OP by Adept
Problem: Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest is explicitly (and somewhat inexplicably, I must say) restricted to examples where the replacement love interest arise from fantastic/supernatural explanations, e.g. clones, time travel, parallel universes, reincarnation, etc., while "mundane" examples where the new love interest is a twin, sibling or merely an Identical Stranger to the previous one don't count.I'm not entirely convinced this impossible vs. mundane explanation of the replacement love interest is at all necessary, and the wick check shows that 24% of the examples are of the "mundane" variety — and this is approximately half the number of the "correct" examples, which comprise 48% of the total wicks checked.\
Proposed Solution: Expand the trope to fit misuse.
Wick check:
Wick check for Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest.Wicks checked: 50/50
Results:
- Correct: 24/50 (48%)
- No fantastic cause: 12/50 (24%)
- ZCE: 4/50 (8%)
- Unclear and other misuse: 9/50 (18%)
- Indices: 1/50 (2%)
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Correct
- Rooftop Prince: Yi Gak pursues Se Na because she is the exact duplicate/reincarnation of his wife from 300 years ago.
- Earth 108: Debra Whitman, an ex-girlfriend of Peter's, ends up with Ben Reilly. She thinks she's settling for his cousin, the reality... is different.
- Umineko: When They Cry - Demons and Furniture: She's a newborn version of Beatrice created with the purpose of loving Battler. Battler is initially cold to her because her personality is nothing like the original Beatrice, but he later warms up to her when he understands she's still Beatrice and she can become more like her previous self given the time which she does.
- Arrowverse: A.R.G.U.S. & Task Force X: He gets tons of Ship Tease with the widow of his late Earth-1 counterpart.
- Heir Apparent: Giannine develops a bit of a crush on the NPC Kenric. For obvious reasons, they can't exactly be together once she's escaped the game. Luckily, he looks just like the game's Teen Genius creator, who shows up to apologize to the heroine personally and seems flattered that she liked the character based on him...
- Doctor Who S30 E13 "Journey's End": The Doctor sends Rose back to her parallel universe with an identical clone of himself.
- Amnesiac Lover: Eventually, Misaki gives in to despair and joins forces with an evil clone of Touma because he does remember her, as she is so desperate to be with a Touma who knows her. Then the clone gets destroyed and she is forced to make amends for the people she hurt while on his side.
- Tsuki Desu: Yukari and Chitose have counterparts who are physically indistinguishable from the present counterparts, who take over their descendants' major character status. Yukari and his ancestor have a few more differences in personality than Chitose and his counterpart. Interestingly, Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest is mostly averted, though that isn't to say there's a complete lack of Ship Tease.
- Roulette Wheel Of Fate: Bingge genuinely believes he can Kill and Replace his good counterpart because he's also Luo Binghe, only for Shen Qingqiu to tell him that he wants the Luo Binghe whom he raised and shares a background with. Even if he has the looks, Bingge is far too divergent in his character for Shen Qingqiu to be content with him.
- Yuno Gasai: Second World Yukki first fell in love with my First World Self, but now I'm from the Third World, albeit with memories of my Second World self.
- Anaprotestantism: Her soulmate, the eon Jesus, then descended onto earth to start a new era and enlighten the pieces of her mind and, eventually, romance his Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest Mary Magdalene''
- Bicentennial Man: As Andrew watches his family grow, Little Miss subtly reveals she has a crush on Andrew, though he is oblivious to what she is implying. After Andrew spends a couple of decades traveling and turning himself into a Deceptively Human Robot, he returns home, where he meets and falls in love with Little Miss's Identical Granddaughter, Portia.
- Aftermath of the Games: Both Princess Twilight and human Flash Sentry tried to do this with the Flash and Twilight of their respected worlds. Neither of their attempts worked though because Captain Flash is too serious for Princess Twilight and Sci-Twi doesn't have the self-confidence human Flash likes about Princess Twilight. Though both learn of the others attempts neither holds it against the other one, and still remain friends with the counterpart of their respected worlds.
