Follow TV Tropes

Sickeningly Sweethearts

Go To

Sickeningly Sweethearts (trope)
Enough hearts to give a bystander a cardiac arrest.note 
"Mr. and Mrs. Drebin, please — I'm diabetic."
Marriage Counselor, The Naked Gun 33⅓

Some romances are painful, others are dead, a few are happy, and then there are those which are... cute.

They use pet names that even Fluffy the Terrible winces at, cuddle and giggle incessantly, never argue (unless you count their "you're cuter" exchanges as such) and basically turn all nearby salt into sugar. They might sometimes wear Coordinated Clothes to make sure everybody notices they belong together. Usually, they're as indestructibly upbeat as you think. Other times, the show will delight in giving them one tiny imperfection, problem, or Single-Issue Wonk that makes them turn into The Masochism Tango.

To be fair, almost all relationships go through a "Honeymoon Phase" in the first few months of dating, where the couple can do nothing but sing each other's praises, much to the annoyance of their friends, families, and coworkers (especially the single ones). But after a while, passions cool as the couple integrates the relationship into their everyday lives. Granted, you do have those couples who never stop laying it on thick. A Sister Trope to Make-Out Kids, when a couple makes others feel uncomfortable by being very affectionate in public, and Insatiable Newlyweds, when tying the knot starts up the sugar rush all over again. The bane of every Affection-Hating Kid. Often results in demands for the lovebirds to Get a Room! and go be affectionate in private.


Example subpages:

Other examples:

    open/close all folders 

    Animation 
  • Simple Samosa: In "Spa Wars", the big plot twist involves spamaster Appa being highly infatuated with rival spamaster Amma and confessing that he inadvertently caused a potential war between their spas by building his so close to hers just so that he could be close to her. The two start to get quite cutesy and flirty with each other, going as far as to calling each other affectionate nicknames, to the point that a disgusted Samosa blurts out "Yuck! This is like a cheesy movie!" right as they put together two halves of a heart amulet they had for some reason. The scene immediately following this has them getting married. And this stems from Amma seeing Appa as he's blatantly hurting Jalebi trying to get the remote for his spa equipment back, by the way.

    Comic Books 
  • The Authority: Apollo and Midnighter, surprisingly. They have well-deserved reputations for violence and brutality, but even their teammates will tell them to get a room once the fighting's done and the sweet, still-covered-in-blood-and-rubble canoodling begins.
  • Empowered: Dialogue from one issue : "No, you should wear that outfit (tee hee)!" - "No, you should wear that outfit (tee hee)!" No wonder the Caged Demonwolf imagines a scene with better dialogue, in his usual flowery style.
  • Jem and the Holograms (IDW): Kimber and her girlfriend Stormer are by far the most affectionate couple in the series.
  • Justice Society of America: Hourman and Liberty Belle. Thankfully, the lovey-dovey stuff doesn't get in the way of them kicking ass in battle.
  • Monica's Gang: In the teenage spinoff, Monica and Jimmy Five abandon their normal personalities of Tsundere and Jerk with a Heart of Gold and become one of these when they finally start dating. This ends up disgusting the other characters so badly that many of them start to root explicitly for the breakup of the couple.
  • New Gods: Mister Miracle and Big Barda were like this during their time with the Justice League International along with frequent allusions to their active and healthy sex life. Considering their backstories it was actually kind of sweet.
  • Runaways: The group has this reaction when Chase and Gert start using pet names for each other.
    Victor: They're using those pet names ironically, right?
    Nico: God, I hope so.
  • The Sandman (1989): Barbie and Ken. They wear matching outfits, finish each other's sentences, and always have an arm around the other. This appears to be a facade on both their parts. We later get to see their most personal dreams and it's revealed that nice guy Ken dreams of sex (not with his wife), money and power, while the shallow Barbie is seen dreaming of adventure and bravery.
  • W.I.T.C.H.: Will Vandom and Matt Olsen. Usually the others take it in stride (especially Cornelia, who sometimes is almost as bad as them), but a particular accident in the New Power saga caused them to have faces the readers can't tell if they're moved or sickened (with Hay Lin verging on laughing herself silly).

