're star-crossed lovers, Sybil dies in childbirth. Her family has finally accepted Branson though, even letting him co-run the estate.
  • Mary and Matthew, up to a point. They seem to have their acts together by the end of series 2, especially after Matthew's fiancée Lavinia dies of The Spanish Flu. Until Matthew gets killed after the birth of his son.
  • Lady Edith and her cousin Patrick before the show begins. Patrick was betrothed to her sister Mary, who did not love him, and Edith was the one who did. Patrick dies in the sinking of the Titanic in the first episode. In season 2, a disfigured soldier from World War I claims to be Patrick, having been recovering in Canada. The family does not believe him and he leaves without telling Edith, the only one who did.
• Drop Dead Diva: Fred and Stacey, the lovable nerd head over heels for the Vapid yet sweet Model, but also unknown to Stacy, he's her best friend's guardian angel who came back to earth when Deb tricked him into allowing her to return as Jane. After the many times the two got together only to let something trivial break them apart, he finally confesses his secret to her. Stacy is overjoyed, seeing this as the changing point, he admits to her that because he revealed his secret, Heaven will call him back, and he will be erased from everyones, besides Jane's, memory. The two share one last tear-stained kiss, then he exits, and as Fred told her, Stacy immediately forgets he was ever in her life. In later seasons, when Grayson dies and meets Fred in Heaven, it's revealed he's been watching over Stacey from above.
• Farscape's Aeryn and John screw up enough to count as this. He lampshades this when he says that destiny is keeping its promise to always draw them together "but screwing us over in the fine print". Seriously - first there were her emotional issues, then he just wanted to go home, then she died, then she came back to life and realised a relationship would complicate things too much, then he split into two, then one of them died, then she had more emotional issues and ran away, then she nearly died again, then she was pregnant and didn't know who the father was, and now my hand is about to drop off.
• First Kill is about two teen girls falling in love - except Juliette is a vampire, and Cal is a monster hunter. Romeo and Juliet is mentioned at various points throughout the story, so they're well aware that they embody the trope. Not to mention, well, "Juliette" is right there in the name. The show plays with this trope to a certain degree; the girls figure out what the other is like and that a relationship would be almost impossible before they become a couple, yet they still fall for each other anyway.
• For All Mankind: Ellen Waverly and Pam Horton. Being a lesbian couple in the '70s would be difficult enough on its own, but when Ellen becomes one of the first female astronauts and comes under a lot more scrutiny as a result, she's forced to fake a relationship with Larry Wilson to stay under the radar, which Pam chafes at. When Ellen is pressured into marrying Larry to maintain the ruse, Pam calls it quits.
  • In season two, Ellen and Pam get back together briefly, and Ellen says she's willing to walk away from her career to be with her. Pam is initially thrilled, but later changes her mind, not wanting Ellen to make that sacrifice on her behalf. She leaves Ellen a "Dear John" Letter (claiming to still be in love with someone else), much to Ellen's sorrow.
  • In season three, Ellen — now the President of the United States — discovers the truth and pays Pam a visit, confronting her over her deception. Pam stands by her decision, believing that Ellen would have come to resent giving up so much had they stayed together. She does, however, take a moment to imagine the life they could have had together, and both of them agree it would have been nice, at least for a while.
    • After Ellen finally comes out as gay in the penultimate episode of the season, the finale gives her and Pam a Maybe Ever After.
• Frontier Circus: Two pairs of star-crossed lovers feature in the Feuding Families plot of "The Clan MacDuff". Ben and Tony have to work out how to get the couples together (and avoid getting hitched themselves).
• Game of Thrones:
  • Lyanna Stark's elopement with Rhaegar Targaryen. Despite Lynna already being betrothed to Robert Baratheon and Rhaegar being married to Elia Martell, they married in secret, which ended with thousands dead in a war that was built on the lie that he kidnapped her.
  • Robb Stark falls in love with an independent woman from Volantis, but he's bound by a political marriage pact to a Frey daughter he's never even met. He breaks the marriage promise to marry Talisa and is then lured into a trap where Walder Frey has him, his wife, his mother, and his bannermen slaughtered at the Red Wedding.