- Through The Looking Glass A Spider Man Noir And Spider Gwen Crossover: Sort of, especially due to Noir's real identity. While Noir and Gwen end up together, the relationship between Gwen and Earth-65 Peter was platonic on Gwen's side and she wasn't even aware of the latter's feelings for her. When asked by Noir later Gwen admits that even if Earth-65 Peter had confessed she wouldn't have accepted since she didn't feel the same way for his old identity as she does his new one.
- How the Light Gets In: Some time after Laurel's death, Dean tried to "make it work" with her Earth-2 counterpart and she even "tried to lie" to make it easier, but it failed because the two versions were just too different. Dean even thinks he could try with every single alternate version of her, and it would fail every time because it wouldn't be his Laurel. Also deconstructed, in that it's made clear even trying was a decidedly unhealthy choice.
- Phantom Investigators: Kira turns out to be the reincarnated love of an Egyptian pharaoh. After performing last rites on his mummy, being transported to ancient Egypt and resolving his attempt to force Kira to come with him, it's implied that the New Transfer Student that looks and sounds like him is his reincarnation.
- Clones Are People, Too: In "Journey's End", the Doctor's duplicate is a very different individual from his progenitor and is given a happy ending as Rose Tyler's Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest.
- Playing Beatie Bow: Abigail falls in love with Judah Bow, but they are separated when she returns to her own time. Then Abigail meets a man who is descended from the Bow family and looks just like Judah.
- Power Rangers Time Force: Before he and Jen got together, she was engaged to Wes' identical descendant Alex.
- Muv-Luv Alternative: Goes both ways for Takeru and the 00 Unit/Sumika. They're both aware they aren't each other's real Takeru or Sumika, but since their personalities are largely the same they still love each other regardless.
- Star Trek: Mirror: Mirror Kirk regards Spock as this, and would really like to be the same for him. He’s rather surprised that Spock disagrees with this notion.
- Alternative Gods: Light angsts that the L he has now isn't the L he knew and loved.
- Futurama: Fry hooks up with a Leela at the end, but even if they're identical, when you get down to it she's just a Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest, and the Fry she loved is also dead. After seeing that ending, pretty much every other episode of the series becomes really creepy, since you know what has/is going to happen to these characters.
- Star Trek: Coda: Mirror K'Ehleyr for Worf during Oblivion's Gate. To his credit, Worf intellectually knows this isn't his K'Ehleyr and he can't project his feelings for his lost love onto her counterpart. However, the two still end up falling for one another anyway.
New love interest physically resembles old one, but no fantastic cause/explanation
- Black Dagger Brotherhood: Mr. O obsesses on Bella because she looks like an idealized version of his deceased girlfriend.
- Fushigi Yuugi: Genbu Kaiden: In the end, he is paired up with Firuka in place of his dead twin brother.
- Honeymoon in Vegas: Betsy is this for Tommy, who manages to look exactly like his late former wife.
- Brideshead Revisited: Charles's first love is for Sebastian but when Sebastian becomes more distant due to his alcoholism problem, Charles—after an unhappy marriage—ultimately courts Sebastian's sister Julia (which turns out to be another ill-fated relationship). There are shades of the Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest here because Charles notes the striking similarity between Julia and her brother when he first encounters them.
- The Mermaid Princess's Guilty Meal: Era's father eventually reveal that her stepmother is the twin sister of Era's biological mother.
- The Empress of China: What draws Li Zhi to consort Xiao, is her supposed resemblance to Meiniang. He even paints her in a series of paintings that are clearly inspired by various events from Wu's time in the palace.
- Faustian Rebellion: By making the "truly selfless wish" for Allison to have a happy life, his contract with the devil is voided, he gets to keep his soul, and he seems to end up dating a girl who is Allison's long-lost twin sister.
- Time Hollow: Of a sort. After Kori is saved by Uncle Derek, the ending cut scene reveals a girl who looks extremely similar, and is implied to be his cousin.
- Orphan Black: Project Leda: She starts a relationship with Paul after replacing his deceased girlfriend.
- Sukeban Deka: In the manga, after being rejected too many times by Saki, Sanpei starts developing feelings for her sister Miyuki (slightly subverted because they are similar-looking, not identical twins). Unfortunately, this leads to his death when Remi impersonates her.
- Anime & Manga: Kou and Aoba meet Akane who happens to look exactly like Wakaba, Kou's dead love interest and Aoba's Dead Older Sister. Looks like we're sailing towards Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest, huh?
