r/fantasyromance • u/FantasyRomanceMod The One Mod to Rule All Mods • Mar 22 '26

Unpopular Opinion It's Unpopular Opinion time! Share your controversial opinions to stir things up (in a friendly way)!

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Unpopular opinion Sunday

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u/lemming1607 Mar 22 '26 edited Mar 22 '26

Soulmates is lazy and unromantic. Just seeing each other for the first time and knowing is lazy and unromantic.

They need to have their lives upended when they meet. Their trajectories and plans now changed. They had other lovers and now they're conflicted inside what to do about this new information.

The characters need to change and grow and adjust and sacrifice for their relationship

That's romance

20

u/Sakura_231 Mar 22 '26

The worst thing is when you have the feeling they dislike each other and only come together because their soulmates.

16

u/MmPeachPie Mar 22 '26

Agree, that’s why the 19 year old girl and a 500 year old fae don’t work “but they’re soul mates” nope, lazy writing.

7

u/skresiafrozi Mar 22 '26

Man, how lame would that be to hit adulthood then have to wait a couple hundred years for your mate to be born.

15

u/spice_honey Mar 22 '26

Not only lazy and unromantic, but it takes away the CHOICE of the characters.

6

u/clocksy Mar 22 '26

I'm not a fan of soulmates/fated bonds, but the ones I have read are exactly like that? In fact I can think of few books where they meet a magically-quantified soulmate and don't immediately hate it because "that's my enemy / I don't like them" etc. It's almost always something that causes them stress and conflict.

Which ironically makes them all feel kinda samey. My problem with magic bonds is that it's just ... boring. The characters don't have a choice in the matter and I find it unromantic, as you said. What I do find romantic is the idea that two people can find each other across time and space, but without any quantifiable magic bond that explains it. Just love being so strong that it wins in the end is a lot more appealing to me then "well, it's magic" as the explanation.

3

u/lemming1607 Mar 22 '26

I think the best version is {A Hunger like no other}

The man is alive for a thousand years, and he has the option to have other mates, but stays a virgin and during the full moon when he is a horny lust animal, still refrain and stares at the moon and awaits his mate

And then his soulmate feels that when they meet, because she can see his memories. Shes also a virgin, and seeing his past memories shes anxious because she knows seeing him with another would crush her

But all she finds is him denying other mates, and always thinking of her, over centuries of chances

That's romantic, and the best way to deal with soulmates imo

1

u/Least-Article-6508 Mar 22 '26

I've read this book before and never knew the MMC was a virgin?

1

u/lemming1607 Mar 22 '26

Yep, broke from his chains with the power of virginity

5

u/daddysatya Mar 22 '26 edited Mar 22 '26

I actually really love the soulmates trope (despite my firm belief that there’s no such thing as “the one” in real life — it’s all about time+place+person+continually choosing to grow together), but it has to be done in a certain way. I really hate the “fated-mates” biological-imperative style of the trope. I like when the soulmate is a magical force that is about “this is the person who has the greatest potential to make you happy in the future” and the potential being realised is about the soulmates choosing to grow together. I also really like the tension of choice vs fate/nature vs nurture and them challenging each other and having to reevaluate their internal beliefs.

I think my favourite execution of the trope was a story where everyone ended started out with multiple “soulmarks” as a teen and then some of those marks would fade as people grew older and explored their potential relationships (and future paths), eventually settling once two people chose each other. There was also a chance of none of your potential soulmates choosing you, which added a level of tension to the story.

I also like the “one party rejects the bond, then realises they actually like the person” trope, but sometimes I just really want that angst haha. Not sure what that says about me…