Why the brooding love interest trope has to go

In books, movies, and real life...

Oct 19, 2024

We all know him.

The insanely attractive man who has it all. Brains, creative talent, and beyond his cold, steel-like surface, a hidden depth. A potential for a divine masculine, a true partner, that is a flaming match to our hearts.

In books and movies, he is the brooding love interest who *suddenly* has a revelation and reveals this hidden depth thanks to the female main character.

Through meeting her, he opens up the parts of him that are gentle, kind, giving, playful - and it’s addictive, beautiful, transcendent.

If you’ve walked into any bookstore lately, you’ll spot this man across the romance section, often inside the enemies-to-lovers or grumpy-sunshine trope. He’s also in movies and series. And let’s not kid ourselves, he is very real too. We would not write about him if he didn’t exist.

The Mr Brooding fantasy

The thing about Mr Brooding, real or imagined, is that he’s the object of our deepest fantasies about love and ourselves. We dream of the romance, the mystery, the sex, the experience of being with this powerful, deep, attractive man - but there’s more.

The fact that we could notice his inner depth, his potential, and draw it out of him makes us special. The fact that he would willingly release his cold facade for us confirms it.

Maybe it’s our extraordinary beauty, which of course we don’t realise because as the great One Direction says: “You don’t know you’re beautiful, that’s what makes you beautiful.” Maybe it’s our wit, our brains, our big hearts, our spirituality, our cosmic radiance - I’m not being facetious, we do have this all inside us.

But the fantasy, the yearning, is that this man will see us. We are the chosen one, the goddess, the queen, who could change him from the unpleasant, sometimes selfish, cold (but let’s face it, HOT) man he acts like 90% of the time. At least towards us.

Because the fantasy often starts with the fact that we are not his type, not part of his usual circles, not chosen by him to share his time and energy with at first.

In movies and series, it’s the brooding popular guy who falls for the nerd girl. It’s the assistants from the warring publishing houses in the book, The Hating Game.

Cinderella trope

BUT THEN *magic-sparkles-fireworks-bibbidi-bobbidi-boo* she shows him her worth. She shows up in a showstopping dress (always). She cuts her hair. She blossoms out of her cocoon into a beautiful butterfly…. Did anyone say make-over or Cinderella trope?

Accompanied with this (but not always), she saves the day, shows him and the world how clever, funny, capable, brilliant she is - and boy, he sits up and takes notice!

Often, her actions or physical transformation have nothing to do with him. She decides to express her true beauty because she’s ready to be seen by all. She saves the day because that’s just who she is.

When it’s not forced, when her presence inspires something in him and HE makes the change in himself, that’s when I can be ok with this trope.

"I'll show you how valuable Elle Woods can be.”

But the problem comes when Mr Brooding Hottie doesn’t change, doesn’t open up, doesn’t take notice.

So the woman thinks: “If he just sees me for who I truly am, then everything will change. Everything will work out! I’ll show him!”

So what does she do? She starts trying. Trying to look more and more beautiful and catch his attention. Trying to say the perfect thing in the perfect moment instead of being natural and herself. Twisting herself into a pretzel, because every interaction with him is her one opportunity to SHOW HIM that she’s the one for him. That she sees his depth. That she deserves his love.

Case and point: Elle Woods in Legally Blonde! The entire movie is about Elle trying to ‘show’ Warner just how wonderful she is, and it’s extraordinary - exhausting - the lengths she goes to. Of course, the beauty of Legally Blonde is that she does snap out of it and steps onto an incredible path of her biggest potential.

But not before a lot of heartache, humiliation, and wasted time.

Romantic fantasies and our self-esteem

Now, I’m not saying we can’t have our fantasies, in fiction or real life! I’ve happily drooled over broody characters since I was a teenager (including more than one werewolf). As a writer, I love exploring love, including unexpressed thoughts, feelings and imaginings.

But the more I think about this particular fantasy, the more I feel that it’s rooted in a lack of self-esteem.

Here me out: The reality is that 99% of the time, Mr Brooding will not “notice” us despite our myriad efforts to show him how beautiful and brilliant we are. He will not open up, he will not change.

When I used to notice a Mr Brooding out in the wild and he didn’t engage with me, I used to make it about something I lacked. Because if the fantasy didn’t come true, then obviously I had failed on my end to catch Mr Brooding’s attention!

It took me a long time to realise that it was his blindness, rather than my invisibility, that was the problem.

I’m not saying the Mr Broodings of the world can never change, that there’s not one woman out there happily married to a man who was previously as closed off as a clam. I’m not saying it’s not fun to imagine ourselves as a sexy fairy godmother bewitching some gruff man with a hidden heart of gold.

What I’m saying is we can’t make it our problem.

What I’m saying is our energy, our dreams, our fantasies, are better directed towards men with open hearts. Men who we don’t have to pry open or attract with exotic mating rituals like birds of paradise.

We deserve romance because we are inherently lovable. We deserve not needing to try so much.

What are your thoughts about this Mr Brooding trope or archetype? Let me know in the comments💌