Strangled By The Red String / Anime & Manga

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• This is actually the premise of The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, Really Love You. As the title suggests, the protagonist, Rentarou Aijou, is destined to have 100 soulmates, who will all fall in love with him the instant they make eye contact with him. The manga handles this by being a Deconstructive Parody of the Harem Genre.
• Aquarion Evol has Kagura and Zessica. Both spent all the story chasing after their respective love interest, and never had any single interaction in the entire show. Come the final episode, both of them get rejected and suddenly they are interested in each other. It all looked very forced, starting with Kagura suddenly saying he thinks Mikono and Amata make a lovely couple when one episode ago he was fighting Amata over her and screaming about never giving her up to anyone. It was obvious they did this to get them out of the Official Couple's way, but for it to make sense you'd have to forget everything about Kagura and Zessica's whole character and everything that happened before.
• In all adaptations of Area 88, flashbacks show Ryoko falling in love with Shin after only having known him a few minutes. The two characters have nothing in common, and neither one understands what makes the other tick. The sole purpose of the relationship seems to be that Shin will have someone to pine for during his involuntary servitude at Area 88.
• Blood-C: Deconstructed with Saya and Tokizane. At first, they don't have any meaningful conversation until Tokizane witnessed Saya's slaying of the Elder Bairn at episode 7. By then, he kept Saya's secret and after the school massacre in episode 9, he comforts Saya and confesses his feelings to her which Saya lampshades why. Until the last two episodes revealed that Tokizane is just hired to play as the "brooding love interest" and he hates it because he only wants money and dislikes Saya's nature.
• At the very end of Boku no Futatsu no Tsubasa the long series of romantic arcs end with Mako and Hiromi ending up together which had never been hinted at all and Hiromi is the very reason Mako comes back to Earth — instead of going down the cousin/sister relationship route that had been developing since the start.
• Daikichi and his own daughter figure Rin in the Bunny Drop manga. They have a very strong bond throughout the manga, yes, however, it's not presented as anything but familial until after the timeskip.
• Ceres, Celestial Legend:
  • From the first moment Aya and Touya meet it's obvious that they would be the Official Couple, but the whole thing happens too fast and very awkwardly. Basically, they've had at least five minutes of interaction in different scenarios until Touya takes Aya to his apartment where she suddenly declares that she loves him. Slightly justified by him being an evolved life form made out of a divine energy ball and was basically wired to serve and protect his family, hence the instant love for application of this instinct.
  • Aya and Yuuhi come across as this in the final chapter. Yuuhi has been in love with Aya the entire series, with hints of him and Chidori as a potential couple at times, and he seems to have accepted Aya and Touya being together. Then the final chapter has Touya telling Yuuhi that he was likely going to die soon and that Yuuhi should take care of Aya and their child when that happens.
• Claudine: Claude and Sirène's relationship doesn't get much if any development despite how she seems to accept his transness without much trouble and their bond being portrayed as the deepest, most meaningful romance of Claude's life.
• Ohgi and Villetta of Code Geass, hoo boy. The former falls in love with the latter even though she is a Britannian spy under amnesia. Even after she tries to kill him after regaining her memories, all it takes for their relationship to continue is Ohgi shielding Villetta from kunais thrown by Sayoko. Not to mention that Villetta was spying on Lelouch, keeping him from going back into the rebellion full-stop for the sake of her being a Baroness, and Ohgi later takes her spotty evidence on him regarding Geass to heart in betraying him. It's not so much about it being an unbelievable romance plot as it is a serious Out-of-Character Moment for Ohgi, who has let his love for Villetta go to his head, and trust the latter, who isn't the most reliable source of information, over Lelouch, who while questionable himself, has still done more good than bad for the Black Knights, and never even gets the chance to explain himself.
• Codename: Sailor V: We're supposed to feel heartbroken along with Venus when she kills Danburite as she tearfully questions, "Is it my fate to kill the man I love?". However, when one takes into account that Minako had only spent several days with him as Ace and had only been helped by him twice as Phantom Ace, her grief over having to kill someone she "loved" isn't taken seriously since in actuality, Minako is being overdramatic over an infatuation. While she had done so before in previous chapters, those were Played for Laughs while this one is supposed to be taken seriously. Not even during the era of the Silver Millennium were Venus and Adonis together since she never noticed him, having already been in a relationship with Kunzite.
• Cross Ange: Tusk has been accused by many of being a self-insert for the sake of getting together with Ange. That Episode 14 was written in halfway through did not help things.
