Drama Goth and Sunny Do-gooder: A Marriage Made in Heaven?
I used to be constantly disappointed in romance stories and sub-plots. But that has started to change, and while I can't rule out some shift in myself I suspect it has more to do with the nature of the stories being told. One dynamic in particular has had me utterly enthralled recently. It can be summed up as:
Cheery do-gooder with a high level of moral certainty and unacknowledged flaws meets vaguely gothy dramatic/angsty character who is on the "bad" side and knows it but has more good in them than they admit. I will call them the Sunny Do-gooder and the Drama Goth for short. This odd couple are drawn together, experience varying levels of conflict, and learn from each other. They not only end up in a healthy and mutually supportive relationship, but their love helps save the world.
OK, that last bit is probably optional, but man is it awesome!
Specifically, I'm thinking of three pairings, all of which can be found in fantasy/sci-fi shows that came out between 2014 and 2020: Laura and Carmilla in the web series 'Carmilla', Aziraphale and Crowley in 'Good Omens', and Adora and Catra in the 'She-Ra' reboot. In addition to the basic character dynamic summarized above, there are some character design similarities as well. In all three, the Sunny Do-gooder is blonde and associated in one way or another with a glowy sword, while the Drama Goth has animal characteristics: Crowley, as Serpent of Eden, has golden slit-pupiled snake eyes; Catra has very similar eyes, plus claws, cat ears, and a tail; and Carmilla looks human most of the time but can turn into a huge black cat. The stories aren't identical, though. Instead, these very similar characters have their dynamic play out in three distinct situations.
** Skip this section if you don't want spoilers**
I've talked
about 'Good Omens' the book previously, but the gist is that an angel
and a demon have spent the last 6000 years on earth, and have gotten very fond
of it and each other, and so team up to try and prevent Armageddon. There is
some definite queer coding of these characters in the book - which I missed initially because it is considerably more
subtle on one side than the other, but lots of people spotted it and latched on enthusiastically, as 30 years of adorable fan art1
attest. The 2019 Amazon mini-series, made with the active participation and
guidance of one of the original authors, on the other hand, is definitely a love
story. Good Omens is, among other things, a cold war parody, with heaven and
hell playing the role of the great powers. Crowley, the Drama Goth of the
story, is never actually the bad guy
- in fact, he's the one who has to convince Aziraphale to try and save the world. It is
the angel who has to go on the journey of realizing that his side isn't automatically
good. They choose humanity and each other over heaven and hell and their petty squabbles.
'Carmilla' is a loose adaptation of a book of the same name that pre-dated 'Dracula' and featured the world's first vampire lesbian. The web series takes place in 5-10 minute mini-episodes, nearly all filmed with a still camera in a single setting and yet manages to be strangely gripping2. In this versions of the story, Laura, the human, is a college student whose original roommate goes missing and is replaced by Carmilla. Laura investigates, and discovers that a bunch of girls have gone missing at this school, and that Carmilla is a vampire. Various supernatural shenanigans ensue. It is quickly revealed that Carmilla wasn't planning to prey on Laura. She actually likes her, and isn't too keen on luring human girls for her vampire "mother"...but she has done terrible vampire things in the past and is prone to apathy. Laura pushes her to be better but sometimes pushes too hard, seemingly forgetting that Carmilla has risked her life "doing good" several times in a year, and sometimes Laura's attempts to fix things only put the campus or the world in more danger. The happy ending involves Carmilla becoming human, not Laura becoming a vampire, which is a nice reversal of the usual pattern. It isn't a perfect show - the plot goes a bit off the rails toward the end - but it is still a lot of fun.
In the Netflix show 'She-Ra and the princesses of power' Adora and Catra have more of a friends-to-enemies-to-friends-to-lovers arc (summarized in show clips here). They both grew up in the horde, but Adora (alter ego She-Ra) has the revelation that the Horde are evil imperialists. She decides to leave, and asks Catra to come with her. Catra says no, and is shocked and heartbroken when Adora leaves anyway, seemingly choosing abstract morality over their lifelong relationship. Catra does not deal with this well, showing a vicious antagonism to Adora's new friends and a determination to become leader of the Horde so that no one can ever hurt her again. Eventually, though, Catra realizes she was wrong, and sacrifices herself to save Adora's friend Glimmer. Adora then immediately jumps into action to save Catra, because even when they seemed to be mortal enemies neither really stopped caring. Catra learns to process her emotions in a healthier way, while Adora learns that always sacrificing what she wants for the greater good doesn't necessarily lead to the best outcome. In fact, Adora is blocked for a while from accessing She-Ra's powers until she figures out that her love for Catra and the other people in her life isn't a distraction: it is why she does what she does.
1. This music video compilations doesn't properly credit the visual artists, unfortunately, but it does illustrate the variety of interpretations and the love people have for these characters.
2. Watch it with the subtitles on - there are a lot of humorous descriptions and asides.
** End of spoilers**
I think what makes Drama Goth + Sunny Do-gooder such a fun pairing is that it combines a particularly well-balanced version of the always-popular "opposites attract" with the opportunity to explore deeper concepts such as "what actually constitutes 'good' and 'evil'?" I'm a big fan of heroes who believe themselves to be basically bad but do good anyway, and heroes who are so naturally nice that they might seem naive and weak until tested. This storyline definitely has the former, and kind of has the latter...though it illustrates the dangers of moral certainty more than some. Finally, of course, the idea that two such opposite but potentially complementary personality types can actually work through their issues and be happy together is very heart-warming and inspirational.
The next
obvious question, once I'd noticed which
stories I'd found this pattern in, was...is this only a gay romance trope? Well, I
don't think it has to be.
