Amicable Exes

Dick joke!

"It's things like using force together,
Shouting till you're hoarse together,
Getting a divorce together,
That make perfect relationships."

— Company (Sondheim), "The Little Things You Do Together"

So, people who break up must indefinitely hate each other, right?

Wrong.

Increasingly common in media are situations where a divorced couple still get along for the most part, and in many cases still care about each other even though they're no longer together. In many cases the divorce happened because of distance, circumstance or the simple fact that people change rather than infidelity, betrayal or other serious problems, and the fact that they got divorced is treated as a fact of life rather than due to a flaw in the people. Both parties also generally agree that it was for the best for both of them. Or maybe they realize they're just Better as Friends. It's also pretty common for couples who broke up because of Incompatible Orientation or who were each other's Last Het Romance to end up this way.

If there are children from the marriage they are shared without much complaint, and the amicability of the parents can often be interpreted as being partly for their sake. As such, this tends to show up in children's cartoons, perhaps as an attempt to counter the stereotype of the children of divorced parents being largely unhappy. May involve a Visit by Divorced Dad that will usually go well, and for the most part, any Divorce Assets Conflicts are avoided or settled reasonably.

The increase in this trope can be attributed to the dramatic shift in divorce rates and public perception of those who have gone through divorces in the last 50 years (i.e. between the 1950s and the start of the 21st century). While divorce used to be scandalous, it's now a fairly common occurrence, and this trope reflects the view that it's just a fact of life that doesn't have to permanently poison a relationship. Sometimes it even results in Divorce Is Temporary, though this is less common in more realistic works and those aimed at children due to an unrealistic message ("wish hard enough and your parents will get back together!").

This can apply to non-divorced former couples as well, thus the name. If someone's current and former squeeze get along well with each other, it's The Missus and the Ex.

Compare Working with the Ex, then there's Sex with the Ex, a Sub-Trope.

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Examples:

Anime and Manga

• Miyuki and Yonamine from Bambino! maintain an amicable relationship as co-workers even after their divorce.
• The Bloom Into You spinoff Regarding Sayaka Saeki discusses this trope, with the titular character arguing against it. Sayaka points out that relationships take time to build up, and if they collapse, it's almost impossible to build them back up. Because of that, Sayaka refuses to forgive her sempai and ex-girlfriend for breaking up with her, and she understands why Haru is fairly certain that she will never again be friends with her own ex. Of course, both those relationships ended on bad terms. When it comes to Touko, Sayaka notes that because Touko rejected her Love Confession rather than breaking up with her, the two are still friends, but she still found it awkward to be around Touko after her rejection and their mutual friend (and, ironically, Touko's girlfriend) had to be present to ease any tension.
• Brick and Cathy are this in Bondage Queen Kate, mainly by the misfortune of both of them being strong dominants.
• Richard and Deborah of The Case Files of Jeweler Richard are still very good friends after breaking off their engagement.
• Digimon Adventure: Yamato and Takeru's divorced parents, Natsuko and Hiroaki. Their marriage clearly failed, and it didn't seem like it was amicable at first, but by the time of the show, the two are capable of being civil with each other when they meet again in probably the first time since their divorce when both get embroiled in the Chosen Children's war against Vamdemon in Odaiba. However, we get hints that the two still do care for each other. Natsuko even still privately (when no one else is around) still calls Hiroaki "dear"^note might be a force of habit, but it's been a couple of years since the divorce, so... during when she and Takeru are separated just after reuniting, and the two are shown holding hands, with a close-up, as they look to the Children's final battle against Apocalymon. The impression being given is that while the two still do care for each other, actually getting back together just isn't in the cards. This certainly helps when both are in likely frequent contact with each other as part of the Children's support group in the real world by the time of the sequel.
• Doctor Slump: Played for Laughs in an episode of the 80s anime. In the episode the Prince Monster had asked his servants to look for a human girl to be his girlfriend, they went to the Penguin Village and found Arale, whom they took to the castle of the Prince Monster, who ended up liking him a lot. But unfortunately Arale did not meet the ideal qualities that he had of a human girl, such as her beautiful song. In the end, he likes her even though Arale destroyed the castle with his N'cha cannon, causing Prince Monster to break up with her, but they seem to be on good terms as he gives Arale his autograph.
• Dragon Ball Z: Bulma and Yamcha seem to have remained fairly good friends after their breakup, in spite of the fact that Bulma's new love interest is a former villain... who was indirectly responsible for Yamcha's death (he got better) while they were still dating.
• Austria and Hungary in Hetalia: Axis Powers are still very much going out together, despite having been divorced after World War I.
• Marmalade Boy starts when Miki's parents Rumi and Jin tell her all smiling "we're having a divorce ♥!" They get divorced and stay friends, then they swap spouses with Yuu's parents Chiyako and Youji, and both families move into a Big Fancy House so the two teens won't lose their parental figures and things will be easier in the financial and emotional senses. It's very justified: Rumi, Jin, Youji and Chiyako have been friends from several years before the story took place.
• Yaichi and Natsuki in My Brother's Husband, to the point that when Mike sees them together he can't understand why they got divorced.
• Haruka's parents in Noein have come to terms with their divorce and are able to get along when together. This is something that took time, as their initial feelings were far more bitter, but they eventually realized that despite their attraction to one another they were simply too different to function as a stable couple, and rather than raise a child in that environment they decided to split up to give her a life where her parents weren't constantly fighting. This makes it a case where the split was mainly for the child's benefit.
• In NTR: Netsuzou Trap, Yuma and Takeda take a break from their relationship early on, one that eventually becomes permanent (at least in the anime). Nevertheless, Takeda remains on speaking terms with Yuma and helps her come to terms with her feelings for Hotaru.
• Ureshiko and Tamotsu in Oku-sama wa Mahou Shoujo aren't officially divorced, but they don't live together anymore. Ureshiko comes over to help him clean once in a while. In the end, they presumably do get divorced amicably, since Tamotsu told Kagura to treat her well.
• Random Walk: Yuka and Hiro are such good friends that the reveal that they used to date each other in the past is treated as a major surprise by their mutual friends. Sachie (Yuka's former stepmother) defies this, however, saying that she can't remain friends with Akimitsu after their divorce, even if she still cares for him and wishes for his happiness.
• Ami's mother Saeko in Sailor Moon seems to bear no ill feelings toward her ex-husband, a famous artist who lives abroad, but this has never stopped Ami herself from angsting about it.
• Parodied in Silver Spoon. Yoshino and Hachiken get along rather well, though they aren't particularly close, and their romantic involvement only ever existed in Tokiwa's overactive imagination. That doesn't stop anyone, including Hachiken and Yoshino, from acting like they were dating and broke up, but are still on good terms.
• In Sing "Yesterday" for Me, when Rikuo and Shinako break up, it's the most honest and open they ever are with each other, and they agree to stay friends afterward.
• In Tamagotchi, while it's never outright stated if they're divorced, Cafe Mama lives in a different city from Papapianitchi, and they're on good terms. They have a daughter named Pianitchi who is with Cafe Mama.
• Cher Degre and Hubb Lebowski of Wolf's Rain get along professionally, though there is definite tension in their relationship, and they split mainly because Cher was so caught up in her work that their relationship suffered. By the end of the series, they have mostly reconciled, but Cher dies suddenly, causing Hubb to cross the Despair Event Horizon, and he spends his last moments cradling her scarf and inhaling her scent.

Comic Books

• In Amalgam Universe, Diana Prince and The Punisher are an Outlaw Ex-Couple.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender comic The Promise plays this for laughs with Penga. She claims that Sokka is her boyfriend, despite the fact that he is dating Suki. She later decides to "dump" Sokka in favor of the Dark One, while remaining friendly to him. Sokka takes this in stride, never attempting to indulge or dissuade her fantasies.
• Hank Pym and his wife Janet of The Avengers after their rough divorce got along very well and even had romantic relations before Janet's death.
• Jefferson Pierce aka Black Lightning and his wife Lynn Stewart split up because of the stress Jeff's superhero life put on their family, but the two remain in friendly contact and Lynn makes sure that their daughters, Anissa and Jennifer remain in contact with their dad, and both even become superheroes later (though Jefferson was very adamant that Anissa finish college first).
• Black Widow gets along pretty well with her ex-lovers Daredevil, Hercules, Hawkeye, the Winter Soldier and the Red Guardian (who is her ex-husband).
• The Flash: Hunter and Ashley Zolomon were not this at first, due to the circumstances. Hunter predicted that a suspect wouldn't have a gun, and thus urged his team to make the arrest without waiting for backup. He turned out to be wrong, and the killer shot him in the knee, crippling him, before gunning down his father-in-law; in response, Ashley filed for divorce and he was let go from the FBI. It was clear that Hunter still very much loved her and regretted his mistake, but he sadly accepted that she would likely never forgive him and was trying to move on with his life. Ashley's thoughts on Hunter after the divorce were only told by Hunter's account, but it's clear she was angry and bitter at Hunter for his mistake that cost her father's life. When Ashley learns that Hunter transformed into Zoom, she left the FBI to come to Keystone City to take over his former spot as the local metahuman profiler to help reform him. She makes it clear that she still loves Hunter, regrets leaving him, and swore that she'll help him and never leave him again. It very clear that they have lingering feelings for each other.
• Emery and his ex-wife in The Internship are still on good terms and both take care of their two daughters.
• Jonesy: Despite being divorced, Jonesy's parents still get along quite well and reveal they broke up due to just marrying too young and having different interests. So, out of convenience for their daughter, her father agreed to look after Jonesy while the mother went off to pursue her dream of going to law school.
• As pictured above, Nightwing usually stays friends with his exes, which is a good thing since he regularly works with his two most well-known ex-girlfriends.
• Omaha the Cat Dancer had the title character being forced to confess that she was married to a long-separated man, but never formally divorced. As it turns out, the man found out about her new notoriety and got in contact with her not to cause trouble, but to arrange a proper divorce which is done on good terms with everyone involved.
• Robin (1993):
  • Tim Drake and Zo remain friends even after he breaks up with her over the phone. While the way he broke up with her upset her it helps that they didn't date for very long beforehand.
  • When Tim's girlfriend Stephanie Brown turned out to be not dead after all, they dated at first and then broke up and stayed good friends.
• Fred and Daphne in Scooby Apocalypse, though Fred still has feelings for her. To the point that he regularly asks her to marry him, to her constant frustration. She eventually admits that she does reciprocate his feelings and accepts one of his proposals before they undergo a recon mission, only for the next issue to reveal that the mission went awry and that he died.
  Daphne: I swear, if you ever propose to me again, I'll—
  Shaggy: "Again?" He's done it before?
  Daphne: I lost count two years ago.
• A same-sex example in the first volume of Secret Six is Scandal Savage and Jeannette, who were a couple when they were imprisoned in a gulag together but didn't work out in the long run for unspecified reasons. Even though they're no longer an item they clearly care for each other a great deal and have no apparent resentment or hard feelings over their breakup, and encourage each other to pursue new relationships. It's safe to say they consider each other their best friend.
• Spider-Man:
  • Peter Parker has remained good friends with his high school girlfriend Betty Brant for decades since their breakup.
  • Post-One More Day, Peter and Mary Jane remained best friends throughout Dan Slott's run on the title, albeit with the ship repeatedly being teased and sunk. However, when Nick Spencer took over in 2018, their lingering feelings for each other proved unignorable and they finally got back together, with recent issues hinting that their marriage may even be restored to continuity in the near future.
• Superman:
  • Clark and Lori Lemaris of Atlantis dated in college, but Lori dumped him, since she was ultimately unwilling to pursue an Interspecies Romance (she is a mermaid). They've managed to remain friends since then, though.
  • Clark Kent and Lana Lang have been great friends after their time as high school sweethearts.
  • Linda Danvers and Dick Malverne dated for a while in their high school years. They drifted apart when Linda moved out, but they remained friends.
    Supergirl: We dated for years, all through college. Were were good together. [...] I guess we grew apart... grew up. We stayed friends, but I hadn't seen him in years.
  • Superman had a brief relationship with Wonder Woman when they were both starting out as superheroes, but they quickly realised they were Better as Friends.
  • Clark's Smallville pals Lana Lang and Pete Ross got married and had a child together, but they got divorced after several years. In Day of the Dollmaker, when Kara asks Lana about her family, her friend replies that things between her ex-husband Pete and her are going awkward, but they will manage.
• In a Titeuf comic, Titeuf's dad meets an ex and they have a casual and friendly conversation.
• Ultimate X-Men: Xavier gets on far better with Moira MacTaggert after divorcing her than he ever did while they were married.
• Longshot and Dazzler of the X-Men divorced off-panel, but seem to still get along well enough and still enjoy the occasional roll in the sack for old time's sake.
• Valhalla: Skadi and Njord. Skadi is a mountain jotun, who can't stand the sea, and Njord is a sea god who can't stand living up in the mountains. They chose separation over trying to build a life where at least one of them would be constantly miserable, but speak of each other with great affection, and are still quite lovey-dovey when they meet.

