Monday 12 December 2011

Luurve Triangles: A Discussion (Of Sorts)

I know what you're thinking, two discussion posts from Cicely in a month? It must be a sign of the apocalypse. But it's something that's been on my mind of late, particularly because I've been reading Clockwork Prince. Love triangles.


There are two kinds of love triangles. Well, there are more than two, but in my eyes, they're pretty much either good love triangles or bad love triangles. Rather, well done triangles. Because, for me, even well done love triangles are a bad thing.


See, my key problem with love triangles is: if the main character is finding it so hard to pick between two (most likely hot..) people, and has a mostly lustful as opposed to loving relationship with both of them, surely neither of them are right for him/her. But that might just be me.


It might be all fun and stuff to see some normal plain girl struggling to pick between two ridiculously hot guys, who, for some reason, have fallen into an incredible, mountain-moving love with aforementioned girl without sufficient reasoning, as it's a pretty unlikely situation to be caught in, and it's a fantasy and all that, but it's really annoying. And there are always two ways for this to go (aka, good triangle, bad triangle). It can either be an incredibly well done love triangle, where you genuinely have no idea who he/she is going to end up with (I will touch on this soon) or a bad, predictable love triangle where you know exactly who she's going to end up with, and the other person doesn't even seem to be an obstacle in their relationship, because, obviously, the two main characters are SO IN LOVE. 


This annoys me because it's pretty much an attempt to add drama that a) will fall flat because the reader knows that the other guy is NOT going to get the MC, and b) kind of feels like an overdone attempt to get readers involved in 'picking teams' and such. It feels much less like these people involved are less characters and more objects which kind of makes me sad. Also, it can sometimes feel like an attempt to make a book more exciting, which is annoying, because I kind of like love triangles to be sub-plots (if existing where not necessary at all), and, I like books with actual stuff happening in them as well as relationships! Books feel so much better when there is something else going on for it, because somehow romance feels way less forced when other stuff is happening? Yeah. 


Onto well done love triangles. These kind of annoy me because it usually means that the girl is just going to go about kissing everyone because 'she's so confused' and 'she doesn't know who she wants to be with' and whatever. That's NOT an excuse to kiss ALL THE BOYS. Because, even though no one will blame you for it, MC, you WILL be hurting people. i.e. the two people you've been going around kissing. Who love you. While you're being all wishy washy and 'but they're BOTH so pretty and lovely'. Stop it, please. It just feels like you're playing around with two of the people who will appreciate you most. Also, please refer back to that paragraph near the top. If you're lusting after both of them, maybe you shouldn't be kissing them both, and instead stay away from the for a while, clear your head, and think rationally about the situation. Do you really, actually, LOVE either of them? If the answer is no and you just think they're sexy, then take yourself, kindly, out of the equation please? Because you are helping no one. And I think that this was my main problem with Nightshade. Every one said how 'kick ass' and strong Calla was, but I didn't get that. I didn't get strong independent female at all. I saw a little lost girl who didn't know what to do with herself around these two unnaturally attractive, sexy guys. And it annoyed me!


So. Yeah. Got a little bit carried away there... But this is like, 2 years of pent up love triangle frustration. You can forgive me that, can't you? And this isn't me saying I completely and utterly hate ALL the love triangles, because there are some that I don't mind at all, but 9 out of 10 times, they just really, really irritate me. Please feel free to rant or disagree with me as you see fit. You'll probably be way more rational on the matter than I am anyhow... ;)

3 comments:

  1. Hey, Cicely! It's Fatima from Twitter. I completely agree with your post! As we discussed yesterday ;) sometimes you just want to focus on the story rather than the romance. Great post!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I am in love with your discussion posts! You need to guest blog for me sometime!

    You are totally right, books that are completely romance-driven with love triangles that don't even make sense really don't work. It's cool if it's a romance and it's all about a love triangle, but if it's say, a paranormal, WHERE'S THE PARANORMAL DUDE? Because all I see is this annoying girl who is in the middle of these two guys, with one totally hot boy and one totally not boy.

    I love a bit of romance, but I hate when a love triangle is not played out well. It's awesome when they DO though, like in the Summer series. <3

    Argh, none of what I said even makes sense!! Sorry!

    ReplyDelete
  3. lol. I love your *cough*rants*cough* discussion posts. I get where you're coming from, and these 'standard' love triangles are ANNOYING. The best ones are the more alternative ones. Like in Vampire Diaries. Elena is of course in love with Stefan, but she's TEMPTED by Damon who understands a different part of her, a part even she doesn't really understand. And in VA, when Rose thinks she has to give up on Dimitri, and tries to move on with someone she is, ultimately, attracted too. Even in loving, long-term relationships we all face temptations, even if they aren't as smokin hot and dramatic as fictional love triangles ;)

    The Cait Files

    ReplyDelete

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...