  • Renly's and Loras's illicit romance comes to a tragic end in "The Ghost of Harrenhal" when Renly is assassinated. Beforehand they were already in difficulty when Renly made a bid for the throne and therefore had to marry Loras's sister to gain the alliance of their house.
  • Tyrion has twice fallen in love with a prostitute, a scandal for a member of the nobility. After he married the first one, Tyrion's enraged father Tywin had the poor girl gang raped by his soldiers and forced Tyrion to watch. The second time, Tyrion tries to send the whore in question (Shae) away for her own safety, but she betrays him after his rejection and jumps into Tywin's bed instead. Tyrion ends up killing her in a fit of rage.
  • Sam is in love with Gilly even though he has sworn to take no wife and she is "wed" to her father. Subverted when he flees with her after the mutiny at Craster's Keep and takes her back to Castle Black with him. They eventually consummate their unofficial relationship and head off for Oldtown.
  • Oberyn and Ellaria genuinely love each other, but they cannot marry due to the latter's social status as a bastard; as such, the best they can go for is concubinage. And Oberyn's death at the hands of the Mountain has left Ellaria devastated.
  • Jon with Ygritte. Jon is a man of the Night's Watch and Ygritte a Wildling, meaning that they can't be together no matter how much they love one another.
  • Myrcella with Trystane. He's a Martell, she's a Lannister (even if she does have a Baratheon name). Those two families tend to be at each other's throats; their entire arranged marriage was an attempt to heal the rivalry between the two houses, but that was before Oberyn died at the hands of the Mountain.
  • The most tragic couple of the series is Jon Snow and Daenerys Targaryen. After falling in love over the course of Season Seven and finally getting together in the season finale, Season Eight sees what seems to be everything in the world working against them. Not only does Jon's family hate Daenerys, but it turns out they're aunt and nephew. Jon, having been raised with the North's taboo against incest, becomes estranged from her as a result, and while he still loves her, the intimacy of their relationship is no longer there. On top of this, Jon's superior claim to the Iron Throne causes numerous individuals, most notably Varys, to start scheming against her with the aim of him supplanting her. Combined with the deaths of her 'child' Rhaegal and her two closest friends, Jorah Mormont and Missandei, in quick succession, Daenerys completely snaps in the penultimate episode, going mad like her father and burning down King's Landing with Drogon while her army sacks the city. Afterwards, she starts planning to Take Over the World. Jon, seeing how Drunk with Power she's becoming, begs her to stop, but when she gives him a We Can Rule Together offer instead, he realizes she can't be reasoned with. In the end, his duty to the people wins out, and he assassinates her after one Last Kiss, crying as she dies in his arms.
• Gilmore Girls: Rory and Jess. From the start, they're treated as polar opposites bad-boy rebel and town princess, and their entire town disapproves of their friendship - let alone having feelings for each other. Despite parting and reuniting numerous times throughout the series, they're prevented from getting together happily. (First, Rory is dating Dean, then Jess needs to face his past and goes to see his Disappeared Dad, then she's dating Dean again, then he needs to sort out his life, then she needs to sort out her life, and finally he's in a different city and she's in love with a new guy, Logan). They part heartbrokenly in the penultimate season, accepting that their time is never going to come. In the revival, it's implied Jess could still have feelings for Rory (who instead appears to have completely moved on) since the last we see of them is a Longing Look he has at her just before she discovers she's pregnant with Logan’s child.
  Rory: I'm so sorry I came.
  Jess: Don't be. It is what it is... you... me.
• Good Omens provides two examples, both of Biblical proportions:
  • Gabriel and Beelzebub, being the Supreme Archangel of Heaven and Prince of Hell respectively, are as star-crossed as star-crossed gets. When the truth of their romance is revealed in the second season, both angels and demons alike are shocked at the “betrayal” of their respective leaders.
  • The other pair of angelic and demonic lovers are Aziraphale, Guardian of the Eastern Gate; and Crowley, Serpent of Eden. Although it isn’t until the second season that their relationship is confirmed as explicitly romantic, they’ve been hiding it from the forces of Heaven and Hell since the dawn of Creation. It all comes to a boiling point when they are forced to choose their respective “sides,” and they decide to Take a Third Option and choose what they call “our side” instead as they openly fight against both Heaven and Hell, together.