Fan Works

• The blog Ask Serious Rainbow has a few examples:
  • Serious's parents had been this to each other until her mother's death, having only divorced when Serious's father realized he was gay.
  • Serious herself is on amicable terms with her ex Twilight, even joking that they had had breakup sex before breaking up. After finding out Gilda had been blackmailed into cheating on her, Serious ends up on good terms with her high school ex Gilda as well.
• The Beast Of Gusu series portrays Lan Xichen and Nie Mingjue as this for all of Unstoppable and most of Heavy is the Head.
• Cast Swap: Unlike canon, Duncan and Gwen become this after the latter breaks up with him (for different reasons than canon).
• The Little Busters! fic Deep Purple deconstructs this trope with Riki and Rin. While the two of them were able to reconcile and get back on friendly terms after breaking up, it doesn't change the fact that they did break up and that it added a layer of awkwardness to their relationship. They used to be close childhood friends, but their breakup made it impossible for them to be as close as they used to be before they dated each other.
• Though nobody is exempt from Ron the Death Eater, there's a trend for Dragon Ball Z fans who ship Vegeta with anyone other than Bulma to portray the two of them as this. It probably helps that Vegeta and Bulma started out as just a one-time hookup, and he's often paired with Goku, who has a wife most fanfic writers seem to find easier to demonize.
• EQuestria Girls Marvel Universe: Flash is still good friends with his ex-girlfriend Sunset Shimmer, with Sunset especially helping Flash deal with the grief of his Uncle Ben's death. Downplayed, as Flash's journal reveals they weren't actually "together", more like they had a "hang-out-with-me-and-act-like-we're-together thing", and he is completely afraid of what she might do to him and Thorax when they tell her they told Sci-Twi about the magic around CHS.
• The The End of the World series story "The Final Eight" has Jemina Kingery, a merchant girl Peeta went on one somewhat bad date with, actual happy to tell the reporters that he spent a lot of the date talking about Katniss, having no hard feelings and knowing that saying so will help them get sponsors.
• Flame's Shade:
  • Blake and Yang had a short relationship. Though it didn't last, they're still good teammates and best friends nevertheless. Yang doesn't have any qualms when Blake begins dating her younger sister Ruby and she even encourages it.
  • Pyrrha and Jaune tried dating but it didn't work out and Pyrrha fell out of love. They're still close friends and teammates nevertheless.
• In A Game for the Fool, while the SI and her husband Walter ended up divorcing, they still remained such good friends that his family still considered her one of theirs.
• In Gender Confusion, Deidara and his ex-girlfriend are actually friendly enough that she invites him to her wedding.
• God Save the Esteem manages to avert Daria's infamous Love Triangle by having Tom start high school at Lawndale High instead of Fielding. As such, he and Jane have already met, dated, and amicably broken up before Daria moves to town and develops interest in him herself.
• Guys Being Dudes: Despite her bitterness towards Arlo from their past as teammates and ex-lovers, Candela still gets along well enough with him to have been willing to get drunk with the Team GO Rocket trio after Go Fest 2020.
• In Harry Potter Fanon, it is strangely common to portray Tonks and Charlie this way, simply because they're the same age and both are rather adventurous.
• How the Light Gets In: Turns out Joanna and Laurel briefly dated in law school, and in fact, Joanna was in love with Laurel. The romantic relationship is over, but they remain best friends. (Until Laurel's death and resurrection at least).
  • Oliver and Laurel also canonically dated, but exactly how "amicable" they are varies.
• In the J-WITCH Series, Uncle Chan and Yan Lin used to date when they were younger. While they're no longer a couple, they're still very good friends.
• In Kill la Kill AU, we have Ragyo and Soichiro, who actually still love each other and, after the events of Comic 25, seemed to have gotten back together (along with the fact that they do live together and spend time together), making that also a case of Divorce Is Temporary.
• The Harvest Moon DS fic A Longing For Home features such a scenario in the final chapter. Jack and Leia tried to make their relationship work, but ultimately realized it couldn't and thus split up. Despite this and their eventually moving on to other loves and starting a family, the two remain close friends, with Leia visiting Jack as often as she can.
• Draco Malfoy and Harry "Vampire" Potter in My Immortal, particularly impressive considering that they're also in a Love Triangle over Ebony Dark'ness Dementia Raven Way.
• My Super Best Friend
  • By the end Stan and Wendy have become this. While they don't get back together, they are able to have friendly conversations about mundane things.
  • Downplayed with Heidi and Kyle by the end. While they still aren't on speaking terms, Kyle no longer hates Heidi and is happy to see her chatting with her friends, while Heidi is happy that Kyle was able to forgive her and is being hopeful that they can one day be friends again.
• Never Say Goodbye (the ending of the trilogy started by the infamous "Zootopia abortion comic", I Will Survive), shows that Nick and Judy have managed to mend their bond despite how harshly they broke up and how horribly Nick's attempt at reconciliation went. They engage in friendly banter throughout the comic, and in the end, the two hug and call each other "friend".
• Power Chord: High School Musical: Luna and Sam were in a relationship in the past, but broke up and decided to remain good friends. This does end up wavering a bit when Sam gets jealous of Luna and Carol, though they do end up reconciling in the end.
• Rock Stars: It's mentioned that Stormer dated Riot at one point. They've since broken up but are still on friendly terms.
• Daisy and Winter subvert this in Ruby and Nora. While both try to be professional, Winter is still enraged at Daisy for why their marriage fell apart.
• Ships Ahoy!:
  • Despite the breakup causing Oprah to become mentally ill, she and O'Donahue remain on good terms with each other and she eventually works up the nerve to call him again after 31 years of not seeing each other. By the end of the story, they've decided to become boyfriend and girlfriend again, although O'Donahue doesn't return to Odd Squad and continues being a fisherman.
  • Octavia and Oz are also best friends by the end of the story when the former rejects the latter's confession, and the two begin dating different agents entirely.
• Sparkling Shimmer: Flash rather gracefully takes Sunset breaking up with him. Timber also wants to be this with Twilight, despite how badly things ended.
• Stan Pines and Eda Clawthorne in the There Was Once an Avenger From Krypton series used to date and were married for a very short time, but they divorced and aren't a couple anymore, though they do still get along well and have been trading goods with each other for years. Considering that she calls him "handsome" in a flirty tone when they meet again, she may also still be attracted to him too.
• These Foolish Things:
  • Oliver and Laurel are trying to be this at the start of the story. It's proving to be difficult, not because of any negative feelings, but rather because they still love each other but are both convinced the other doesn't love them back anymore. Eventually it is subverted when Laurel inadvertently admits she still loves Oliver, prompting Oliver to finally acknowledge that he still loves her, and allowing them to get back together.
  • Oliver and Sara are a more traditional example, with Sara giving Oliver some poignant advice regarding his relationships with Laurel and Felicity.
• This is one of the major elements in the Hetalia fic Tizenot, showing how Austria and Hungary got to their current predicament.
• What It Takes: Oliver and Sara, who are still best friends despite their previous break-up and completely supportive of each others' relationships with Laurel and Nyssa, respectively.
• Friday Night Funkin' fanfictions frequently portray Pico and Boyfriend, who are confirmed by the developers to be exes, this way.

Films — Live-Action

• In Bon Cop, Bad Cop, David Bouchard still lives in the same house as his ex-wife (in a basement apartment) and both seem committed to raising their daughter together, sharing meals, and attending school recitals together. Somewhat subverted in that David still has regrets.
  • They remarry in the ten years that elapse before the sequel.
• In Breaking Point (1976), Helen is still on good terms with Andy's father Peter, who doesn't seem at all jealous of her marriage to Michael.
• Chef (2014): Despite being divorced, it is clear that Carl and Inez care for each other greatly. Inez is also friendly with her other ex-husband, Marvin. Carl and Inez end up remarrying by the film's conclusion.
• Celeste and Jesse Forever: Celeste and Jesse began their separation a couple months before the movie began, and get officially divorced partway through. Despite that, they remain friends throughout the movie. They never get back together, although they both consider it at various times. Apparently, they were longtime friends, got married relatively young, and realized they were Better as Friends.
• Hester and William in The Deep Blue Sea. They're not yet divorced but live separately since William found out Hester had been cheating on him with Freddie. While initially very mad at her and refusing to give her a divorce, the film shows he's mellowed out completely in a few months and visits Hester to make sure she's happy. On her part, Hester never blames him for their unhappy marriage, though she refuses to continue it, and is grateful for his concern.
• In Definitely, Maybe, Will (played by Ryan Reynolds) and his ex-wife were on good terms when together on a trip with their daughter Maya at the end of the movie. Maya realizes from her father's stories and through this trip that her parents aren't meant to be together, and that's okay.
• Disenchanted (2022): Edward and Giselle used to be engaged, as did Robert and Nancy. Now the happily-married Edward and Nancy are shown to be close friends with Giselle and Robert and the godparents of their daughter Sofia.
• In Everyone Says I Love You, Joe (Woody Allen) and Steffie (Goldie Hawn) were once married, but they still get along great with each other. Joe is even good friends with his ex-wife's current husband Bob (Alan Alda).
• Jurassic Park III:
  • Paul and Amanda Kirby are very caring and friendly with each other. Granted, they initially pose as a couple and they do have an important common purpose, but given the stressful circumstances, one would expect them to get on each other's nerves at some point and show some signs of resentment. Instead, there are strong hints that they will get back together.
  • This even extends to Grant and Satler in the same movie; she's married another man and started a family, but she's still in regular contact with Grant and even saves his life during the climax. Heck, their actors even still have visible chemistry on screen! Sure enough, they get back together decades later in Jurassic World Dominion.
• Kung Fu Zohra: At the end, Zohra and Omar are divorced following a climactic fight that had Zohra triumph of Omar's Domestic Abuse. When Omar comes to bring their daughter Zina to Zohra's apartment afterwards, Zohra proposes him coffee without an issue.
• L.A. Story: Sara and her ex-husband Roland get along well together. Roland thinks it's because of their nationality:
  Roland: England and America are different. The English keep civil relations with their exes. The Americans sue them.
• Love Is Not Perfect: Elena and Marco, the father of her daughter, are friendly with each other when they meet again. She's also still close with her ex-lover Adriana once they break up.
• Marriage Story: When Charlie and Nicole decide to get a divorce, they make clear from the get-go that they refuse to hurt each other and be this trope for the sake of their son, and when the divorce finally is done they make do on that promise. The drama of the plot is then that they both still go through said drama of tearing each other apart in the courtroom because they make the mistake of hiring rival Amoral Attorneys and they absolutely refuse to let the other attorney win. Nicole's attorney even does a massive Kick the Dog act when she, explicitly against Nicole's wishes, requests Nicole to have more time with her son over Charlie, when Nicole wanted a 50/50 split in joint custody.
• Marvel Cinematic Universe:
  • In Doctor Strange (2016), Stephen and Christine work together and used to be lovers prior to the start of the film, leading Christine to now follow "The Strange Rule" and not date colleagues, but the two still clearly have feelings for each other and she attempts to help him through his depression after a car accident leaves him unable to use his hands to perform surgery, at least until he pushes her away in an angry outburst and goes off to Nepal searching for a cure. Once they're reunited, she gives him a kiss on the lips when he says he has to leave for good and both are clearly torn by his having to go, but the damage has been done already and they don't end up back together.
  • For most of Ant-Man, Scott Lang and his ex-wife Maggie aren't this despite his best efforts, with Maggie not even being too keen about Scott seeing their daughter Cassie until he gets his life back together after getting out of prison. But after he saves Cassie's life at the climax of the film, she's warmed up to him again completely (although not romantically; she's happy with her new partner Jim Paxton, although he and Scott are also cool with each other) and in Ant-Man and the Wasp, Maggie's fully supportive of Scott, furiously taking his side against what she sees as his unfair harassment by the FBI enforcing his home arrest situation, even after the trouble he got into in Civil War.
  • Having danced around each other in Avengers: Age of Ultron before a sudden trip to space put the brakes on their romance, Bruce and Natasha have reached a version of both this and Better as Friends in Avengers: Endgame, with the pair both on warm terms following the five-year time jump in the wake of Thanos's death. Naturally, Bruce's transition into his Professor Hulk form would have made the logistics a little bit difficult even if they hadn't.
  • Spider-Man: Far From Home: Ned and Betty have a mutual breakup at the end of the film, where they both agree that while they don't regret their relationship, they also don't regret ending it. This confuses the hell out of Peter since they only started dating at the beginning of the film, about a week earlier. They spent the entire week being Sickeningly Sweethearts until suddenly they were broken up.
• In The Meg, Jonas and Lori surprisingly get along despite being divorced. Lori even gets in on the Everyone Can See It Shipper on Deck business once she notices Suyin's less-than-subtle interest in Jonas.
• Mission: Impossible – Fallout: The film reveals that Ethan and Julia amicably divorced sometime ago. While it was because Julia figured out that Ethan would never be able to settle down properly with her, they both recognized that the decision was the best for both of them, and remained friends afterwards.
• The conclusion of Mrs. Doubtfire shows Miranda and Daniel coming to terms with their divorce and ending their custody dispute. This trope is discussed in the closing monologue.
• In Night at the Museum, Larry and his ex-wife, Erica, are quite friendly with each other (almost with a sibling-like relationship) and have no trouble with both of them taking care of their son. Larry is even friendly with Erica's fiancé, Don, who also doesn't see him as a threat.
• Panic Room: Downplayed with Meg and Stephen. When Sarah starts Calling the Old Man Out, Meg tells her not to talk about her father like that but agrees that the woman he cheated with is a bitch. When Meg calls him for help in the middle of the night, he immediately comes to her aid and does whatever he can to protect them even after being severely beaten by the burglars.
• In one of the short stories in Paris, je t'aime, a separated couple have one final date before the divorce papers are settled.
• Run Sweetheart Run: Cherie and Trey, for the most part. She calls him for help after Ethan attacks her and he comes to get her. Cherie cannot really explain to him that Ethan is a monstrous creature who is determined to hunt her down and kill her or how much danger he still represents to her and their daughter. He still takes her to his home and later apologizes for things said earlier in anger, stressing that what happened was not her fault.
• In The Santa Clause, Scott Calvin and his ex-wife came to terms with their divorce and sharing custody of their son Charlie, as well as Scott being the new Santa Claus (in a particularly touching scene, she tosses the court papers that say Scott can't see Charlie into the fire). In the sequels, he grows close to Lucy, his ex's daughter with her new husband, who even calls him "Uncle Scott."
• At the beginning of Taken, Bryan Mills (played by Liam Neeson) and his ex-wife Lenore are definitely not this trope, having divorced mainly because of his career with the CIA convincing her that he didn't care about them, but by the end of the film, after he single-handedly rescues their daughter, he most certainly earns back a measure of her love, as well the friendship and respect of her new husband. Taken even further in the sequel. The events in the film rekindle old feelings they had for each other and it implies that they'll end up back together.
• Ticket to Paradise: Discussed. David says that he and Georgia are not friendly exes like one might see on television (they really hate each other).
• Scottie and Midge from Vertigo were once engaged but are now Just Friends, although she still retains obvious feelings for him. This adds a lot of conflict as Scottie falls in love with a married woman.
• Young Hearts: Even after they break up, Harper and Tilly soon become friendly to each other again.

