Basic Trope: A marriage that's prearranged by someone other than the bride and groom, usually their families.
- Straight: Alice's parents engaged her to Bob.
- Exaggerated:
- Alice has no say whatsoever in whether or not she marries Bob, and vice versa.
- Alice and Bob are arranged at birth.
- Alice and Bob are arranged before birth.
- Alice and Bob are married at birth.
- Alice and Bob's great-grandchildren have already had marriages arranged for them.
- Downplayed: Alice's parents take the role of Match Maker Dot Com, and simply shrug and try again if a Child Marriage Veto occurs.
- Justified:
- Alice's parents were tired of seeing her depressed, so they found Bob, looking for love as well, and decided that they should get married.
- Alice and Bob are from noble families, and their parents are looking to increase their wealth and/or sociopolitical alliances by marrying their children to each other.
- Alice's parents are Shippers On Deck who ship her and Bob.
- Inverted:
- Alice and Bob are married, and their parents arrange for them to get divorced.
- Parental Marriage Veto.
- Alice and Bob arrange for his widowed mother to marry her divorced father.
- Alice and Bob's parents set them up to be sworn enemies.
- Subverted:
- Alice's parents planned to engage her to Bob, but she asks them not to do anything like that, so they don't.
- Alice's parents have arranged for her to marry Bob, but she refuses.
- Alice's parents talking about arranging her a marriage, but it turns out they'll let her pick her own suitor, provided he comes from "a good family", is of good character, etc.
- Double Subverted:
- Alice's parents plan to engage her to Bob, and she asks them not to so they tell her they won't. However, they actually have behind her back, and Alice is surprised to find out.
- Her parents basically tell her, "Tough shit!" and the marriage happens anyway.
- They encourage her by introducing her to the sons of family friends, or helping her set up a profile at Match Maker Dot Com, particularly if she's getting to be what they consider past her prime.
- Parodied: Alice is always complaining how her parents are arranging for her marry different men, each of them having a different ridiculous quirk.
- Zig Zagged: Alice's parents engage her to Bob, but the marriage is contingent upon Alice and Bob consenting. One or both of them refuses, so they find Alice another suitor. This time it does go through.
- Averted:
- Alice and Bob don't get married or engaged at all.
- Alice and Bob's parents don't arrange a marriage for them (when in-universe circumstances might justify them attempting to do so).
- Enforced: The writer loves forbidden love, so she makes Alice marry Bob, but she is really in love with Charlie.
- Lampshaded:
- "Wait—I'm marrying Bob, yet I've never met him?"
- "Cheer up, Bob. Think of it like a blind date." "The last blind date I went on was in high school, and it lasted about four hours rather than for the rest of my life!"
- Invoked: Alice's parents want grandchildren, and they want more power, so they chat up another noble family with eligible sons.
- Exploited: Alice's parents engaged her to Bob and make a Reality Show out of it.
- Defied:
- When Alice finds out that her parents are planning to arrange her marriage, but she gets married normally before they could.
- Alice refuses Bob.
- Alice's parents don't believe in choosing a partner for her.
- Discussed: "They make a lovely couple, don't they?"
"But they've never met before. This was all the parent's doing."
"Well then their parents have a good eye for this. D'you think they could do the same for me?" - Conversed: "Arranged marriage can't really be like it is on TV, can it?"
- Deconstructed:
- Alice and Bob's marriage is a political threat to their detractors and sparks a war.
- Alice and Bob are trapped in a loveless marriage.
- Reconstructed:
- Alice's parents do remember to take her happiness into account, and arrange her with a nice-but-dull young man from "a good family." Alice isn't in love with him, but the two do manage to become good friends.
- Perfectly Arranged Marriage.
- Played For Laughs: Bob is obviously an ugly Straw Loser that Alice is expected to marry.
- Played For Drama: Alice is forced into marriage. If she dares refuse or run away, she is mutilated or killed. Now that she is married, consent doesn't matter. Let's not forget about the domestic abuse. The parents only care about the political power they're about to gain from selling their daughter.
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