A ship war so powerful that it takes place in two dimensions.
Examples of Love Triangles in Western Animation.
- The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius: Jimmy/Cindy/Nick and Cindy/Jimmy/Betty. It only fits that Jimmy/Cindy and Nick/Betty happen.
- All Grown Up!: In "Lost at Sea", Tommy wants both his mother Didi and his girlfriend Rachel, Didi wants Rachel, Rachel wants neither.
- Avatar: The Last Airbender:
- Played with in Avatar: The Last Airbender. The ONLY episodes where Aang isn't in love with Katara are the ones in which she is in love with or being pursued by Jet. That's two episodes. And during those episodes Aang likes Jet, until things go sour for other reasons.
- The Legend of Korra:
- There was one prior to the series between Aang's son Tenzin, Toph's daughter Lin, and Pema. In the end, Tenzin married Pema, with some implication that Lin is still a bit bitter about the whole thing.
- And then there's Korra/Mako/Asami. Both Korra and Asami like Mako while Mako likes both Asami and Korra. Bolin was briefly a fourth person, as he had a crush on Korra which started out strong, cumulated in episode five, and due to...circumstances, seemingly faded away afterward.
Season one ends with Mako and Korra as the Official Couple, after Mako realized he was in love with Korra and Asami noticed. Their breakup seemed fairly amicable, however. It is then reignited in season 2, when Korra and Mako get into a fight and break up, Mako and Asami begin to re-explore their feelings for each other, and an amnesiac Korra returns and wants to rekindle her relationship with Mako. Eventually, she remembers. In the end Mako and Korra both accept that their romantic relationship won't work out - leaving every side of this triangle single by the end of the season. - The whole thing ends rather neatly at the end of Season four, Korra ends up with Asami. Mako ends up alone, but according to Word of God in a much better mental space to handle future relationships. Bolin, who sensibly stayed out of things since season one, is in a relationship with Opal.
- As Told by Ginger:
- "April Fool's": A is Dodie, B is a boy named Dustin, and C is Macie.
- In "Love With A Proper Exchange Student" (the next ep in production order, actually): A is Dodie again, B is an exchange student named Joaquin, and C is Ginger.
- BoJack Horseman, in addition to a couple of minor love triangles that pop up over the course of the series, has the central love triangle of BoJack, Diane, and Mr. Peanutbutter. BoJack falls in love with his ghostwriter, Diane, who's in a relationship with Mr. Peanutbutter, BoJack's longtime rival—who, in fact, genuinely likes BoJack and doesn't see why the two of them can't be friends.
- Bob's Burgers: Tina is in love with Jimmy Jr., who often flip-flops on whether he returns her feelings or not. In turn, Jimmy Jr.'s best friend Zeke is in love with Tina, who usually dislikes him but sometimes gives hints of Ship Tease in return.
- You won't believe how many Love Triangles fit into Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers. There is Gadget who is admired by Chip and Dale. Then there's Tammy's mad crush on Chip, combined with Gadget making her jealous. Gadget herself shows too much interest in Sparky for both chipmunks to just sit and watch. Monty is heartbroken since Désirée hooked up with Errol. And so forth...
- Clone High: Joan Of Arc is after Abe Lincoln, who is with Cleopatra. This is addressed by the narrator in the opening to episode 8.
- Danny Phantom starts off with Danny, Sam, and Paulina before it moves to Danny, Sam, and Valerie.
- The Daria/Tom/Jane triangle was a major arc throughout Daria's fourth season.
- Doug: Patti is unaware of Doug's feelings and the triangle is completed when Guy debuts (he falls in love with Patti pretty quickly). Both want Patti, both have some kind of rivalry, and Patti has a good friendship with both. The triangle is dissolved when Guy gives up, but it is uncertain if Doug and Patti ended together.
- The Fairly Oddparents: Tootie loves Timmy, who's in love with Trixie. Early episodes set up the possibility of a well explored love triangle. Then flanderization set in...
- Gargoyles:
- The series had this for one episode after Goliath's daughter, Angela, joined the Clan. After months of thinking that they would never see a female Gargoyle again (except for one who's psychotic, genocidal, and Goliath's ex), the young trio Gargoyles instantly leapt at the chance to woo this comely newcomer, creating an annoyingly aggressive romantic rivalry for her. Eventually, Angela angrily put her foot down on this and told them to be patient for her to respond, while consoling them with the delightful fact that she has 15 sisters back on the magic island of Avalon. (For the record, she chose Broadway; Brooklyn would find a mate while being Unstuck in Time and the creator said Lexington would eventually get a male suitor.)