Literature

• In After Her by Joyce Maynard, Rachel and Patti's mother and father divorced when the two were young children, but their father continued to play an active role in their lives. In this case, the split was because their parents married young and eventually realized that they simply didn't work as a couple and the stress from his job as a police detective pushed them apart. He admits that he makes a better friend to their mother and confides in her when his investigation of a Serial Killer puts extreme pressure on him, and it's indicated that their mother knew about him having another child with another woman after the divorce but agreed not to tell Rachel and Patti because it would upset them.
• Alan Alone: Takara tells Miss Tijah at the disaster relief shelter that he plans to visit his only son in Japan, and is anxious because his flight was cancelled. That is until his ex-wife appears with the son, having flown there out of concern for the father when she heard about the storm.
• In the Amber Brown books, for the most part, throughout the series, Amber Brown's parents are not this. However, by the end of Amber Brown is Horsing Around, they seem to be moving towards it, if only because they've both come to realize their childish bickering and bad-mouthing each other hasn't been good for Amber.
• In Apparatus Infernum, Mikani and Saskia are not on completely relaxed terms, and have a few leftover complaints against each other (such as Saskia not letting go of the fact that Mikani once tried to arrest her). However, it's more exasperation than bitterness, and when they have to work together, they do reasonably well. This is noted to be unusual for Mikani, whose numerous ex-girlfriends seldom end up on speaking terms with him.
• Variations in Animorphs: Rachel's parents, Dan and Naomi, are uncomfortable spending time together, but they'll do it. On the other hand, she's friendly enough with Jake's parents (her ex-husband's brother and his wife) that she'll dog-sit for them when Jake's mom's grandfather passes away, while she and Jake still refer to each other as "aunt" and "nephew". And on the other hand, she and Saddler's parents don't really get along, but her family still "helps out" once he's in the local hospital.
• Watson Brewer (Kristy's step-father) and his first wife in The Baby-Sitters Club, where Watson steps in with insurance help and making sure Lisa can manage with crutches when she sprains her ankle. Less so in the Little Sister spin-off.
• In a subversion, Ivan and Tej in Captain Vorpatril's Alliance have an amicable attempted divorce. They get married to avoid immigration on the promise to divorce as soon as possible, only to find out that this is only allowed with cause (which means in Barryaran law, roughly the same as would be familiar on Earth plus "concealed mutation"). And "unfortunately", they had both got along too well together for that to be plausible.
• Jenny Everywhere and Madame Tarsa are revealed to be this in The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids — they were happily married once, "millions of years ago", but the particular incarnation of Jenny whom Tarsa had fallen in love with died; Tarsa elected to consider herself widowed, but remain friends with other versions of Jenny.
• Rupert and Zinka in Deep Secret were once a couple. Exactly how serious their relationship was isn't clear, but Rupert still finds her very attractive. They broke up largely due to the sheer strain of being Magids, and remain very good friends.
• David Lurie and his second ex-wife Rosalind from Disgrace, who are still friends and meet up with each other regularly.

• Earth's Children:
  • Jondalar and Zolena. They remain good friends even though they're no longer in a relationship. Zolena obviously cares for him and is happy when he brings Ayla home, announcing he intends to make a hearth with her.
  • Jondalar, once again, and Serenio. They break up because they realize that Jondalar just can't love Serenio the way she wants, among other issues. Serenio actually intentionally invokes this, as she fears if they stayed together for the sake of it they'd eventually resent each other and she would rather they both be happy with other people.
  • Jondalar's parents, Marthona and Dalanar. They have no hard feelings over their break-up and are friendly with each other and their respective spouses.
• In Fifty Shades of Grey, Christian is good friends with his ex-domme. Subverted in that she started a relationship with him at age fifteen, it's implied that his methods of domming come from her, and he sees nothing wrong with what she did. There is also the fact that his former submissives are not good friends with him.
• In The Godfather, Johnny Fontane starts to reconcile with his first wife, at the Don's suggestion, after he gets sick of his second wife screwing around. Though they agree to just remain friends and be involved in raising their kids.
• Harry Potter: Not played straight at first with Harry and Cho. After their messy breakup, it's mentioned in Half-Blood Prince that they are too embarrassed to even look at each other. However, by the time of Deathly Hallows, things have settled down; Cho gives Harry a friendly smile when she answers to the DA's call to defend Hogwarts, and offers to help him find the Ravenclaw Diadem (before Ginny objects and has Luna take her place).
• Calliope and Josh in Hidden Things are extreme examples of this trope. Despite having a pretty messy break-up, and an even messier break-up of their band, they remained close enough that Calliope joined Josh's new detective agency even though it's implied she dislikes it. She even refers to Josh as her best friend. Their relationship is so amicable that virtually every other character at one point or another suggests that they never broke up at all.
• Loveless: After winning him back at Shakespeare Soc, Georgia apologizes to Jason for using him as part of her experimenting phase. Jason accepts the apology and doesn't mind remaining friends with her, even if he was heartbroken that his crush on her wasn't reciprocated.
• Nathan and Cynthia, in The Memory Wars, dated briefly in college. They're still close enough to go investigating murder scenes together.
• Of Fire and Stars: Mare was best friends with Nils before they became lovers. They remain that close after as well.
• One Day has Dex and Sylvie amicably sharing custody of their daughter and still caring about each other.
• One-Third Nerd: Liam, Dakota, and Izzy's parents are divorced, but they're still on good terms, and even seem to pool finances.
• In The Pale King, Chris Fogle's parents try to give this impression, but both of them are deeply affected by it.
• Isaac Asimov and Robert Silverberg's The Positronic Man: In this adaptation of "The Bicentennial Man", it is established that when Ma'am leaves to go to an art colony, she is also leaving the marriage. However, she remains in contact with the rest of the family, especially Sir.
• In Elinor Glyn's The Reflections of Ambrosine, there's a Third-Act Misunderstanding when the heroine meets a child sired by her Love Interest and one of her greatest friends. Without any discussion with said friend, she assumes the guy must be off-limits and dashes off a letter telling him so. He replies equally quickly that the relationship happened ten years ago, ended completely mutually, and both of them consider it nothing more than a youthful folly ^note the book is set before the invention of contraceptives, when even non-serious relationships could result in children. It's just that Ambrosine cannot imagine someone not being as passionately devoted to him as she is.
• The Shadowhunter Chronicles:
  • Clary and Simon are still best buds after breaking up, which they attribute to them not being right for each other, rather than any personal flaws. In The Dark Artifices, the two have become parabatai, which means that they forsook any romantic love in exchange for a brotherly one (parabatai being forbidden from loving each other romantically).
  • Emma and Cameron, who decide not to pursue each other again after their final breakup.
• Decidedly defied in Shaman Blues. Despite years having passed since Konstancja and Witkacy had their falling-out, he's still angry at her, and she still doesn't feel comfortable coming to him for help. He even points out that she shouldn't expect this trope to occur, seeing how she pretty much abandoned him.
• In the Song of the Lioness series, Alanna ends up breaking up with Prince Jonathan after the third book, and after spending some time apart they evolve into this, with Alanna even being chosen as King's Champion^note essentially the highest-ranking Knight in the kingdom, meaning that he trusts her to dispense justice on his behalf once Jonathan is crowned.
• Robert B. Parker's Sunny Randall and her ex-husband Richie still spend quite a bit of time together, to the detriment of their other relationships. Their divorce was due to a variety of factors but is mostly Can't Live with Them, Can't Live without Them and the fact that Sunny realized that Richie was very similar to her father. They don't have any children, but their miniature bull terrier Rosie is shared between them, with much Lampshading about how they want the best for their "kid."
  • By the same author, Jesse Stone has an interesting relationship with his ex-wife Jenn that varies between this and less amicable, since while she did cheat on him to further her career they are on relatively good terms, and cooperate on a few cases (the TV movies based on the books play their relationships as much more antagonistic). Parker himself was Happily Married for over 50 years to his wife Joan.
  • It's no surprise, then, when Sunny and Jesse end up hooking up in a Crossover between their series.
• Tales from Netheredge: At the end of Bright Flame Galen and Rask make amends after the reappearance of Cole, and by the time of Jewel of the Harem all three of them cordially share a home.
• In Robert Heinlein's Time Enough for Love, Lazarus Long states that he ended up parting on good terms with most of the wives he's had over his two-thousand-year lifespan. Though one or two tried to kill him. The discussions other long-lived Howards have about their marriages suggest that it's a common phenomenon with them.
• In The Traitor Son Cycle, it's implied rather heavily that before the Red Knight started his mercenary company, he and Sauce were lovers. They've broken up since, but are still good friends, with her serving as his Number Two in the company.
• The Trials of Apollo: Piper and Jason. Despite breaking up, they still care for each other a lot and go on missions together.
• Charlie and Renee in The Twilight Saga.
• In Vampire Academy, Janine Hathaway and Ibrahim "Abe" Mazur had a relationship eighteen years before the main events of the series. They interact closely late in the series and seem to have a very friendly relationship. Rose suspects that they are getting back together.
• The Wake Of The Lorelei Lee has Jacky and Higgins getting married as a cover. As soon as possible, they get divorced, and their relationship goes back to the way it always was.
• In Warrior Cats, Brambleclaw and Squirrelflight eventually get back to being on friendly terms after their breakup: he forgives her and even makes her his Number Two when he becomes Clan leader. A while later they realize how dumb they're being and that they still love each other, and get back together.
• In The Warrior Heir, Linda Downey and her ex Hastings sometimes act like this, sometimes ... not. They haven't split up because of the usual reasons, but because of different opinions on how the problems of the main plot ought to be solved. So when they do fight, they are not bitter about the end of the relationship but angry because the other person foils their plans.
• In A World Less Visible, getting a divorce seems to have greatly improved Ted's relationship with his ex. She enthusiastically approves of his new boyfriend.
• In Call Me Sunflower, Mom and Scott are still good friends after their breakup. Sunny hopes that this will improve their chances of getting back together, but they're never anything more than friendly no matter what she does. This is because their relationship was a sham. They were really just Heterosexual Life-Partners who wanted to Give the Baby a Father.
• Stim: Robert and Chloe temporarily break up in Kaleidoscope. They keep living together, partly because they find change stressful, and partly because they still enjoy each other's company even in they aren't dating. As Chloe puts it, "We've decoupled, but we haven't defriended."
• In Sanctuary, Vinnie and Caleb stayed together long after their relationship died, partly for the sake of their son Theo, but partly just because they're such good friends.
• How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom: Played with in the case of Castor Vargas. He divorced his wife, Accela Walter, to protect her from being caught up in the consequences of his rebellion, but she still loves him and considers herself his wife.