• In the show Grey's Anatomy, Cristina and Owen appear to be star-crossed lovers as they have faced countless obstacles in their relationship and break up every season. In season 9, they get back together after their divorce; however in the season 9 finale and over the course of season 10, it becomes clear to Cristina (and to Owen) that their differences are too large to overcome despite the mutual attraction. One episode's name sums it up quite well: "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together". Though they remain Amicable Exes (and occasionally Sex with the Ex) all the way till Cristina's departure.
• Hiro and Charlie from Heroes. It's Love at First Sight for Hiro (time traveling shenanigans put Charlie's "first" meeting with Hiro at the end of a six-month relationship), but Sylar kills her just hours after they first meet. He attempted to jump back five minutes in time to save her, but ended up six months in the past, detailed in the Tie-In Novel Saving Charlie. Eventually, Hiro gains better control of his powers and manages to return to that day and actually convinces Sylar to not only spare Charlie, but also to save her from the aneurism in her brain. Of course they're Too Happy to Live, and so the evil carny Samuel has his own time traveler trap Charlie at an unknown point in the past to force Hiro to work for him. Hiro does eventually find her again, but she's now old and has built a long and happy life without him. Rather than erasing all her children and grandchildren from the timeline by traveling back to rescue her, she convinces Hiro to leave her life alone.
  • He also has a brief romance with Yaeko in Feudal Japan, but can't stay with her due to the many ways it could break the timeline, such as him ending up his own great-grandfather and the fact that Kensei was supposed to be the one who ended up with Yaeko, not his little sidekick.
• Takeru and Mio/Iyal from Hikari Sentai Maskman. Unfortunately, they never got together in the end and had to break up due to Iyal's duties to Tube.
• Ice Fantasy: Li Luo and Ka Suo are meant to be (throughout all of history, as the second season shows) and yet the universe gives its everything to keep them apart. Over the course of the series they face things like Li Luo turning into a monster and dying then being resurrected in someone else's body.
• Interview with the Vampire (2022): Sung twice with the verse "Like star-crossed lovers" in Lestat de Lioncourt's Villain Love Song "Come to Me". In his lyrics, Lestat conveniently glosses over the fact that he's a Domestic Abuser and poetically depicts himself and Louis de Pointe du Lac as lovers doomed by fate like the eponymous characters from the French play Pelléas et Mélisande.
• iZombie: Liv and Major appear to be this, the two were engaged and close to being happily married, until Liv became a zombie, and broke off the engagement to protect him. After everything that happens, including Major eventually becoming a zombie as well, this is ultimately subverted in the finale, where after it appears that the two had died, him from after being cured and murdered on live tv, to prove that Zombism can be cured, and her from a suicide bombing, the two eventually reunite and disappear off the grid together, forming their own happy family, raising a group of orphans Liv had taken in, on a secret haven called Zombie Island.
• Jeremiah: Markus is trying to rebuild the world that was devastated by the Big Death and keep the virus from returning to devastate the next generation, while his mutual crush Meaghan is a Typhoid Mary carrier of the Big Death who has the potential to either cure the disease or spread it, and can't even touch Markus safely.
• Merlin (2008):
  • Lancelot and Guinevere. It's Love at First Sight for Lancelot, and Gwen seems to reciprocate, only for Lancelot to be exiled from Camelot. They meet again during a Rescue Romance, but when Arthur turns up, Lancelot realizes that he's in love with Guinevere and decides not to interfere. Lancelot returns for the third time at the end of the third season and is reinstated as a Knight of Camelot, but by this point, Guinevere has fallen in love with Arthur and in a committed relationship with him... Only for him to return once more after dying in series 4, and shaking things up again, although this is all Morgana's fault.
  • Merlin and Freya also classify as this trope. It's a Rescue Romance and Freya is someone that Merlin can reveal his magic to - as he has to hide it from everyone else. But it turns out she is cursed to transform into a monster at the stroke of midnight, and everyone in Camelot starts hunting her. She ends up fatally wounded just as Merlin is planning to run away with her.
• Michael and Nikita from La Femme Nikita.
• Sayid and Nadia, Lost: he searches for her for eight years, finds her, and marries her. She's killed only months later.