    Comic Strips 
  • Hobbes of Calvin and Hobbes tends to describe love to Calvin in terms likely to nauseate adults ("'Bitsy Pookums,' I'd say. 'Yes, Snoogy Woogy,' she'd reply..."), let alone a six-year-old inclined to believe that Girls Have Cooties.
  • FoxTrot: Peter and Denise were known to be like this from time to time. One occasion featured them in a rather sweet moment, in which Peter talked about how unbelievably great it was to finally have a girlfriend like her. "Just great?" she responds. "Okay, super-duper-ooper-great." "You're so cute." And of course, Jason and Marcus are spying on them behind a clump of bushes, causing Jason to whisper: "If I'm ever that cute, shoot me dead."
  • Lucy and Sophie Say Goodbye: The formulatic strip about two women who so caught up in one another, and kissing one another, that they are oblivious to their surroundings.
  • Zits: "Richandamy" are a high school relationship taken all the way to symbiosis. The only time the two were ever seen not hugging was one strip where Rich was using the men's room. The rest of the cast are torn between a strange admiration and incredible disbelief towards them.
    • Amusingly, Richandamy were based on two college friends of creator Jim Borgman. They were actually named Rich and Amy, he was tall and she was short, and they practically were that inseparable. They're now Happily Married with three kids.

    Fan Works 
  • After they start dating in Black Rose Blooms Silver, Ruby and Penny quickly veer into this territory. They spend much as much of their free time as possible cuddling, kissing, telling each other how wonderful the other is, and flooding places with rose petals involuntarily produced by Ruby's Semblance. The rest of the cast waver between being annoyed by their antics and fearing heart failure from how sugary sweet the two are.
  • Cheater, Cheater: Dream and George constantly come up with nicknames for each other, always defend each other, and generally act so in love that they piss everyone else off.
  • Played for Laughs in Cinderjuice and its sequels. BJ is amused to find that he enjoys pretending to be this with Lydia, because it confuses and possibly nauseates the hell out of onlookers, especially her parents. They act much more relaxed in private.
  • Hetalia: Axis Powers fanfic Cucinando…Sōkoku?: Romano actually references this trope by name after watching Italy and Japan share a kiss while eating spaghetti.
    "Chigi! Your relationship is a hyper-saccharine concoction of supersaturated snappiness! You guys are sickeningly sweethearts who never argue! Heck, you guys can never be on opposite sides of anything! I'm going to puke out rainbows at this rate! I'm going to get diabetes from all this!" Romano's blood sugar levels had soared through the roof, only worsening his already horrible mood. He made the worst of hyperglycemics look dangerously hypoglycemic in comparison. He may or may not have been jealous — HE WAS NOT!
  • Luz and Amity can be this way sometimes in Enchanting Heist. King even lampshades it when he and Amity are looking for Luz, saying they don't even know where she is and Amity is still gushing over her upon Ann asking Amity about what Luz was like, asking if she can save it for when and/or where he doesn't have to hear it.
  • Female Transfiguration 101: Ginny once knocks Ron off of his broom because he would not stop complaining about her and Hermione making out in public all of the time.
  • In Heroic Myth, Sigurd and Brynhildr are constantly flirting and espousing their love for each other, much to the annoyance and jealousy of gods and mortals alike.
  • The Infinite Loops: Almost any Looping couple is liable to be like this. Korra and Asami, for example, who spend one Loop being nothing but this. It annoys Mako, on account of their replacing Belle and Beast (he's replacing one of the servants, and is still cursed because they haven't bothered lifting it).
  • Maria Campbell of the Astral Clocktower:
    • Maria theorizes that she is the bastard daughter of Duke Claes, though she only shares this theory with Rafael. He doesn't mention that this is extremely unlikely. They are so infamously in love that even his "mother," a Yandere who hates romance due to being burned too many times, was embarrassed for them.
    • Prince Ian and his fiance, Selena Berg, were both under the impression the other hated them due to political maneuvering trying to break them up. Once they realize that's not the case, they become infamous across the kingdom for being absolutely inseparable. Most scenes with them involve a make-out session that lasts at least half an hour, no matter who happens to be nearby. They publicly declare their intent to wait until marriage to consummate; it's noted that while in many cases, this is assumed to just be a lie, everyone immediately believes them because if they weren't being chaste, Selena would be very, very pregnant.
  • On a Cross and Arrow: Rarity and Elusive, in their own way, as well as Fluttershy and Butterscotch, in a more awkward and shy sense.
  • In the Firefly fic San Diego Serenede Mal wakes up in the infirmary with Kaylee and Simon after he and Simon were tortured. Simon tells Kaylee he went to her when he died, and Mal makes a fake gagging noise and tells them to "stop making goo goo eyes at each other". They say no in unison.
  • Many Phineas and Ferb fanworks have Phineas and Isabella as young examples of this trope.
  • Scootamom: Cadence and Shining Armor, again, much to Scootaloo's disgust whenever she has to witness it.
  • A running gag in Skyhold Academy Yearbook is that Cullen and Evvy are "so cute it's stupid." They admit there's some justification to the comment.
  • Son of the Sannin: While Kiba and Tamaki have basically been stuck in the Belligerent Sexual Tension phase since they were eight, their Genjutsu world counterparts are so open about their relationship that they actually stop in the middle of a life or death battle to have a "No, I love you more" argument.
  • Titania Falls: Erza and Jellal have a lot of lost time to catch up on. It's so bad that Mabel, Dipper, and Stan treat it as something to specifically avoid whenever they can.
  • Keith and Tophella from Total Drama Legacy. The two of them are to romantic relationships what Katie and Sadie were to platonic relationships: they were introduced as having already had a close relationship with each other, are pretty much inseparable, often go on and on about how much they care about each other, and when one of them gets eliminated, the other doesn't really have much to do until their own elimination.
  • The Twilight Child: While Big Macintosh and Cheerilee (see Western Animation) talk like this when afflicted by a love poison, Shining Armor and Cadence are like this naturally, all the time.

