History Main / RomanticFalseLead

%% * Many of the people Sam or Diane dated in ''Series/{{Cheers}}''. Even Frasier Crane was originally intended as a simple false lead...but then the viewers found Creator/KelseyGrammer funny enough that the producers decided to keep him around for twenty more years.

* ''Series/NewGirl'': Reagen with Nick in season 6. Jess realizes she's still in love with Nick in season 5 and spends most of season 6 being heartbroken over Nick's relationship with Reagen. Instead of being outwardly vicious to Reagen, she begins a friendship with her and tries to earnestly help their relationship because she wants Nick to be happy. Reagen is show to be TheAce but her relationship with Nick fails as they want different things and Nick is unknowingly wanting someone like Jess. Most of their relationship was through Jess's perspective with her [[IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy trying to help them work through their problems.]] Nick and Reagen's relationship solely existed to make Jess upset enough to leave the loft which leads to Nick and Jess's big reunion at the end of the season.

'''Schmidt/Cece''': Yeah.
'''Jess''': Am I the architect of my own nightmare?

* ''Series/NewGirl'': Reagen with Nick in season 6. Jess realizes she's still in love with Nick in season 5 and spends most of season 6 being heartbroken over Nick's relationship with Reagen. Instead of being outwardly vicious to Reagen, she begins a friendship with her and tries to earnestly help their relationship because she wants Nick to be happy. Reagen is show to be TheAce but her relationship with Nick fails as they want different things and Nick is unknowingly wanting someone like Jess. Which leads to their big reunion at the end of the season.

* ''Series/NewGirl'' Reagen with Nick in season 6. Jess realizes she's still in love with Nick in season 5 and spends most of season 6 being heartbroken over Nick's relationship with Reagen. Instead of being outwardly vicious to Reagen, she begins a friendship with her and tries to earnestly help their relationship because she wants Nick to be happy. Reagen is show to be TheAce but her reltashinship with Nick fails as they want different things and Nick is unknowingly wanting someone like Jess. Which leads to their big reunion at the end of the season.

%% *''Series/NewGirl'' Reagen with Nick in season 6. Jess realizes she's still in love with Nick in season 5 and spends most of season 6 being heartbroken over Nick's relationship with Reagen. Instead of being outwardly vicious to Reagen, she begins a friendship with her and tries to earnestly help their relationship because she wants Nick to be happy. Reagen is show to be TheAce but her reltashinship with Nick fails as they want different things and Nick is unknowingly wanting someone like Jess.

** "The Cyber House Rules" features Adlai Atkins, Leela's childhood crush and plastic surgeon. He aids Leela with her self-loathing by giving her a second false eye to appear more "normal," despite Fry repeatedly insisting Leela not go along with it (both because he loves her as a cyclops and because he's jealous). Despite Adlai being an IndubitablyUninterestingIndividual, Leela seems happy to be with a wealthy and charming man. She only realizes that Adlai isn't good for her when he refuses to adopt Sally, an orphan with a third ear, without giving her an operation to look "normal," which also leads to the BeYourself moral. For what it's worth, she also calls out Fry for cheering when she dumps Adlai.

** Adlai Atkins (Leela's plastic surgeon), whose main flaw is that he wanted to remove the extra ear on an orphan named Sally. (He was also willing to marry Leela and adopt said girl. Being an orphan himself, he knows firsthand how cruel the orpaharium can be for those who look different.) It gets hypocritical when Leela insists Sally is fine the way she is, only to [[FreakinessShame act squicked out]] when Sally adds that she also has a tail. It's obvious the real flaw with Adlai [[DerailingLoveInterests is that he simply isn't Fry.]]
** Once again, when Leela dates a man who she believes is the same alien species as her. It turns out, though, that he's a shapeshifter and planned to marry ''four other girls'' on the same day!
** Lars, from Bender's Big Score. [[spoiler:Arguably a subversion, since Lars is Fry. [[ItMakesSenseInContext Time travel is involved.]] ]]
** Colleen, from ''The Beast With a Billion Backs'', is Fry's girlfriend and would be this for Leela, But she was only a little jealous of them. So, another subverted trope.

* ''Webcomic/SluggyFreelance'':
** Dex, specifically at the point when he finally decided to start dating Zoe right after Torg realized his own feelings for her. Of course, this was set up right before the KITTEN slasher parody, so he wasn't a problem for the story for long. This did mean Zoe never got to realize what a jerk he really was, although she already [[WhatDoesSheSeeInHim should have done earlier]].
** Leo. Also a bit of a jerk in the end, as he was all right with Zoe's crazy stories about what happened in her life only until it turned out they ''weren't'' lies. Of course, Zoe and Torg still didn't get together after this breakup, because Torg was afraid of getting too close to her (since terrible things happen to all of his love interests) and Zoe somehow failed to realize he had romantic feelings for her [[spoiler:(or that ''she'' had romantic feelings for ''him'')]].

%% * In the Wiki/TVTropes original webseries ''WebVideo/EchoChamber'', [[BestKnownForTheFanservice Porn Girl]] becomes a GirlOfTheWeek version of this for Tom, but [[GenreSavvy Dana]] is unimpressed and knows it won't last.