• The relationship between Johnny Burnett and Eida Rosso in Dancougar Nova comes out of nowhere, feels rushed and never serves much of a purpose.
• DARLING in the FRANXX:
  • Viewers have found it difficult to support the romance between Kokoro and Mitsuru due to its somewhat weak setup. Kokoro gives several "longing looks" at him, expresses some concern for him, and seems to enjoy talking to him, while Mitsuru brushes her off for most of the first half until significantly later into the series run time. Meanwhile, Kokoro and Futoshi seemed to have a good relationship prior to the switching of Kokoro and Ikuno, and her desire to switch comes out of nowhere after making a promise to Futoshi almost five minutes before said switch. The second half worked to give them more scenes together, but the amnesia plot undid some of that development in some fans eyes; Mitsuru never regains any of his memories of falling in love with Kokoro at all, but still decides to stay with her for their child's sake, making it an almost literal example of this by the end.
  • While some fans were happy to see that Ikuno has companionship in Naomi as an adult, others felt it was a heavy case of Last-Minute Hookup, given that the two didn't interact much even when Naomi was with Plantation 13, and she's the only named side character to wake up, making some fans think she was awoken just to make sure Ikuno doesn't end up alone.
  • For some critics, Hiro and Zero Two feel like this, especially in the second half. While the anime makes an attempt to establish their relationship from the beginning, for some the relationship seemed too shallow for anything to feel legitimate and that bland character writing kept Hiro from making their interactions genuinely interesting. And while Episode 13 is praised, the second half only made the red string tighter. Once she actually gets together with Hiro, Zero Two lost a lot of what made her stand out among the rest of the cast. In addition, most of their shared screentime is exchanging a lot of "I love yous" and "Darlings". Both points are criticized for taking away any chemistry the two of them may have had and laying on near obnoxious reminders that the two of them are in love without having actual displays of believable chemistry and realistic interactions. By the end, it can feel like the only reason the viewer should think Hiro and Zero Two are in love is because the narrative is forcing them to, rather than having them form a more believable relationship.
  • Despite the fact that she unambiguously rejected him twice during the series itself, Ichigo is married to and starting a family with Goro by the Distant Finale. It makes some viewers believe that the only reason they do get together in the end is to further hammer in the family moral. One would think that she would have some bigger issues to get over before this (namely, that the person she actually loved sacrificed himself for her and the rest of the cast), but it's all handled offscreen.
• Digimon Adventure 02:
  • Yamato and Sora are the primary Official Couple of both Digimon Adventure and Adventure 02 and are an exceptionally complicated example that generates rage to this day. Head director Hiroyuki Kakudou always intended to pair Yamato and Sora off because he considered it a cliché to pair the male and female leads. However, because the series was never actually about relationships, their intended romance was never openly developed and was given only a smattering of subtle foreshadowing. Unfortunately, Kakudou's intentions were stymied repeatedly due to trying to balance Sora and Yamato's future romance with Sora and Taichi's current friendship, Creative Differences he had with other series contributors, and the fact that he had a bad habit of not sharing his plans with the other creators; many of the voice actors themselves related surprise and disbelief about Sora and Yamato pairing, including Sora's seiyuu Yuko Mizutani.
    • In fact, where Kakudou wasn't directly involved, the creative trend inevitably slid towards developing Taichi and Sora. Mamoru Hosoda, another major series director, introduced an explicit romantic subplot between them in Our War Game, rife with Ship Tease. The staff behind the Fox Kids dub, including head writer Jeff Nimoy, openly preferred them as a pair, which they considered to be the more plausible couple, and stuck with the portrayal of them as a hinted future couple (ex. when Sora's Crest of Love first glows, Taichi says, "I want some of Sora's love, too," and Tai says in the dub, "I felt something — I think it was your love shining through"). Back on Kakudou's end, efforts were taken to ensure his vision, which led to the infamous Christmas Episode in which Sora and Yamato, who were now Out of Focus along with the rest of the original cast, became the series' Official Couple, creating a spontaneous Love Triangle with a tragic outcome for Taichi in both versions, just with Filling the Silence in the dub. At this point the case of Platonic Writing, Romantic Reading was growing out of control, leading to the franchise producing supplementary materials and the drama CDs trying to develop it; the Digimon Adventure PSP game recast the whole affair as a love triangle, which was completely against Kakudou's vision.
  • The second official pairing Ken and Miyako doesn't fare much better. Yes, she expressed interest in him earlier, but only barely interacted with him for the rest of the show. Their marriage appears to have been an example of a Real Life Writes the Plot Casting Gag; they were paired off in the Distant Finale because their seiyuu got along so well with each other.
