Romance tropes you dislike?

[Inspector_Spinda]

I'm actually not that picky with romances. If I really like both of the characters I have no problem seeing them together. This is still kinda rare though as in most stand alone stories I never develop any super strong connection with the characters and just kinda find them an okay level of appealing. In general I'd say I'd have to spend around 20 hours in a visual medium to really love a character and ship. The books it either happens instantly or not at all. It can also happen if I really like one of the characters and find the idea of them in a relationship itself very interesting even if the significant other is completely bland.

In general I don't like it when characters don't get along though. If you start a romance with two characters not getting along, to me it's really hard to realistically recover them that in the span of a single story. The exception would be if they were just sort of "meh" about each other because they hadn't spent a lot of time together yet.

[cherrystark]

This is also a character role/dynamic thing. If you establish a character as a love interest (like Lois Lane) and aren't planning a love triangle as part of your main plot, readers generally will only accept the first love interest unless the first love interest is completely removed from the storyline (think like Gwen Stacey/Mary Jane Watson).

The big downside too with multiple love interests, is that authors make the differences between love interests too stark so we prefer one to another. Like how many stories have a girl unhappy with the Boy A, only to run to Boy B. Boy B is the better fit but Boy A "changes" so Girl comes back to him. If the story is a drama, Boy B then goes through an uncharacteristic personality change so Boy A is now the better choice.

[domisotto]

I am so going to use that one in a dialogue

[Inspector_Spinda]

Like how many stories have a girl unhappy with the Boy A, only to run to Boy B. Boy B is the better fit but Boy A "changes" so Girl comes back to him. If the story is a drama, Boy B then goes through an uncharacteristic personality change so Boy A is now the better choice.

I actually know one lol. It's Patrik the Vampire. Right now the female lead has a new girlfriend after dumping her old boyfriend who was abusive

[Inspector_Spinda]

yeah but sometimes it's hilarious. ive never seen it in a romance movie only in comedies. love planes, trains and automobiles.

[cherrystark]

I'm not saying it can't work and be interesting . I'm saying love interests for the MC that are presented as like the bad boy and the boy scout. One is presented as clearly "better choice" but never really stood a chance because of the first love interest.

[GoldenHoneydew]

It makes me wanna commit scooter ankle when romance stories start off with rape and then give a tragic backstory for the rapist as if it's supposed to make us sympathize, which they don't even always do either. Once saw a BL where the love interest got mad & raped the mc and said basically said: "omg I'm so sorry, I was jealous because you were talking to another guy" and everyone in the comments was like "yup. sounds about right." I don't know how other people manage to do it but I cannot ship people at ALL once something like that happens between them. no matter the height, race, age, sexuality, gender, etc.

[Inspector_Spinda]

im not disagreeing with you just giving an example of where I've seen it. and in those types of situations they also tend to make it pretty obvious from the beginning that the bad SO is bad. like the point of the story is to get rid of them. i do think it's a bit cheap because sometimes it's even used to make the new SO look so amazing for doing normal stuff.

[GoldenHoneydew]

twilight is sweating really hard while looking at this thread

[GoldenHoneydew]

I also hate when one person (usually the man) in the relationship has extreme trauma but their SO (usually the woman) who went through something that isn't even that bad is crying on their shoulder 24/7 about how terrible their trauma is. So the man's backstory will be "he was abused by his family locked in a basement and forced to watch as his dad hunted, shot at, and dissected animals from the ripe age 5" and the woman's backstory would be "her brother tripped her on accident when she was 16 and she broke her index finger" yet for some reason EVERY time the male lead would bring up something from their extremely traumatic past the female lead will go on crying for paragraphs about her index finger. It gets even more frustrating when the male lead blames HIMSELF and starts thinking stuff like "omg I should've known better than to talk about that what was I thinking?!?!"

[cherrystark]

I read a story that was similar to this. It was set during the 1800s. The guy was a widowed father of three. His trauma wasn't as dark as your example but losing a spouse is tough. He wrote for a mail-order bride because he needed to put his children's needs first over finding love again. The girl had her heartbroken by her crush, the "bad boy". Her first reaction was to become a "mail-order bride" because she was "broken". It always seemed like an extreme reaction to teenage heartbreak

[AHaplessFool]

It grates against my eyes when I see romance presented as if it's an obligation if you're a sexuality pair and know each other longer than a year. Why can't platonic relationships be treated like real relationships??? It's not "faking anything" by being a friend, and if a long-time friend is in love with the other, but the other isn't, they shouldn't have to be a bad person by saying no thanks. And it shouldn't completely ruin the relationship for the rest of time/until the other friend caves. Long-time platonic relationships (especially with sexuality pairs) without any romantic tension are so underrepresented.

[GoldenHoneydew]

to add onto this, something else that bugs me is when there's a female character that wasn't associated with either the mc or love interest they automatically get labeled as a bitch. Even when she isn't interested "wrecking" the ship- she could be used as someone to represent insight from an outside pov to show them that their relationship isn't healthy but she somehow almost always manage to get the label of being a bitch

[Inspector_Spinda]

Man you guys seem to know some pretty shit stuff lmao T_T

[GoldenHoneydew]

most of the ones i mentioned are tropes that are extremely common on wattpad

[Inspector_Spinda]

AHHH omg lmao. now that you mention it. I used to be a big fanfiction girl and when I think back on some of the stuff I read as a teen. It was pretty messed up. Always super well written technically so I'm positive they had to be adults, but actually quite toxic. I remember a wendy and captain hook ship and it was kinda stockholm syndrome-y.

there's also this one discord x celestia comic that is beautifully drawn but definitely goes into grey areas of consent. there's also this one black and white movie i still kinda love, but the situation is still kind of a grey area. There's a witch who makes a love potion and accidentally drinks it herself and ends up marrying the guy she'd sworn revenge on. he didn't know she hated her or that she did the love potion so it really is her own stupidity, but still it's a bit cringe.

[Namiar]

I am so going to use that one in a dialogue

Haha yeah I actually betaed a story once that had this trope, and the writer altered the scene slightly lol.. I didn't mean to do that, just point out that it's funny to me

[domisotto]

Oh, I was already going for a scene where she tells him, ‘this is not some romcom, you get your own room’, but I am happy to expand the banter for kicks and giggles.

[Namiar]

Haha, if you don't mind, I'd love to see that when you're done

[domisotto]

It’s for the second season of Trapped by the Mafia, so, will come up. I just liked your observation, it rings true and makes the standard scene of checking into the hotel with the last man on earth type of deal more interesting and adds more tension.