what some people don't seem to understand is that using the lens of psychology to nitpick how healthy or not fictional romances would be if translated to real life dynamics is also a form of CinemaSins brainrot. I'm not talking about pointing out harmful patterns like the way so many romcoms involve the guy manipulating the girl into falling for him, or how so many action heroes act predatorily toward their love interests. I'm talking shit like "Romeo and Juliet never loved each other, they were just horny", or "Rose never actually loved Jack, she was just clinging to him as a escape valve from the life she hated", "these relationships would not work long term because they had no concrete basis beyond infatuation", etc, etc, when these stories only work if you buy into the idea that, yes, this is true love, and yes there was a happy longlife relationship waiting for them on the horizon that fate has cruelly pulled out from their reach upon their untimely deaths. what would be the point of a tragedy where the stakes are just "horny teenagers can no longer bang until they get tired of each other"? suspend your disbelief and stop being a killjoy.
this doesn't go just for tragedies tbh, sometimes I just want to write a romance between two traumatized people finding healing and comfort with each other without the need of writing an epilogue like "and then they each got therapy so they wouldn't burden each other with solving all their trauma, and they also got each a strong friend group so they wouldn't become overly dependent on each other for emotional support, so don't worry, their relationship remained long and healthy *thumbs up*". can't you just assume that whatever happened after the story is over it worked out in the end? otherwise the romantic arc they went to get together would have been pointless? thank you.