Live-Action TV

• The Affair: After a bitter custody dispute following their separation, Noah and Helen eventually settle into this for the sake of their children.
• Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: After several other characters complain about their exes, Mack smugly states that all of his exes are great and he still gets along with all of them. He quickly retracts his statement after being reminded that he once had to pretend to like quinoa for a year.
  Mack: [dead serious] That was a dark time...
• Amber Brown (2022): Though there's some friction between them, Sarah and Phil are very friendly with each other after they divorced. Sarah even tells their daughter Amber that she loves Phil, just not in the same way as before.
• Andor: Bix and Cassian are exes and also close friends who trust each other and secretly work together to supply stolen parts on the black market. Cassian also dismisses Maarva's concerns that any of his other exes with whom he'd shared his secret would turn him into Pre-Mor after Pre-Mor puts out a bulletin looking for someone meeting his description and secret background.
• Arrow: John Diggle and Lyla Michaels are still partners after their divorce. Then they get married again.
• On Babylon 5, John Sheridan and ex-wife Elizabeth Lochley not only get along but have an implicit trust in each other that makes them an ideal command team. According to Elizabeth, they both realize that the marriage was a horrible mistake due to their aggressive command personalities. The divorce saved their friendship.
• Leonard and Penny from The Big Bang Theory are like this during their "off again" stages. They occasionally bicker, but it's clear to anyone that they're close friends. This trope is Lampshaded after their first "real" break up when they treat Sheldon as if he were a child over whom they have shared custody, watching him sleep peacefully after a trip to Disneyland together.
• Downplayed overall in Blue Bloods between Erin Reagan and her ex-husband Jack Boyle. They're reasonable but rather curt with each other, and the first time we meet him, Jack wonders why Erin still has her married name "Reagan-Boyle" on her door. She says it's the same reason people who have lost weight keep a "before" picture. Ouch. However, they still trust each other enough that Erin calls Jack to represent her brother Danny after he gets framed.
• Pilot neighbor Howard Borden on The Bob Newhart Show is friendly with his ex-wife, although his insecurity makes him competitive over impressing their son.
• In The Boys (2019), M.M.'s wife Monique was initially bitter about him rekindling his crusade against Supes and was quick to leave him over it, but by Season 3 she's mellowed out and shows that she still cares for him even if it's too dangerous for them to be together, and maintains a healthy friendship with him while allowing him to spend time with his daughter.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Except for a flashback to when their marriage was on the rocks, Buffy's divorced parents seem to get along fine, and afterwards Joyce recalls their relationship with fondness. The two are extremely cordial in Hank's few appearances in the show. It's only really after Joyce's death that his status as a deadbeat is fully implemented.
• Carnival Row: Vignette and Tourmaline were once lovers. However, though Tourmaline would like to rekindle things, she accepts Vignette's rejection of that after discovering her husband is still alive. They are still close friends.
• Castle: Richard Castle gets along with both of his ex-wives. He likes Alexis' mother, but it was just that being married didn't work for either of them. And his second wife continues being his publisher and publicity agent even after their divorce.
• While they still trade plenty of barbs, Frasier Crane and Lilith Sternin of Cheers and Frasier are on amicable enough terms to have Thanksgiving together without killing each other or anyone else, and when Lilith wants another baby and needs a sperm donor, she comes to Frasier first.
  • In one episode of Frasier both Frasier and Lilith are unknowingly set up on a blind date together. They both end up telling each other that they both have a date. They both end up canceling them to spend the evening with each other watching a movie, both unaware that they were set up together. Their friends who set them up were unaware of their past relationship.
  • This relationship was also subjected to a bit of Early-Installment Weirdness when Martin comments that Lilith was worse than Niles's then-wife Maris. It would later become evident that Maris was two inches away from Domestic Abuse, and didn't deserve, much less attain, this trope when she and Niles split up. In early episodes, Lilith's presence was interpreted as being downright demonic (as a play on her name). Also, Frasier and Lilith had just freshly divorced when the show started (on account of her cheating on him after a really subtle relationship decay), while Maris's foibles didn't lead to her and Niles separating until 3 or 4 seasons later; the divorce didn't even come until he discovered she was sleeping with their marriage counselor. After that, she was considered just as screwy as Lilith, if not more so.
    • This could also come from the fact that while Maris obviously has significant psychological problems (anorexia, surgical addiction, severe phobias, and hypochondria are some of the more easily diagnosed) that she can't help, Lilith is intentionally cruel and cold, to the point that she laughed as Maris read her flowery vows during her and Niles's wedding.
  • Even after some point, Niles and Maris begin to fit this trope, when after the divorce and his marriage to Daphne, Maris comes to him for assistance regarding an abusive boyfriend.
  • During his divorce from Maris, Niles ends up sleeping with Lilith after her husband leaves her for another man. The next time they see each other a few seasons later they're perfectly cordial to each other and make polite small talk. Frasier finds this so unnerving he demands they go back to the snarky, combative way they interacted before their one-night stand.
• Sae Hee and Young Joo in the Korean Drama The City Hunter. They broke up because of his job but still see each other frequently as friends.
• Common Law features this between Wes and Elizabeth. The two are still clearly close and it's implied quite often that Wes would like nothing better than to go back to the way things were.
• Conversations With Friends: Frances and Bobbi dated in the past, but this evolved into just a close friendship (though they butt heads at times). They even work together reciting the spoken word poerty Frances writes. The pair get back together later.
• El corazón nunca se equivoca: Diego and Temo are still pretty good friends, even though Temo is dating Ari and Diego is still in love with Temo.
• Jules and Bobby on Cougar Town get on extremely well, hang out together all the time. It seems that they both think they work better divorced.
• Criminal Minds:
  • David Rossi gets along with his ex-wives:
    • It's implied his marriage with Carolyn fell apart over the trauma of losing a baby. They still trust each other enough so that when she's diagnosed with ALS, she asks him to assist in her suicide.
    • While his marriage with Hayden fell apart with him choosing the Married to the Job part, they did reconcile and resume their relationship years later after Rossi reunited with his and Hayden's daughter Joy only to end it, deciding that they're Better as Friends.
    • His original marriage with Krystall was brief as they then went on a binge together, and later got married at a drive-thru wedding chapel by an Elvis impersonator before annulling it a day later, but kept in touch years later when Krystall invited him to her daughter's wedding, which led to them rekindling their relationship and eventually remarrying in the penultimate season finale.
  • Hayley and Hotch go through a painful period after their divorce, but after some time has passed, it becomes clear that they still care very much for one another. Unfortunately, before things can get as far as "amicable," Hayley is murdered.
• Jo and Russ on CSI: NY. The main problem was that Russ wanted a stay-at-home wife, while Jo is a dedicated career woman. However, the two episodes he showed up in depicted them as fairly friendly and even still had some UST in one.
• An early season of Degrassi had Ashley wonder why her parents divorced since they were still very close friends. She finds out that it was because her father realized he was gay and he ended up remarrying.
• Desperate Housewives:
  • After their divorce at the beginning of the seventh season, Bree and Orson Hodge are on better terms with each other.
  • Lynette's mother and her favorite stepfather only divorced when the husband came out as gay and he even agrees to be her caretaker when they're both elderly.
• Deconstructed with Lance and Maggie in Series 1 of Detectorists. They see each other nearly every day despite the fact that they're divorced, and outwardly appear to get along very well. However, in truth Lance hangs around and does boring domestic tasks that Maggie's new husband doesn't want to bother with in the futile hope that she'll come back to him one day, while Maggie is just using Lance for free labour and mainly keeps him around because she learned about his lottery win and hopes she can convince him to give her some of his money.
• Rose Tyler and Mickey Smith in Doctor Who, though the latter is at first upset when she left him to go with the Doctor but they maintain a friendly relationship afterward.
  • The 2006 episode "School Reunion" broached the subject, with Mickey referring to former companion Sarah Jane Smith as the Doctor's ex, and the ending of the Doctor and Sarah Jane's relationship was framed as a form of romance that was forced to end, with the Doctor and Sarah Jane in separate scenes confirming that there was more than just friendship between the two. Despite all of this, the Doctor and Sarah Jane are overjoyed to see each other and are friendly throughout (indeed, their friendship is reignited and continues after this).
• The main character, Martin Tupper, on the TV series Dream On got along very well with his ex-wife, Judith.
• Emergence: Jo and her ex-husband Alex have a very friendly relationship, so much that it makes you wonder why they got divorced.
• On ER, Susan Lewis gets along well with nurse Chuck Martin after both their annulled marriage and their later breakup.
• Eureka has two cases:
  • Carter's Ex actually shows up and establishes that the breakup was because Carter would always rush off to work, and when she realizes how much a part of the town both he and daughter Zoey are, she's even willing to step aside and let Zoey remain, even though the agreement was for her to return with Abby at the end of the school year.
  • Allison and Nathan Stark divorce over the course of the initial season, but still work together and eventually commit to remarry , until Nathan 'dies' while ending a time loop.
• First Kill: Cal is best friends with her ex-girlfriend Tess, although she confides to Juliette that going back to being best friends hasn't worked out too well.
• Friends:
  • The series starts shortly after Ross and his wife Carol divorced after she came out as gay. Nonetheless, they still get on very well and happily co-parent their son Ben; if Carol wasn't a lesbian, they'd probably still be together. This may explain why Carol's current partner Susan doesn't seem to like Ross much. Though her opinion of him jumps up considerably after he shows just how amicable he is by convincing Carol to go ahead with the marriage to Susan despite Carol's parents' disapproval.
  • And of course, Ross and Rachel. They were hostile towards each other for a few episodes after their breakup, at their worst in "The One Without The Ski Trip", but then went back to being friends.
  • Rachel and Joey briefly get together at the start of Season 10. However, they soon realize they aren't actually comfortable being a couple and amicably break up after agreeing that they're Better as Friends.
    Joey: I don't get it. I mean, I was so sure this was what I wanted.
    Rachel: I know. Me too. Well how come Monica and Chandler could do it?
    Joey: ...I guess they weren't as good friends as we are.
• Fringe: Broyles' obsession with a certain case ended his marriage with his wife Diane. That said, the two are still on very good terms, and he appears to be on friendly terms with her new husband as well. After he finally closed and solved the case, Diane was genuinely proud of him for it.
• Game of Thrones: Tyrion with Sansa, asking about her wellbeing in Season 7 when Jon visits Dragonstone. Of course, neither of them had wanted to marry the other in the first place. In season 8, they have a brief conversation where Sansa remarks wistfully that out of all her husbands or fiancés (including violently abusive Joffrey, screaming brat Robyn, and rapist Ramsay), Tyrion was the best.
• Ghostwriter: Lana Barnes and her second husband Carlo Perretti, the father of her daughter Janine, stayed friends after they divorced.
• On The Golden Girls, Dorothy and Stan's relationship gradually becomes this. After being married for thirty-eight years, they split up not long before the series begins, which Dorothy deeply resents—not just because Stan cheated, but because he refused to tell her face to face, instead having a lawyer tell her over the phone ("a stranger told me that my marriage was over"). At first, she claims that she won't be happy until she's "tasted Stan's blood," but after getting to finally tell him off at their daughter's wedding, she is able to let go of her anger. Once she has, the two vacillate between contempt, sarcasm, friendship, helping each other out with problems, and even the occasional sexual dalliance; one plotline of a later season has Stan propose to Dorothy again, which she willingly accepts (she only chooses to not go through with it—on the day of the wedding itself—because he tries to make her sign a prenup). In the Grand Finale of the series, Stan (who at this point has been married two more times) hijacks Dorothy's limousine as she prepares to wed Blanche's Uncle Lucas to make one final speech to her about how deep down, she'll always be the one woman he truly loves. Dorothy is touched by the sentiment and thanks him.
• This is the entire basis for the show Happily Divorced on TV Land. Fran and Peter still live together, share advice, and are involved in one another's lives. If not for his coming out, they would most likely still be married. This is based on star/creator Fran Drescher's relationship with her ex-husband, with whom she still works.
• On Happy Endings, Dave and Alex try to play out this trope even though they were never actually married (Alex left Dave at the altar). They have many friends in common and value those friendships too much to make those friends choose sides. They do fight sometimes, especially at first, but eventually play this straight, even after they get back together and break up again.
  • Penny was Max's Last Het Romance, though now they're very good friends.
• Hercules: The Legendary Journeys: "Pride Comes Before A Brawl" establishes that Hercules and Nemesis used to date, with him even calling her the first love of his life. We never learn why they broke up, but it was clearly amicable, as they hug upon seeing each other again, banter, and even flirt. Though they have a one-night stand in a later episode when she's Brought Down to Normal, they never do get back together, but Hercules still drops everything to help her if she's in trouble.
• In Hill Street Blues, Captain Frank Furillo's ex-wife Fay shows up at the police station every few episodes, usually asking Frank to help her with something. Even though this sometimes irritates Frank, they still seem quite fond of each other. Part of the equation is that Fay has custody of their son, Frank Jr. Frank's new girlfriend Joyce Davenport is also usually on quite friendly terms with Fay, even though she's a rival for Frank's attention.
• In season 7 of House, House and Cuddy get along nearly as well after they break up as they did before they got together in the first place (i.e. not all that well, but about as well as House gets along with anyone). Until House drives his car into her living room at the end of the season.
• How I Met Your Mother:
  • Ted and Robin break up very amicably with no heartbreak or fighting whatsoever (after realizing that they wanted completely different lives and didn't want to force each other to compromise), and not only remain very close friends throughout the series but it is revealed that they will always remain close friends, as Robin is known as "Aunt Robin" to Ted's future children and apparently interacts with them a great deal. They are even platonic roommates in seasons 4-7, and Ted has promised to be Robin's best man should she ever get married.
    • This is eventually subverted when they realize that they are too amicable with each other. Their later partners express discomfort with their close friendship and Ted especially cannot maintain new romantic relationships. In the back of his minds, he has the faint (false) hope that they will get back together and thus he cannot fully commit to new relationships. By official series end, it's revealed that Ted's been carrying a torch for Robin for years and he's been telling the story in hopes that the kids would support him into asking her for another date after The Mother passed away. Played straighter in the DVD-release alternate ending, which shows Ted and the Mother still happily alive and married 2030, and Future Ted's narration implying that Robin and Barney will eventually rekindle their romance.
    • Even as early as the first "Slapsgiving" episode, several months after the breakup, it was revealed they'd been more or less faking being this and considered no longer being able to remain friends. It turned out they really just needed to acknowledge that things had changed and it wasn't all good before being able to move forward.
  • Ted's parents. Ted's father apprently introduced Ted's mother to two of her later boyfriends, one of which became her second husband.
  • Barney and Robin date for a while in Season 5, but eventually become discontent and break up. Barney laments that dating has ruined their relationship until Robin suggests that they are merely "getting back together as friends".
• iZombie shows that even after calling off the engagement, due to her zombiesm, Liv and Major still share a very close and involving friendship with one another.
• Nate and Maggie of Leverage, so much so that she's the only person he talks to outside team.
• Cal Lightman from Lie to Me gets along very (very, very) well with his ex-wife.