    Films — Animation 
  • In Antz, Chip and Muffy (the Cultural Posturing wasps). Chip is referring to Muffy as "Cuddly Widdles" and "Wattling Kiddles".
  • In The Emperor's New Groove, Pacha and Chicha deliberately invoke this trope to get their kids to go to bed.
  • The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part has Batman x Queen Watevra Wa'Nabi. After falling for one another, they become very lovey-dovey with Ice Cream Cone repeatedly breaking them up to tell them to stop with their affections. At one point, Batman asks if he's been there the whole time, which he responds that he has and he's sad about it.
  • Googly-Bear and Schmootzy-Poo (aka Mike and Celia) in Monsters, Inc., which leads to a moment when Celia refers to Sulley as "Sulley-Wulley" and he reacts in a combination of taking it in stride (calling her "Celia-Welia") and "What the...?"
  • The love potion from Strange Magic causes this among the various denizens, much to the disgust of the two leads.
  • Barbie and Ken from Toy Story 3. Buzz makes a "you have got to be kidding me" facial expression after overhearing a conversation between them.

    Films — Live-Action 
  • Chris and Lisa in Anna and the Apocalypse act like this; however, they don't get to show it for a majority of the film, as they're separated by the Zombie Apocalypse (though one of-of their priorities is making sure the other is okay). They both get bitten near the film's end, and they decide to be Together in Death.
  • Parodied in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang in the song "Chu Chi Face." (And you're my teddy bear. Together we're a Chu-Chi Woo-Chi, Ooo-Chi Coo-Chi Pair!) Of course, the entire time the Baron and Baroness are singing this to each other, he's trying to arrange an untimely death for her, resulting in her getting more and more nervous and uneasy as the song progresses.
  • Winsor McCay had a couple like this in one of his early minor features.
  • In The Mummy Returns, whenever Evelyn and Rick kiss, they'll get a disgusted look and the "Find yourself a room" comments from their son and/or Evelyn's brother Jonathan.
  • Spoofed in the movie The Naked Gun 33 ⅓: The Final Insult. While at marriage counseling, Frank and Jane start calling each other sappy pet names. At first, the therapist smiles at the display, but after a few more he says, "Mr. and Mrs. Drebin, I'm a diabetic. I think you two ought to go now."
  • The pair of robbers (Amanda Plummer and Tim Roth) at the end and beginning of Pulp Fiction are this. They're even credited as "Pumpkin" and "Honey Bunny."
  • Ned and Betty in Spider-Man: Far From Home, who go all in on the lovey-dovey stuff on each other throughout the film, much to Peter's befuddlement. By the film's end, they've broken up, but remain Amicable Exes.
  • Karin and Larry Blake in Two-Faced Woman, who were all over each other when they were presumed dead by Larry's colleagues. The newlyweds don't hold back on kissing each other when they're not talking, play-fighting on the floor and talking about how happy they are. It's so sweet that, at first, Mr. Miller thinks that they're trying to distract him and Miss Ellis from making Larry go back to work.
  • The Ultraman Zearth series of films managed to pull this off with their villains, a married couple of ruthless alien invaders, the powerful Alien Benzene and his wife, Lady Benzene. They repeatedly goes "I wuv you..." "I wuv you too..." via intercom in the sequel, and it's hilarious.
  • In Who Framed Roger Rabbit, this proves to be Jessica and Roger's relationship. "Honey-bunny!" "Oh, love cup!"