- There's also a subtle one between Goliath, Demona (the aforementioned ex), and Elisa. The girls don't directly fight over Goliath, but he's becoming close to Elisa at the same time that he's realizing that his relationship with Demona can't be salvaged. Demona does hate Elisa more than she does other humans, but it's unclear whether or not that's because she recognizes her as a romantic rival on some level.
- More triangular examples include the one between Princess Katharine, the Magus, and Tom, and the one between King Kenneth II, Finella, and Constantine.
- The love triangle among the Coldtrio added an extra layer, when Coldsteel, who secretly lusted after Coldfire, tries to convince Coldstone that Coldfire was secretly in love with Goliath.
- On Gravity Falls, Dipper has a Precocious Crush on Wendy, who is dating Robbie during the first season. After the two break up and Dipper gets the courage to admit his crush, Wendy points out the age difference (Wendy is entering her late teens) and softly rejects him.
- Hey Arnold!:
- "Gerald vs. Jamie O": A is Gerald, B is an older girl named Chloe, and C is Gerald's older brother, Jamie O. Helga/Arnold/Lila, Helga/Arnold/Ruth, and Brainy/Helga/Arnold. This show lives off of this trope.
- It was even parodied in the episode "Quantity Time" when Helga and Big Bob went to see a musical called RATS. The singers started this:
- Jimmy Two-Shoes: Peep loves Heloise, who has Single-Target Sexuality for Jimmy.
- Kick Buttowski has Kendal Perkins who secretly has a crush on the title character, however Jackie Wackerman, better known as "Wacky Jackie", more or less has a crush on him first.
- Kid vs. Kat: Phoebe has a crush on Coop, but Coop is terrified of her and is in an unofficial relationship with Fiona. Unfortunately for Fiona, Phoebe seems to think Murder the Hypotenuse is the best solution to this.
- King of the Hill: Dale and Nancy are married, Nancy has had a years-long affair with John Redcorn (and has had his son, who Dale believes is his, being oblivious to the obvious clues), but Dale has generally positive feelings about John Redcorn who he believes merely treats his wife's headaches. Comes to a head when Dale assists John with his suit to gain land as reparations from the government, and John decides to end the affair since he cannot screw over someone who has treated him as a friend.
- The Legend of Zelda (1989): Link likes Zelda, who knows full well what a loser he is, and whenever she decides he's being cute enough to get a kiss, circumstances intervene. Meanwhile, Spryte is in lust with Link, often bashing Zelda right before trying to come on to Link... who prefers his girls a little taller than three inches. (Incidentally, Spryte is one of the three girls in the series by whom he actually does get kissed. Zelda is not.)
- A few episodes of The Little Rascals have Alfalfa and Waldo fighting over Darla.
- Marinette and Adrien in Miraculous Ladybug somehow wound up with a strange, two-person variant. The problem arises from the fact that they are not allowed to reveal their alter egos as Ladybug and Cat Noir to anyone, even each other, and they both act significantly different in their civilian identities. Thus, Adrien likes Ladybug, but not Marinette, and Marinette likes Adrien, but not Cat Noir.
- My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic: "Simple Ways" begins with The Fashionista Rarity having a crush on Trenderhoof and failing to make an impression on him. Trenderhoof quickly falls in love with Unkempt Beauty Applejack, who has no interest in him. Hilarity Ensues when Rarity tries dressing in increasingly rustic attire and eventually changing the theme of a fashion show to try to impress Trenderhoof, but given Rarity and Applejack's preexisting friendship, the episode ends with things more or less back to normal.
- Over the Garden Wall has an interesting variation. Wirt thinks he's Person A, while his crush Sara (B) is obviously into Jason Funderberker (C), who he's convinced he has no chance against. When we get to see these characters interact later in the miniseries through a flashback episode, we see that Wirt and Jason's roles are actually swapped: Sara is heavily implied to like him back while being mostly indifferent towards Jason. Wirt is just too socially anxious to realize this (or even how well-liked he is by his peers in general).
- Pet Alien plays with this: Granville dislikes Tommy because he thinks the latter has a crush on Melba, who Granville is also trying to win over. In actuality, Tommy and Melba despise each other and Melba in turn dislikes Granville.