• Lucifer:
  • Not only do Chloe Decker and Dan Espinoza remain friends after they divorce, they seem to get along better than when they were married. They still work together and jointly raise their daughter, Trixie. Although Dan partly blames him for the divorce, he eventually becomes Vitriolic Best Buds with Lucifer, Chloe's current love interest. In fact, Dan actually ships them together.
  • It takes an entire season, but Maze eventually reaches an understanding following her breakup with Amenadiel and the latter's subsequent relationship with her best friend, Linda Martin. She moves in with them and helps them raise their son.
  • "BlueBallz" reveals that Chloe dated a DJ named Jed once. Although it didn't work out, the two are amiable upon being reunited, and Jed is revealed to have named a charity he founded after his Affectionate Nickname for her.
• MacGyver seems to have a new never-before seen ex-girlfriend pop up every other episode, and nearly all of them regard him as a good friend and quintessentially Nice Guy.
• In Marlon, Ashley and Marlon are divorced after sixteen years of marriage and they try to remain friends only for the sake of their two kids. However, it is easier said than done, due to their different personalities, Marlon's wild, reckless behavior tends to clash with Ashley's need of order and peace, not to mention the occasional jealousy when the other starts dating, different parenting styles, and the fear of potentially falling for one another again, all of which could ruin their goal of having a "cool divorce". A lot of the episodes try to focus on them trying to make this "friendship" workout and to have them not go back to the same dysfunctional cycle that ended their marriage in the first place.
• The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel: Midge and Joel are firmly settled into this place in season 2. Played With in that they're technically still married but they haven't finalized the divorce, since Joel seems optimistic about the possibility of getting back together with her once he's cleaned up his act. When they do get the divorce finalized in season 3, the judge is reluctant to grant the divorce because they seem too amicable, prompting Joel to make up a story about sleeping around with other women (with Susie helping him out by claiming to be one of these paramours).
• In Men of a Certain Age, Joe and his ex-wife divorced before the events of the first season. As of the second season, they appear to be getting romantically involved with each other again or at least exploring the possibility. At the very least, they are friendly and have shown up to their kids' school events together.
• Miami Vice: Crockett is still on good terms with his ex-wife Caroline, visiting her and their son regularly until she moves away in the first season.
• Jane and Colin Parker from Microsoap. Their divorce is covered in the first episode but they remain on good terms with one another for their children's sake. When Jane's new beau Roger comes into the picture, Colin is initially jealous but once he gets over that and starts dating other women, he ends up on good terms with him as well.
• In Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers, the Pink Ranger Kimberly's parents are divorced but start off knee-deep in this trope - their one appearance involved the mother showing up with her new flame in a meet-the-parents affair at Angel Grove High. The real Aesop though is that the divorce hasn't affected their relationship with their child rather than each other.
• In the Monk episode "Mr. Monk and the TV Star", it appears that crime show star Brad Terry and his murdered ex-wife Susan Malloy were this. But, as it turns out, Brad's show Crime Lab SF is about to go into syndication and since he was still married to Susan when the show first began airing, she's entitled by California law to half of his earnings from the reruns. Since Brad doesn't like that part of the agreement, he stabs her while she's doing her yoga workout and makes it seem like she was stabbed by a deranged fan while he was outside talking to paparazzi.
• Earl and Joy from My Name Is Earl. Their relationship was a complicated one from the beginning, where Joy got him drunk enough to get a Vegas marriage when she was 6 months pregnant. Then she cheated on him with Darnell and Earl ended up raising two kids that weren't his. She divorced him when he was laid up in traction from getting hit by a car and eventually married Darnell. Despite all of this and a very rocky start of their post-marriage life due to Earl's lotto money, they became pretty close friends and have a small celebration on their anniversary. Earl often spends time with the family and Joy's kids even refer to him as "Old Daddy." This became even more complicated in the last episode when they discover that Earl actually was the father of Joy's first son (due to mistaken identity and Earl being drunk), and Darnell wasn't the father of the second.
• In NYPD Blue, John Kelly and Laura Michael continue to have a good relationship even after their divorce. In a Cracked Magazine, there's a NYPD Blue spoof where they would even lampshade on the fact that these two have a better chemistry with each other seperated than married.
• The New Adventures of Old Christine: Old Christine and her ex-husband Richard are the epitome of the Amicably Divorced, tossing deprecatory puns back and forth between them while helping each other sort through their problems. In fact, they both count as being among each other's best friends. This caused New Christine to call off her and Richard's wedding, as she was upset that the two were spending so much time together, even at the wedding. Interestingly, Julia Louis-Dreyfus who plays Old Christine, also played Elaine on Seinfeld.
• In New Tricks, Gerry Standing is on very good terms with three ex-wives, to the point that he occasionally hooks up with them every so often. At the very least, they all seem very sociable and friendly in general, since the pilot has a scene where he has dinner with them and the four daughters they produced between them.
• NUMB3RS: Don Eppes and Liz Warner. Things are awkward for them for a couple of episodes after they break up, and then everything's fine. Liz even offers advice to Robin when she's having a fight with Don.
• In Once and Again, Although Karen is thrown when she finds out Eli has gotten together with Lily, eventually, they become good friends. It takes a while longer for Lily to feel the same way about Jake, though they eventually get there.
• In The Originals, Klaus and Hayley are this. They had a one-night stand that produced a daughter. Klaus is happy being a Shipper on Deck for Hayley and his brother Elijah.
• The Other Two: Brooke and Lance dated for many years but broke up before the series begins. Lance remains a supportive friend to her, however.
• The Orville: The series begins on a Cold Open where Ed Mercer walks in on his wife Kelly Grayson cheating on him. Fast forward one year (and one bitter divorce), and Ed's career is on the ropes due to drinking on the job and general insubordination when he receives word that he is receiving a command. Turns out, Kelly recommended him for the position, and she's going to be his XO. After a bit of arguing over it, they seem to be able to put aside their previous marriage for the job. Later on in the season, the same guy Kelly had cheated with shows up, and it turns out his entire species is Extreme Omnisexual capable of Instant Seduction through special pheromones... and subsequently ends up hooking up with Ed. After that particular episode, the two were able to reach an understanding, and while they didn't hook back up, they were able to work well together.
• The Outer Limits (1995): In "Tribunal", Aaron Zgierski and his ex-wife Gwen Sawyer are good friends. Gwen, who is an assistant district attorney, is helping Aaron with his investigation of Robert Greene, whom he correctly believes to be Nazi war criminal SS-Obersturmführer Karl Rademacher who killed his father Leon's first wife Miriam.
• In Our Flag Means Death, Mary and Stede end up getting along well enough given all that's happened between them, and they end up being supportive of each other's new relationships.
• In Jim Henson's unsold pilot Puppetman, Gary gets along well with his unseen ex-wife.
• The Ranch: Beau and Maggie have been separated for many years, but never got around to signing divorce papers. Beau lives on the titular ranch, while Maggie lives in a trailer near the bar she owns.
• The Real O'Neals gives a more realistic example in the form of Pat and Eileen, it is extremely awkward as they navigate towards it due to Eileen's clear discomfort with the whole idea of divorce because of her devout Catholicism.