    Music 

    Myths & Religion 

    Pro Wrestling 
  • While they weren't "married", Jim Cornette was "close enough" with The Midnight Express for fans to start chanting "Faggot!" at him, sometimes when celebrating with them and especially when he would "cuddle" with them for protection from crossed baby faces.
  • When they weren't performing some gruesome act of violence, Stevie Richards and Victoria spent most of their hugging and sweet talking each other. And yes, they had coordinated ring gear, which was usually pink.
  • Despite being a Gorgeous George, the wrestling stylist Rico Constantino and his valet, Miss Jackie, were very touchy-feely with one another, routinely rubbing noses before matches. (Of course, this is exactly what made the gimmick work)
  • "Team Be Jealous" were as close as sisters and occasionally mistaken for lesbians. Jessicka Havok even imitated Allysin Kay's hairstyle and fencenets.
  • Mike Bennett and Maria Kanellis, two trouble makers in Adam Cole's Ring of Honor group "The Kingdom", to the point after Bennett was given Matt Hardy's "Icon Title", he renamed it the "Title Of Love". This continued when they came (or in Maria's case, came BACK) to WWE in June 2017.
  • Cody Rhodes and Damien Sandow, while not "a couple" in the traditional sense, were very "Best Friends", which the latter would state at every opportunity while also talking up Cody's finer mental and physical points, especially his mustache.
  • Pretty Proper, officially a Tag Team between The Savage Gentleman Victor Benjamin and Lady Frost, functionally a mutual agreement to help each other cheat their way to singles title belts. And thy kiss one another while choking their opponents, all behind the back of the referee!

    Puppet Shows 
  • Fraggle Rock: Junior Gorg is revolted by Pa and Ma's song: "The Ways I Love You."
    Pa: [singing] Eyeballs and earlobes and muscles like bread rolls,
    With a heart that's as big as a zoo.
    Those-ose-ose are the ways I love you.
    Ma: You do?
    Pa: Aww, I do, sweetie. [singing] Those are the ways I love you.
    Junior: Uh, can't you talk mushy somewhere else?

    Roleplay 

    Tabletop Game 
  • Yu-Gi-Oh!: The Water-attribute card "Giant Pairfish", which is from the Wyrm subtype, shows a couple of fishes, one of a dark blue colour and a dark pink fish (the latter presumably female) with a lovey-dovey look in their eyes and hearts in their pupils. To further show how in love they are, there are even hearts floating around the pair.

    Theatre 
  • Discussed in "Before and After" from Babes in Toyland:
    Before they were married they talked like this:
    "Will lovey's own dovey give love a kiss?"
    "Will owney's own ownest be ever true?"
    And "Oos 'ittle oozelly oose is oo?"
    Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Pardon the laughter.
    That was before but this is after!
  • Benedick from Much Ado About Nothing disdains love in general, but he specifically complains that becoming promised to Hero has turned Claudio soft.
    I have known when he would hear no music but the drum and the fife, now he would rather hear the taber and the pipe.
  • Thomas and Martha Jefferson in 1776. Tom misses Martha so much that he's rendered completely unable to concentrate on writing the Declaration of Independence and Adams has to send for her. When she arrives, she and Tom glom onto each other to the extent that they don't even notice anyone else is in the room; afterwards, Martha has a number about just how much she loves Tom and his violin. (Contrast this with John Adams and his wife Abigail, who — having been married for considerably longer — spend as much time bickering as they do flirting and sometimes do both at once. Truth in Television; one of the reasons Adams fell so deeply in love with Abigail in the first place was because she was his equal in snarkery.)
  • Cho and Cedric acting like this in A Very Potter Musical piss Harry off to no end since he has a crush on Cho. It actually doesn't end well though since Cedric gets murdered.