• DNA²:
  • Played with between Junta and Karin. Karin always planned that, once she found a guy she wanted to settle down with, she'd simply shoot him with a DMC bullet that altered him in a way to love her. And when Junta shows interest in Karin, she thinks she accidentally shot him with said bullet. It turns out to not be the case and their mutual feelings come from themselves.
  • Played straight with Junta and Ami. The two have been friends since they were children, with Ami obviously carrying a torch for him, but not saying anything and Junta simply seeing her as a childhood friend. At the end of the story, Karin decides to return to the future and shoots Junta with one last DMC bullet to remove the playboy DNA and any memory of her and the events that transpired, with Junta last seen meeting Ami.
• Doctor Slump: A lampshaded and Played for Laughs example. In early chapters, Senbei and Midori have an embarrassing stalker/Lust Object type of relationship and Midori seems mostly oblivious to Senbei's love for her. Then at some point, there was an Accidental Proposal while Midori was in the bathroom: she overhears, immediately accepts, and the next thing you know, the two are hitched. They are Happily Married for the rest of the series. This was intentional since the author explicitly stated he doesn't like writing romances. Downplayed in later chapters since Arale/Obotchaman, Taro/Tsururin, and Akane/Tsukutsun have slightly more developed relationships (Word of God stated that all these relationships were his editor's ideas).
• Most pairings in Dragon Ball Z and its continuities (though Gohan/Videl actually averts it, since the two take a while to develop their feelings). A few characters marry and have kids during the series's frequent time skips with little on-screen development. To the author's credit, the reason for the lack of development is because he's stated in interviews that he doesn't care for romance, and most of the couples hook up during a Time Skip of several years, allowing the readers' imaginations to run wild.
  • Vegeta and Bulma actually became a fan-favorite relationship partly due to this trope. The romantic competition (poor Yamcha) was dumped so suddenly, and the sudden hook up was so unlikely (they had barely spoken, and he had killed her boyfriend and many of her friends) that it ended up being hilarious, and left a lot of space for people to make stuff up. It helps that they didn't actually get legally married — they just hooked up and had a kid together, and it took a while for their relationship to become an actual loving one.
• While Natsu and Lucy of Fairy Tail have yet to become an Official Couple, signs of this trope are becoming clear in the sequel, Fairy Tail: 100 Years Quest. Any romantic undertones between the two are only truly apparent via two separate pairs of doppelgangers that are stated romantic relationships (Nack and Lucia of Fairy Nail, and Natsu Dragion and Lucy Ashley of Edolas Fairy Tail). This implies that Because Destiny Says So is in effect with their relationship, in spite of their strong platonic bond throughout the original series.
• The relationship between Sieg and Jeanne in Fate/Apocrypha is easily the most common critique of it. On one end, a Blank Slate with no discernible personality to start with that is effectively "maturing" as he experiences life and the war. On the other, a sainted virgin sworn away from romance and with massive responsibilities bearing down on her. Time it takes for Jeanne to start crushing on Sieg, a state she'll be in for the rest of the series: the same episode she meets him in. Granted, Jeanne's personality is being influenced by her human host (though Laeticia herself denies influencing Jeanne's romantic feelings directly), and it takes up to Jeanne's sacrifice before Sieg truly begins to understand how he feels about her outside of "friendship" (making it more of a one-sided crush). Jeanne even angsts about her feelings in private and is even pushed into a Heroic BSoD by a Breaking Speech where one of the villains points out as a holy maiden she shouldn't be falling for anyone. It's only by the Distant Finale (where Sieg has spent untold years mulling over the events of the series and his feelings while Jeanne has been trying endlessly to reach him) do both of them finally admit their feelings for each other — but it's still barely elaborated why they have feelings for each other, outside of being the male and female leads.
• First Love Monster: Arashi doesn't care about his girlfriend and seems only interested in his creepy Otaku interests, and Chiaki looks more like she's putting up with him than in love with him. The latter even flat-out says she only stays with him because of his looks.
• The ending of Hayate the Combat Butler heavily implies that Hayate and Nagi become an Official Couple, which is odd since it was just 7 chapters ago that it was established he doesn't love her, which is what kicked off the finale in the first place.
• I Belong to the Baddest Girl at School: Tatsuku randomly decides he likes Aika after having interacted two times at best with her before his confession.