• Emma and Leo from Red Band Society. Leo broke it off because he was afraid he was about to die of cancer; meanwhile, Emma believes he was afraid he'd be stuck with her if he survived. To get around their issues, they resort to a lot of snark.
• Fred and Mary Andrews on Riverdale are still close enough that Fred mentions in a phone call with Archie that the two are having dinner with one another, even despite the two officially discussing finalizing their divorce after being legally separated for months, and Fred even uses the word amicable when describing his relationship with Mary to Hermione. Their bond remains so close, that when Fred dies, coinciding with the real life death of Luke Perry, Mary is treated like his Widow and not his Ex-Wife.
• Morpheus and Calliope in The Sandman (2022) clearly had a messy breakup after the death of their son Orpheus in the past and both of them recognize that they said and did regrettable things to each other during that time. But in the present, when they met again, they are past this and are grateful to see each other, sharing concern and empathy over how they were imprisoned and abused by humans for decades. When Calliope expressed an openness to rekindle their relationship, Morpheus gently pointed out it would be best if they gave it more time due to their recent traumas.
• The Jacksons on The Sarah Jane Adventures. Remarkably so considering Chrissie left Alan for her Judo instructor.
• Scarecrow and Mrs. King: In the 3rd and 4th seasons, Amanda and her ex Joe get along well. His absence the first two seasons is explained away because he was overseas working for an American Government Relieve agency. He is the only one in Amanda's "normal" life that knows about her being a spy and her relationship with Lee. Joe found out when his boss framed him for stealing from the relief agency and killing the Prime Minister of a fictional country. When Lee and Amanda were close to proving Joe's boss was the actual guilty party, he went after Jamie and Phillip. Lee saves the boys and their Dad.
• Scenes from a Marriage (2021): While Jonathan and Mira try to be friendly after they separate, and for the most part are able to be cordial with each other, nearly all of their conversations end up delving into arguments that only bring out the worst in themselves. In the finale, they're shown to get along very well, though both of them are forced to come to the realization that they will never love anyone else as much as they love each other.
• Schitt's Creek:
  • David and Stevie have a brief fling in Season 1, but they get through the hurt and become best friends. He's pansexual, but she is his Last Het Romance as he later falls in love with and gets serious with Patrick.
  • Alexis is able to work with her ex Ted and they get along well, although after a couple of seasons they get back together.
  • Alexis stays friends with and has genuine affection for Mutt after their breakup.
• Scrubs:
  • Dr. Cox and Jordan are divorced from the beginning of the series, but still obviously in love. They constantly snipe at each other, but that's what affection looks like for both of them. It's an atypical example, because they ultimately get back together, live together, and have a child together, but never consider getting remarried. In fact, when they discover that their divorce was never finalized, they both feel so suffocated by the concept that they end up divorcing to save their relationship. They stay together but are both much happier with the understanding that they don't have to be.
  • JD and Elliot try to be this, since their attempts at a relationship always failed horribly. Season 4 establishes that they no longer have romantic or sexual feelings for one another. In season 5's "My Day at the Races", they realized that their friendship was superficial and they weren't as close as they had been before their last breakup, but this is fixed by the end of the season and they stay that way until season 8 when they start having romantic feelings again.
• In the backstory of SeaquestDSV, it's revealed that Katie Hitchcock and Ben Krieg married right out of the Academy, then divorced a year later due to incompatible personalities. They wind up assigned to the same ship, but Katie's now Ben's superior officer. Their relationship is best described as friendly/wary (within the bounds of military protocol), but various episodes have shown that either will go out of their way to help/protect the other.
• George and Anne from The Secret Life of the American Teenager. They broke up when George cheated on her, got back together, then broke up again. Yet they're still friends, frequently chat, and have no issue with the shared custody of their three children.
  • George and his first wife Kathleen are also on good terms, both agreeing that they were simply too young and immature when they got married.
• Seinfeld:
  • Jerry and Elaine were, before the series starts, in a long-term relationship. They get back together after a round of casual sex in one episode of the series but quickly go back to being strictly friends.
  • In one episode George dates a woman who still lives with her ex.
  • "The Bizarro Jerry" riffs on the Jerry and Elaine relationship by having Elaine befriend another ex-boyfriend who is the antithesis of Jerry in every way (in other words, he's a good friend), creating a completely platonic Love Triangle.
• Vasiliy and Olga in Servant of the People remained close friends after their divorce.
• Sesame Street: Maria and David dated for several years, then remained friends after she fell in love with and married Luis. Sadly, David was Put on a Bus just a year later, and his actor Northern Calloway died soon afterward.
• Sex/Life: Billie and Cooper evolve into being this by the end of Season 2. They make peace with each other, respecting the time both had together and becoming friendly co-parents of their kids.
• Shes Gotta Have It: Nola and Opal have a rather nasty break up, but are friendly again later.
• John & Laurie Cooper of Southland. His coming out as gay was a major factor in their divorce, but they clearly still love/care for each other. Laurie risked her job and career as a nurse for a long time to provide John under the table pain killers for his bad back.
• Stargate Atlantis: Colonel Sheppard and his ex-wife Nancy seem to get along well enough to understand how much strain their respective jobs had put on their relationship, and she's able to use her position at Homeland Security to pass along some information to him when he's back on Earth to track down a Replicator.
• Star Trek: The Next Generation:
  • Will Riker and Deanna Troi are this. They are implied to have drifted apart before the show started (primarily because Riker decided to prioritize his career in Starfleet) but remain very close friends throughout the run of the series. They do get back together in the movies, though, and eventually marry, with their relationship continuting into the Star Trek Novel Verse and Star Trek: Picard.
  • In "All Good Things...", Jean-Luc Picard and Dr. Beverly Crusher are shown to be this in the possible future. She even keeps his last name, leading to a moment where an ensign says, "Captain?", and both she and Picard respond, "Yes?"
• Star Trek: Picard: Played With during season 3. Crusher and Picard had a lot of Unresolved Sexual Tension during TNG, but they ultimately decided not to act on it. Nevertheless, she's at least willing to give him a call for help, as the trailer for Season 3 reveals she sent a distress signal specifically to him for help. However, it's later revealed she cut herself off from all of her old crewmates, but she still calls Picard because he's the only one she can trust.
• In The Suite Life of Zack & Cody, Zack and Cody's divorced parents, Carrie and Kurt, are on good terms. They only really fight when Carrie calls Kurt out for his overly slack approach to parenting. In one episode, Kurt inadvertently meets Carrie’s new boyfriend who she looks set to marry, and they hit it off and Kurt even happily endorses him as his ex-wife’s potential new husband, and gently helps Cody cope with it (though Carrie turns down the proposal).
• Subverted in Supergirl (2015). Mon-El and Kara Danvers were forcibly separated when she had to send him into space to save his life. When they meet again, Mon-El has spent seven years in the future and moved on. He still wants to be Kara's friend and Kara tries, but she just can't.
  Kara: (to Mon-El) This is worse than the worst thing I could possibly imagine. That's you looking at me with no love in your eyes. So please just... Please... (walks away in tears)
• Alex and his ex-wife Phyllis Bornstein-Consuelos from Taxi had a pretty good relationship as shown whenever the latter appeared. It helped that they both hadn't seen each other for eighteen years. They even kissed when Phyllis came over to visit Alex for Christmas.
  • Lampshaded by Louie's ex-girlfriend Zena, who wanted to invite Lou to her wedding. Though Louie was too depressed to go, he decided to set things right by crashing into Zena's honeymoon cruise.
• That's So Raven: Eddie’s parents get along well enough but still have issues from their divorce. Towards the end of the series when an episode makes it clear how much their separation has had a negative effect on Eddie, the two agree that they will never let their differences stop them from helping celebrate Eddie’s birthday.
• In Transparent, Maura and Shelly are on quite good terms with each other. Later in the season, this trope also applies to Sarah and Len.
• By the finale of Turner & Hooch (2021), "Bite Club," Laura and Grady seem to be on good terms, thanks to Grady helping to crack the dog-fighting case and save Scott Turner Jr. Grady tells her that he'll always be there for her, divorce or no divorce.
• Elena and Matt on The Vampire Diaries. They are still friends who look out for each other after they broke up.
• Viva Variety (spin-off of The Slate) is hosted by Mr. Laupin and the Former Mrs. Laupin. They even do a romantic musical number together called "My Divorce."
• The Walking Dead
  • Harshly defied with Rosita and Abraham, who split up because the latter is now interested in Sasha and claims he only got with Rosita because he felt like she was the "last woman on earth". Sasha does little to help the situation either, and though Rosita does still look out for Abraham and vice versa in the field, she’s unable to reconcile with him before he’s murdered by Negan.
  • Carol left Tobin with a "Dear John" Letter when she left Alexandria, but when they reconnect a few weeks later during the Savior War, they manage to make peace and finally give the latter some closure.
  • Subverted with Rosita and Siddiq, as the two only had a fling and thus the latter doesn’t mind when Rosita gets into a relationship with Gabriel. He even agrees to help the pair co-parent the girl that Rosita gives birth to, who is his child. Rosita and Gabriel become this themselves when they break up offscreen in Season 11, still perfectly civil and caring towards each other, and willing to work together to raise Coco especially since Siddiq is long dead by this point.
  • By Season 11, Carol and Ezekiel finally settle into this. The pair have moved past the tragedies that led to their marriage falling apart and have overcome their personal battles with depression, and are able to form a healthier, more natural friendship. Ezekiel still flirts with Carol, still interested in rekindling things, but Carol says it’s not going to happen, and even then she’s not too stern about saying it.
  • Magna and Yumiko remain friends after splitting up in Season 10, but rekindle their relationship by the end of the series.
• Toby Ziegler and Andrea Wyatt on The West Wing, who were so, uh, "amicable" he wound up impregnating her while they were divorced, of course, this may have been left over of part of the couple's previous fertility treatments while they were married. It's possible that Andy was impregnated by previously fertilized and stored ova, the actual means of how Andy got pregnant are not discussed or revealed, so it's unknown exactly what happened, but either way, they'd have to be pretty amicable to even agree to it in the first place.
• Will & Grace, who are extremely close Platonic Life-Partners, briefly dated in college. She was his Last Het Romance.
• Lowell of Wings divorced his wife Bunny after a long separation, only to have the split end up completely reinvigorating their sex life. They would end up having to work at staying apart.
• The Wire: McNulty and Elena zig-zag this trope throughout the series. They can't stand each other at first (he even calls her a "cunt" at one point, and in the second season, when he tries to clean up his act and get back together with her, she refuses. However, by season 4, when McNulty has (seemingly) cleaned up his act for good, he and Elena have become this, and in season 5, when McNulty falls Off the Wagon, Elena pleads with him to get his act together.
• 7 Yüz:
  • In "Prosedür", the relationship between ex-lovers Rıdvan and Banu creates the story's conflict. Rıdvan still considers her one of his closest friends after they break up; however, Banu's lingering feelings for him complicate the situation considerably and results in frustration on both sides.
  • Metin of "Biyologik Saat" maintains friendly ties with two of his exes. Nil, who moved to Canada and married a Russian woman named Olga, remains one of Metin's closest friends, and the two seem to Skype on a daily basis. Duygu also demonstrates a friendly relationship with Metin, as she greets him with a hug after seeing him the first time in years. She has since been Happily Married with two children, which makes Metin realize he wants a family of his own; he jokingly tells her to call him if she ever gets a divorce.

Music

• Adele's song "Send My Love (To Your New Lover)" is about moving into this after a rough breakup and ultimately deciding to forgive and move on with their lives. It also has her sending good wishes and blessings to his new relationship.
• Belly has song "Suffer the Fools", in which Tanya Donelly sings about dividing property with a partner ("You keep my key and my lazy letters/I'll keep the angel that you bought to watch over me") and moving apart, but still hanging out together ("I'll bring that terrible wine you love").
• Subverted in the Corpse Husband song "Life Waster". The song seems to feature a situation where Love Cannot Overcome, and some of the early lyrics imply that there is at least some lingering fondness and good will between the two. However some lyrics that come later in the song pretty firmly establish that even if the two initially parted ways on good terms, anger and bitterness have overridden it.
• "Same Old Lang Syne" by Dan Fogelberg is about two ex-lovers who run into each other on Christmas Eve. They either parted on good terms, or enough time has passed that they're not upset anymore because they share a few beers and catch up, and both are genuinely happy to see the other doing well. She gives him a kiss before they part ways once more at the end of the song.
• Franco De Vita: The theme of "Un Buen Pededor" (A Graceful Loser). In the song, Franco is aware that his ex-girlfriend found someone else in her intimate life, but he's okay with it. He wishes her the best of luck, and should she need the advice of a good friend, he'll always be there to talk with her about it.
• Gwen Stefani's song "Cool", which was inspired by her ex from No Doubt. Notably this was written several years after No Doubt's groundbreaking album Tragic Kingdom, which was about the polar opposite of this trope.
• P!nk's song "So What" is a subversion of this trope. While the song is about a harsh breakup full of revenge and bitterness, she and Carey Hart did get back together after some marriage counseling.
• "Every Other Weekend" by Reba McEntire and Kenny Chesney (or Skip Ewing) is about two exes who are sharing custody of their children, but still having feelings for each other — feelings that they can't share in the children's presence.

Podcasts

• Downplayed by Asmoraius and Misroch from Brimstone Valley Mall. They're ex-lovers and are still friends, but argue a whole lot, and still have a lot of Belligerent Sexual Tension, not helped by the fact that Asmoraius flirts with Anything That Moves and has a new boyfriend whom he has sincere feelings for. The two of them can barely be in the same room without sniping at each other, but they obviously still care for each other, and still hang out every day regardless.
• Jonathan Sims and Georgie Barker from The Magnus Archives. They're apparently such good friends Jon even stays at her place in season two, when he's both in hiding and at the height of his paranoia, suggesting she's the person he trusts the most, and she's willing to let him stay for weeks no questions asked.
• Dot and Dale Harper from Unwell Podcast remain friendly after their divorce.

Radio

• In New Dynamic English, Kathy received a phone call from her ex-husband to remarry again. Her response? She refused his offer, and said that he cares about him but not necessarily love him, and maybe even become friends.

Religion and Mythology

• Skadi and Njord in Norse Mythology are usually seen this way. Their relationship got off on the wrong foot when the Aesir offered Skadi a marriage deal as part of the negotiations to compensate for the death of her father, and stipulated that she had to pick a husband from a lineup of bachelor gods... whom she was only allowed to see from the knees down. Skadi was angling for Baldr, and assumed that the most beautiful of the feet had to belong to him. It turned out that the constant salt soaks put Njord far ahead of his competition, and though she was disappointed, they made a go of it anyway. The brief marriage produced the twins Freyr and Freyja, but it turned out that Skadi and Njord were incompatible roommates - he couldn't stand the wolves howling in her domain, while the seagulls in his drove her nuts. They split up, but given that Skadi still considered her deal with the Aesir to be fulfilled and the couple regularly continued to attend divine events together, there can't have been too many hard feelings.