• In Lost Girl, Bo and Lauren are considered this; the main reason for this is that Bo is a Fae and Lauren a human. One of the number one rules of being Fae is not to fall in love with humans. And even if they get past this and all other personal problems, Bo is going to outlive Lauren hundreds of years. Plus there's the fact that Lauren was initially being used by the Ash to spy on Bo, and Lauren's girlfriend Nadia who ends up getting killed by the Garuda.
  • We also have Bo and Dyson, especially in Season 2, where he gave up his ability to love her in order to save her life. Kenzi gets it back for him thanks to threatening the tree-based Fae who holds it with a chainsaw.
• Lost Love in Times:
  • Played with. Qing Chen and Yuan Ling's fates are joined in a dual star; Qing Chen is the Evening Star, and Yuan Ling is the Morning Star. It's decreed that they will meet and fall in love. But in the second timeline, Qing Chen does her best to defy fate and make them Star-Crossed Lovers so they won't face a repeat of the first timeline.
  • Played straight with Tao Yao and Xi Xie. In the first timeline Xi Xie dies, and in the second one Tao Yao dies. They don't get to be together in either.
• The Kamen Rider franchise played with it sometimes.
  • Kamen Rider 555 have Keitaro and Yuka. They spent the bulk of the show being pen pals and texting and supporting each other anonimously, while, in person, Keitaro have a crush on Yuka, who have a crush on Kaido, who really likes himself only. When they do finally discover each other identities, Keitaro doesn't care about Yuka being an orphenoc and they're ready to their first date next day...Then, Yuka is killed by Saeko/Lobster orphenoc, with Keitaro still waiting and with no idea about what happened.
  • Airi Nogami and adult Yuto Sakurai from Kamen Rider Den-O. Time travel and all its problems. This is slightly averted for the fact that, while the adult Yuto goes as far as erase himself from the existence to secure the timeline, the current Yuto still have the chance to grow up into a man that Airi will love. The fact their daughter from the future still exists confirms that.
  • In Kamen Rider Kiva, the Socially Awkward Hero Wataru falls for the equally socially awkward Miu. The problem is, Wataru is Kiva and son of the ex-Fangire Queen, while Miu is the current Fangire Queen and the promised bride of Wataru's step-brother, Taiga. Miu eventually dies, dreaming about marry Wataru, while this prompts Wataru to usurps Taiga's place as the next Fangire King.
  • While it took place during one of The Movies, Kamen Rider Fourze/Gentarou Kisaragi ends up falling in love with an alien lifeform...before a rogue member of Kamen Rider Double's Foundation X captures her, effectively kills her and turns her into an Astro Switch. Adopting the name Nadeshiko, she actually gets better and comes back to Gentaro during the crossover movie with Wizard. Nadeshiko departs to the deep space soon after the problems are fixed, though, reinforcing the "star-crossed" part, and there's no clue if she'll ever comes back to Gentaro for good.
  • It happens with Haruto and Koyomi too in Kamen Rider Wizard. Being White Wizard's daughter, Koyomi is eventually killed, with Haruto unable to save her. He somewhat compensates that saving alternative versions of himself and Koyomi, in a quick crossover with Kamen Rider Decade, Tsukasa Kadoya, giving up of his ultimate form in the process.
• Simon and Alisha from Misfits: They're trapped in a time loop where Alisha has to die at Rachel's hands in order for Simon to decide to go back in time and save her life, in order for him to meet an earlier version of her who falls in love with him and so encourages his earlier self to become a hero, so that he can go back in time to save her life when she dies at Rachel's hands...
• Moon Lovers: Ha-jin and Wang So. They manage to be happy together for a few weeks at most. Then things go badly wrong, Ha-jin ends up married to Wang So's brother, and she dies without ever seeing him again.
• The Myth: Xiao Chuan and Yu Shu. He's a time-traveller who becomes a general and she's the emperor's favourite concubine.
• Nirvana in Fire: Nihuang and Lin Shu/Mei Changsu have loved each other their whole lives. But Mei Changsu was thought dead for years, is Secretly Dying, and when he and Nihuang finally reunite he knows he hasn't long to live. Sadly he dies in the final episode.
• The O.C.: Ryan/Marissa. Ryan was a bad boy who suffered from Parental Abandonment and originally came from the wrong side of the tracks in Chino and Marissa is a nice rich girl who is originally from Orange Country. The two loved each other even though numerous things tried to prevent the two from being together. Sadly, their love ended in tragedy when Marissa tragically died in a car accident at the end of season 3.
