Tropes: narrative devices, usually typical of a genre. One can find them in any given piece of media, no matter the creator. At this point, the use of tropes is fairly standard practice for branding a story as part of a certain genre. Creators might use character tropes (the jerk with a heart of gold, the action girl, the bruiser, etc.), story tropes (the bottle episode, the “you know what you did,” the love triangle, etc.), or any number of tropes specific to the medium and genre of the story.

Some work well and are genuinely delightful, such as certain character dynamic tropes (i.e., short angry person is best friends with tall mellow person). Some don’t work so well, but are still being used simply because it feels like they must be a staple of media by now. A prime example of this is the “will they, won’t they” trope.

This trope occurs when two characters are toying with a romantic relationship and, instead of settling on a decided yes or no, the writers instead keep them locked in unresolved sexual tension, or UST. As a consumer, this can become extremely tedious. A show or series might run longer than anticipated because the dynamic set up between the two characters is based firmly in UST, their dancing around each other becomes more and more unnatural the longer it is drawn out.

The solution to this? If the answer is “they will,” let them get together! The progression of a relationship from friends to lovers to spouses – if that is where the relationship is going – is far more interesting to an audience than the stasis of perpetual UST. Then subvert the negative tropes used as shortcuts in portrayals of relationships. Don’t let the developing relationship devolve into the standard “one person is nagging, the other is overworked,” but rather give us these two characters we have come to care about working together. Give us sleepy giggles and early morning kisses, Give us sweet notes left on the counter and in coat pockets. Give us hugs and holding hands. Or show us the negative, too; give us disagreements they try to work out. Give us the nervous waiting up for a response to that awkward text. Give us screaming and crying and patching up – but don’t let the negative rip them apart so easily. Show us that they want to work it out, together. Show us they are invested so we have a reason to be invested.

If a relationship between two characters has to be in jeopardy for the audience to care about it, then it hasn’t been developed enough. No number of tropes can pull back someone too fed up with static UST to care anymore.