• Karate Shoukoushi Kohinata Minoru: Some of the early couples can look like this given how little development they were given initially. Mutou/Haruka and Mamiya/Yukiko were the ones that stood out the most. While the former advanced pretty quickly, the latter is actually the slowest-growing couple.
• Kiss of the Rose Princess: The endgame couple is Kaede and Anis, but several chapters ago, Anis was reluctant to admit her feelings, so this sudden development is a little unrealistic.
• Mewkledreamy: Ackey's crush on Yume at the end of episode 14 of Mix comes across as this to some people, the show treated it as Love at First Sight, but he interacted with her a few times before and didn’t seem to have any kind of affection towards her until this episode.
• Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch: Caren with Subaru, an anime-only character probably introduced only so people would stop slashing her with her sister.
• The original Mobile Suit Gundam has Amuro Ray and Lalah Sune, who despite being on opposite sides of a war, instantly fall in love the first time they meet. It's justified in-universe by their Psychic Powers causing them to mindlink and thus know each other better than they know anybody else, but that doesn't make the relationship anymore real to the audience or give us a reason to care about them.
• Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam:
  • Newtype romance ended up becoming a staple of the franchise, with one of the most blatant examples being Kamille Bidan and Four Murasame. They spend about twenty minutes in each other's company and suddenly can't live without each other, despite being opposite sides, and Four at least was initially characterised as a borderline psychopath and only got Hidden Depths later (whereas Lalah at least was a Nice Girl). Many fans like the relationship despite this, not least for the Character Development it forces onto the previously-unlikable Kamille.
  • Amuro and Beltorchika Irma are making out for the third time an episode after meeting, though this is somewhat justified in that Amuro was trying to unconsciously use Beltorchika as an "excuse" to not go into space and relive the utter trauma he was into. In Amuro's next appearance, he is already with Chan Agi, another girl he barely talks to — apparently, because of Executive Meddling that didn't let the creators use Beltorchika's character as Amuro's CCA girlfriend. Notably, Yoshiyuki Tomino penned a novelization of Char's Counterattack called Beltorchika's Children, which was specifically written to be adapted as a film (Sunrise instead chose to adapt High Streamer, an earlier work of Tomino's); in it, Beltorchika appears in Chan's place and assumes her role, only she is explicitly noted to be pregnant with Amuro's child and survives the events of the novel as opposed to Chan in CCA proper.
• In Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny, Shinn and Lunamaria who up to then had been Just Friends get together right after he has apparently killed her previous love interest and her little sister. It can be argued that Lunamaria was suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and neither she nor Shinn was thinking straight, but even fans of the pairing dislike how they actually hooked up. Making this somewhat more prickly is the Word of God statement from director Mitsuo Fukuda that their relationship was the only pure one in the whole series, which fans of the other couples took as a giant middle finger. Since Kenichi Suzumura and Maaya Sakamoto (Shinn and Lunamaria's VAs, respectively) got married in real life in 2011, this became both Hilarious and Heartwarming in Hindsight.
• This is especially prevalent with Asemu Asuno and Romary Stone in Mobile Suit Gundam AGE: After joining the military, they very rarely interact on-screen and neither of them seems to get past the point of "I like you but what are words" for the whole series, plus Romary has feelings for both him and Zeheart. To resolve this, there is a flashback to one conversation between them in Episode 28 and then the generation ends with the wedding. It does not help either, though, that Asemu and Romary's relationship was already more of a default given than anything else right from the beginning: Their son in the Third Generation, Kio, had been leaked to have Romary's hair color even before the entire series has started airing in the first place.
• Naruto: The second-to-last chapter of the original Naruto series seems to imply that Ax-Crazy Rival Turned Evil Sasuke has finally seen the error of his ways, and will try to make amends for the horrible way he has treated his former teammate Sakura, who has gone through hell on account of her irrationally persistent love for him. The Distant Finale reveals that Sasuke and Sakura ended up married and had a daughter together. Theoretically, this might have made logical sense given the time scale, but from the viewers' perspective, one moment Sasuke was trying to kill Sakura, showing utter indifference for her well-being and openly rejecting her (even invoking What Does She See in Him? on himself), and the next moment he was married to her. Back at the beginning of the series, it was pretty clear that Sakura was crushing on him, but it never came across as genuine love; they never shared a real conversation in the manga, and Sakura's feelings seemed to basically amount to "he's really strong and really hot." By the later parts Sasuke had become so hostile to Sakura that this sudden turn to marriage and offspring was completely unpredictable and impossible to understand unless you were wearing Shipping Goggles. This does end up being acknowledged more in Naruto Gaiden and its Boruto anime arc adaptation, where the faults of the relationship are brought under the spotlight and explored, even if they aren't quite resolved.