"Zutara", the pairing of Zuko and Katara in 'Avatar the Last
Airbender' would actually be a perfect example...if it had happened. The earnest Brian and
chaotic Sally in 'Cabaret' sort of fit too, but that relationship is not a
particularly healthy one...nor particularly straight, at least on Brian's end.
But for the most part while there are some similar tropes in straight romances,
an exact parallel is hard to find. (3/23/22: Updates at the end of this essay!)
The closest are the classic "Byronic hero" romances, and one of its popular modern descendants: the vampire-human romance. The Byronic hero archetype is described well in this video, but in brief he - and it is nearly always a he - is a tragic, brooding, potentially dangerous figure, in contrast to the "white knight" type of romantic hero. Most of the time, the appeal of the Byronic hero is that he is mysterious and sad, and the heroine is drawn to fix him and give his life meaning. Which is not really a great idea; it usually doesn't end well in real life and often doesn't end well in fiction either. Mr. Rochester and Jane Eyre might be the pairing in classic literature that comes closest to Drama Goth + Sunny Do-gooder, except that while Jane is a sensible and morally upright young lady, I'm not sure "sunny" is the right word for her, and she doesn't have the flaw of being too moralistic. They are at least the healthiest relationship I've seen in that genre; at its worst you get something like 'Fifty Shades of Gray'! Still, I can't say I consider Rochester that much of a catch, while I love all my Drama Goths to bits and was genuinely thrilled to see things work out for them. They aren't just sad and broody; instead, they already have a bunch of characteristics that are positive - or would be, if exercised in the right setting.
The vampire-human romance involves even more unbalanced power dynamics than the traditional Byronic romance, and also frequently ends tragically. Of course, 'Carmilla' is a vampire-human romance, but the power differences between Laura and Carmilla aren't played up that much, and are gone by the end. The closest straight equivalent I can think of is Sookie Stackhouse and her various supernatural beaus in Charlaine Harris's southern vampire series. But while Sookie is another feisty, optimistic blonde, none of her vampire or shape-shifter relationships are actually good ones with staying power, and eventually that and the ever-expanding numbers of magical creatures made me lose interest.
Thinking about the vampire romance thing reminded me of an inversion of the Drama Goth + Sunny Do-gooder, best exemplified by Louis and Lestat in 'Interview with the Vampire'. I'm not sure if this has showed up enough times to be a trope, but if it has I'd call it Moody Moralizer + Cheerful Monster. This one isn't a healthy dynamic, but the writers are at least fully aware of that. Louis is a bit tiresome, especially on his own, but Lestat is just such a gleefully amoral character and it is really fun to watch them interact. But, oops, that's another same-gender example, isn't it?
The other somewhat similar sets of romance tropes, which are super popular in rom-coms, are "doofy guy gets overly serious lady to lighten up" or the reverse with the quirky whimsical girl and overly serious dude. I have a love-hate relationship with these stories. They can be fun escapism, but the minute I start to think about them I get annoyed, in part because I wouldn't want to be the woman in either. In the first, the heroine usually ends up giving up some part of her ambitions, and gets a semi-incompetent man-child as a the reward. In the second, the "manic pixie dream girl" has no purpose of her own other than to take some angsty guy out of his shell. And these stories generally have very little in the way of plot or themes beyond the romance. At most maybe someone has to save the family business.
I think both the reason both Drama Goth + Sunny Do-gooder and Moody Moralizer + Cheerful Monster appeal to me and the reason all the good examples I can think of involve two characters of the same gender is this: the protagonists are equals but opposites. A lot of writers still seem to have trouble crafting a romance between a man and a woman where they are equally strong but very distinctive characters. More often, the "love interest" character is just wish fulfillment for the "audience stand-in" character, which results in the former being too perfect and the latter too bland.
In the better straight romances, the hero and heroine often end up being very similar people - like two of my favorites, Beatrice and Benedick from 'Much Ado about Nothing', or Morticia and Gomez Addams. And that's lovely too, but it is a different dynamic, fulfilling the wish of finding a friend who shares your interests who you'd also want to kiss. Because the characters are so similar, they don't usually have much internally generated conflict - unless their shared characteristic is "sharp-witted and argumentative" like Beatrice and Benedick - and they don't have as much to learn from each other. We probably see less of this trope in same-gender pairings because there would be more risk of the two seeming like the exact same character.
The best happy opposites-but-equals straight example I can think of are Zoe and "Wash" Washburne from 'Firefly'. Zoe is a no-nonsense former soldier, second in command of the smuggler/cargo spaceship Serenity, while Wash is the more sensitive, light-hearted pilot. Though conflict between them could sometimes arise due to Zoe's platonic devotion to her war buddy Captain Mal, most of the time they are just loving and supportive toward one another while being entertainingly sassy. Sadly, there doesn't seem to be ANY good compilations of their lines, but here's a sample. While it doesn't match the pattern I'm talking about here, it is still a really fun depiction of a relationship between two very different people that works.
So come on, writers of straight romance: do more of that. But maybe show how they met, add in some extra stakes, dial up the emotional drama, make sure both characters learn something from each other...and make sure they stay equal all the way to the end!
Updates: I've found one more gay example ('Heaven Official's Blessing') and - drumroll - one straight example ('A Deadly Education') of this trope. It cracked me up to hear someone speculate that the latter book might have started life as some kind of M/M fanfiction...because maybe this dynamic is why it seems that way! 'Inuyasha' - the first anime I ever really got into - almost fits, but not quite. The titular demon is absolutely a drama goth, but Kagome, while a sunny do-gooder in the most literal sense, doesn't have enough faults. She's basically never wrong, and that makes her kind of dull after the first season or so, despite being sassy, brave, etc. Also, Vikram in 'Alif the Unseen' is basically a drama goth alone, which is kind of sad, especially given what happens to him in that story.