    Toys 

    Web Animation 
  • Barbie: Life in the Dreamhouse portrays Barbie and Ken like this. For starters, the first episode begins with Barbie getting ready to celebrate the 43rd anniversary of the first time they held hands, even revealing that she made Ken a card after failing to find one at the store.

    Web Comics 
  • Bitty and Jack from Check, Please!.
    Bitty: [to Jack over the phone] Okay, sweetheart, you have a good day... Oh you flirt. No, you stop! Oh my goodness, well—yes! I could use sugar. Or honey. Or even darling...
    Hops: They've been saying goodbye for 10 minutes.
    Dex: Chew louder. It drowns it out.
  • Parodied in Questionable Content, when Marten and Dora engage in cutesy banter - about necrophilia.
    Faye: At least they're not one of those nauseatingly cute couples.
    Penelope: Just nauseating.
  • The Order of the Stick: Stereotypically, half-orcs are the product of rape. Not in the case of Therkla, whose human and orc parents were very, very affectionate.
    Chief Grukgruk: chief grukgruk frankly not want dwell on that very much.
    Therkla: Try growing up with it.
  • Lampshaded and played for laughs in Our Little Adventure. Julie and Lenny go out on a date during their downtime and behave this way. The Elf waiter who is serving them seems to be reacting how the audience would.
  • Parodied to Hell and back in Sire, where a die-hard Edgar Allen Poe die-hard fan/descendant/supernatural roleplayer finds her mister charming... and then tries to ruin his life according to The House of Woe's script, and fails because her boyfriend is too thick-headed to start growing terrified of love AND he's as creepy as her so she can't even hate him for it.
    Delores: I'm the real victim, here!
    Susan: So, um, you? Not the man you're going to emotionally scar[?] After helping all your friends kill themselves, and, effectively, their innocent boy-toys, you were going peak murder-boner over this guy. I mean, you're the boss. This was gonna be your group's masterpiece. [...] You're in a [romantic comedy], Delores.
    Delores: AAAAAAAAA
  • Melty Flame and Melty Frost in Sleepless Domain, to the point that when Undine briefly entertained the idea of asking to join their team, she quickly realized she'd just be the third wheel.
  • xkcd: "No one must know" that Black Hat (a self-described "Classhole") and his equally terrible girlfriend Danish are like this. No one.

    Web Original 
  • SCP Foundation: Would you believe a pair of boats can be this? SCP-1522 is a pair of Sapient Ships that follow and play with whale pods, "kiss" by gently nudging into each other, and "talk" to each other using their foghorns. Word of God is that the foghorn conversation between the two transcribed in the log consists of "I love you" and "I love you too." Unfortunately, it ends tragically.
  • One of Thomas Sanders' Vines is set up around this, ending with him carrying the girl down the hall ballet-style with an "I'm off to class with my lady love!"

    Web Videos 
  • The Lizzie Bennet Diaries: Jane Bennet and Bing Lee when they start dating. She bakes him homemade cookies. He watches romantic period dramas with her and treats her like a princess, pretending to carpool when he in fact just keeps giving her a lift. Lizzie is happy for them, but she implies that sometimes they're too much to take and also that Jane has the "I-want-you-to-be-in-a-happy-relationship-like-myself" vibes which make her uncomfortable.
  • Due to the No Hugging, No Kissing tendency in Noob, the relationship between Arthéon and Kary gets depicted this way until the Season 4 finale.

    Real Life 
  • Lovebirds are famous for essentially being the Sickeningly Sweethearts of the bird world, to the point that an Urban Legend has it that a lovebird will die of loneliness if kept without a mate.note  Needless to say, the urban legend coupled with the adorableness of these birds cuddling and preening each other is often what leads potential lovebird owners to always buy two of them... only for them to be baffled when they realize that the birds refuse to pay any attention to them because they're so wrapped up in each other.


 
Feedback

Video Example(s):

Alternative Title(s): Sickening Sweethearts

Top

"Awwww, That's So Sweet!"

Farnsworth briefly forces Leela into speaking cutely with his cattle prod when she expresses her disgust about Romanticorp's owners.

How well does it match the trope?

4.7 (10 votes)

Example of:

Main / BabyTalk

Media sources:

Report