If Only We Live in A Rom-Com: How Can It Shape Our Perception of Love?

I don’t know what thing brings me up to be this hopeless romantic kind of lady, sitting on the bench in the park, alone. Just kidding. I am here in my room covered up by my blanket, doing what exactly I said in my previous article to write whatever comes in mind. I exactly get myself right because I spent much times to watch and read a rom-com, and being life-lessoned by some TV series and all its theories.

As a 22-year-old woman, I grew up assuming that the female protagonists in the romantic comedies of the 1990s and early 2000s were representative of a new era of modern women and career success. Today, I’m not so sure.

Romantic comedies themselves, are movies with light-hearted, humorous dramatic stories centered romantic ideals such as a “true love” able to surmount most obstacles or the “perfect couple.” Romantic comedy films are a sub-genre of comedy films as well as of romance films.

The basic plot of a romantic comedy is that two people, usually a man and a woman, meet and then part ways due to an argument or other contrived obstacles. Cheesy, somehow. Initially, these two people do not become romantically involved, because they believe that they do not like each other, because one of them already has a partner, or social pressures. However, the screenwriters leave obvious clues that suggest that the characters are in fact attracted to each other, or that they would be a good love match. I keep thinking this one sentence, somehow;

“I’m not sure whether I fall in love. I just feel like I rom-com myself and long story short, it turns out to be left with a com only”

Can a Rom-Com become a verb?

If only real life could be exactly like your favorite romantic comedy. You’d be Emma Stone, Anna Hathaway, Kate Hudson with perfect hair and a chatty soul that just won’t quit, and he’d be Ryan Gosling handsome and Zac Efron smart (minus the whole crazy multitasking part). You’d be just okay for being clumsy, awkward, carefulness, chatty, yet all are distracting enough from your painfully gorgeous face. He’d be successful (most likely a CEO, Director, or Businessman) and emotionally available, which is almost unheard of these days. If any of these signs sound true, it’s more than likely that you’re living an actual dream — and that dream is a rom-com come to life.

I envisioned myself living out a romantic comedy. The story is always the same. One person is madly in love with another person, but that person doesn’t love him (or her) back or doesn’t even notice him. I must say it’s really hard to get away from this script.

In my defense, as a lead actress as well as the director in my rom-com life, the leading man for my own scenario of romantic comedy kept getting recast, most of times. The cast for my continuous romantic comedy kept changing. As a lead actress on my scenario, I changed my character couple times to complement the leading man, but that was a disaster. I couldn’t change who I was to attract certain guys, so I nailed down my character and pursued guys that fit the script I imagined. But, do I have to make that damn list of criteria for an audition? Because perhaps, this one rom-com will lead you to that one girl who loves herself and would rather die than change for a guy — yet they still want to be with someone.

It was a long and exhausting process. My fragile heart was taking a beat. Just as soon as I grew attached to someone — rewriting the script for how he could play a leading role in my life’s story — he’d leave, and I’d have to recast the part, starting from scratch.

So, the next time when people ask:

“Where are you in this issue?”

We may answer:

“I’m rom-com-ing myself”

The Meet Cute

is a scene in which the two people who will form a future romantic couple meet for the first time. This type of scene is a staple of romantic comedies. Frequently, the meet-cute leads to a humorous clash of personality or of beliefs, embarrassing situations, or comical misunderstandings that further drive the plot.

I must say this is the essential part in a rom-com script. It’s the moment of everything ready to begin. It’s the moment when we keep our faith that meeting someone in a bad situation may turns out to be something magical, or stand still instead.

Me myself, I’ve been in a meet cute a bunch of times yet it means nothing and don’t have any continuous story — perhaps this one title of the rom-com shutting down.

Here, I pretty much would like to give you a brief how this meet cute went in my own script. Perhaps just two of bunches of that story line.

One time, I finally am single. I’m being someone else’s ex, for the first time in my life. Yes. For the first time — I’ve been single in 21 years, expected to have a one first & last relationship. Turned out, it didn’t work out with me. And being a single girl make your friends desperately introduced you to her/his friends — classic cupid.

I once introduced by a guy I’ve never met. I only knew him by name his tune in a Soundcloud. We just connected by a writing. I love writing poem implicitly. Somehow, he knew what I write and he is just the only one who understands. He complemented what he saw through the cupid. I did a spoken-word-poetry, he got the point. He then sent a record, singing a song I used in the background of my spoken-word-poetry. The cupid seems so excited knowing the connection between us, even we had not met. Yet, time passed, I hear a thing that he needed to solve a thing with his ex. I don’t want to be in the middle of this complicated obstacle. I took a step back.

This rom-com just didn’t have any chance to get tons of episode and get its own fandom because again, it has no future plot. I need to recast.

And the other. I once was introduced by a guy who falls so much in one TV series that I like. He knows and understands the whole story, even the life theories by the series. I’m pretty sure that he gets the same concept of life with me. But that time, I was dating someone for the first time. I was being that blind. I did not give a chance to myself to open up this damn heart.

One day after the relationship ended in months, I decided to open up my heart another chance. I asked my friend — who’s that guy? Turns out. Oh, I’m pretty sure you know what the rest is. Yes. He is that guy, who basically loves the TV series. Yet, apparently already being somebody’s boyfriend. And again, this rom-com, will not end up very well and get the high rating. Because it doesn’t even have a future plot.

Well then, it was a meet cute. But no have any meet.

For God’s sake, timing is a bitch.

It Keeps Coming in My Head

I’m pretty much sure that rom-com movies affect me that much, personally. Because whenever some particular moments happen in my life, I’m not surprised if I make my own silver lining to the rom-com related. Even there was not something specific, but I gotta admit that I will find the silver lining itself by myself, even it may turn out not to be silver, but grey.

A parallel theory suggests that even if viewers aren’t necessarily taking notes in front of the movies they watch, what they see over a long period of time will still shape what they perceive as normal, thanks to oft-repeated themes and images in the land of movie love.

Further, we may take the media that brings up every issue regarding this romances perception. We can’t deny there are a lot of informations spreading, talking their own subjective that give you the wider perception about romance.

“Media can shape our attitudes. It totally makes sense if we’re seeing all these unrealistic (romances). What we feel is acceptable in a relationship and what we want our own relationship to be like” — Sarah Coyne, professor of family life at Brigham Young University.

Turns Out….

Life isn’t like a romantic comedy. It’s so much more than that. No matter how persistent you are, God may have other plans for your life. While the desire for marriage is good, it’s bad to expect it as a certainty.

Thankfully, God does promise a happy ending for those who love Him, and that ending is far better than any relationship we could ever imagine.

And yes, I keep waiting my own rom-com end up perfectly, in all ears.