Basic Trope: When a character swaps genders, it leads to romance between them and another character who previously had an Incompatible Orientation.
- Straight: Alice and Betty are originally both straight women, but when Alice gets zapped with a Ray Gun and becomes Andy, she (he?) hooks up with Betty.
- Exaggerated: There was originally No Hugging, No Kissing, but then everyone in the cast changes gender, and then everyone hooks up with one another.
- Downplayed When Alice becomes Andy, Betty starts crushing on him, but they don't become a couple.
- Justified:
- Betty originally saw Alice as a Stupid Sexy Flanders.
- Andy looks just like the kind of man Betty is attracted to.
- Alice was bisexual and had feelings for Betty, but Betty was straight. Now that Alice is Andy, they can be together.
- Inverted: Alice and Betty are a lesbian couple, who break up when Alice becomes Andy.
- Subverted: After Alice becomes Andy, he and Betty are teased as a couple, but never actually get together.
- Double Subverted: ...Until later in the season, that is.
- Parodied: Alice is Betty's Abhorrent Admirer, and everything she does makes Betty even more unlikely to date her. Then Alice turns into Andy, and while he still does all the same things she used to do, Betty is smitten.
- Zigzagged:
- Alice is a Sex Shifter who keeps changing between herself and Andy, and which version, if any, that Betty is attracted to varies Depending on the Writer.
- Alice turns into Andy, and then gets a Will They or Won't They? plot with Betty.
- Averted:
- Alice stays a woman.
- Alice does turn into Andy, but there's still no hint of romance with Betty.
- Enforced: The meddling executives demand more romance, so the writers decide to add it to the Andy subplot.
- Lampshaded: "Whoa, you're so hot now that you're a man!"
- Invoked: Betty is noticeably more affectionate to Alice as Andy than when she wasn't genderbent.
- Exploited: Andy was already pining for Betty when living as a woman, and deliberately genderbends because Betty is into men. Alternatively, Betty genderbends Alice because why not date the closest person to her?
- Defied:
- Alice refuses to test out the gender-bending ray gun, as she doesn't want unwanted advances from women.
- Betty is either amused or offended that Alice thinks gender was the only barrier to dating her. Sure she's sexually attracted to men, but that doesn't mean that she'll immediately take off with the one that's closest to her simply because of his gender.
- Discussed: "If I were a man, would you find me hot?"
- Conversed: "How come whenever characters swap genders, it's instant romance!?"
- Implied: Betty is seen making goo-goo eyes at Andy.
- Deconstructed: Andy dislikes the newfound attention he gets from Betty now that he’s a man, Betty questions her sexuality, and both parties worry that their relationship will ruin their friendship, and that the relationship won’t last if Andy ever finds a way to change back.
- Reconstructed: ???
- Played for Laughs: ???
- Played for Drama: ???
- Played for Horror: Betty rapes Andy.
Back to Jumping the Gender Barrier.