• The Office has two examples:
  • Michael Scott and Holly Flax, the most adorably dorky pair of "soup snakes" (soulmates) that you ever did see, cruelly separated 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. After reuniting, and some strain because she was seeing someone else initially, they decide to get together anyway, get engaged, and when Holly moves back to Colorado to take care of her family, Michael decides to go with her. The finale reveals they are now married with children, and supplementary material reveals they have three children with one on the way- and they "couldn't be happier". DOUBLE awwwww.
  • Andy Bernard and Erin Hannon. During Erin's first year at the company, she and Andy awkwardly dance around each other. By the time something comes out of it, Erin enters a loveless relationship with their boss Gabe Lewis. As soon as Erin dumps Gabe and asks Andy out, he reveals he already has a girlfriend. Eventually, Andy dumps her and starts dating Erin, but between his newfound confidence and family issues, Erin starts realizing Andy is too childish and self-absorbed for her liking. After Andy leaves Scranton for three months, Erin starts hanging out with a new coworker named Pete and gives up on Andy completely. Suffice to say, They Don't, and are Amicable Exes by the finale.
• Once Upon a Time:
  • Regina and her first love Daniel. He was a stable boy, and Regina's cruel mother Cora wished for her to marry the king so she could move up in status. When she discovers the couple planning to elope, Cora murders Daniel.
  • Cora herself was this with Rumpelstiltskin back in the day. When given the choice to run away with him or marry a prince, she chose the prince to become royalty. She would eventually admit to Rumple that he was the only one she ever truly loved.
  • Merlin and Nimue funnily enough. Nimue was Merlin's lover, but he was immortal and did not want to watch the woman he loved die. Although he was prepared to give up his immortality, she later became immortal herself - but used the powers to become the first Dark One. Thus the myth about Nimue imprisoning Merlin in a tree comes to pass.
  • Zelena and Hades. She's the Wicked Witch and he's the Lord of the Underworld. While True Love's Kiss would animate his heart, he instead uses this to take control of an Artifact of Doom known as the Olympus Crystal. Zelena has undergone a Heel–Face Turn and is forced to kill him.
  • Likewise Regina and Robin a few seconds earlier, Robin shields Regina when Hades attempts to use the Olympus Crystal on them, and according to Hades, not only does the crystal kill Robin, it also ends him, meaning no afterlife in either the Underworld or Olympus for him and no reuniting with Regina, he simply ceases to exist, and his soul evaporates into nothingness, giving one last look to a tearstained Regina.
• One Tree Hill: Lucas Scott and Peyton Sawyer. They were described as being soul mates who were meant to be together by the series creator Mark Schwahn. They had to overcome many obstacles and issues over the course of the series before being able to have their Happily Ever After.
• Orange Is the New Black has Alex Vause and Piper Chapman. There is also the Daya and Bennett relationship which is doomed for several reasons. One is that Daya is an inmate and Bennett is a correctional officer meaning that a romantic relationship between them is against the law. The other reason is that Daya is pregnant with their child and Bennett WILL go to prison if word of this ever got out.
• Oshin has the titular Oshin's eldest son Yuu and his girlfriend Hatsuko, who was raised by Oshin's family. He enrolls in the Japanese Army and dies in World War II, and Hatsuko near crosses the Despair Event Horizon afterwards. She recovers, but decides to stay single for the rest of her life.
• The Other Kingdom has a very unfortunate example with Princess Astral of Athenia and Prince Tristan of Spartania. Astral and Tristan are deeply in affection and love for each other, and Tristan turns out to be a fairy just like Astral. The problem? Tristan's not just from a different tribe but from Athenia's (Astral's homeland) rival tribe Spartania, who neither side can stand. So Tristan was forced back to Spartania by his father to one day reign havoc over Athenia, and Astral had to leave to "other" world to return to Athenia. Ouch. And to make things worse, that's where the series abruptly ends. So unless a revival's made to continue the story, or Tristan's tribe of Spartania eventually realizes their ways, Astral and Tristan will never be together.
• Pan Am: Kate and Niko, she's an American Stewardess/CIA Courier, he's a Yugoslavian Ambassador working for a communist regime. Needless to say it doesn't end well, though she was able to get him to defect and help the USA and their Allies fight against the USSR, as a double agent.