Theater

• This trope is the basis for a scene in Company (Sondheim):
  Robert: You mean you two are not married now?
  Susan: Well, not since the divorce.
  Robert: Then where are you living now, Peter?
  Peter: Why, here at home. I mean, I've got responsibilities. I've got Susan and the kids to take care of. I certainly would never leave them.
  Robert: So, are you two considering getting married again?
  Susan: Married? Oh, no, we tried that, thank you very much.
• In Critic's Choice by Ira Levin, theatrical critic Parker Ballantine and actress Ivy London are on very friendly terms with each other despite being divorced; she's also the mother of his only child. Ivy arrives at Parker's house just before some simmering tensions between Parker and his current wife Angela come to an ugly head.
• The Mrs. Hawking play series: It is revealed in Base Instruments that Nathaniel's wife Clara and his brother Justin have some sort of romantic history. They have both moved on from it, and Justin clearly wishes his brother and sister-in-law well, though they do still tease one another.
• Henry and Charlotte in Tom Stoppard's The Real Thing. Though they divorce after Henry's affair with Annie is exposed, by the second act (two years later), Henry and Charlotte are on friendly terms. They trade witticisms and discuss both their daughter's impending departure as well as their respective relationships. By the end of the scene, Charlotte slyly offers sex (which Henry declines):
  Charlotte: You don't fancy one for the road?
  Henry: No, really.
  Charlotte: Or a drink?
  Henry: (Smiles) No offense.

Toys

• Barbie: Barbie and Ken broke up for a few years, however they stayed close friends nevertheless. Eventually, they got back together.

Video Games

• In The Boogie Man, one possible ending has Helena and Keith end up going through with a divorce and having a pleasant chat at a bar. Then Keith kills Helena and himself, revealing it to be a bad ending.
• Between the events of Borderlands and Borderlands 2, Roland and Lilith were in a relationship, but the former broke it off so that they could focus on their war against Handsome Jack. Despite this, they get along pretty well (though Roland is still somewhat awkward with her) and Lilith seems interested in trying to rekindle things with him.
  • Mad Moxxi has three ex-husbands, two of whom we've met, and appears to have this sort of relationship with them. The first is a bandit named Mr. Shank, whose relationship may have failed due to him being in a Transparent Closet. Even though Moxxi is the one who sent you after him (he was holding Athena hostage), she is saddened when he dies and tearfully oversees the funeral arrangements herself. We get a better feel for her relationship with the series' resident arms dealer Marcus, as both characters are still around. Marcus admits that he misses her sometimes and that he respected the cunning business advice she provided. Moxxi is fond of him but isn't above snarking that paying his tab in her bar does not constitute alimony.
• Mario's original love interest in the Donkey Kong arcade game was a woman named Pauline, but she was soon replaced by his more famous love interest, Princess Peach. When Pauline returned in the Mario vs. Donkey Kong series (and later Super Mario Odyssey), it was made clear that she's still good friends with Mario.
• Dragon Age:
  • It's possible for the Player Character and their former Love Interest in the games to avert this or play it straight due to how the companion approval systems work. Ending a romance can lose approval, but gaining it back is often a trivial matter.
  • In Dragon Age II, this seems to be the background situation for Hawke's mother Leandra. She ran away from her Arranged Marriage to the Comte de Launcet in order to marry Hawke's father; however, once the family is back in Kirkwall, it's mentioned more than once that she's in contact with her ex and his wife, and even goes to visit them at least one time.
• In Fire Emblem Fates, Saizo and Kagero used to date but broke up to dedicate themselves to their duties. They can potentially get back together, but it depends on the player; if not, they'll remain like this.
• In Kitty Powers' Matchmaker, Spicy candidates don't mind if their date's ex shows up, and they'll acknowledge that at least they're still friends.
• In Love & Pies, Amelia is initially embarrassed when her high school ex Joe applies to work part-time at her café to help rebuild it, but her lingering feelings for him after her divorce lets her consider hiring him full-time to try repairing their lost relationship. Joe then finishes raising enough money for his father's medical bills to quit his job at Edwina's café to work at Amelia's not only to help save it, but also to try reciprocating his feelings for her. In fact, they have always been on good terms with each other since they dated a few times in the past before drifting.
• In the Mass Effect trilogy, ending a romance from one game in another usually results in this, since if the ex is a squadmate they're still in the party with you:
  • Played with in the case of Ashley or Kaidan, whose reunion with you on Horizon in the second game does not go well regardless of if you were in a relationship, though in the third game you get the opportunity to patch things up.
  • Similarly things reach this point with Liara after Lair of the Shadow Broker where she'll confront you if you entered into a relationship with someone else if you were with her in the first game, but after that, you talk it out and she's on good terms with you again throughout the third game.
  • Garrus is also very understanding (if obviously somewhat hurt) if you romanced him in the second game and decide not to continue it in the third, and his loyalty to Shepard is unaffected by this.
• Johnny Cage and Sonya Blade wed some time after the ending of Mortal Kombat 9's Story Mode as the only two Earthrealm warriors that survived the events of the game but prior to the sequel, Mortal Kombat X, their relationship fell apart (but not before they had a daughter named Cassie, which is why they try to stay agreeable after their falling out). They patch up their relationship by the end of the game, and at the beginning of Mortal Kombat 11 seem to be on very good terms, but unfortunately Sonya dies in a Heroic Sacrfice saving Cassie.
• Taizo Hori and Masuyo "Kissy" Tobi are the divorced parents of Susumu Hori. If Namco × Capcom is any indication, they seem to get along fine when working together, though there are shades of Teeth-Clenched Teamwork at first.
• In Night in the Woods, you find out that Mae briefly dated Cole in high school, but their prom date was a disaster of epic proportions. (It involved her biting him so hard he bled while trying to kiss him, and him nearly choking to death on paper towels while she vomited in the sink.) Mae is understandably anxious about seeing him at a party, but it appears Cole would like to try for this trope with her — he doesn't bring up what happened and acts warmly towards her when he sees her. Unfortunately, Mae is raging drunk and begins publicly ranting at him. (And then he apologizes for upsetting her, possibly in hopes of calming her down.) The whole thing ends with Mae puking and swiftly being brought home by Bea, leaving a very confused (and sober) Cole.
• In Persona 4, if the PC chooses to ask Ai out midway through her Social Link, in the second-to-last scene, she will break up with him. Unless the PC tells her that he needs time apart (which will break the link), the link concludes with her asking to stay friends.
• In River City Ransom: Underground, it's revealed that Ryan and Cyndi broke up at some point after the events of River City Ransom, but they aren't really broken up about it and remain good friends 28 years later. Alex, on the other hand, is shown to have harbored feelings for Cyndi for some time and is visibly upset that she's living with a deadbeat husband. How deep Alex and Cyndi's relationship went, if there even was one, is not brought up by the game, but it's worth noting that Cyndi named her daughter after Alex, suggesting she might have returned those feelings at one point.
• The "best" ending of Silent Hill: Shattered Memories involves Harry and Dahlia leaving on equal terms, and only divorce because their relationship has grown irreconcilably stale. The other endings, though...
• In Spider-Man (PS4), Peter and Mary Jane had broken up six months prior to the start of the game and haven't seen or spoken to each other since. When they do meet up, they are civil enough to have friendly conversation over a meal together. While Peter wants to repair their relationship even if it's just friends, Mary Jane is more hesitant due to the "baggage" from their previous romance. Peter had been under the impression that they broke up because Mary Jane wanted to focus on her career but in reality, Mary Jane felt that Peter's overbearing and overprotective nature made him treat her less than an equal and she couldn't get past that frustration. However, MJ later admits that her blaming Peter was just an excuse for the guilt she felt over being unable to help him save the day, which in turn caused her reckless Going for the Big Scoop behavior in an attempt to compensate. They gradually fix their relationship during the game and by the end, they are an Official Couple again.
• Star Wars: The Old Republic: The Sith Inquisitor PC gets to meet their companion Andronikos Revel's ex-girlfriend Casey Rix during their Tatooine storyline. They're still on good terms despite having been forcibly broken up when Revel's Starscream of a Number Two led a mutiny and ejected him in an Escape Pod.
• In Tomodachi Life, it's possible for two Miis who were sweethearts to end their relationship on good terms and go back to being friends.
• Averted and then possibly played straight in Undertale when it comes to Toriel and Asgore. In the events that happened before the game, Toriel abandons Asgore after he declares war on humanity when his son was killed by humans. In the final leg of the pacifist route, Toriel and Asgore meet up again after a long time, but Toriel still hates her ex's guts for what he did and finds it near impossible to forgive him, especially after it's heavily implied that Asgore killed several children to harvest their souls so that he could break the barrier keeping his people trapped and go through with his plan. In the Golden Ending afterwards, Asgore wants to make amends and he can be seen trimming the hedges at Toriel's school, implying that the two of them may be working things out.

Visual Novels

• Backstage Pass: John and Lloyd, who are still working together rather splendidly.
• Deconstructed in Double Homework with the protagonist and Rachel. When the story begins, Rachel is still in the phase when she hates him, but she warms up to him again when it’s clear that he’s changed for the better. The two of them can even get back together.
• In Heart of the Woods, long-time best friends Madison and Tara dated for a few weeks while in college, realized it was a mistake, and ended their relationship in order to salvage their friendship. Their friendship continued to be healthy for some time, until at the start of the game, when Madison announced her decision to quit Taranormal, the Vlog Series they'd founded together, after their trip to Eysenfeld.
• In My Magical Divorce Bureau, the marriages weren't mutually agreed in the first place, so the parties certainly aren't amicable towards each other when they come to you. If you manage to address the underlying failures of communication, however, they may be on better terms by the time the divorce is finalised. Indeed, the protagonist seems to see securing this outcome — not processing the divorce paperwork — as the proper function of the divorce bureau.

Web Animation

• Anon has Kyle being this with both Chelsea and Kandi.

Webcomics

• Dumbing of Age:
  • Danny was dumped by his high school girlfriend Dorothy soon after they both started college, and while it takes him a while to get over the shock, he trusts her enough to confide in her about his new relationship and newly discovered bisexuality.
  • Joyce still gets along with her ex Ethan. They only broke up because Joyce realized that it was wrong to be Ethan's beard or try to change him into a heterosexual.
  • Dorothy tries to be this with Walky, but it's complicated because she still has feelings for him that she's trying to ignore because it's affecting her grades (even to the point of setting Walky up with Lucy so he's 'unavailable').
• Josh and Mare are this in A Girl and Her Fed... twice over. And they've been talking about getting married a third time. They don't really do traditional relationships.
• Justified in Girly: Autumn and Chuy get divorced during their honeymoon because Chuy is physically incapable of living a monogamous lifestyle (his life force is tied directly to his libido.) They're technically still a couple, it's just an open relationship now.
• Elliot of El Goonish Shive has two exes who're still his friends. Nanase broke up with him because she was gay (although she didn't realise it at the time, and eventually hooked up with his Opposite-Sex Clone). He and Sarah both came to the conclusion, independently of each other, that they were better off as good friends, and the only potential drama involving their breakup was that they didn't think anyone else would believe it went so smoothly.
• Homestuck:
  • Meulin and Kurloz were originally in a long-term romantic relationship until Kurloz had a nightmare, after which he screamed enough to deafen Meulin. This incident prompted him to chew off his own tongue and sew his mouth shut, and even though the two of them are no longer together they're still very close. Slightly complicated by the fact that Kurloz is seen to use at least some level of Mind Manipulation on her to make her loyal to his religion, which in fact worships the comic's Big Bad, so it's uncertain how much of this is genuine.
  • Dave broke up with Terezi partly because he was weirded out by troll polyamory and partly because the other guy she was being polyamorous with was less than savory, but they stayed friends.
• In I Don't Get It, this is the case with the main character's stepmother, who is still close to the father despite being divorced.
• Inhibit: Julia and Joanne are still good friends, despite the fact that they used to date.
• Commander Badass of Manly Guys Doing Manly Things is still on good terms with his ex-wife to the point of having a barbecue together and casually exchanging custody of the kids after work. As a result, it's a huge kick in the tear ducts when Nomura Syndrome renders the Commander unrecognizable to them. He's also cool with his former team keeping a pin-up of her as their ship's Nose Art, stating that just because they divorced doesn't mean she's not hot anymore.
  • The Commander is also on good terms with his high school girlfriend Spider, and they still meet up for drinks and talk occasionally. Things got a bit strained between them when she decided to go full-body cyborg (the Commander has always been violently opposed to full body-mods), but that seems to have passed when he realized it was what she genuinely wanted and not some conspiracy from the higher-ups.
  • The Commander's relationship with his ex-boyfriend Tank is a bit more strained but largely amiable. Still, Tank has a whole slew of mental health problems and another slew of non-related personality issues which make him... not the easiest person in the world to deal with.
• Ménage à 3:
  • Yuki and Gary, of all people, eventually reach this point after Yuki realizes that her issues have made their relationship incredibly one-sided and unhealthy for him, causing her to break up with him. When they run into each other later they're seen chatting with each other in a friendly way, and when she finds out he has a new relationship she is genuinely happy for him.
  • Despite a traumatic break-up that was very much caused by Zii, Erik and Zii later get into friendly conversation when he discovers her crying over another problem. When Zii thanks Erik for his kindness under the circumstances, he replies that he prefers to remember the good times.
• In Midnight Macabre, Gaspar and Natalie are friendly after their divorce. This is probably because they were friends even before they dated; Gaspar's friend Art, however, thinks it's because Texas doesn't have alimony laws (or didn't, as this comic is set in the 80s).
• In Niels, Agent 250 and his ex, Irene, are practically best friends, and Irene gives pointers to his current paramour, Agent 300.
• In Polandball, Czechoslovakia's "Velvet Divorce" is sometimes portrayed as this.
• In Punch an' Pie, there are several examples:
  • Heather's hippie mother is described as "happily separated from [Heather's] father after the two of them came to the mutual conclusion that they just weren't meant for each other" and talks about him with affection even though they're no longer a couple.
  • Angela eventually meets up again with Seamus, her ex-boyfriend from when she appeared in Queen of Wands, and after spending some time catching up and doing a post-mortem on their relationship are on good terms again.
  • By the end of the strip Angela and Heather have moved into this after running into each other by chance and catching up, and by the end, both have apologized for what led to them breaking up.
• Questionable Content:
  • Marten Reed's mother is a famous fetish model, and his father is the owner of a very successful gay nightclub who realizes as an adult that he is himself gay. Their marriage falls apart due to this, but they remain in friendly contact. Despite being an unsuccessful couple, they are excellent parents to Marten; Veronica's approval for Henry's remarriage is contingent with Marten's. She says that they just make better friends and parents than they do husband and wife. She rehearses a speech at Henry's remarriage about how he ruined her life, but it's revealed to be just a joke — Henry's right there and playing along, while Marten is busy choreographing a Wedding Smashers brawl with the groom. The speech she does give (in 2402) revolves around loving your ex.
  • Additionally, Marten and Dora eventually fall into this after some initial awkwardness after their breakup, and both are supportive of the other's new relationships.
• Rain (2010):
  • Fara and Vincent. Or, at least, they were; they're officially back together as of chapters 41/42.
  • Rain and Rudy still get along well, even after their break-up.
  • It took a long time, but Maria and Emily as of Chapter 35.
  • Aiken and Jess both seem like they've arrived here as of Chapter 38.
• In Something*Positive, Davan and Branwen are a huge example of this. Their breakup was over Branwen moving rather than any issue between them, and they've remained close friends ever since, with Branwen even meeting Davan's new girlfriend Vanessa and getting along perfectly well with her, too. It's really showcased during Davan and Vanessa's wedding reception when Branwen shows up in a t-shirt with "I used to screw the groom" on the front and "now I've come for the bride" on the back.
• In Starward Lovers it's revealed Bakesby and Matsumoto, the two older members of the team, used to date in the past. They're still on good terms (and co-workers), though Bakesby seems a bit wistful at what might have been.
• Ally and Alan in Sunstone had a really volatile break up back in college, but you wouldn't guess as much considering how indestructible their friendship is now. They broke up due to two dominant partners being a poor match, and part of the reason they are such great friends now is that they share common interests.