• Ocean Waves: Throughout the movie, Ritsuko does absolutely nothing good to Taku: She lies to him to borrow money, drags him on a flight to Tokyo, gets drunk in his room forcing him to spend the night in a bathtub, poses him as her boyfriend without his consent, lets the gossip about their trip spread around, and rejects his best friend Yutaka in a very rude way ("I hate boys speaking the Kouchi dialect"). The last times they talk to each other end with slaps to the face. Yutaka's comment that Taku "has been in love with her all along" comes off like an Ass Pull because the two barely share any moment that can be considered romantic. When Taku is looking up at the castle and wishing that Rikako was there with him, we get a montage of some of her main lines from the movie. About half of them are her being rude to him, most of the others are about her own issues, with only one or two that could possibly be seen as affectionate.
• Adette and Gouly from Overman King Gainer are both leaders of their respective squads but do not talk much and never have a romantic moment until the final two episodes. Adette kisses Gouly to awaken him from being Brainwashed and Crazy and the next episode sees her holding him and flirting with him. The only setup is the fact that Adette loves strong men, and Gouly is a badass ninja. Apparently, the Banpresto developers did not like the handling of the Adette/Gouly pairing; in Super Robot Wars K, this ship is unceremoniously sunk when Adette gets back with her previous love interest after the Overdevil's defeat.
• Phantom Thief Jeanne: Neither Yashiro and Kagura, nor Yamato and Miyako share any on-screen or on-page chemistry or romantic foreshadowing before confessing their love for each other.
• Ranma ½:
  • Apparently the demand for Ryoga to get a happy ending led to the creation of Akari Unryu, who is so perfect for Ryoga, and shows up few times in her subsequent appearances.
  • Mousse got some major attempts at redeeming his character, which can actually come off as rather jarring due to spending the early series trying to kill Ranma, and once boasted along the lines that he would gladly break any rules and forsake any honor to get Shampoo, though Shampoo never changed her opinion of him — while she did occasionally show him some "soft" moments, she spent most of the series outright abusing him and on one occasion was perfectly willing to go and play video games while abandoning him to what she believed would be certain death at the hands of a life-sapping demon.
  • Ukyo got an (attempted) and very literal Last-Minute Hookup in the form of an effeminate transvestite ninja master, Konatsu, who appeared less than Akari did (this relation is still ambiguous).
  • For some fans, even Ranma and Akane, for their tense relationship and constant fights.
• Junji Ito wrote a short story called Red String in which this trope is played out literally and, and since it's Junji Ito, with a nice dose of Body Horror.
• Samurai 7 has the village priestess, Kirara, and Katsushiro, act like they're developing feelings for each other for most of the series. And then suddenly at the end of the series, she announces that she wants to marry the man she's fallen in love with... who turns out to be Kanbei, despite there never having been the slightest hint that the two of them were actually attracted to each other.
• The manga version of Sorcerer Hunters does this with the Carrot/Tira pairing. While it's made clear how Tira feels about Carrot, Carrot's own feelings are rarely brought into question, and even the few moments where he does seem to notice her as more than a sister figure seem to fall short of convincing anyone this hook-up happened for any other reason other than that they were destined all along.
• Spider Riders: one-sided so it may not count, but before episode 35 who could have guessed Beerain was that infatuated with Buguese? Let's not even get into what this does to her character for the rest of the series.
• Sweetness & Lightning: Many fans thought Kotori's sudden feelings for and confession to Kouhei came out of nowhere, considering for most of the series she viewed him as more of a father figure and friend and their relationship could really only be interpreted in a romantic sense through Shipping Goggles. It doesn't help that she only does this thanks to the confession to her of her own Romantic False Lead Kujirai, who was only introduced a couple chapters ago.
• Thanks to the Time Skip, pretty much any canon couple in Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann save for Simon/Nia and Kamina/Yoko.
• Twin Princess of Wonder Planet: After establishing the Love Dodecahedron for the majority of the first season, during the last couple of episodes, Shade and Bright redirect their interest to Fine and Rein respectively. While Bright did get enough development to bridge that interest, especially when Fine's fear of him makes him realize she never understood him, whereas Rein tried to directly confront him, Shade's interest in Fine is less implicit. It's hard not to see Shade rebounding towards Fine after realizing Rein will never like him romantically.