• Passions: Luis/Sheridan, Ethan/Theresa, Chad/Whitney and Miguel/Charity. They are all destined soul mates who did not end up together (with the exception of Ethan/Theresa, who did end up together).
  • Luis/Sheridan have been said to have shared many past lives together, confirming that they are canon soul mates. They have shared past lives on the Titanic and in Ancient Egypt. However, despite Luis and Sheridan constantly finding each other and falling in love in past lives, something always manage to tear the two apart and they can never stay together as a result. This is evident when in the current lifetime, Luis/Sheridan did not end up together and instead, Luis ended up with Fancy (Sheridan's niece) and Sheridan ended up with Antonio (Luis' older brother), despite the fact that the two will always be soul mates.
  • Ethan/Theresa's relationship is built upon the concept of fate and destiny, just like Luis/Sheridan. Ethan and Theresa have gone through endless struggles just so that they could be together. And when they do manage to get together, there is always some kind of obstacles thrown between them to destroy their happiness. eLuckily for the both of them, Ethan and Theresa do overcome the obstacles and end up together at the end of the show when they get married.
  • Chad/Whitney don't end up together due to the fact that Chad is shot and killed by his own father, Alastair.
• Paige Mccullers and Emily Fields from Pretty Little Liars. It's like the universe is plotting to keep them apart but at the same time they keep finding their way back to eachother, untill Alison traps Emily with her rape babies.
• Princess Silver: Wu Yu and Zhao Yun fall in love and try to elope, but they're caught and Zhao Yun is forced to marry Ning Qian Yi. Even after Ning Qian Yi's death they don't get to be together, and Wu Yu eventually marries someone else.
• Pushing Daisies: Chuck and Ned—this is essentially the whole point of the show. Kind of, anyway. They're together, but they can never be together.
• In the Red Dwarf episode "Holoship", Rimmer falls in love with Nirvana Crane, a crew member of the titular holographic ship Enlightenment. He tries to join Enlightenment's crew in the only possible way: by challenging an existing crew member for their place. Unknown to him, Enlightenment's computer selects Nirvana to be his opponent, and she withdraws from the contest so that Rimmer can fulfill his dreams. Once he knows this, Rimmer resigns from Enlightenment and returns to Red Dwarf so that Nirvana can be resurrected, even though there is no possibility that he will ever see her again.
• The Rise of Phoenixes: Ning Yi and Zhi Wei. She's part of the royal family his father overthrew, and they become enemies after she learns the truth about her parents. Eventually they reconcile... just before Zhi Wei's suicide.
• The Rising: Neve and Alex love each other deeply. However, as Neve is a ghost, with Alex still alive, it can't last. Neve in the end must bid Alex a sad farewell, with the hope they'll meet in the afterlife.
• Roswell: Max and Liz get a really spectacular version of this in season two: a future version of Max showed up and announced that the fate of humanity depended on Max hooking up with Tess rather than Liz. This plot point was ignored entirely once Tess was revealed to have killed Alex, and Max and Liz did eventually get together, but still, points for effort.
• Roswell, New Mexico: Michael and Alex have a decade of this. Their cosmic love in high school was cut short by Alex's abusive, homophobic father, who drove Alex to enlist in the military and whose shadow continued to loom over the couple when they reunited upon Alex's return. Michael decides to start a relationship with Maria despite some lingering love for Alex, as he feared their history was too complicated and a renewed relationship would only lead to more heartache, complicated further by a Glad-to-Be-Alive Sex threesome. By season 3, they largely got past their issues and become a mostly stable couple.
• Scarlet Heart: Zhang Xiao and Yin Zhen. They wait for ten years to be together, and even then it doesn't work out for them.
• In Smallville, Clark and Lana were often referred to as star-crossed lovers.
• Special Ops: Lioness: Cruz knows very well that her relationship with Aaliyah will go nowhere, despite its passion, as she's tasked to kill Aaliyah's father. Further, in any case Aaliyah's getting married very soon and would be cut off from her after that.
• Star Trek:
  • Star Trek: The Original Series:
    • Kirk may have been a womanizer, but he did have two tragic loves during the series: Edith Keeler and Miramanee. Miramanee was carrying his child when she died to save his life and he had to stand back and watch Edith die to repair an altered timeline.