- And just to dust off an old classic, in Popeye, Olive Oyl is always being courted by Popeye or Bluto, who compete for her affections. Olive will sometimes favor Bluto depending on the short, and she's rather fickle, prone to suddenly leaving Popeye for Bluto because she's "tired of" him. Despite this, Popeye always takes Olive back after letting Bluto have it; except in "Barnacle Bill the Sailor" where he snapped at her and put her in her place at the end.
- The Secret Show: Victor Volt pursues Anita Knight, who is with Alphonse.
- Sidekick has Eric who likes Vana who hates him, but Kitty likes Eric to an almost stalker level.
- South Park has the bizarre Love Triangle of Saddam Hussein/Satan/Chris. Yeah. For Fanon examples, see One True Threesome.
- Star vs. the Forces of Evil: After the episode "Bon Bon the Birthday Clown", one has started among Jackie, Marco, and Star. The season 2 finale "Starcrushed" leaves all three of them aware for the first time that the triangle exists. After the season 3 episode "Lava Lake Beach", one has started among Star, Marco and Tom, and one among Star, Marco and Kelly.
- Steven Universe:
- Pearl wants to fuse (a metaphor for some kind of relationship) with Garnet (who is a relationship and fusion between Ruby and Sapphire), and while Garnet (and thus Ruby and Sapphire) seems to be up for it ocasionally, Pearl manipulates the situation in a way that breaks consent and is unhealthy, thus making it Type 6.
- In the flashback episodes "Story for Steven" and "We Need to Talk", Pearl was in love with Rose Quartz, who was in love with Greg. Pearl was incredibly jealous, and tried to get Greg to give up pursuing Rose. Later, it becomes increasingly clear that Rose was also in love with Pearl, but that didn't keep Pearl from feeling like she was losing Rose to Greg.
- Stōked: Johnny has a crush on Emma, which everyone can see except Emma herself. Emma, in turn, has a crush on Ty, which everyone but Ty can see. It causes Johnny much angst to hear Emma compare him to a brother and fawn over Ty in the same breath.
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles:
- The entire franchise has always had one as the source of the conflict between the Hamato Clan and the Foot (primarily the Oroku Clan). The beautiful, but ultimately ill-fated Tang Shen is the object of affection for both Hamato Yoshi and another suitor (in most adaptations, Oroku Saki, though in the original comics it was Saki's brother Nagi), and always chooses Yoshi over the other suitor. Said suitor then gets jealous, and, well... you know the rest.
- In one episode of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987), Shredder dopes three of the Turtles with a pizza laced with a love potion (Donatello demurs, because he's driving), causing the three to fall in love with April's friend Irma, and fight with each other over her affections. She's oblivious to the fact that she has three mutant turtles lusting after her, but is delighted that she is suddenly the target of three anonymous suitors.
- Total Drama:
- Cody likes Gwen (B), who is pretty much destined from episode 1 to be with Trent (C). Cody initially didn't realize this despite obvious clues, but decided to help set them up when he finally did.
- And again in season three, except (C) is Duncan and Cody punches him in the face instead. Technically more of a square, though, since Duncan was already dating Courtney. Sierra has a Fangirl crush on Cody, who still has feelings for Gwen.
- While not played up as much, Ezekiel has a crush on Bridgette who's dating Geoff.
- Courtney and Gwen are good friends but both want Duncan, whom Courtney is dating. Then Duncan reveals he wants Gwen, causing both of their relationships with Courtney to implode. When the dust settles by the time of All-Stars, Duncan is dates Gwen, tries to keep Courtney's attention and loses both of them because of this, and the two girls make up and entering a Pseudo-Romantic Friendship.
- In WordGirl, Tobey has a Villainous Crush on the eponymous superheroine (and possibly a case of Belligerent Sexual Tension with her Secret Identity Becky), who goes back and forth between rebuffing and simply being oblivious to his affections. Becky/WordGirl meanwhile has a crush on school reporter Todd "Scoops" Ming, who is Oblivious to Love. That said, Tobey and WordGirl do actually have some moments of legitimate, mutual Ship Tease, something that has not gone unnoticed by the fandom.
- Young Justice (2010) has a major love triangle between Miss Martian/Superboy/Lagoon Boy in season 2. Miss Martian and Superboy break up shortly before the beginning of Season 2 because of Miss Martian's abuse of power and she begins dating Lagoon Boy. Eventually, Miss Martian breaks up with Lagoon Boy after she realizes the error of her ways and gets back together with Superboy by the end of the season.