- Highlander: Lisa Milon was surgically altered to look exactly like Tessa Noel.
ZCE/Not enough context
- The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp: The whole plot turns on this, although Candy never really realizes it.
- Freezing: Holly Rose for Louis.
- Star Trek Deep Space Nine S 06 E 08 Resurrection: Bareil Antos.
- Lover and Beloved: Vanyel's Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest, Stefan, is much younger than he is. Initially Vanyel plays the mentor role to the young bard, refusing even the slightest hint of sexual attraction, but eventually the lifebond between the two becomes impossible to deny.
Other misuse/Unclear
- Doctor Who S16 E4 "The Androids of Tara": Played with. Grendel doesn't really care whether Reynart marries Strella, Romana or an android, as long as he can claim it's Strella, and kill both when it suits his plans. Doesn't explain that anyone's love interest is killed and then replaced with a similar-looking one.
- El Goonish Shive Main Characters: In an odd way she's this to Nanase being a female version of Elliot who she only broke up with because she was a lesbian not because she didn't like him. Seems more like Doppelgänger Dating instead.
- Oglaf: Parodied in "Homecoming", when a woman's love apparently returns after a long time apart. The guy flat-out admits that he's a trickster spirit wearing the form of her husband in an attempt to seduce her. The woman thanks him for his honesty, there's a Beat Panel, and in the next one they're happily fucking. This sounds more like Preferable Impersonator.
- Wrong-Name Outburst: Kovacs is ready to walk out at this point, but Vernon convinces him he needs to stay; even if he's not the man she wants by her bedside, he's the man she has right now. Nothing indicates that the love interest is actually replacing a dead/lost loved one, or that the two look alike.
- Finale: Played for Laughs with Dani's boyfriends, who are all played by the same actor. Relationship between the boyfriends are not explained. Are they clones, aliens, or simply identical strangers?
- Suikoden IV Obel: Louise apparently looks just like this mystery girl, and so his attentions are temporarily transferred to her. Not sure what this is even trying to say.
- Harmony and Valor: Zig-Zagged between Flash Sentry and Sci-Twi. Flash got his feeling hurt when Sci-Twi ignored him thinking she was Princess Twilight and Sci-Twi tries to make it up to him by asking him out. Sci-Twi's friends don't like the idea of her asking out Flash because of him and Princess Twilight already seeing each other but agree to help once she explains that there will be no romantic feelings between the two of them. Averted by the end of the story when Sci-Twi understands that Flash is in love with Princess Twilight and doesn't have the same feelings for her, but the two do agree to be friends and Sci-Twi jokes that he should look her up if things don't work out between him and Princess Twilight. The guy is still with the original love interest.
- Live-Action Films: The driving plot thread of the first half of Vertigo is the mystery behind Carlotta Valdes and whether or not Madeline is possessed by her. The second half of the film (after Madeline's death) is centered around Scottie's obsession with Madeline and the lengths he'll go to in order to be with her again. Doesn't actually show mention a specific potential replacement love interest, doppelganger or no.
- Himouto! Umaru-chan: In the Or Was It a Dream? storyline about getting Trapped in a Videogame from Himouto! Umaru-chan S (It Makes As Much Sense In Context), the NPCs look like people Umaru and her friends know from real life. Notably, Umaru and Kirie ran into NPC Taihei who owns a store together with his wife(?) Ebina... That's it, the real Ebina who found him first after getting sucked into the game too and basically was ignoring game rules and playing house by treating NPC Taihei as a Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest of sorts. So basically she uses a simulation to hook-up with a game version of the love interest?
Indices, Related tropes, etc.
- Spider-Man: In other words, Conway's story is a proto-deconstruction to a number of comic tropes that came afterwards (i.e. Death Is Cheap, Status Quo Is God, Doppelgänger Replacement Love Interest especially as it came to be seen in the wake of The Dark Phoenix Saga)
Edited by GastonRabbit on May 3rd 2023 at 12:26:26 PM
How sweet it is
#27: Apr 27th 2023 at 4:10:20 AM
Calling in favor of expanding the definition.
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#28: Apr 27th 2023 at 4:43:04 AM
We just need to revise the description and then we can close, right?