    • Kirk's relationship with Carol Marcus, the mother of his son David, can also be viewed as this since it canonically ends with their going separate ways. In fact the 1990s Expanded Universe comic even calls the three-part arc expanding on their romance "Star-Crossed."
    • And Kirk again from the EU with his long-running affair (spanning all the way from his Farragut days to the time period between Star Trek V: The Final Frontier and Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country) with Romulan captain T'Cel in the Debt of Honor graphic novel. The last time they see each other Kirk quotes a song to sum up their relationship: "Star blessed for having met you, star crossed because it's only to see you go."
    • Bones and Nancy were never meant to be.
    • Nurse Chapel's fiancé, brilliant scientist Dr Korby, went missing on a mission. She spent the next five years searching for him. The outcome was not a happy one.
  • Star Trek: The Next Generation:
    • Poor Picard and Kamala, the look on his face during Kamala's wedding sure didn't make things easier. He kinda looked like someone who's just been kicked in the gut.
  • Star Trek: Deep Space Nine:
    • Kira and Bareil ended in tragedy.
    • Kira and Odo. Odo spends the entire show resisting his people's request for him to rejoin them, partially because of his love for Kira (although not entirely for this reason). In the end, he comes to realize that the best chance for the future of both the Alpha Quadrant and the changeling race is for him to return to his people and teach them to tolerate humanoids. He has to sacrifice Kira to do it, but she understands.
    • Garak and Ziyal. From the outset, Dukat and Kira were convinced Garak would be bad for Ziyal but in the end she actually came a cropper by helping Kira's La Résistance against Dukat's oppressive regime. Word of God states the writers created the romance because they wanted a tragic, doomed love between the woman that never lies and the man that never tells the truth.
    • Worf and Dax. Jadzia was killed by Dukat and Ezri would never have been able to have a formal romance with Worf because Trill law has a taboo against getting involved with the partners of previous hosts.
    • Sisko and Kassidy. The Prophets tried to prevent them getting married but the reason they gave was cryptic. In the end, Sisko was forced to leave the world he was used to and join the Prophets in theirs. He left behind his son Jake, his wife Kassidy, and their unborn child. He does promise to return to them one day, but the Timey-Wimey Ball nature of the Celestial Temple makes it impossible to say when or how that will happen.
• Shades of this in A Tale of Thousand Stars. Phupha is a poor state officer on a remote assignment. Tian is a rich kid, son of a powerful government minister, and lived most of his life attended by servants. Ultimately, Phu pushes Tian to return to Bangkok because he doesn’t want Tian to throw away his talents and alienate his family. Tian finds a way back anyhow.
• Teen Wolf: Scott McCall and Allison Argent. Scott is a werewolf and Allison is a werewolf hunter who comes from a family of werewolf hunters who have a legacy of hunting Scott's kind. Taken up to eleven when Allison tragically and unexpectedly dies in Scott's arms at the end of season three.
• Bill Compton and Sookie Stackhouse from True Blood.
• The Twilight Zone (1985): Subverted in "Song of the Younger World". Mordecai Hawkline forbids his daughter Amy from ever seeing Tanner Smith again as he is an inmate of the House of Refuge Reformatory for Wayward Boys of which Mordecai is the superintendent. Amy and Tanner manage to escape Mordecai's grasp by transferring their souls into the bodies of wolves in a younger world, where they can presumably live happily ever after.
• Tyrant (2014): When Jamal was younger he fell in love with a woman from the rival Rashid clan. His father knocked several of his teeth out and forbade them from ever seeing each other again. Jamal later discovers that their relationship did produce a son he didn't know about.
• Oddly enough the Ultra 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 Anniversary series Ultraman Mebius, and sort of confess their feelings to each other. Since both are energy beings now it is implied that they could potentially get together.
• The Vampire Diaries:
  • Stefan Salvatore and Elena Gilbert, much like their novel counterpart. Often, they are comparable to a "modern-day Romeo and Juliet".
  • Silas and Amara, the very ancient ancestors of Stefan and Elena.
• Velvet: Main couple Ana and Alberto are kept apart both by their separate social classes and their feelings of obligation towards the store.
