Tropes Media Browse Indexes Forums Videos Ask The Tropers Trope Finder Media Finder Trope Launch Pad Tech Wishlist Reviews Tools
Cut List New Edits Edit Reasons Launches Images List Crowner Activity Un-typed Pages Recent Page Type Changes Changelog
Tips
Creating New Redirects Cross Wicking Tips for Editing Text Formatting Rules Glossary Edit Reasons Handling Spoilers Word Cruft Administrivia FAQ
Tropes HQ
About Us Contact Us Advertise DMCA Notice Privacy Policy Report Bug
Go Ad-Free Changelog
  • Show Spoilers
  • Night Vision
  • Sticky Header
  • Highlight Links
 

Follow TV Tropes

Following

Romantic Comedy
aka: Rom Com

Go To

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/csl_5.png
It goes for the funny bone as well as the heart.
"Every romantic comedy should just be called Trying to Fuck. 'This week, Jennifer Aniston and this guy are Trying to Fuck. Next week, Jennifer Aniston and this guy are Trying to Fuck. Will they fuck? Probably.'"
— Patton Oswalt

Romantic comedy, aka "rom-com", is a genre in which the development of a romance leads to comic situations.

Since all it says on the tin is "love" and "laughs", the genre provides large meadows for the screenwriters to frolic in. Many writers have pushed and blurred the lines of romantic comedy.

Many rom-coms use a set of certain tropes. Many feature two more or less equal protagonists with one slightly more equal than the other. The story may start with one character being dumped/divorced/widowed. His/her friends and family urge him/her to find someone. The protagonist may agree to go on several blind dates. At some point, they meet our second protagonist. Usually, the second character isn't an obvious match for the first; maybe she's wild and crazy and he's a CPA. Or he's rich and she's poor. A romantic comedy usually provides a victory of love against all odds. A certain amount of overlap with Dramedy is not unusual. Romantic comedies in more recent years have made a concerted effort to subvert some parts of the genre where possible, present the story in a more down to earth or certainly less light and fluffy manner, add raunchier humor, more flawed characters and occasionally elements of self-deprecation, but in most of them there remains a large degree of audience-understood foregone conclusion.

Every story needs a conflict, and since rom-coms are driven by the quest for love, the conflict derives from the obstacles to the quest. This could be the apparent incompatibility of the leads: mutual Love at First Sight is rare. The two characters will spend a good part of the movie fighting their obvious attraction. Eventually, they'll realize they're perfect for each other. Or, something will pop up; maybe a Three's Company kind of misunderstanding, or a revelation in the third act about one of them lying. One of the two characters will storm off in a huff. Or the couple is already married for some reason, and the conflict comes partially from different expectations and misunderstandings.

The climax of a rom-com requires the satisfactory recognition of love: the other chases after the love interest and does something really romantic to win them back. The reconciliation scene ends with the two characters reunited in a romantic embrace. Often ends in a wedding.

Tropes typically employed in a romantic comedy are covered in:

The usual rom-com main characters are covered in Love Interests. Characters that often occupy the stratosphere around the rom-com protagonists include: Beta Couple, Deadpan Snarker, Gay Best Friend, Plucky Comic Relief. The main characters are typically employed in a Rom Com Job.

See also Romance Arc, Rule of Romantic, and compare with the Bromantic Comedy and Screwball Comedy. Often overlaps with Harem Genre, although those are not always comedic.

Examples

    open/close all folders 

    Fan Works 
  • Best of My Love is listed as this, with the twist that one half of the main couple (Meng Yao) is on the ace spectrum.
    • Lampshaded in-universe by Mianmian, who comments that “that was a romcom” when she sees the two interact.
  • The Demonic Seto Kaichou Is My Valentine: the main source of humor is the shenanigans that happened between Miku and Len by the student council members that set them up to a "date".
  • Guys Being Dudes: The budding relationship between Spark and Arlo is the main source of humor throughout the fanfic and many common tropes to the genre are lampshaded.
  • The Fanfic Knowledge is Power is theoretically this.

    Films — Live-Action 

    Literature 

    Live-Action TV 

    Theatre 

    Visual Novels 

    Web Animation 

    Webcomics 

    Western Animation 
  • Hailey's On It! mostly focuses on Hailey completing every item on her to-do list so she can save the world, but her crush on her best friend, Scott Denoga, also receives major focus, since one of the items on her list is to kiss him. He's already dating someone else, which creates comedy and mild drama.
  • My Adventures with Superman has plenty of sci-fi superhero action, but it also focuses much more than previous incarnations of the character on the relationship between him and Lois Lane, to the point of centering much of the plot on the quirky love story between them.

 
Feedback

Video Example(s):

Black Widow Rom Com

SNL designs a Marvel movie that shows that the MCU is also for women.

Example of:
Real Trailer, Fake Movie

Alternative Title(s): Rom Com

Previous

Index

Next

  • Show Spoilers
  • Night Vision
  • Sticky Header
  • Wide Load

Important Links

Ask The Tropers Trope Finder Media Finder Trope Launch Pad Tech Wishlist Reviews Go Ad Free!
Crucial Browsing
Resources
Top

Black Widow Rom Com

SNL designs a Marvel movie that shows that the MCU is also for women.

How well does it match the trope?

5 (6 votes)

Example of:

Main / RealTrailerFakeMovie

Media sources:

Report