%% Every example in this "Ralph Bellamy" section needs to be given more context and turned into a proper example as per Administrivia/ExamplesAreNotGeneral.

%% * Ralph Bellamy practically made a career of playing the "dull nice guy" version of this character.
%% ** So much so that his character in ''Film/HisGirlFriday'' is said to look "like Ralph Bellamy." That was one of two different films in which Bellamy played the Romantic False Lead that loses the girl to Creator/CaryGrant, the other being ''Film/TheAwfulTruth''.
%% ** Unsurprisingly, happens to him in ''Film/HandsAcrossTheTable'' which was made before the aforementioned films.
%% ** In ''Film/Sabrina1954'', he plays David, the MillionairePlayboy that the title character (Creator/AudreyHepburn) has a crush on, only for her to throw him over for his workaholic brother Linus (Creator/HumphreyBogart).

%%
%%

%% * Taken UpToEleven in ''WesternAnimation/Ben10Omniverse'', when it's revealed that, thanks to fate, literally every girl Ben has expressed an interest in that wasn't [[FirstGirlWins Kai]] was this.

* Film/Charly2002: Mark Randolph is Charly Riley's longtime boyfriend and he is very keen on marrying her. They live together in Charly's New York City apartment and share the same goals and worldview. Things change when she goes to Utah for the summer. She re-evaluates her outlook on life, converts to Mormonism, and develops feelings for a local [[OneTrueLove man]]. Upon her return she tells Mark that she [[LeavingYouToFindMyself no longer feels the same way about him]]. She also [[ForcedFromTheirHome kicks him out of her apartment]] because it's not appropriate for her to live with [[AgainstMyReligion him anymore.]] Mark is confused but undeterred by this new development; he attempts to woo Charly back to him. But when he comes to understand that she truly has changed, [[IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy he wishes her the best, and they part ways on good terms.]]

* In yet another comic book movie giving us a nice guy example, ''Film/TheIncredibleHulk'' has Leonard Samson. He's shown to be a very nice guy who even gives Bruce some psychotherapy in a few deleted scenes, and while there's no official breakup he seems to understand that Betty and Bruce are a real item and quietly stands aside. Of course, it helps that Samson is a character from the Hulk comics, being Bruce's therapist and another Gamma-powered superhero (though the latter part obviously wasn't in the movie).

%% * [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Lucy the Slut]] acts like this for part of ''Theatre/AvenueQ''. {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d by Christmas Eve in the song "The more you [[{{Engrish}} ruv]] someone"

** For [[{{Deuteragonist}} the secondary couple]], the romantic false lead would be [[spoiler: Tsubame. Ishigami starts developing a crush for Tsubame at the end of the Sports Festival and the question of [[WillTheyOrWontThey whether or not they'll get together lasts for quite a few chapters]], but when graduation comes, Tsubame turns Ishigami down because... well... [[JustFriends she doesn't like him the way he likes her.]] Meanwhile, Iino feels nothing but pain [[GreenEyedEpiphany every time she sees the two interacting,]] making her reevaluate what Ishigami means to her. While Tsubame ultimately turns down Ishigami, her role in his and Iino's story [[ChekhovsGunman was absolutely necessary]] for the both of them to develop as characters and for a relationship between Ishigami and Iino to be possible in the first place.]]

* ''Anime/{{Aggretsuko}}'': Season 2 introduces Tadano, a donkey whom Retsuko meets in Driving School and starts a relationship. As it turns out, he's a rich tech mogul who adores Retsuko and is willing to give her whatever she wants to make her happy... [[spoiler: except marriage; by the end if the season, Retsuko realizes she wants to MarryForLove, but Tadano doesn't believe marriage and kids are worth the time and won't compromise with Retsuko on that front. The two end up breaking up, but it's shown they still care for one another and Tadano may be [[IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy secretly working in the background to get Retsuko her true happy end]]]].

-->-- [[http://strangeplaces.net/weirdthings/analogies.html Worst Analogies Ever Written in a High School Essay]]

* In ''Film/AcrossTheUniverse'' Molly is this, being Jude's girlfriend in England before he goes to the US to find his father and meets the heroine Lucy. Surprisingly, she's not [[DerailingLoveInterests vilified]] at all, and although Jude and Lucy's relationship is portrayed as a good thing, his cheating on Molly is not. In fact, ''Molly'' gets in the last word, ending up HappilyMarried with a kid on the way. She even gives Jude a short TheReasonYouSuckSpeech about how he thought he could have both women. In the end Jude and Lucy get their happy ending, and we can only assume Molly and new husband Phil do, too.

* Katara has Jet in ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'' which stays that way until she finds out Jet's true colors. Even then, she was blushing every time the subject was brought up until his HeroicSacrifice closed that particular possibility off for good. Interestingly enough, Aang shows little to no signs of jealousy towards Jet. It was Sokka (Katara's brother) who disliked Jet because he felt OvershadowedByAwesome.