• Veronica Mars:
  • Logan and Veronica. They try it out several times, but each time circumstances contrive to keep them apart, usually through their clashing personalities and Logan's self-destructive behavior. This is subverted by the 2014 movie, however. In the end they ultimately prove to be this, as after getting through all the crap, both their own and the worlds, to be together, and Logan proposing during season 4, Veronica finally finds herself in a good enough place to accept his proposal. During the series finale, come the scene immediately after their wedding, and the two preparing to go on their honeymoon, Logan goes to move the car out of the alleyway for street cleaning, and dies in a car bombing meant for Veronica. The episode is even title "Years, Continents, Bloodshed".
  Logan: I thought our story was epic, you know, you and me. Spanning years and continents. Lives ruined, bloodshed. Epic.
  • Duncan and Veronica are also an example since, in which while Duncan doesn't die like Logan not only can they never be together, they can't even so much as contact each other without the risk of spending the rest of their lives in prison. Veronica herself lampshades this:
    Veronica:True love stories never have endings.
• The White Queen: Anne Neville and Richard of Gloucester start their journey as Puppy Love sweethearts who must overcome numerous obstacles before they can achieve a Childhood Friend Romance. Although Lord Warwick has suggested to Edward IV that Anne and Richard be united in matrimony, the king refuses. Their families are then embroiled in a civil war, and Anne is forced to marry Edward of Lancaster to cement her father's new alliance with Margaret of Anjou (the wife of Henry VI), whereas Richard is a commander in his brother Edward IV's army. After the Yorks vanquish the Lancasters, Anne and Richard are reunited when he beats up Yorkist soldiers intent on raping her, but he's obligated to take her into custody because she's the widow of a traitor (he does so in the most gentlemanly way possible, of course). The king decrees that Anne becomes the ward of George of Clarence, who restricts her movements to his own home and denies her any visitors, including Richard, despite the latter's persistence over a period of six months. Frustrated, the two lovebirds then sneakily meet in a garden to determine what they should do next. At the second rendezvous, Richard concludes that a marriage between himself and Anne is the best solution to their problem, and she agrees. Their engagement not only liberates her from George's grasp, but Anne and Richard can finally be together as a couple.
• Lily and Diego from Wildflower (2017). Diego was a White Sheep to the Ardiente family who are responsible for Dante and presumably Camia's deaths and attempted murder of Lily, who he befriends and later falls in love with. They can't be in a relationship in public since they are targeted by the Ardientes. They manage to get engaged and later get married, but things take a tragic turn when Julio assassinates Diego while the latter is giving a speech as governor, leaving Lily a widow.
• Wonder Woman: Wonder Woman and Andros II in "Mind Stealers from Outer Space". Despite the obvious chemistry between him and Diana, their conflicting responsibilities in different solar systems prevent them from taking their relationship to the next level.
  Wonder Woman: The last time we said goodbye was when? 1943?
  Andros: Perhaps we should keep track of our hellos instead. Even better...
  Wonder Woman: Don't ask me that.
  Andros: I know a planet with eight moons. They fill the night sky like jewels in a crown. You'd look beautiful under that sky.
  Wonder Woman: Andros...I can't. I'm needed here.
  Andros: Yes...you are. So, Princess: until whenever.
  Wonder Woman: Until whenever.
• Word of Honor: Gu Xiang and Cao Weining fall in love, decide to get married... and are murdered on their wedding day by the leader of Cao Weining's sect.
• The X-Files:
  • John Fitzgerald Byers and Susanne Modeski.
  • Lyda and Maurice from the episode "How the Ghosts Stole Christmas" were a pair of lovers who formed a Suicide Pact at Christmas in 1917 so that they could stay together for eternity. It worked, as they haunt their house and try to get other couples to re-enact their fate.
• Z: The Beginning of Everything depicts F Scott Fitzgerald's marriage to Zelda like this. She is from a proper antebellum family, and he is a new money writer with delusions of grandeur. Even when they elope together, Zelda's inability to fit in with New York's high society leads to her indulging in excessive partying that Scott can't afford. Likewise he resorts to lifting passages from her journals and letters to use in his own work when inspiration fails him. While the series ended prematurely, in real life Zelda ended up in an asylum and Scott lost all critical respect that wouldn't be regained until after his death.

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