The Significance of Heroes Want Redheads

Not sure if this is just a description issue that needs to be hammered out or if this needs TRS but I feel that the description of Heroes Want Redheads is lacking and slightly contradictory. In theory, the trope is that heroes prefer red-headed love interests because of the Fiery Redhead personality, part of it is also due to the perceived exoticness of red hair.

But then the description goes on to state this:

There isn't always a reason for this; if there is, sometimes, the red hair is symbolic of love and romantic desire, or the author just finds people that look like that appealing.

Which seems to be almost immediately contradicted by this sentence in the next paragraph:

So what is the criteria for Heroes Want Redheads? I haven't done a proper wick check, so I can't say as to if it actually needs TRS or not, but just checking a random folder (Animated Films), many examples can be summed up as "Character A loves Character B, who has red hair/fur." without any further context.

I definitely think this has decayed into "someone dates a redhead", And That's Terrible.

I think the core tropeworthy idea is actually "sexualized/exoticized redhead", but that doesn't need to be couched in a "hero's love interest" framing (especially since redheads in fiction, 'specially comics, are kinda overrepresented anyway).

(A related discussion might be the one for Significant Greeneyed Redhead, where the rarity value of the combo is mentioned)

Edited by Synchronicity on Apr 25th 2023 at 1:04:45 PM

I feel like this is more a Trope in Aggregate than anything, which makes writing individual examples pretty difficult.

I wonder if this trope was, besides comics, also inspired by tropers reading the expanded universes of both Star Wars and Indiana Jones, both of which had prominent love interests with red hair (Mara Jade and Sophia Hapgood, respectively).

Edited by harryhenry on May 4th 2023 at 5:09:10 AM

Well, I got some time to kill so Imma start Sandbox.Heroes Want Redheaded Wick Checks

Edit: Forget 'hot redhead' as a concept, it's mostly ZCE/PCE. TRS Queue'd up.

Edit edit: Does this trope currently cover 'red hair is seen as exotic/attractive in-universe'? I was thinking that could be TLP-able ahead of the TRS to help catch some of the usage.

Edited by Synchronicity on Jun 8th 2023 at 6:37:30 AM