Western Animation

• Adventure Time has Finn and Flame Princess. They break up in season 5 after Finn manipulated her into fighting with the Ice King and accidentally destroys the Ice Kingdom in the process, and are on pretty bad terms after that, in "Earth and Water" they finally make some sort of amends and agree to stay friends, but even then is still incredibly awkward, due to, in no small part, Finn still having feelings for her. This trope is finally played straight when they really do become friends again in season 7's "Bun Bun", in which Finn admits that while he apologized, he never really understood what he did up until recently and apologizes again, stating to be truly sorry, she accepts the apologies, realizing how much he grew ever since then.
• Carrie and one-off character Azrael from The Amazing World of Gumball are on very friendly terms despite having broken up a few centuries prior to the start of the series (being both ghosts), and he seems not to mind her current boyfriend Darwin's company.
• Buster's parents from Arthur seem to get along when they interact, and Bitzi certainly doesn't seem to mind it when Bo takes Buster traveling for a long period of time (this is the focus of the Spin-Off Postcards From Buster).
• Lois and Jonas Foutley on As Told by Ginger were divorced, though it was never made clear why, but was implied due to changes in their lifestyles. Lois and Ginger can still accept Jonas despite him not always being there, but the divorce has made Carl distant from his father, and this conflict appeared in a few episodes, since he wasn't even around for the first season or two of the show and completely failed to keep up on events with his kids. When he suddenly came into the picture it was as a hesitant, awkward but trying man, and fits with the theory of someone who ran away from a problem but is now trying to fix it, but is aware they don't really deserve a second chance.
• Mary and Warren McGinnis from Batman Beyond seemed reasonably amicable until Warren's death. Terry however had some issues with the divorce and living with Warren, and joined a street gang before the start of the series and was caught shoplifting, prompting Warren to spend more time with both of his sons.
• Bill and Nancy Green of Big City Greens, despite some differences in personality, get along just fine and Bill seemed to be happy when she finally returned from prison.
• Sharon's parents in Braceface are divorced, but are on good terms and both have a new partner.
• Jane and Tom in Daria's final season, after she gets over him cheating with Daria. Daria and Tom at the end of the series.
• In Disenchantment Zøg and Oona end up getting divorced after Zøg's first wife Dagmar is cured from her Taken for Granite state but they actually get along better once they split up. It helps that the marriage was a diplomatic one in the first place.
• Fry and Amy in Futurama previously dated but remain close friends.
  • As of Season 6, Amy and Bender.
• The Legend of Korra:
  • Tenzin and Lin Beifong had a failed Childhood Friend Romance before the start of the series. They appear to get along well enough, and Tenzin claims that while Lin was angry about the breakup at first and attempted to have her love rival arrested, she's moved past it. It's pretty obvious that she hasn't, particularly in how she treats Korra. Realizing this helps Tenzin extend the hand of friendship, after which the two manage to get along better. She also seems to get along pretty well with Tenzin's children with said former love rival, especially after they help her fight off the Equalists. By the end of the show, they’re pretty good friends.
  • Mako and Asami eventually gain this type of relationship as well, which is interesting considering that their relationship falls apart over Mako kissing Korra while still being in a relationship with Asami. Asami's main issue with it seems to be that he lied and tried to hide it rather than the fact that it happened, and she notably refuses to blame Korra for what happened, knowing that she has not been very well socialized. The last time they see each other in season one (and Word of God says this was intended to be their breakup scene), their parting is solemn but friendly and she kisses him on the cheek.
    Mako: I'm sorry things got so messed up between us. But whatever happens today, I want you to know how much I care about you.
    Asami: I care about you too.
  • Similarly, the end of season 2 sees both Bolin and Eska turn into this. The two characters still have feelings for each other, but given the events of the season realize that they simply don't work as a couple. It's also hinted that Asami and Mako are considering getting back together as well, but ultimately nothing comes of it and they remain apart for the rest of the series.
  • Part of Mako's character arc in Book 3 was to develop into an amicable ex around Korra after their breakup in season 2 and come to terms with the awkwardness of being around her, even if they are happy with their friendship.
  • Finally, implied to be what happened with Toph Beifong and the father of her daughter Lin, who turned out to be some guy named Kanto who had never been seen or referenced before since all Toph says about him is that he was a nice guy and things simply didn't work out between them.
• In The Owl House, Eda and Raine dated when they were younger, but Raine broke off the relationship due to Eda's refusal to open up to them about her curse. The two are shown to not have hard feelings when they run into each other in the present day and there's still some attaction on both sides.
• Pepper Ann's mother and father, who split up because he was away as a blimp pilot so often and have no apparent hard feelings between them, even if they do engage in a bit of ribbing. While Lydia does struggle as a single mother she clearly doesn't regret raising the kids on her own.
• On Phineas and Ferb, Charlene seems to have this sort of relationship with her ex-husband Doctor Doofenshmirtz, even defending him when their daughter calls him evil. (Even though he is evil by his own admission.) Doofenshmirtz himself is civil around her and Vanessa, but one can tell that he doesn't appreciate her Deadpan Snarker attitude and remains a tad bitter:
  "...far away from city life/My stupid brother, and ex-wife..."
  • In her first appearance in "Ice Cream, You Scream" Charlene tells Vanessa that "no one's evil" and that their marriage didn't work because they both wanted "different things." ("Was one of those things being evil? 'Cause he's evil.")
  • In the episode "Run Candace, Run", Doof's building is being foreclosed on since he spent his mortgage money on some gargoyles. Despite Charlene being able to lend him the money to cover the cost, he refuses to call and ask her, since she told him gargoyles were a stupid idea. In the end, he does ask her, and she does lend him the money after the obligatory "I told you so."
  • Subverted with their Alternate Universe counterparts in "Tales from The Resistance: Return to the 2nd Dimension"—they are in fact Happily Married and pretending to be divorced, for a number of reasons ranging from protecting Charlene from the law to tax benefits to just preferring to have their space.
• In The Simpsons, Seymour Skinner and Edna Krabappel were this after their breakup at the altar in Season 15, when not spinning in the Relationship Revolving Door. In The Movie they attend a rock concert together, with Edna wearing a shirt that says "NOT MY BOYFRIEND" with an arrow pointing down for when Seymour lifts her on his shoulders.
• Several examples in Star vs. the Forces of Evil:
  • Marco and Jackie break up in "Sophomore Slump" due to the latter figuring out that the former has strong romantic feelings for another girl (it takes Marco a few more episodes to realize that her claim is 100% correct). The episode "Britta's Tacos" takes place over a season later and revolves around some of Marco's old friends questioning whether they actually ended on good terms when Marco states this to be the case, which makes him paranoid about her possibly resenting him. After a tearful apology, an amused Jackie assures him that there are no hard feelings, and that she's since moved on and even has a girlfriend now.
  • Downplayed with Marco and Kelly in "A Boy and His DC-700XE". They weren't truly a couple, but Kelly seems to wish they had been. And while they still hang out, it's clear that she still has some lingering hurt from the breakup.
  • When Tom and Star break up for the second time in "Sad Teen Hotline", he's uncertain about whether they can still be friends afterward, feeling like it would hurt too much to still be around her afterward. Especially since part of the reason for the breakup is that Tom realized that Star is in love with Marco, who is also Tom's best friend. But ultimately, they do end up remaining friends for the rest of the series.
• Rodolfo and Maria on El Tigre, who only got divorced because Maria couldn't put up with the stress of seeing Rodolfo be in constant danger as a superhero. Word of God states that they eventually remarry when Rodolfo retires.
• Total Drama:
  • Gwen was able to stay friends with Trent after their break up, Averted with Duncan.
    • Things were rather awkward between Gwen and Trent, with her breaking up with him because of a mix of his jealousy of her friendship with Duncan and learning he was throwing the game so she could win. Trent was heartbroken to learn that Gwen asked his team to vote him off and was too heartbroken from their breakup to defend her when the other contestants give her a hard time over their breakup. However, when Geoff wants to throw Gwen in a dunk tank full of piranhas, he puts his foot down and tells Geoff that that is enough, he was the one who threw the game, not Gwen, and it was not her fault. Gwen thanks Trent and apologizes to him, with him telling her that they're cool. After that, they seem to move on from their break up and become good friends, as the two are seen hanging together or joking with each other during World Tour's Aftermaths several times.
    • Originally, Gwen had a strong friendship with Duncan that formed into a relationship. However, by the time of All-Stars they're shown to lack chemistry and affection at the start of the season. Eventually, they break up because of a mix of Gwen's attempts to make up with Courtney combined with Duncan's attempts to get Courtney's attention. It's telling that Duncan's more confused than heartbroken regarding the break-up. While she does not bitterly hate Duncan the same way Courtney does, it is clear that the love, friendship, and respect Gwen had for Duncan is gone. Duncan leaves the competition on bad terms with Gwen, as she sarcastically mocks him while he is being escorted away by the police after blowing up Chris' cottage, showing no concern for Duncan's imprisonment.
  • Harold and Leshawna as well when the two break up during the Island special. While Harold continues to remain in love with her and constantly tries to win her back, he seems pretty happy with being Just Friends as well. Similarly, Leshawna, although usually annoyed by Harold's inability to take a hint, does actually care a lot about him and is genuinely touched on occasion by his attempts to impress her (with a few episodes implying she does have some mutual feelings for Harold).
• Tino's mother and father in The Weekenders. The main factor of their divorce seems to be that Tino's dad needed to stay on the East Coast for his job.
• The Young Justice (2010) tie-in comic notes that Nightwing has managed to stay friends with all of his exes (who include Zatanna and Rocket). "That's my superpower."
  • This is true of his comics character as well. Dick is still friends with Barbara Gordon and Koriand'r.

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