• Urusei Yatsura:
  • A case where this might actually be the happy ending; initially Shinobu, the Tsundere with Super-Strength, seems to be the Unlucky Childhood Friend, though she legitimately falls out of love with Ataru Moroboshi due to recognizing that he is an apparently irredeemable Lovable Sex Maniac. Her next choice of crushes? Handsome Lech and Royal Brat Shuutaro Mendo, who's not only just as bad as Ataru in terms of lustfulness but is also chasing after Cute Monster Girl Lum. Meanwhile, she's being pursued by the gonkiest character in the series, a hulking, repulsive moron who repeatedly tries to ambush her. Finally, she earns the attention of Inaba, a shy and clumsy, but sweet, innocent and genuinely romantic character, whom she grows quite fond of. And then he only shows up in about one story.
  • Ryuunosuke likewise has this happen to her. Towards the end of the manga, it is revealed she has an Arranged Marriage with a boy named Nagisa Shiowatari, who only shows up in a pair of two-part storylines, the big manga finale, and a single OAV. The two are seemingly setup as a perfect gender-blurring couple, since they're both surprisingly badass Wholesome Crossdressers with crazy fathers, just from opposite angles. The problem? Ryuunosuke can't stand Nagisa; she wants to be normal, he embraces his faux-womanhood, his massive appetite repels the impoverished Ryuunosuke, and he's an uncontrollable cuddlebug whilst she Hates Being Touched, since her only familiarity with physical contact is either her father beating her senseless or Ataru trying to grope her.
• Takanashi and Inami of Wagnaria!!. On a series that works on Status Quo Is God, Takanashi goes from not liking being with Inami but having his nice moments with her, to blindly loving her more than anyone else in the world with zero explanation, despite Inami being the exact opposite of his tastes and, well, punching him in the face when he gets close. And no, him liking her doesn't make her stop punching him.
  • This becomes somewhat averted by the third season of the anime, where Inami's androphobia gets better to the point that she no longer punches Takanashi on sight, and he is even able to make physical contact with her and hold her hand. Takanashi himself also begins to notice how nice and cute an Inami that doesn't hit men is.
• Wedding Peach: The way it's initially presented, Yuri's crush on Yanagiba had always been about as shallow as the other girls', and as soon as her previous life's backstory with Limone (which had no foreshadowing at all) comes up they immediately become a couple without much development compared to the other two. It's slightly better in the manga, in which an extra chapter reveals the details of what their past relationship was actually like, but it does so after the fact. Both versions eventually do build up what their romance ends up being afterwards, but the fact that it's done after their hookup and that their initial fall for each other comes out of nowhere is a little jarring.
• Kitty and Bobby in X-Men: Misfits. The two barely interacted, he always seemed disinterested in her, Kitty never had any concrete interest or chemistry with him, but there is a hint at a Last-Minute Hookup at the end of the story.
• Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V has four pairs of dimensional counterparts. In the final episode, there's a scene of each of them looking at each other fondly, in parallel with the other pairs, implying that they're destined for one another. The problem? Most of them have barely interacted over the course of a 146-episode series. Yuya and Yuzu get the most interaction, but they still spend almost the entire series apart^note they spend most of the first quarter working on their own or with other people, and at the end of that part, Yuzu gets sent to another dimension, kidnapped multiple times, and they aren't properly reunited until the aforementioned scene, meaning there's about four episodes where they have a significant interaction and about two where it comes across as romantic, and they were at most best friends (Yuzu's obvious crush notwithstanding) before being separated. The pairings of Yugo/Rin and Yuto/Ruri straight-up never interact onscreen while not brainwashed, but they at least had some level of prior history and got flashbacks that showed their relationships. And then there's Yuri and Serena, who not only never canonically interacted as far as we know, but were on opposite sides, with the former being an unrepentant psychotic villain! The overall effect reads less as true love sufficient to break dimensional boundaries and more as Because Destiny Says So elevating one-sided, barely-there, or nonexistent relationships to that level.
• More or less parodied in YuYu Hakusho, where Kuwabara sees Yukina on a videotape once and decides that she is his soul mate and even provides a visual of the Red String of Fate. When he finally meets her and treats her almost like this, she seems more confused than anything and just goes along with it. Toward the end of the series, though, the relationship does seem to be on a more serious note.
• Sorta alluded to in Zettai Shoujo Seiiki Amnesian, where Himeko feels that Chikane's utterly intense devotion and love for her is too rushed. Granted, this happened twice before (in Destiny of the Shrine Maiden and Shattered Angels), it shouldn't be surprising.

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