How's this for a start:
A character is forced to part with their love interest for whatever reason, but eventually gets together with someone who looks almost exactly the same as their previous beau. This new love interest is usually a twin/sibling of the previous one, but they could also be an Alternate Universe version of that character, a clone, or just an Identical Stranger.
If time travel is involved, the love interest in the present is often an identical grandson or grandfather, which also makes for some incestuous implications if you assume they get married and have babies.
See also Doppelgänger and Doppelgänger Dating, obviously. Doppelgänger Gets Same Sentiment for examples of the same concept that don't necessarily involve romance.
Due to the nature of this trope and its close association with Death Tropes, spoilers are likely.
Edited by Adept on Apr 27th 2023 at 6:43:23 PM
How sweet it is
#29: Apr 27th 2023 at 4:47:24 AM
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Looks good so far. Let's see if anyone has ideas on how to improve on it.
GastonRabbit
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
from Robinson, Illinois, USA
(General of TV Troops)
Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#30: Apr 27th 2023 at 5:52:06 AM
I swapped it in since I don't see any problems, but I'm going to wait for feedback in case any of us missed anything.
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Captain of USS Bajor
#31: Apr 27th 2023 at 6:01:52 AM
Looks good to me. Maybe compare it to Has a Type as per earlier but that's about all I can think of.
themayorofsimpleton
Now a lurker. Thanks for everything. | he/him
from Elsewhere
(Experienced, Not Yet Jaded)
Relationship Status: Abstaining
Now a lurker. Thanks for everything. | he/him
#32: Apr 27th 2023 at 11:13:05 AM
Description + StarSword’s suggestion looks good.
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#33: Apr 27th 2023 at 5:57:40 PM
Added the Has a Type bit and expanded the other trope comparison for more clarity.
Edited by Adept on Apr 27th 2023 at 8:01:00 PM
JoeG
Since: Jul, 2010
#34: Apr 28th 2023 at 7:20:37 AM
I can think of at least two cases (Vertigo and The Lady Eve) where the "replacement" is actually the same woman using a new identity. Do these count?
Edited by JoeG on Apr 28th 2023 at 7:21:06 AM
Captain of USS Bajor
#35: Apr 28th 2023 at 8:01:23 AM
If their S.O. is unaware of it and thinks their old identity indisposed, I would think so.
Edited by StarSword on Apr 28th 2023 at 11:01:54 AM
GastonRabbit
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
from Robinson, Illinois, USA
(General of TV Troops)
Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#36: Apr 28th 2023 at 9:10:05 AM
I agree. I'd say it's an invoked example if the trope is being faked to throw the love interest off.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Apr 28th 2023 at 11:10:29 AM
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
GastonRabbit
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
from Robinson, Illinois, USA
(General of TV Troops)
Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#37: Apr 28th 2023 at 9:49:12 AM
Double posting because I enacted the suggestion from a week ago to remake Replacement Love Interest as a disambiguation page between this trope and Replacement Goldfish, since I was waiting to see where this thread went before making it, and since we've already finalized the decision, I figured I'd go ahead and do it.
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
GastonRabbit
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
from Robinson, Illinois, USA
(General of TV Troops)
Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
#38: May 3rd 2023 at 10:23:44 PM
Since the rewrite was already done several days ago and I didn't get any responses, I'm just going to lock up since the rewrite was the only thing needed.
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Trope Repair Shop:
Doppelganger Replacement Love Interest
24th Apr '23 2:12:54 AM
Crown Description:
Doppelganger Replacement Love Interest is explicitly (and somewhat inexplicably) restricted to examples where the replacement love interest arises from fantastic/supernatural explanations (e.g., clones, time travel, parallel universes, reincarnation, etc.), while "mundane" examples where the new love interest is a twin, sibling or merely an Identical Stranger to the previous one don't count. Since there are concerns that the exclusion of "mundane" examples is arbitrary, expanding the trope to include these "mundane" examples has been suggested. What should be done with Doppelganger Replacement Love Interest?
Total posts: 38
I'm not sure if we have enough votes, so I hooked a crowner. Note that I don't think we'd need to do wick cleanup if we expand without renaming, but I did add renaming as an option (though I downvoted it and only upvoted expanding).
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.